Gorillas, gritted teeth and grannies

£155. Brilliant. That’s the total I’ve managed to raise thanks to all those that sponsored me in my Glasgow 10k on the 2nd September. 310% of my predicted sponsor target. Fantastic. Facebook, email and twitter made using the Just Giving site so much easier so no one could have missed it really and even it they did, the sponsor page is still there, so it’s never too late!
Like I said I couldn’t have done it without you guys that gave your hard earned cash to such a worthwhile cause, Glasgow Sands, so thanks very much all of you, (you know who you are!).
The whole experience wasn’t without a certain amount of pain and hardship though as I did suffer a little for around four days. It wasn’t until the following Friday that I actually started regaining my usual walking abilities and stopped moving like a hungover John Wayne who’d been up all night. Going up and down stairs turned into an exceptional challenge, lurching up and down, like a limping Robocop. I’ve only got myself to blame, of course, it was the first time I’d ran 10k in a oner and I got very little training in beforehand. I even had to put the usual thrice a week trips to the gym on hold while we flitted at the turn of the month. If training for a 10k had included loading, lifting and the unpacking of heavy boxes, not to mention the seemingly constant use of a screwdriver, I would have completed the run in no time with no unfortunate after effects. Never before had small, menial, tasks been such hard work such as getting up off the couch and walking to the kitchen to make a brew. All with gritted teeth and noises and muttered sweary words.
The after effects didn’t actually kick in until the Monday morning when I had tried to get out of bed. I thought a gorilla had came in during the night and attacked me, refraining from waking me during the assault, as I slept.
Mysterious, nocturnal, gorillas aside, immediately after the race, under Nelson’s Monument on Glasgow Green, I’d felt great.
The run had gone well.
Later the results were published on the official website I had taken 58 minutes and 1 second.
Standing there, in Glasgow Green, I knew I had done it in around 58 minutes as I had timed myself with my trusty Rotary. I had aimed for under an hour at least so I was quite pleased with myself. Unfortunately I had no one to celebrate with.
Ka and the Mums and Dad’s had travelled into Glasgow to cheer us runners, Colin, Jillian and myself, off the starting line in George Square and, presumably, had the intention of cheering us over the finishing line. As I ran up through the last leg of the route, over Victoria Bridge and up Clyde Street and Greendyke Street into the Green, hollering crowds on either side, there had been no sign of the wife or either of the couples so I had assumed that I had missed them among the colourful, cheering crowd. As I slowed to a trot beyond the finishing line I picked up my medal, the traditional bag of runners’ goodies, and avoided the giant boxes of bananas, (I don’t like bananas… not sure why?) at the foot of Glasgow Green’s needle walked out on to the green picking a spot to stand and wait for anyone who may want to run up and congratulate me.
Nobody did.
Instead I watched all the others runners coming out through the finishing gates picking up their own medals and getting their goodie bags and then being greeted by loved ones over the surrounding temporary metal fencing.
I wasn’t bothered. I had run it in under and hour. I had seen it, even if no one else had. I kept an eye out for any of the ‘support’ but none could be seen. Not even the wife. Typical.
Around ten minutes later I spotted the familiar sight of Jillian in her Sands T-shirt, making her way through the puffed out running crowd, in the expanding queues for the medal, goodie bag and banana collection, a big smile on her ever so slightly red face. The brother-in-law’s missus to be, turned thirty that day and was celebrating by crossing yet another finishing line before she headed down to Newcastle for the Great North Run later in the month. This 10k was probably a mere walk in the park.
Jillian and myself then headed further down the park to the fencing at the side of the finishing line where we eventually met Ka and the meandering Mums and Dads who’d missed me because, on the long, tiring, arduous, walk down from George Square, they had felt the need for a McFlurry. In her wisdom, Ka had refused and walked on but had still managed to miss me, by a matter of minutes we worked out. However, minutes is everything when it comes to this kind of thing (especially 2 minutes, that’s donkeys… as long as it’s under an hour).

Ka has an excuse, of course, so I let her off, the fact that she’s currently carrying another Reid lifeform in her belly, (an excuse she uses way too often to be honest), and after we cheered Colin over the line we headed off, back to George Square to celebrate Jillian’s birthday over lunch in the Italian La Vita Pizzeria. We had tried the Greek Restaurant Elie first, where we met the rest of Jillian’s family, but the staff of Elie claimed half past twelve was too early to serve 12 hungry people, on a Sunday afternoon. This was the be only the first meeting for Jillian’s birthday though as her highly anticipated Muppets and friends 30th Birthday party was to follow the next Saturday in Kirkintilloch. Unfotunately, however, this was not be be, as Jillian’s wee Gran, Helen Hodge passed away early on that week.
Helen had not been too well the previous week and had been thought to be on the road to recovery and had missed Jillian’s birthday lunch whilst recuperating. So when Saturday did come around we all sadly found ourselves attending a funeral, rather than a birthday party, remembering the little 90 year old lady, with the seemingly endless energy with which she had constantly travelled up and down the country with her family, visiting relatives and seeing the sights whilst still attending all the party’s going and even the odd clubbing night. There is no doubt Helen will be sorely missed in the Hood household, not to mention the family parties, but forever remembered.
Like all grannies. Each one a massive cog in the machine of the family.
When that cog stops turning you wonder if the rest will keep going, knowing there’ll be none, in any way, similar to take it’s place.
Somehow though, the cogs do keep turning.
It’s the remembering of loved ones lost that sometimes keeps you going.
Why else would you go to the bother of running 10k?
Certainly not for your health.
My ankle still hurts.
But it was worth it.

A quick message about a wee run!

Hello everyone!
Please sponsor me a £1, £2, anything you've got?!
It's all in aid of SANDS, Stillbirth and Neonatal Death Society and in memory of little Lucy Reid.
I'm running 10k tomorrow, Sunday 2nd September, in Glasgow and am looking for you, kind friends, family, readers, and folk out there, to sponsor me something, anything, to make it all the more worthwhile.

I've never ran 10k in a oner before, so it should be interesting...

Thanks in advance to all those that click this link: https://www.justgiving.com/Michael-ReidforLucy

Monopoly and waffles

The clouds filled the sky on Saturday morning whilst only a slight spit of rain fell through the air as Ka, Grace and myself readied ourselves to take part in another 5k Big Fun Run in Bellahouston Park. The three of us had once more donned the Sands T-shirts, complete with pinned running numbers and our pictures of Lucy. Dougie stood at the side of the track, voted bag and camera carrier as he still nursed a sore ankle from a previous misadventure in the gym. Angela was on her way into town with Morgan and Joshua but had already called to say she had once more successfully got herself lost and had had to stop at Ibrox to ask for directions. Not the best place to ask directions, I thought, considering how long it’s been since they obviously lost their way.
Ka’s sister hadn't done much better than me though. After successfully taking the turn off for Govan from the M8, instead of taking an immediate left after the first right turning at the lights, which should have taken me down Paisley Road West, I decided to carry on, past Ibrox and down Edmiston Drive. It wasn’t until we reached Southern General Hospital that I realised I was way off course and performed a swift U-turn.
After picking up our numbers and carrying out a brief warm up on the track, we were off once more, running the same route that we had done last September, except this time with a little less rain.

At around the 29 minute mark I crossed the finishing line, Dougie missing me with the camera as Angela, Morgan and Joshua had just arrived from their travels. 29 minutes was Dougie’s approximation anyway although the time it took to go around the tree lined 5k route seemed a little longer, and a little tougher, this time around which doesn’t really bode well for the 10k to be completed this September.
Ka crossed the finishing line at approximately 45 minutes followed eventually by Grace, who was walking the lap with two other girls raising money for Yorkhill Hospital. After a visit to the swing park where Joshua squatted on the spring mounted wooden animal and dropped lolly pops and a quick coffee in the Leisure Centre’s café, we headed home, Morgan hitching a ride with Ka and myself back to Kenilworth.
The pursuit of money. A game of power, greed, financial domination, property ownership, riches, taxes and possible bankruptcy. Again, nothing to do with Rangers F.C. but a minor game of Monopoly, one of Morgan’s favourites. However, if my niece was a football team I certainly know which one she’d be. She tries everything within her power in order to not have to pay her taxes, bills and other various fines imposed upon her by the board, the Chance and the Community Chest cards. I think she tried everything but the “Look Madonna!” tactic in order to avoid paying her dues. Once she realised she was playing with someone that checked the rulebook every five minutes though she got a little fed up and began to lose interest.
The two of us were crouched over the board on the open space of carpet in the living room, rolling the dice and diligently moving our pieces around the square of London locations.
As the afternoon wore on Morgan and I continued to lightheartedly argue and complain, swiping our credit cards through the banker’s calculator as Ka objected about the volume of our game busy, getting herself ready for our visit to Tommy and Tricia’s for a BBQ that night.
At first Ka shouted at us from the kitchen, her showered hair wrapped up in a towel, whilst she grilled us waffles for lunch. The waffles caused a rather confused look over Morgan’s face at first as Ka asked her if she’d like wAffles. Waffles with the double A.
With that little frown Morgan had entered into a debate that has been raging in the Reid household for some time.
“You mean waffles Auntie Ka?” she puzzled, pronounced with the ‘of’, a pronunciation I have been trying to implement into our day to day lives for years. Silently, and smugly, I nodded at Morgan and looked up at Ka’s slightly exasperated face as she struggled not to acknowledge my superior, silent, linguistic, victory.
That was before my victorious conclusion to the game as we counted up our final amounts, whilst Ka reminded me, once again, that Morgan was eight, a fact, I told Ka, that I was more than aware of.
Counting our final sums didn’t take too long as they don’t even have cash in Monopoly any more?!
In the edition we have you use credit cards and swipe them through either the plus or minus side of the calculator. I suspect I missed Morgan using the plus side of the calculator when she was paying her taxes a few times as I only narrowly won by a couple of hundred bucks when it came to the final count up just before Angela, Steven and Joshua arrived.
Our own, real life, adventures in buying property are moving a little slower than my decisions about the fate of Brick Lane.
Verbally, our offer for the house in Calderwood has been accepted. Legally, there is nothing confirmed as yet, only an official letter affirming our offer sent from our solicitor to theirs. So it looks like we’re playing the waiting game.
Claire is already looking out for tenants for us. She gave us a phone tonight to tell us that someone was on facebook that may be looking for a one bedroom flat to let. So I immediately got on the case, looking the complete stranger up and sending him a message.
We have been given a date for getting the keys to the house so we may well be in a new house by mid August. That’s one hell of a chance card.

Jack Russell terrors

That’s it. The training starts here!
On my return from work tonight, and finding no dinner waiting on the table, I decided to get my trainers on and head out for a quick 5k. I’m running a 10k in September in aid of Sands and have not been out on the streets for a run for months.
In fact, I’ve never run 10k in my life. The family used to run 5, 6 or 7ks when we were younger, in and around Strathclyde Park on the Motorola fun days, but I’ve never attempted 10k in one go. So, with this in mind, I thought I’d better start doing a bit of training. Okay, I know September is ages away but the longer you leave it, the harder it will be (in my measly opinion).
With grey clouds smothering the sky and the occasional droplet of water hitting off my nose, I started running, expecting the occasional droplet to turn into a raging downpour as that’s usually what happens on these 5k runs around Calderwood and St. Leonards.
Thankfully I ran the length of the lap with no rain but, thanks to my lack of jogging in recent months, struggled for the majority of the 35 minutes, passing the occasional walkers and growling or muttering dogs. Dogs who were sometimes held back by straining leases or allowed to run free, running up threateningly towards me and growling angrily at my audacity to be running with shorts on, keys jangling in my pocket. Thankfully none of the dogs were Jack Russell Terriers. If it had been I may have lost my shorts… or worse.
I have a history with Jack Russell terriers.
For some reason, this particular breed of dog seems to dislike me. For years every single one of them that has passed me in the street has took an instant dislike to me. These small, white and brown dogs may seem innocent looking upon first glance but don’t let them fool you.
Upon meeting them in the street, some of these little terriers, simply growl as they pass and others bark. Others have been known to stop dead in their tracks and glare at me threateningly or stop and then snarl and snap, some jumping about wildly on the spot, flashing their small, but not insignificant jaws, filled with sharp, straight teeth.

In Manitoba Crescent, our second family home, the permed neighbour owned one. This neighbour was a quiet, airy fairy type of woman, with a large, dark permed hairdo and one of those vaguely annoying, patronising voices. The kind of voice that, coupled with her habit of tilting her head to one side when talking to you, sounded like she was constantly being sympathetic towards your situation. As if she pitied you as she spoke.
She’s now a waitress in the local Beefeater. She served our table one night when I was out for dinner with the family. We didn’t recognise her at first as her perm is now gone but she still does the mourning voice and the head tilting, sympathetic, nodding during conversation.
Anyway, she owned a Jack Russell and was one of my paper round customers when I delivered the East Kilbride News.
Every Wednesday night I’d walk to the town centre after school and pick up a huge pile of newspapers from the office’s front desk and trudge all the way home on foot, come rain or shine. Not an easy job as the East Kilbride News wasn’t the lightest of weekly local rags. Little did I realise then that I’d end up helping putting the paper together every week.
From behind the large glass window of the neighbour’s front door the wee mutt would constantly bark, growl and snap at me as I tried to safely deliver the permed neighbour’s newspaper. As soon as I prized the letterbox open to start sliding the week’s latest East Kilbride News in through the opening, the Jack Russell’s teeth would be there, snapping and snarling at me from the other side.
I don’t mind admitting that sometimes I would aim the first end of the rolled up paper directly at the dogs snapping mouth, hoping to give it a wee smack across the jaw. Usually the paper’s end would be torn and shredded within moments on the other side of the letterbox, the crazy wee mutt attacking it with a violent, psychotic hatred.
This neighbour had a baby girl as well?! Can you imagine having such an animal with this lunatic nature around a baby? Nuts.
One afternoon, after picking up my usual pile of papers, I decided to treat myself to a paperback I’d been looking forward to reading. I dropped in at WH Smith on my way and headed on out up the road to make my deliveries. Hours later, with only the permed neighbour to go, I started making my way up her Manitoba Crescent drive when I heard the weekly snapping and barking start once more from behind the large glass front door. I seen the familiar brown and white blur of ears and teeth jumping up and down as I made my way up the drive and, just as I got around two thirds of the way up the paved path, the permed neighbour appeared out of nowhere in the small porch and, to my horror, swung the front door wide open to greet me. The crazy little mutt of a dog sprinted right for me. Barking, growling, snapping.
A blur of rabid dog hatred, galloping towards my legs, spittal spinning out from it’s black dog gums, upon which the small, sharp teeth snapped. My steps faltered but I kept walking, pulling the paper from my bag, ready to deliver, striding up the path as if undeterred by the coming white and brown onslaught of noisy, yapping teeth. Then, as if on a spring board built into the permed neighbours pathway, the dog fired straight up into the air, aiming for the face. I swerved to the side, the dog missing, barking and snapping all the way, as it landed safely on it’s four paws at my side.
Almost instantaneously, it leaped up again, snapping at my arm.
This time it hit. Biting my arm briefly but thankfully letting go just as the teeth found some grip on my arm. The jacket I was wearing at the time was some kind of canvas number so the teeth did not manage to do much damage but it was enough to make me kick out at the little runt on his way back down to ground. The permed neighbour stood in her doorway, gently chastising the little git of a Jack Russell for playing, with that pathetic, quiet voice of hers and that tilting head of pity. Undeterred, the Russell paid his master’s voice no heed and once more lept up into the air spraying me with another volley of barks and yelps and snapped onto the WH Smith carrier bag in my other hand. This time the dog bit in and wouldn’t let go. My new book was in there and the little terrier had it’s grip on it with it’s vicious jaws. I shook and swept the bag through the air between myself and the permed neighbour in an effort to separate the mutt from my newly purchased book but with a dogged determination the dog held on by the teeth. The struggle lasted for at least a couple of seconds before the permed neighbour eventually took hold of her pet’s body. The mutt released the book upon the touch of his owner and continued with his barrage of verbal abuse, but this time from the safety of his owner’s hands, snapping and growling at me as I threw the paper into the doorway and retreated back down the garden path.
On getting home I pulled my new book from the slightly shredded carrier bag to find one large set of jaw prints cut into the lower half of the book. Proper, deep, tooth marks embedded through each side of the cover and buried down, gnawed into at least 100 pages on either end of the book. Throughout the following weeks, reading that book, turning those tooth marked pages, I never shook the feeling of anger and hatred towards that little b**tard of a dog.
I remember it was only a matter of weeks until I was walking up the hill to school one day and an older gent passed me, innocently walking his dog. Of course the dog was another Jack Russell Terrier and stopped in its morning ramble to fiercely yap and bark in my general direction, jumping around madly on the spot of pavement before me.
“They’re all insane!”, I remember thinking, but inadvertently half shouting at the same time, at the rather puzzled elderly owner as he clipped the end of the dog’s lead on and pulled it under control.
There have been more than a few other similar incidents over the years, all with Jack Russells.
Even a few months ago another one of these little runts destroyed my nephew’s football the day we took him, and our niece, Morgan, over to Strathclyde Park. Joshua, Morgan, Ka and myself stood and watched helplessly as the mutt ravaged the blue football to blue, plastic smithereens, growling the guttural noises of a wild animal after running across half the park, out of nowhere and descending on the ball like a bat out of hell.
Perhaps that’s why I didn’t enjoy ‘The Artist’ as much as everyone else seemed to.

Okay, Uggie did look a little friendlier than most Jack Russells but I couldn’t help but spend the majority of my time watching that movie being highly suspicious of the supposedly wonderful little co-star. I don’t care if he could rescue someone from a burning building, play dead with an imaginary bullet or walk on two hind legs, I wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw him (or even kick him). All of those skills just make him all the more dangerous for when he starts attacking people in the street, regardless of how many awards he’s got on it!

Team Lucy

The Black Eyed Peas woke me up from my slumber, early on Saturday morning. It felt and sounded like Fergie and will.i.am were actually standing around my bed, belting down their microphones but, surprisingly enough, it only turned out to be Angela calling on Ka’s unattended mobile phone. It was half past seven and still concussed from a weird dream, I opted to leave the phone and merely shouted on the wife, telling her of her sister’s early buzz.
It was the day of our fundraising big Fun Run in Bellahouston Park, and after Ka had spoke to her sister, it was decided that Angela would come over to EK with Grace and Dougie in her car as she was unsure of the route to Bellahouston. This meant Angela having to follow us, on our twisting route through the hills of EK, as we were picking up fellow runners, Claire and Pauline, on our way to Glasgow.
After appearing at the door in her silver Vauxhall, Angela gave me a whistle from her driver’s seat, obviously liking the sight of me in my shorts, as Ka and myself jumped in our car to begin the journey on which I drove slowly and carefully ensuring my dearest sister-in-law didn’t get lost on one of the many roundabouts of East Kilbride.
We picked up Claire first, who left a teary Olivia behind with her Dad, and then headed for Gardenhall, and Pauline, who ran back into her house for a large pile of towels, unsure of the darkening clouds above us.
On our two car trip down the M77 Pauline took a rather urgent call from a slightly stressed Angela who informed us her tank was empty. So pulling off at Silverburn we made our way to the garage were we topped up our tanks whilst Grace decided to go for a wee wander around the pumps on her mobile phone. Colin was on the other end of the phone informing her that Jillian and himself had already arrived at Bellahouston Park and were successfully parked and ready to go. Ka and Claire quickly warned Grace to put her phone away in case of an explosion.
Old myths die hard and the possibility of an explosion caused by a mobile phone call in a petrol station is still, apparently, a possibility even though nobody has ever heard of it happening, anywhere.
Imagine standing innocently locking your petrol cap up when your phone goes off in your jacket pocket. Just as you huff and shake your head at the unfortunate timing of the caller, a tremendous explosion sends you, and all the gathered motorists, up into the grey clouds over Silverburn, in a rising ball of flame.
I’m pretty sure I wasn’t warned of such dangers when I bought my phone and signed the contract.
Anyway, as we left Silverburn’s Tesco station quite safely, and without any fireballs created from Grace’s mobile, we made our way out on to the first roundabout, turned left and lost Angela.
Angela had successfully navigated the streets of EK, followed us down the M77 with care on an empty tank and was now, after one left turn, nowhere to be seen. We stopped at some red lights, that were taking us back out on to the motorway, where various urgent phonecalls were made, but, by this point there was no turning back for us and before we knew it we were approaching Bellahouston, Ka shouting at me about where Colin and Jillian were park in the street from the front passenger seat. Taking my own lead and seeing one of few spaces left, I pulled the car up in the park’s Sport and Leisure Centre’s car park where we piled out to make some calls and wait on a silver Vauxhall.
Both Claire and myself were in dire needs of a loo and, finding ourselves unable to wait any longer, we left Pauline and Ka standing in the car park with the phone whilst we headed off to find the sports centre’s toilet.
There was one of each just outside the café and Claire and myself stood in the small square room between each toilet, politely waiting on the slow occupants within, Claire just missing out as a family of three entered the female toilet just as we arrived. I tried the male toilet handle only to get a huffy shout from within. Claire and myself waited politely, myself shuffling a little on my feet, but trying desperately to control myself before the eyes of one of my wife’s best friends.
After a good five minutes a toilet flushed from within the male toilet. I almost punched the air eagerly. Another toilet flushed moments later. There was a click, and a turn of a handle. But it was the wrong handle. The family of three bundled out from the female toilet and allowed Claire access, leaving me standing awaiting the male door to swing open. Five minutes passed. Suddenly the toilet flushed once more from within. More waiting. Then it flushed once more and eventually a rather tall man in glasses, a luminous yellow jacket and shorts appeared from within.
“Sorry, had a bit of trouble there!” he let me know. “I was struggling to get that clear!”. I nodded with an uneasy laugh and elbowed my way into the toilet before the question occurred to me. What was he struggling to clear? I gulped nervously as I looked at the closed over toilet seat below me.
Angela, Grace and Colin eventually arrived moments before Colin and Jillian strode over from the other side of the park and we all pinned a copy of one of Lucy’s pictures to our backs, alongside our various charities logos. Colin complimented his Dad’s athletic figure complaining about his own jelly belly as he made sure he had his iPod and cigarettes for the run whilst I struggled with the clothes pins and everyone piled their belonging into the back of the car.
Everyone was running for Sands with the exception of myself. When I booked up I thought I’d be different and try and raise money for Yorkhill Children’s Hospital, just so they didn’t feel left out. So instead of Sands’ white short sleeved T-shirts, I was wearing the Yorhill blue vest, but over a normal white T-shirt. I didn’t fancy exposing my armpits to the gathered running masses.
Approximately 600 folk were present on the day and as we all milled around awaiting the run to start we commenced a general warm up on the park path behind the sport’s centre and the Run’s Start and Finish line.
One lady asked Ka who the little girl was on all our backs. Getting a little teary mid stretch Ka she explained about our wee Lucy but held herself together well as the woman immediately apologised and then commenced to give the usual compliments referring to our beautiful wee girl.
Steven, Morgan and Joshua then turned up waving from the side of the track as ‘Walk this way’ started blasting out from the starting line’s speakers whilst the warm up girls punched the air repeatedly with their fists, photos were taken and Colin gave more of his comedy breast hooter impressions. Eventually, at around twelve to thirteen minutes past eleven, we were off. The first few minutes were slow as the crowd got going, people moving slowly apart, finding their feet and their preferred speed for the first quarter of a kilo. As I started getting into a steady pace I suddenly heard a familiar shout from behind a fence to my right.
“Yoohoo!” Mum was waving from behind the fence, Dad walking up and waving behind her, appearing at the last minute to cheer us on.
Round and up Bellahouston Park we ran, over the large, grassy but pathed flat and then up into the trees and over the steep hill which took us up and round the House for an Art Lover, past it’s back portico which leads into the large garden and the Giant foot where Ka and I spent a rather day and evening back in July 2009. After this we headed for the main road and Ibrox before turning off and moving round the perimeter of the park. I think it was around there that Jillian said she met one of her ex-boyfriends mid run. Apparently he was one of the guides, who stood at various route corners and pointed you in the right direction with some words of encouragement to spur you on.
As I neared the 3km mark I looked up to recognise one of the route guides myself. It was the tall, bespectacled man in shorts who’d had the struggle in the toilet. He seen me and looked away rather quickly, faltering on some words but then shouting encouragingly at the runner that had passed ahead of me.
Chris and her pal Sandra, who always has her camera hanging from the strap around her neck whenever I see her, were at the finish line to welcome us at the end of the race, along with a hastily arriving Mum, Dad, Steven, Morgan and Joshua who’d followed our progress from various points around our route.
Everyone finished, happy, a little tired, some a little sore, but probably a little fitter.
We all collected our goody bags and medals whilst more photos were taken, Morgan and myself got covered in mud, running back through the park and Mum met a long lost neighbour in Sandra, Chris’s photographer friend, who, it turns out, grew up in the same street as her and used to hang out with her and my Auntie Tricia. Another one of those strange, small world like incidents that take you by surprise.
27 minutes. That was my initial thinking of my time. But, due to a lack of clock at the finish line we’re all a little unclear as to what our final times were. As it turns out my time may have been a good few minutes shorter than 27, as Ka crossed the line around four to five minutes after me, and Jillian followed around a minute or so after her, and Jillian tells me her tracker tells her she took 29 minutes. So nobody knows for sure, but nobody really cared.
Pauline crossed the line moments later followed by Angela, who was last on the running track over a year ago but found it a walk in the park. Finished next were Claire and Colin and then, around ten minutes later, Grace and Dougie. We’d all ran for Lucy and the chosen charities, collecting at least a good seven hundred pounds between us, thanks to a lot of generous family, friends and colleagues.

Ka and myself have even talked of making it an annual event, making a yearly effort to raise some money for our charities in Lucy’s name. Jillian responded by text later in the day, rather optimistically, suggesting next year’s Glasgow half marathon.
We’ll see.
5km may not be a lot to some but Team Lucy did well.

Restaurants, rehearsals and running

We’ve not heard back from Chaz yet. Both Ka and myself text him a message yesterday to ask him how he got on with his casting audition to be in the next big Brad Pitt movie being filmed in Glasgow.
Chaz and myself ordered dinner in the Crooked Lum on Thursday night, two three course meals, taking full advantage of a 25% off voucher Chaz had procured from a taxi driver. I ordered a fillet for my main but Chaz had to do better. He challenged himself by ordering the steak platter, a massive square plate of food which included a large sirloin, fillet and ribeye along with a mountain of chips, a massive mushroom and a giant half tomato that looked like it had been grown in some kind of mutant vault in a local Nuclear facility.
Over dinner Chaz informed me that he was to go along on Saturday in a suit and tie for a movie audition to be an extra in a forthcoming Brad Pitt movie production which apparently involves zombies, being zombies or being attacked by zombies. I’d always thought Glasgow was the perfect setting for a zombie movie – although I’m not sure we need more of them diving about Glasgow than there is already.
By trade, Chaz is a car salesman but I’d also always thought he’d have made a rather good actor. Chaz lamented the end of his drama days over dinner. His best part to date being the role of Lead Pharisee in the school Easter play in the late eighties. Chaz managed to turn the part of the Chief Pharisee into a sort of flamboyant Police Informant type Government spy character. His biggest scene, pivotal to the capturing of Jesus, included Chaz skidding on to the stage and informing the gathered characters that:
“It’s alright, he’ll do it, at ten o’clock tonight!”
Unfortunately his adventures in drama ended during the final rehearsals for that particular scene with the skid on to the stage not quite ending where it should have, resulting in a continuous skid off the stage and the bashing of an eye off the end of a gym bench below.
Let’s hope he gets on better with his zombie audition. I hope he’d done his homework and watched Sean of the Dead, Land of the Dead or has just simply walked up Sauchiehall Street on a Saturday night.
Or the Hamilton town centre on a weekday, for that matter, a strange, destitute place into which my work has just moved and is taking some getting used to. Ka and myself met for lunch last week, my first week in the Hamilton office, and we sat on a bench in the middle of the local shopping precinct to eat our lunch. Strange, smelly, lonely looking characters soon began to circle us like vultures, eyeing either the bench, our lunch or the very flesh which clings to our bones. I wasn’t sure which, but it was enough to put me off my ham sandwich and Irn Bru.
Thankfully, Ka and myself ate in far nicer surroundings yesterday. Once again, we found ourselves dining out, once more in a restaurant, Grace and Dougie treating us to a meal for our anniversary, which was then followed up with a few coffees and shandies at a local pub.
With all this eating in mind we woke this morning finding our usual trip to the gym a bit of a stretch, so instead opted for a run round Calderwood and St. Leonards, circling around the neighbourhood, one lap being just over 5km. It went well considering it was our first jog in months, since before Ka fell pregnant. So Ka and myself are feeling rather pleased with ourselves. Next time we’ll make it two laps. Mum, Dad and Lynsey were popping round for a cuppa though so we had an excuse today to make it a single lap. We’ve promised ourselves to go running more often, especially in the run up to Ka’s run for charity in October (details of which can be found here http://www.justgiving.com/Kelly-Ann-Reid).
There is a turn off, halfway round, where you can trim a good half a mile off the whole lap. Ka was tempted to take this route as she was knackered, struggling for breath and generally getting grumpy after fifteen minutes running and stressed that she may have to ease herself back into the running by taking a shorter route round. When I refused to go this way and told her she would be fine with various other words of encouragement she swiftly replied with a barrage of abuse, just as we passed a row of quiet houses. The occupants of these houses had probably been enjoying a quiet Sunday afternoon up until that moment when they spilt their teas, woke from their naps or jumped from behind their Sunday papers to the loud, shouting couple jogging by their front window.
No pain, no gain, they say. Although I didn’t believe it was the pain of the hurling abuse from your stressed wife as she runs around the block after you. So with little argument after this I reluctantly agreed to take the shorter route only for Ka, not more than 5 minutes later, to agree to carry on with the full lap, missing the halfway point turn off. Typical Ka. She was either fiercely determined to complete the planned route, or was simply refusing to go along with anything I agreed to.
It’s all well and good running for miles on a treadmill in a gym but when it comes to real outdoor running it’s very different. Hills appear on your route spontaneously before you, inclines that you did not even realise were inclines when you usually drive along them in the car. Midges and bugs are everywhere too. On passing various clusters of bushes and foliage various sizes of insects would instantly decide to aim for you face, particularly the eyes, nostrils, or even worse, the mouth. You’ll be chatting away to your fellow jogger, or arguing, as you tackle the latest incline when all of a sudden a passing midge that had previously been buzzing about a local bush, would take a notion for a kamikaze mission with your tongue, stopping and firing itself straight into your oral cavity.
Something a little more pleasant is the nodding to and greeting of fellow joggers. You notice this when you’re out walking on the hills too. You’re all complete strangers but you follow some sort of unspoken code with which you nod or greet passing joggers, as if acknowledging each others’ athletic prowess and sportsmanship tackling the dangerous pavements and grass verges.
A greeting of a different kind I received today was a wolf whistle. I’ve never been wolf whistled before but managed not to get too excited about it as it was from a trio of giggling 12-13 year olds who passed by me giggling. A few moments later their giggling was interrupted by the jogger they’d failed to notice behind me, elbowing them off the pavement. Ka mumbled some more abuse as she caught up, running up behind me just as the rain started to fall and a jeep carrying our former neighbour Kay, passed by. The horn tooted as the neighbour waved at us, grinning smugly over her phone from behind her windscreen in her nice, warm, dry 4x4.
With the exception of the interfering insects, the threatening rain and the teenagers, the 5km was a bit of a breeze to be honest and I was pretty surprised at how easily I managed it.
Well, when I say easily we did finish the run with faces the colour of tomatoes. I was suffering with weird blurred vision after coming to a stop outside outside our front door, wiping the dead midges from my face as the old legs began to quiver a little with exertion. The walk I performed going up the stairs to our front door wouldn’t have looked out of place in Chaz’s zombie movie.

Good reasons to stay off the pancakes

The sun is out today over bonnie Scotland and I'm actually looking forward to a bit of exercise tonight after last nights excesses.
After dinner last night I ventured into the depths of the kitchen's largest cupboard to find the non stick frying pan. For the first time ever, I was determined to make pancakes. After buying possibly the largest bag of flour on the Somerfield shelf, on our way home, I was horrified to discover we only had three eggs in the fridge. My recipe clearly stated I needed four. Disasterous news. However, opting to carry on regardless, I made up the batter and started producing some damn good looking pancakes of the large thinner variety, rather than the small, fat, chunky ones. The recipe did not seem to suffer too much with the lack of an egg. I even tossed them! That was a bit tricky to get the hang of. My first pancake broke apart on landing back on the pan, a few extraneous parts flying off to various points around me in the kitchen. Making sure I had cleaned up the rogue pancake parts before Ka came back into the kitchen I then showed off my handiwork serving them hot, with jam and ice cream. Fantastic. Afterwards Ka dived straight into the kitchen and reached for her flash. She claims I'm a messy chef which I find pretty slanderous. The way she cleaned the kitchen after I had been cooking you'd think the place had been attacked by the Swedish Chef.
Today is the beginning of Lent and a time of fasting. Probably a good thing as my Uncle Tom has been trying to talk Ka and myself into signing up for the Troon 10k. A distance I have not run in a long time... a good reason to stop eating all the fatty foods if ever there was one!