#oneaday, Day 280: Run, Jedi, Run

So I know you're dying to know how my running is going. What's that? You aren't? Well tough luck, sonny, I'm going to tell you anyway.

For those of you joining me in this post… first of all, welcome HELLOTO YOUHUGSANDKISSES and secondly… I've been following the Couch 2 5K running programme for the last 5 weeks. This programme, originally recommended to me by the fine example of gentlemanhood that is Mr Calin Grajko, aims to get lazy bastards up and running a 5K in the space of nine weeks. It does this by doing a gradually-intensifying programme of walks and runs.

The programme starts with you running for 1 minute, then walking for 1.5 minutes, 8 times. The second week gets you running for 1.5 minutes, then walking for 2 minutes, 6 times. The third week has you alternating running 1.5 minutes and walking for 1.5 minutes, then running 3 minutes and walking 3 minutes, twice. The fourth week, which I've just completed, sees you alternating running 3 minutes and walking 1.5 minutes, then running 5 minutes and walking 2.5 minutes, twice. And this week, which I've just returned from the first run of, sees me running for 5 minutes and walking for 3 minutes, three times.

As you can see, the programme gradually increases in intensity a little bit at a time. It's paced so well that if you stick with it, the actual relative difficulty of each week remains the same. So while you may be panting and wheezing after the first run of week 1, it'll seem like a cakewalk by the time you're running for 5 minute bursts in week 5. It's excellent motivation because it lets you see exactly how much you're improving. When I think back to the end of September, when I started, there's no way I could have even contemplated running for 5 minutes at a time. Even the 1 minute runs of the first week were a daunting prospect. But now, a minute of running is child's play.

This is partly due to improved stamina and partly due to you getting to know your body a bit better (in a non-masturbatory sense) and being aware of your limits. As you become aware of said limits, you learn to pace yourself effectively to be able to carry yourself through each zone of intense exercise.

And sure, I'm still slow as hell, but it doesn't matter, because it's giving me a workout and I can feel it having an effect. At the beginning of week 1, I was slow and incapable of running for more than a minute at a time. Now, at the beginning of week 5, I may still be slow, but I can keep it going for some time. Once the stamina is there, the speed can be worked on.

I have to say, the use of gadgetry to help with all this has been a key motivational factor. My iPhone comes with me on every run, along with the RunKeeper and Get Running apps. RunKeeper keeps track of your time, pace, distance and draws a handy map of your route. This will come in particularly handy once I'm trying to improve speed rather than stamina. In the meantime, it's a means of drawing geographical penises across Google Maps.

Get Running is the key app, though, and I've mentioned it before on here, I know, but it's worth talking about again. It's a very simple app, being essentially a glorified stopwatch, but it's put together so elegantly and produced so slickly that it's an excellent aid to the inherent motivation of the Couch 2 5K programme. The recorded coaching is delivered with feeling and makes you feel like you have an actual trainer with you, encouraging you and spurring you on to the next milestone. It reminds you how far you've come since the beginning at the end of each session, tells you at just the right moment that you have "only a minute of running left" and so on. It's a really excellent app and comes highly recommended to anyone interested in following the programme.

So that's that. Exercise without an expensive gym membership to worry about. All it cost was the price of a simple iPhone app which, if you've got a stopwatch, you don't even need. Plus it's an excuse to get out and about and explore your area, which is a particularly pleasant thing to do out in the countryside.

So wish me luck in the next few weeks of the programme as I get ever-closer to the elusive 5K. It seems a long way off now but, given the progress I've made so far, it certainly seems to be within reach.

#oneaday, Day 268: Through the Night

I took my first steps into the night. Coming from the brightness I'd left behind me, the inky blackness looked impenetrable, a solid wall of darkness into which I'd vanish, never to be heard from ever again, were I to take one step further forward.

I took a step forward, and I did not vanish. The light was still behind me but my eyes were gradually adjusting, focusing, bringing that which was hidden into view again.

I took out the small torch and lit it, the small pool of light it cast spilling onto the floor, concentric circles of light and shadow. There's always a way through even the blackest darkness if you have even just a little light.

I stepped forward again, and again, and began walking into the darkness. I didn't know where my feet were taking me save into the black of the night. But I was moving forward, ever onward, like it was the thing to do. It was important. This was all that mattered right now. I walked, sweeping the dim light of the torch in front of me and watching ill-defined shapes pass as the light caught them and I walked past.

"Run," whispered a voice in my ear, and I obeyed. I quickened my pace, still holding the torch, still sweeping it around, not knowing where I was headed or where I would end up. But I was running. The ground was hard under my feet, the regular thump-thump-thump of my steps mingling with the quickening of my heart in a chorus of drums that only I was witness to.

The darkness closed in around me, and the pool of light showed me that I was surrounded by shadows, but they did not feel threatening. Rather, they encased me, enclosed me, kept me safe. And still I ran, ever forward. The hard ground gave way beneath my feet to loose stones and finally soft mud. I felt the occasional splash of a puddle, but I was already past it, ever moving onwards. Still moving, still pushing forwards. But to where?

A scent filled my nostrils, a natural smell; the smell of the woods, of trees and leaves. It infused my being with a sense of peace. Out here there was nothing to fear, nothing to hide from, nothing to run from. But still I ran, with a sense of purpose that became ever more urgent.

In the distance, a pinpoint of light. As I drew closer, it flickered, its warm glow drawing my eyes away from the dark and towards what I now knew to be my destination. Closer still, and I could see the gentle flames; a source of comfort, warmth and safety, a place to rest a while.

As I entered the clearing I felt the warmth of the fire on my face and smelled the sweet smoke. And then she was there too, looking at me, smiling, those eyes gazing deep into my soul.

"I've been waiting for you," she said, taking my hand.

#oneaday, Day 267: Go Outside!

It's funny. I've never particularly thought of myself as an outdoorsman, despite growing up in the country and despite semi-regular trips from primary school and Cub Scouts (yeah, deal with it) to various campsites. This is largely to do with being a nerd, of course, because everyone knows that nerds, like vampires, tend to shun sunlight in favour of the glow of a TV or computer screen. Or sometimes candle-light and books. But books don't glow. Unless they're on an iPad.

Anyway, the point I was getting at is that I appear to have spent most of the last couple of days outside. This is partly due to the Couch-to-5K running programme I've been following which, by its very nature, requires one to go outside to do said running. Today, though, I decided to just go out for a walk. Of course, I had the flimsy justification of putting various GPS trackers on to try and measure how far I went yesterday (3.75 miles, as it happens) but mostly it was a desire to actually go out again. The place I went yesterday—a nearby wood—is a place that's nice and quiet and peaceful and has literally nothing surrounding it on Google Maps. Today, rather than running there (or run-walk-run-walk-ing there, to be more accurate) I just walked and took my time. I had some awesome tunes on for the duration and just enjoyed being out, feeling the breeze on me (until it got a bit cold later) and the feeling of being surrounded by nature. Evidently I have some sort of latent hippie/wood elf tendencies.

Of course, any kind of sudden change in one's routine is normally down to external stimuli, and of course there's one in this case. A few online chats with a very nice person (who may be reading this right now… hello! *waves*) inspired me to go out and spend some time in all this countryside I'm surrounded with. This countryside I grew up in, and pretty much took for granted, and then became a teenager and thought was boring. So I have. So, special person, thank you for being the one to give me a nudge in the correct direction. It just takes the right person to say the right thing and… well, you find yourself in the middle of the woods listening to Shpongle.

For those who are keeping up, this person is also the person who bullied me (not very hard) into picking up a copy of Firefly and then sat until the early hours with me yesterday watching it "with" me. Which was nice. But also made me forget to write my blog. Although that was mostly my own fault for not writing it earlier and then engaging in a conversation I knew would continue for quite a long time.

Anyway. Yes. Going outside is good. So do it. Especially if you've just finished watching that DVD box set or beaten that game you were playing. Don't pick up another one (yet)—open that door and go and enjoy the lovely mild Autumn sunshine and the crispy brown leaves under your feet. Unless you live in the city, in which case you can go out and enjoy the howling Autumn Peugeot chavmobiles screaming past at all hours.

I have been outside most of today, so I now have no guilt at settling down under a warm duvet with a mug of hot chocolate and a Firefly box set. Can you say the same? Can you?

Oh, here's some photos. These were taken using the iPhone 4's fancy-pants HDR setting and haven't had any processing done to them. Enjoy! I'm off to watch aforementioned Firefly.

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#oneaday, Day 259: Home Again

I prepared the above comic in advance just in case I was too knackered to do a proper one upon returning from London. And I am pretty knackered. But I managed to get my ass outside and go running tonight. At 9pm. In the dark. In a country village. At least I remembered to take a torch with me this time; less stumbling wildly into darkness and a little more Alan Wake. Though with less of whatever that game has in it (because I still, to my shame, haven't played it yet. I KNOW, I KNOW, all right?) and a little more… well, just running. And walking.

I'm following the Couch to 5K programme (again… I started once before) that was originally introduced to me by the fine gentleman that is Mr Calin Grajko. Given that I'm presently in the middle of nowhere (well… the nearest gym is seven miles away) running seems like a safe, easy option to get some exercise without needing any 1) expense and 2) travel. The thing with gyms is, they're cool and all, but if you're already feeling lethargic and not wanting to leave the house, then travelling somewhere that is going to cause you to be grunting, breathless and possibly in pain is likely not high on your agenda. Unless you have a favourite hooker at that classy brothel you like so much.

But with running, yes you still have to leave your house, but you don't have to go anywhere to get started. The world is your gym. And rather than staring at your sweaty, gasping self for half an hour in those mirrors that gyms insist on putting absolutely bloody everywhere, you can take in the scenery. You can take different routes for variety and challenges. You can run in the dark. You can run in the middle of the day. In the cold. In the warm. In the wet. And you can use fancy-pants iPhone gadgetry to analyse your runs in a level of detail that you really don't need to. Or, possibly, attempt to run a route which lets you draw a giant cock on Google Maps. (I haven't done this. But having just thought of it, now I think I pretty much have to.)

So far I've completed Week 2, Day 1 of the programme. This meant that tonight was the first time I was running for a bit longer, but also walking for a bit longer too. The pattern for this week is run for 90 seconds, walk for 2 minutes, 6 times. Last week it was run for 60 seconds, walk for 90 seconds, 8 times. This week sounded like it should be easier. It isn't! Although as I've found previously with exercising, it's actually surprisingly quick to build up a little bit of stamina. I'm obviously not at the stage where I could even think about running a 5k without collapsing dead yet, but I've noticed a marginal difference between how easy it is to keep going since the first day I started.

Just gotta keep it up! Fortunately, there's a good iPhone app to keep the motivation up. It's called Get Running and it's really very simple; it's basically a glorified timer with vocal feedback telling you when to start and stop running, walking and so forth. It also tracks how far you are through the programme and suggests which day you should do next, as well as allowing you to tweet your progress. The nice thing about the vocal feedback is that it's recorded by a real person, which makes it infinitely more motivational than some robot going "You have… RUN… One. point? SIX! Miles."

Anyway. I have a bed to get to very shortly. And then lots and lots of things to write in this coming week. Adieu.

#oneaday, Day 108: Just Like Marilyn Monroe

I went dancing last night. Yes, you read that correctly. You can blame @Amy_Walker for the bizarre image you undoubtedly have in your head right now. She twisted my arm rather less than I expected she'd have to and I agreed to go along and give it a try.

"It?" I hear you cry. Doubtless you're wondering exactly what kind of wibbling around on the dance floor I was taking part in. Could it be ballet? (No. I don't look good in tights.) Street dance? (No. Largely because the music makes me want to throw dustbins. But also because it looks far too difficult.) Ballroom dancing? (No. I don't grin like an idiot enough.)

Dance in question was Mo'Jive, which is, I believe, short for Modern Jive. (Apostrophes make everything cooler, as everyone knows.) It's actually kind of difficult to describe, but appears to involve lots of holding hands, offering resistance, spinning people around and trying not to accidentally grab anyone's boobs. It appears to be a pretty versatile sort of dance, too, with the music that was played ranging from the very modern to more traditional stuff from the 50s and 60s. It's deceptively energetic, too. Although the moves themselves feel relatively straightforward to perform in terms of the amount of effort involved (if not in the considerable amount of coordination required) by the end of the night I felt like I'd had a decent workout. Obviously not quite the same as lifting weights or anything, but definitely from a cardio perspective, things were happening.

I learned three moves throughout the course of the evening which I believe were called the First Move, Push Spin; the Hatchback; and the Man Spin. The geek in me was delighted that I had genuinely learned a selection of moves that sounded like they'd require some pretty advanced button combinations to pull off. ("Man Spin" is quarter-circle forward followed by punch and kick together, if you're curious.) The social spaz in me was delighted that I didn't make a complete tit of myself in front of lots of different people. And, well, just me was delighted that I was actually doing something I'd never done before and never thought I would do.

Okay. I made mistakes. I kept using the wrong hand halfway through a Man Spin. I occasionally did too many turns in the middle of a First Move, Push Spin. Sometimes I got completely lost and had to start the whole sequence again. But by the end of the night, I was looking surprisingly convincing. Amy even told me earlier today that several friends she knew from the sessions had mentioned how quickly and well I'd picked things up – especially considering I'd never tried it before. She assured me that she wasn't just saying it to make me feel better, too. I think I believe her.

I had a good time. No, a really great time, actually. After recent events, I've found it especially important to get out there and do stuff. Sitting at home being miserable isn't going to achieve anything. So I'm glad I stepped out of my comfort zone for once and pushed myself to do something that I wouldn't normally have even contemplated doing. And more to the point, the results were far from disastrous. It's given me a bit of much-needed confidence, and God knows I need some of that right now.

I'll leave you with this, which has to win the Scary and Hilarious Music Video of the Week award. Gotta love the Right Said Fred. Enjoy.

Post-Script: I hasten to add that the Mo'Jive class Amy and I attended didn't involve any topless bald men, bikini-clad ladies or swimming pools. Or indeed dancing in the style seen in the video. If you're curious about what it's actually all about, check out the Mo'Club here.

#oneaday, Day 99: One Away

This is not me.

Tomorrow marks my centennial on the #oneaday train. That's pretty good going. I know some people are ahead of me already, but we should all celebrate each others' milestones. And the way I choose for you all to celebrate my own milestone is to buy me cake. Particularly as it's my birthday soon.

Anyway, cake aside, what I wanted to talk about today is exercise. I've managed, through some serious mental reconditioning that may or may not have involved an electric cattle prod, to get back into a gym routine. I've been every day for the last few days. That may sound like a lot to some, but the last time I jumped in with this intensity it had a noticeably positive impact on my body. I felt better and I looked better. I mean sure, I was still a tubby bitch, to quote Mr Kevin Smith, but slightly less so than before. Then various things happened, I left my job which was conveniently five minutes' walk away from the gym, got depressed, ate too much, took on a job that was so far away from where I lived that by the time I got home of an evening I wasn't able to get to the gym before it closed and finally quit that job. Clear? No? Never mind.

Now that I'm in that weird sort of "uhhh… what now?" phase without having a full-time job, I have plenty of time to get to the gym. Even on days when I do have some work, I've managed to get home, have a quick rest, maybe a quick blast on WoW and then head out to the gym before dinner. This time around, I feel like I've made much quicker progress than before. The day before yesterday I managed a 10-minute non-stop run on the treadmill, which I can't normally do. I can't do it consistently yet, as I need to be full of energy to pull it off, but it's getting there. And I can do 5 minutes non-stop without too much difficulty now.

Experimented a little with some free weights today. Rhiarti has said she's going to give me some suggestions for a Geek Workout using weights rather than machines. The machines are all well and good, but apparently the free weights actually work more muscles because you have to support the big lump of metal you're lifting as well as, you know, lifting it. And certainly after I tried a few bits and pieces I'd looked up online today, my muscles felt like they'd had a much more solid workout than if I'd used machines for equivalent exercises. The side-effect of all this, too, is that I feel rather more positive about my body image. I know there's no way that my shape would have changed over the course of less than a week, but I feel better about myself. I think it's just taking the positive step to do something about it that makes me feel better. I have a lot of work to do, but I feel like I've got into a good rhythm now. Let's hope I can keep it up.

No idea whether I'll be working tomorrow yet. The irritating thing about supply teaching is that you have to get up super-early for no guarantee of work on most days. But even if there's no work, I have some articles to write and some potentially paid freelancing gigs to chase up, so it's not as if I'll be short of things to do. I also applied for three jobs today, so hopefully something will come of one of those. Though going on past experiences with my saying "hopefully something will come of one of those", I fear it will be unlikely I'll hear back from them ever, my application lost in the Netherstorm for all eternity.

It's time for bed. Before midnight! Good job, me.

Also, to the shouting drunken morons outside my front room window, kindly jump in the Solent.