It has been a month since my last long run, and since seeing the Phoenix crowd, so it was good to get back down to the towpath to catch up on some long miles, and smiles.
Up at 4.50, the sky was pink, which was beautiful, but signalled trouble ahead, as beautiful things so often do.On leaving the front door, I realised there were just 8 minutes until the bus left, so had an early morning sprint to the bus stop (a normal 10 minute walk away). On arriving, the screen informed that the bus was in fact delayed for another 15 minutes. Plan B! I did another sprint to a different bus stop to catch a different bus, to find that was delayed by 5 minutes also. Hmmm.
Eventually, a bus arrived, I wasn't fussy by this point about where it was going, so on I hopped, and by a stroke of luck ended up at Waterloo. Success! Two minutes spare to source a coffee, and then on to the early train to meet Sarah and complete a chat-athon of epic proportions (six weeks of news!) at the first of Phoenix Running's double event today, the Viking Run. In anticipation of having a lot to talk about, we had prepared an agenda, which we co-chaired, so we for the most part kept to schedule - holiday lap, work lap, bad news lap, running news lap, major life changes lap, etc. We slightly ran out of laps for topics, so will need a part 2.
The pink sky had accurately foretold the weather, which was altogether strange. Overcast but pretty humid. Sweaty! A half way ice lolly from the Phoenix Freezer was a delightfully cold treat.
After feeling uncertain and stressed for a few weeks, it was good to get rid of some angst, and as always after a long run, I felt much better. There is no truer fact that running, or in fact any sort of activity, is such great medicine.
I chose the non medal option today, to 1) choose a more economical option, and 2) the giant Viking ship would not fit in my hand luggage....but thank you Sarah, for a photo, as well as an excellent chat-athon!
In a final public transport challenge of the day, after an early start to be able to get to the airport in time for an evening flight to Scotland, it turned out the flight is delayed. The screens and Easyjet app seem undecided as to the exact delay, which varies wildly, from somewhere between 2 to 4 hours, depending on what screen you check and when you check it. Mysterious! I suppose it shall go at some point. Annoyingly, I did have time to stay and do the afternoon run, after all!
I have passed the time so far by firstly seeing how many times I can refill my water bottle (3 so far, I think I was quite dehydrated). I have also read several magazines in WH Smiths - most magazines are now £6-7, at least! As I had time, quite a lot of it, I did a search to find the cheapest, and this was the Angling Times, at £2.75. This seemed altogether very fishy, given it was so much cheaper than all the rest. I pearch-ed on a ledge, and flicked through a few pages, but I didn't find anything worth carp-ing on about, really, but that could just be my lack of fish knowledge letting me down, it's a bit bass-ic.
Having tired of fish related jokes, I did a few laps of the airport, to up my steps a bit more for the day, ate both Freddos from the race, and now am somewhat of a loss as to what to do next - one could say I'm flounder-ing, even. And on that note....