burn, baby, burn....

I've been pretty tired recently.  I'm usually something of a night owl, heading off to bed some time after midnight and catching up on lost sleep at the weekend.  Just recently though, I've found myself heading off to be bed before 10pm.  Even stranger is the fact that I've also really enjoyed the feeling of waking up in the morning feeling properly refreshed.

This time last year, I was finding myself almost nodding off in meetings in the early afternoon, between about two and three pm.  I'm sure that was partly to do with the incredibly tedious presentations I was attending at the time in stuffy, windowless rooms, but getting more sleep has clearly helped.  I also more or less stopped drinking at all during the week at the start of this year.  I never really had more than the odd bottle of beer in front of the telly, but cutting it out has definitely left me feeling brighter eyed.  Not that I've stopped drinking altogether, you understand.... that would just be ridiculous.

It's not a foolproof regime: I inject myself with beta-interferon every Tuesday night, and although I take a 1000mg of paracetamol and 400mg of ibuprofen before going to bed and sleeping through the worst of the side-effects, I still often wake up on a Wednesday morning feeling as though I'm being gently pushed back into the mattress by an invisible hand.  MS-related fatigue also strikes me at strange and unpredictable times.  Last Saturday afternoon, I was pootling about the shops with C. when I suddenly found myself so tired that I was almost unable to speak.  A cup of tea and a sit down and I was soon back to normal, but it's not a pleasant feeling.  I think the fatigue accumulates, and if I do too much, it reaches a critical mass that spills out irresistibly.

So, if I'm sleeping more and drinking less, why am I feeling so tired all of a sudden?

It really doesn't take a genius to figure it out:  since September 5th, I've been cycling to work.  It's not as though I don't take much exercise already, but a quick peak at some of the stats really gave me pause for thought.

I usually run three times a week for a total of something like 12 miles.  I'd like that to be further, but I'm building my way back up after a load of injuries over the summer.  Far better a few shorter runs than no runs at all.  Anyway, since September 5th, according to my Garmin, I have been out running 19 times for a total of 75 miles and a calorie burn of 11,081.   Bearing in mind that I likely wouldn't have spent any time on my bike at all before I started cycle commuting to work, since the same day, I've done 78 cycling activities for a total of 392 miles for a total of 22,386 calories.

I've essentially trebled my calorie output.  No wonder I feel tired.  I also seem to have lost a few kilos.

Hm.

Perhaps I should eat some more cake?

After a few weeks off to let my tattoos heal, I'm also back in the swimming pool too.....

here's to another year....

I think I’ve cracked the secret to happiness. Well, a small part of it anyway.  A tiny part really.... but a part nonetheless.

It’s a secret that comes in two parts, but I didn’t realise until I put them together how powerful a force for good they really were. The first part I put into place several months ago, but I only got hold of the second part, completely independently, on Saturday afternoon…. But as soon as I put the two pieces together, it all very quickly clicked into place, and I’ve been experiencing a zen-like calm ever since.

As I’m a generous sort, I’ll share so that you too, dear reader, can benefit from this serendipitous discovery.

The first piece of the puzzle was the impulse purchase of a little plastic dish in the shape of the tea pot. I saw it in the Co-Op when I was in there for some entirely mundane reason or another. I saw it at the grand price of something like £1 and immediately saw the soothing balm it could pour onto all my kitchen troubles. You see, I generally make tea on a mug by mug basis, dunking the tea bag directly into the cup next to the kettle. This works well enough, but the problem is that I then have to walk across the kitchen to the bin with a hot, spent tea bag balanced on a spoon. It’s all highly unsatisfactory. With the addition of a little plastic dish in the shape of a tea pot, placed carefully next to the kettle, this problem immediately disappeared. Yes, alright, so I have a stack of dried up, used teabags next to the kettle… but I can live with that.

For a while, that was enough, but on Saturday, the second piece of the puzzle arrived to make my life practically complete: a little set of tongs with plastic squeezers in the shape of hands. The little plastic dish in the shape of a tea pot is great, but there’s still that awkward moment when you lift the burning hot tea bag out of the mug and have to use your fingers to squeeze it out against the teaspoon to wring it out before transferring it to the little plastic dish in the shape of a teapot. Ha! Not any more, my friends, because now I have a little set of tongs with plastic squeezers in the shape of hands to wring out my teabags (and if, I feel so inclined, to hold my biscuit for a more thorough dunking experience)!

Life, my friends, is good.

--

In other news, I turn 38 on Wednesday and will be spending the next few days in London to celebrate. We’re having lunch at Albert Roux and Michel Roux Jr’s restaurant at the Landau; we’re going to watch Graham Linehan’s adaptation of “The Ladykillers” at the Gielgud theatre (starring Peter Capaldi); we’ve tickets to see the Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition at the Natural History Museum; we’re going to catch up with some friends and maybe buy a hat…. It’s all good.

See you on the other side.

I can tell that we are going to be friends....

After years of refusal, I have finally caved in and set up a Facebook account....although judging by the number of people who almost immediately hit me with requests to be my "friend", I would imagine that most of you know that by now.  (how does that work, incidentally?)

I'll admit that I was quite proud not to have an account for so long, but the simple truth is that the real reason I didn't open one because I know myself too well; I know how much time I spend on the internet on things like blogger and twitter, and I had an inkling that Facebook wouldn't be any different.  Best not to open that door, I thought; better not to get started at all than to have something else to suck up my life.  That and the idea (picked up from membership on Friends Reunited) that I would be getting requests from people who I would rather never see again as long as I live.

In the end, what tipped the balance was the desire to stay in contact with some of the brilliant people that I met in Africa.  Yes, I could email them, but setting up a Facebook account seemed to be the best way of making sure I was included on the photos we were planning to share and was generally a good way to stay loosely in contact with everyone with the minimum of effort.

You know what?  It's been okay.  I have had requests from people I don't care for, but I've ignored them; I have spent a fair bit of time mucking about with it, and it's another thing -- along with email and twitter -- that I check regularly on my phone, but overall it's not been so bad.  Actually, it's been sort of fun.  I had some initial problems setting up the privacy settings on my account, but even that's now been sorted and everything seems to be ticking along nicely.  I'm "chatting" to some people I haven't had much regular interaction with in years, and it's been good.

I've not "poked" anyone yet, mind..... I hope it stays that way.  And no, I haven't Facebooked your mom, although I wouldn't rule it out.

I am tired, I am weary...

I seem to be developing bags underneath my eyes; bruised, black smudges pointing obliquely outwards from the inside corner of my eyes towards my cheekbones. They rather serve to make me look sallow, sunken and tired. I think this may largely be because I *am* sallow, sunken and tired. They might always have been there, I suppose, obscured from my attention by the glasses that I used to wear. I rather think, however, that they're new and that they're a product of my age, my exercise regime and too many late nights.

I'm not really taken with them, but I hardly think I'm metrosexual enough for eye lotions. Perhaps I'll simply have to get used to looking tired. I *feel* tired most of the time, so why not?

Coming hard on the heels of some very late nights at the weekend, I'm sure that the twelve mile run I did last night won't have much helped, but it did include two moments that brought a massive smile to my face and a spring to my weary step. The first was when I turned around at the six mile point just as "Knights of Cydonia" popped up on my iPod. That guitar solo is preposterously joyous. The second moment came soon after, at about the seven-and-a-half mile mark, when I saw a man walking a ferret along the canal towpath. It was a perky looking thing, with bright white fur and wearing a natty looking harness. Its owner offered me a cheery good evening as we passed, and the thought of them kept me amused for at least another mile in the darkening evening.

There was a little bit of a chill in the air by about 8pm, and I'm rather afraid that summer might be over.



I was quite pleased with my splits for this one:

mile	Split:	climb (ft):
1	9:27	1
2	9:32	9
3	9:12	4
4	9:04	21
5	9:56	14
6	10:17	1
7	9:44	2
8	9:14	0
9	9:49	0
10	9:19	4
11	10:07	1
12	10:04	2

It's a very flat run, as you'd expect alongside a canal, but what stood out for me is the way that I ran at a pretty consistent pace all the way through. It certainly didn't feel like that, as for the last five or six miles, my legs felt like lead. I discovered that, even though I was feeling tired, if I picked my knees up and upped the pace a bit, it didn't make me feel any worse.... hence the slightly faster times around miles 7-10. I suppose it just goes to show how much of running is mental as well as physical. At this sort of pace, I should think I should finish the race a few minutes over two hours. If I give my body a chance to recover in the run-up to the race, so that I actually get to the starting line feeling fresh, perhaps I'll be able to run a bit quicker. Who knows?

As you probably already know, C. and I are running the half marathon to raise money for the MS Society. We're hoping to raise £1000, and any money you can spare is gratefully received. You can sponsor us here.

I think I heard a shot....

I had a terrible night's sleep last night. Normally I'm one of the lucky ones, and sleep is not usually something that I have any trouble with at all. I'm a night owl but I have to get up in the morning to get to work, so I very rarely get enough sleep, and certainly not as much as I'd like - the fabled eight hours is something that only ever happens to me at weekends - but pretty much from the moment I put my head on the pillow, I'm out for the count until my radio alarm reluctantly drags me back to consciousness at around seven.

I'd had a couple of glasses of wine with my dinner, read a few pages of my book, and when I turned the light off, I was fully expecting not to wake up again -- barring the odd trip trip to the bathroom -- until C. got up to catch an early flight to Moscow in the morning. No such luck. I got a little over an hour's sleep before waking up at around 2am, and from then on in, I just seemed to be completely unable to settle down.

My left arm was aching, my feet were numb and my thighs were throbbing. I felt a little as though I had insects crawling under my skin looking for a way out. Not a comfortable feeling, sure, but not something that I haven't had to become accustomed to over the last few months. That in itself did not explain why I was tossing and turning. It's possible I was worrying about work, although unlikely; more likely was the possibility that my appointment on Friday at the disease modifying clinic, when I'm going to choose the treatment I want for my MS, was playing on my mind. The cat, contrary creature that she is, decided that tonight would be a good night to sit curled up against my legs. She usually sleeps at the top of the stairs, where she can keep an eye both on us and on her cat-flap, only very occasionally gracing us with her presence on the bed. Even when she does hop on, she is a dab hand at stomping off in a huff as soon as there is a stir of movement from under the duvet. Yesterday though, there was no shifting her: every twist and turn I made in the bed, the cat just adjusted herself so that she was leaning up against my legs again. I was pleased and slightly honoured that she was there, but as I thrashed around, I couldn't help but think I might be more comfortable if she moved. I could have kicked her off, of course. Of course, I did no such thing.

I watched as the sky grew lighter; I picked up my phone and checked Twitter , sent a tweet and then looked at my email. I considered turning the light on and reading my book for a bit, but decided to content myself with a toilet trip and another serious attempt at sleep. On my way back, just as I was pivoting on the floorboards to face the bed, the fleshy part of my big toe caught on a raised nail and the skin punctured. As if I wasn't awake enough already, now my foot was throbbing into the bargain. The cat blinked at me sleepily as I tried to assess whether or not I was likely to bleed all over the sheets. She didn't move when I climbed back into bed, although C. stirred and wondered what all the noise and movement was about.

I dropped off eventually, but before long (and certainly before my alarm went off), C. was up and about and getting ready to be picked up and taken down to Heathrow for her flight. She brought me a cup of tea and left me to get up and do my strengthening exercises before showering and getting ready for a day I felt even less prepared to face than normal.

I know that I'm lucky not to normally have problems with my sleep. One restless night does not an insomniac make, and I'm fairly sure that a real insomniac would laugh in the face of my probably-not-actually-disturbed-all-that-much sleep. But still, it was a rubbish night's sleep and I don't care to see it repeated tonight. If I'm this het up after one night like this, then I don't know how people cope with real insomnia. I'm not sure how much loss of sleep I could take. One crappy night and already I am Jack's cold sweat; I am Jack's raging bile duct; I am Jack's colon; I am Jack's complete lack of surprise; I am Jack's wasted life; I am Jack's inflamed sense of rejection.....

No sign of Tyler Durden yet, but I wonder how far away he is.

"I see all this potential, and I see squandering. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables; slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."

Then again, perhaps I'll sleep like a baby tonight and we can forget we ever had this little conversation?