Run Forrest run, run like the wind...

Running, running and more running... it's hit me like a curse, the bug has bitten and I'm hooked. Despite my desperately aching legs the last two days after running my first road race on Sunday.

On the 15th November, 2 weeks ago, after noticing a Facebook post by one of my FB friends that he had done it, I was outrageously spontaneously inspired to register for the Two Oceans half marathon (21km) next April, which I did, I signed up, and just in time too it seems! All 16,000 available places for the 21km were snapped up within 9 days of being made available. A record. There are now loads of people offering to buy tickets from those of us who have them, I could make a lot of money if I sold my spot, but I'm not going to do that, no sir! It would be like selling my soul!

Two months ago if you suggested I register to do the 2 Oceans I would have laughed in your face, while sweating over my mayonnaise infused 2 minute noodles, after which this blog is named! Or slurring through another bottle of cheap whiskey while another fatty pork chop sizzles on the stove!

But that's all in the past now!

Well, that signing up to do the Two Oceans spurred on the need to get involved in some serious training immediately, including chatting to some friends who are regular runners to learn some tricks, and finding out about shorter local runs. So I got onto the web and quickly found a few useful sites full of info about some upcoming road and trail races and spent copious amounts of time reading up about them and registering for a few. I didn't even know what a trail run was a few weeks ago, nor had any interest in that kind of physical abuse to my big wobbly ass that took me so long to build!

My first run, 3 days ago, was the 10km Superspar Chappies run up Chapmans Peak starting in Hout Bay. The weather was miserable and the wind was pumping, yet everybody there was in high spirits and charged up to do the run, as was I. After all I'd been training for a whole week already with much enthusiasm and sweaty grunting on the gym treadmill! Despite the wind I actually quite enjoyed the experience, something I would never have imagined doing in my wildest aspirations 2 months ago when I was still fat, sweaty and lazy (and probably hungover as was the norm on Sunday mornings!). I started off on the long uphill quickly falling into a comfortable stride aiming to run 10mins and walk 5. 10 minutes came and went as did 15 and I kept running, eventually I took my first break at 25 minutes and walked for 5 before running again. The halfway mark came sooner than expected, at which point I turned around and headed off back the way I came to the finish, all the way DOWNHILL! I did the run in 1 hour and 8 minutes, all 10km up and down Chappies! A few experienced runners reckon this was a very good time for my first run. Honestly I was quite impressed too, I was aiming for around an hour and a half at a push! According to the official timing (see the second page near the bottom) I came 208th out of about 320 runners in the 10km run. At least I didn't come last!

Being my first run I expected to struggle a lot more than I did, it wasn't so bad, I loved the spirited atmosphere amongst the other runners, the surroundings and views were magnificent, I enjoyed the natural beauty and detail that one otherwise misses when you drive the route! All that combined has been a great motivation that I can actually do this and even enjoy it!

I can't wait for the next one...

So I have signed up to do a few more, 4 confirmed and possibly another two, all by the end of the year, which is not too far off:

• This coming Saturday, 3 December - The Vital Run at Lourensford Wine Estate near Somerset West, an off road trail run of 10km through the beautiful winelands. Liezel is doing this one with me.
• Next Saturday, 10 December - The TSiBA Eden New Balance trail run, a 12km run also through the winelands near Stellenbosch.
• Friday 16 December - The RCS Gugulethu Reconciliation Day race, a 10km run-like-hell through the Gugulethu township. I'm really looking forward to this one, it should be a very fascinating experience!
• Wednesday 21 December - The Sundowner 10km race, a late afternoon race starting at the V&A Waterfront, following Beach Road until the Seapoint swimming pool and back. Liezel's doing this one too!
• (Possibly, if my wife allows it!) Monday 26 December, on Boxing day - The Tokai Manor House race, a whopping 16km run through the Tokai forest, just the trick to burn off the ton of calories & fat collected on Christmas Eve and Christmas day, courteousy of our dear mothers. Not that I'll turn my nose up at any of that good food, but I can at least pig out happily with a clear conscience knowing I'll have plenty of energy to burn off over 16km!
• (Possibly, if my wife allows it!) Saturday 31 December - Runners Memorial race, a little 8km to end off the year.

But, there's more! I have also been in touch with a local running club, the West Coast Athletic Club, which I will be joining as a member in the next few days. This will open up the opportunity to do regular runs with a regular group of people as part of a proper club. Apart from the weekly Tuesday run along the Blouberg beachfront (which includes the option of a social drink at the clubhouse, the lifesavers club at Big Bay, thus the club motto - "A drinking club with a running problem") I will be part of the group wearing club colours at the big races around. AND, my club membership will include an official WP (ASA endorsed) running license for a year, which will save a lot of money in paying for temporary licenses every time I register for a race.

BUT, THERE'S EVEN YET MORE... The WCAC invited me to join them for their club hosted annual West Coast Annual Charity Pub Run, TOMORROW evening! Yes you read that right, it's a PUB run. Kind of like a pub crawl, except it's actually an 8km run with 5 compulsory pub stops along the route, which runs from the clubhouse at Eden on the Bay (Big Bay) down to the News Cafe by the Blaawberg road circle and back again. I'm not too worried about the fitness aspect of this run because it's more of a fun social event than a serious race. It will be my first introduction to the club I'll be joining and a chance to meet many other local runners, with drinks in hand! Liezel is doing this one with me too, after much convincing! I'm sure it will be lots of fun, I'm certainly looking forward to the event, which culminates in a big party back at the clubhouse!

So, that's the start of my running. It's still tough for me as I'm still building up the stamina and endurance to do long runs, but I'm keen and full of enthusiasm to take this far and keep it up until I'm doing the long runs and marathons in good times and enjoying it all the way! I'll never win the races, my short stocky legs and stocky build won't allow it, but I'm not doing this to win races, I'm doing it to keep fit and healthy and have fun and get out into the fresh air and enjoy the social vibe that goes with the running events. It's more fun that the treadmill in the gym amongst the testosterone pumped throng of ego-jocks & their cocks wagging at the silly girls only there to be noticed.

My biggest vice with the running at this stage is my smokers lungs clogged up with 18 years worth of tobacco tar! But that is also changing soon! As mentioned in my previous post about the Allen Carr clinic, I did indeed manage to get a spot on this weeks session on Friday due to a cancellation. So, at about 2.30pm on Friday 2nd December 2011 I will be smoking my last cigarette!

Well that's the intention anyway, I'm going in there open-minded with the desire and intention to quit the cigarette for good. Hopefully my will-power will overcome the pull of the addiction and I'll fight off the temptation to light up a fag until the mental pull of the "need" to smoke will diminish into nothingness and I can get on with my life happily without the cigarettes and with a pair of lungs that gradually clear out and come back to life, allowing me to be able to run further and faster without worrying about losing chunks of lung on the roads and trails! If anybody is actually reading this, I will need the encouragement and maybe a kick up the arse if it looks like the temptation might get the better of me! The biggest problem with this is, knowing I'm going to quit soon I am currently smoking more and consciously enjoying my cigarettes, every single one; though the biggest challenge is certainly going to be drinking and not smoking!

Oh, and the last of my health news - I've finally cracked the 90's and broken into the 80's. This morning I weighed 89.9kg! Woo hoo! Although I'm currently 1.6kg behind on my daily weight loss target, it is still steadily coming down, and I'm happy with that. I'm also packing on muscle lately due to all the exercise and I'm pumping heavier weights at the gym, so I'm happy with my health progress. In fact, my trousers that were tight on me 2 months ago are now so large around my waist that even with a belt they look ridiculous. I need to go and buy smaller clothes again soon! How cool is that!

Chocolate brownies and marathons.

Yo whats happening my peeps?

Ag not much excitement from my side hey! I'm on my lunch break now, a rare peaceful one these days! I've been out the whole morning and most of yesterday doing departmental section audits at Groote Schuur hospital, you can't believe how insanely huge that place is! And so far I've only done the old main building, the old hospital. According to my new pedometer (the larney little step, distance, speed, time counter I bought along with a new sports watch last weekend) I have walked around 17km, about 20,000 steps, just at the hospital the last 2 days. And I'm far from finished, I still have to do the NEW main hospital, which is like a city in one building, which is likely to triple the amount of walking I've done so far!

All this along with the running I now do at the gym almost every day, usually 3km lately, and a circuit workout and an hour of squash, is contributing to a pair of constantly stiff legs and gradually increasing fitness levels. I have upped my game with the fitness mission because I recently signed up for next years Two Oceans half marathon of 21km and in the interim registered for loads of short runs, starting with a 10km this coming Sunday up Chapmans Peak. So apart from the fact that I AM gonna kak off on Sunday, I've been putting in the effort to train as hard as my endurance can handle, which isn't much yet! My body is certainly building up the strength quickly, but my lungs are not handling and feel like they are going to explode out of my chest at times in an effort to keep up the oxygen supply to my body. So my next mission is to quit smoking, and soon, but I've decided I like smoking too much so I can't do it on my own as in just quit cold turkey style, and I'm not interested in drugs and nicotine replacement gimmicks. Therefore I have decided to go the Allen Carr route, via one of their half day clinics which apparently has a 90% success rate on the first attempt. Go to the website and see what it's all about, I'm not going to explain it here, but basically it looks like a system that may have a chance of defeating my smoking addiction. Only problem is it's so popular the next free spot on one of the clinics is mid January next year. So I sigh a sigh of relief as I get to enjoy my fags a bit longer!

Meantime I will have to bear the consequences in my new athletic endeavours, but I'm sure I'll be ok, albeit not posting any record times and probably barfing up chunks of blackened lung along the way!

This weekends run is a road race up a mountain, then the next two weeks I'm doing Trail Runs of 10km and 6km which are off-road runs through the wine lands along country paths through vineyards, forests, mountains, etc. These will be a fair bit tougher, but I'm looking forward to the idea of the fresh air outdoor adventure aspect of the sport.

The other reason I'm boosting the fitness now is that my weight loss took a knock over the last week and a half (spit braai last weekend, lots of junk food this weekend including steak, bacon, eggs, pate's, chocolate brownies, etc, and 2 weekends of heavy drinking), and until the last weekend I was not losing any weight, actually gained a bit, unable to break the 91.6kg mark which I reached 3 times in 9 days,  and as such have gone over the red line on my graph depicting my daily target. So now I have some catching up to do to make the 80kg mark by Christmas, and so far it's working, this week I've lost 2kg in 4 days already. This morning I was 90.9kg. By Sunday morning before the race I want to be at most 90kg, just so I have that little bit less to have to lug up the mountain with me!

There are a few potential hiccups between now and Christmas, as can be expected at this time of the year, starting tonight with Liezel's company function, the Party in the Park, which is likely to include something unhealthy. I will refrain from too much beer and junk food, but admittedly the delicious salad I had for lunch didn't totally fill the gap, and after the walking I'm going to do the rest of the day I will probably be hungry enough by the time of the party to be tempted by a boerewors roll or something equally delicious with an ice-cold brew!

Then I have 2 work Christmas lunches and a few other functions involving nice food along the way.

So it will be hard work keeping ahead of the target, once I'm back on track, but watch me I'll do it! I will impress the least believing of you!

And someday soon I'll get back on track with the photography too, which I haven't had time for lately. I do miss it, and I will get it going again in earnest as soon as I've reached my weight loss goal, which right now takes up a lot of my spare time.

But for now I'll leave you with the menu I created for my office Friday tea last week: Home made very Chocolate brownies (with extra chocolate chips), ice cream and a hot chocolate sauce I made using 5 large Bar-One chocolates, a tin of condensed milk and a pot of cream. Then for savoury I made 3 pate's to go with a biscuit selection: rich, spicy chicken liver pate with brandy, smoked snoek, cream cheese and parsley pate, and an avocado & garlic hummus. For extra's I bought coconut cookies and Christmas mince pies. See the photo below for a conservative idea of the feast that my colleagues stuffed themselves on delightedly! Once again I am the undisputed Friday tea King! And, I'm a fucken boy outperforming the old tannies!

It's my first day back at work today after being off sick the whole of last week with the Chicken Pox, which was not fun. Anyway, I can't say I'm delighted to be back, it's always a drag getting back into the boring old work routine after some time off.

To be honest I'm feeling a bit lazy to write this blog too. It's just an obligation since I didn't do one for a week and some weekends and I got plenty to say, I just don't feel like it right now. But sometime in the course of the week I'll do an in-depth account of what the chicken pox experience is like at the ripe old age of 35. Just in case anybody was wondering and considering it as an excuse to get off work or other responsibilities for a few days. Trust me, it's not worth it! It's is a horrid experience!

Just a quick update on the health mission - I'm still working at it... This past weekend I reached the 1 month mark since starting the lifestyle change and in that month I lost 13kg. Unfortunately we went out to a party on Saturday night which featured a lamb spit braai. That meat was just so fantastically delicious that I ate huge quantities of it, throughout the night as I could fit it into my stomach, washed down with the majority of a bottle of whiskey. So anyway I packed on another 0.8kg by this morning that I need to now drop again. Of course my graph went haywire and my estimated target date to reach 80kg (calculated my an automated exponential forecast trendline) moved further along by 2 days from the 19th to the 21st December. But it's ok, at this time of year we're bound to take a knock once in a while, it just means working harder in between.

Tonight I'll be back at gym again for the first time since the dreaded pox struck me down over a week ago. Back on the squash court, and I think dinner will be a portion of my diet protein shake. Got to get that graph back down!

So much for not saying much. Below is my graph as of today.

I work at a radio station!

This whole diet thing has now spawned a rather annoying side to it! Word is out in my office that I'm on this diet and weight loss mission, and everybody is talking about it. It's at the point where I can't have an interaction with somebody at work without either some comments about how the diet is going or how much weight I have lost and how much better I'm looking, which is all flattering but I don't want to discuss it constantly! Even worse, if I pass somebody in the corridor people think I don't notice them checking me up and down! I feel like the spotlight is on me and following me around. Sure, when I'm on stage playing drums I love the attention, but that's the only time. I'm otherwise quite a shy person and not a big fan of attention!

Today we had our weekly Friday office tea, which was very nice. My colleague outdid herself in quality, quantity and presentation, and she made a concerted effort to make the options as healthy as possible, like the lady who's turn it was last week! It was appreciated! It included carrot cake with low-fat cream cheese icing, apple pie, and a very nice fruit platter which I had generous portions of. Very nice indeed, and I ate my fill without pigging out. But then at one stage I got up to go for a piss, because as part of the diet I drink copious volumes of water constantly. When I got back I was asked, in front of 8 people, if I had gone to "purge", ie. stick my finger in my throat and barf up my food. This then became a conversation and I was questioned further. I must have gone red in the face with embarrassment, it was a kak thing to ask and a fucking shit awkward thing to have to explain, at the tea table, that I had indeed gone for a fucking piss! I was seriously not impressed! What the fuck - do these people think I've lost all this weight from throwing up my food like some anorexic ballet dancer (no offence intended to ballet dancers!) This diet has been fucken hard work, determination, and sacrifice of many things that I love!

Seriously, fuck off!

I will no longer mention my mission nor answer questions about it at work. It's something I'm proud of, I don't need condescending insults!

Anyway, rant over... This Friday tea was just a treat that I took as a calculated moderation of something nice.

When this crowd sees my tea contribution next week they are going to fall over backwards, probably with cholesterol heart attacks! It will be a surprise indeed!


Tomorrow we are going to my friend Mandy from school for a braai, whom I've not seen since school, in 1994. Yes I'm that old already! She is also on this will power diet, Tamsyn is a mutual friend from school, so we will endeavour to keep the contents of the braai reasonably healthy as well as being enjoyable. 

BUT, before the braai, Mandy and I are playing squash after months of threatening for a game, something I've been dreading due to her reputation as a pro with bite. That said, I'm looking forward to the game, it will be a good workout and a fantastic learning experience. I have never had any squash coaching so I don't even know if I'm holding the racket correctly, let alone playing correctly, so hopefully I'll learn a few useful tricks!

I also intend to hit the gym tonight and tomorrow morning, with some squash if there's any free courts as I don't have any bookings. I don't book weekend courts in advance since weekends can be so unpredictable. Liezel and I had spoken earlier in the week to not do anything this weekend besides gardening and working around the house and the hike up Lions Head on Sunday morning, which has been cancelled since everybody who was so keen to get a hiking club going has chickened out, and I'm not keen to go up alone and get mugged, which happens there regularly in case you think I'm chickening out too, because I'm not! I'm keen to do it! Well, the weekend is now fully booked, just about!

Then Sunday evening I'm doing a family photo shoot at the beach. Should be interesting!

So anyway, lunch is over, I need to get back to my Autocad drawing!

Have a nice weekend all!

Hallo!

Howzit all you lovely mofo's!

Don't really have much to say today except I have an itch on my back that I can't scratch because my stupid elbows can only bend forwards. How useful it would be if they could go backwards too, what kind on incredible talents and skill sets that would open up! Personally I wouldn't mind being able to turn my head 360 degrees like an owl without breaking my fucking neck! How cool would that be... try sneak up on me then bitch! I won't even start on being able to flap my arms and fly like a bird! That's a very realistic dream I have on a regular basis, in all kinds of surreal situations! Flap my arms and glide over the city at night, quiet and unseen. Though I just thought how impractical taking a camera with would be! But really, I would love to be able to fly!

Anyway, I have no idea where that last paragraph just came from. Boredom brain is at it again!

It's amazing how much more active and imaginative my pickled old grey matter is becoming as time progresses through this lifestyle upgrade I'm putting myself through. Evin mah shpelling has improoved! No seriously, the stronger, fitter body; all the healthy nutrients my body has been deprived of for most of it's existence; and mainly the lack of alcohol seems to be contributing to a gradual increase in my cleverness and sharpness. Even if I'm the only one who thinks so!

Yesterday I played squash twice. Once in the morning at the UCT squash courts on Health Sciences campus, and again in the evening at the gym followed by a good workout. The work paid off, I lost half a kilo in a day, putting me at 95.9kg down from 96.4 yesterday. I have to admit publically, because I have no shame, that yesterday's game at UCT was played in my smart black work shoes and long black socks. Choppy here forgot my trainers. Thank goodness nobody else was there to see it, I must have tooked like an idiot. To top it off I had to wear those same socks and shoes the rest of the day, AND I forgot to take deodorant with! Fortunately I had an emergency supply of deo back at the office!

I just had a salad for lunch, for a change. LOL. Herb lettuce, cucumbers, little tomatoes (as usual) with diced chicken breast, avo, seeds, sun dried tomato, fresh raw garlic, and delicious spicy croutons I made freshly last night, baked with olive oil and chilli. Breakfast was a very good smoothie made with a banana, 4 big strawberries, fat-free yogurt and milk, water, jungle oats, future-life, protein shake, and a tablespoon of peanut butter. This all for two of us! This healthy stuff is just way too delicious!

Talking about last night, the photo is the beautiful meal I cooked for the fandamily. Fortunately it was just enough for the servings pictured, because it was so nice that my Liezel would have uncontrollably eaten tons more had there been more. There was one extra mushroom that she nearly made love to when I slipped it onto her plate (wish I could be as lucky as the mushroom... nearly is better than nothing!).

The food was simply salmon which I bought on special with the frozen fish, otherwise we could not justify paying for salmon in this backwards country. I laid the salmon on a bed (no I didn't shag it you pervert!) of two large mushrooms per piece of fish, with garlic and lemon juice in between and mixed herbs with Ina Paarmans fish spice on top. Baked it in the oven for about 20 minutes (the fish went in still frozen solid) and grilled it the last 5 minutes. Vegetables were steamed in the electric steamer and splashed in the fishy mushroom juice in the baking dish just before serving. The fish was devine, complimented perfectly by the garlic mushrooms!

You may have noticed, or not, there is a lot of garlic in my food lately. The great thing about the garlic is it's making me fart like a tractor, constantly! Especially when I'm walking or playing squash. And I love a good release of ripe fermented flatulence! Just as well I've played squash solo the last 2 days otherwise I'd have had a noxiously unfair advantage on the court! There was something maliciously satisfying earlier today walking through the cafeteria in the Molly Blackburn hall up on UCT campus, place packed to the rafters, puffing away stealthily like a professional "windgat" leaving a trail of gagging students.

Tonight I'm not cooking, we will have health-shakes for dinner and I have a squash court booked at 7.15 after Tammy's swimming lesson.

Have a good baff, I mean day!