Highly Strung

Lake Hayes

kirses — Sat, 24 Mar 2012 01:37:54 +0000

It’s been so long since I posted WordPress has changed and it’s taken some time to figure how to use it. In the meantime I’ve been sampling the delights of Wellington nightlife as a succession of friends visited, ridden from Glendhu Bay to Arrowtown and been a tourist in Central Otago (see photo above).

The first weekend in a month or so on my own and my flat is now cleaned from top to bottom, I’ve read a book and started another, had a 10km ride around the hills and done the weekly shop. Sunday night has come all too soon.

Sirens

kirses — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 09:01:32 +0000

Funny thing, when I hear a siren here or even a bunch of sirens, I don’t immediately assume something dramatic is occurring. This is partly because I’m very used to the sound and partly because it’s different here, less dramatic, safer. There are no acts of terrorism (well not since the French blew up that boat in the 80′s) and there is no rioting. Aside from the occasional mugging gone wrong it’s pretty quiet really. This is no bad thing.

Run – the third

kirses — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 07:22:07 +0000

Saturday morning dawned sunny with gusts of wind of 85 miles per hour. So instead of running at Oriental Bay I hopped in the car and drove around the bay until I reached a relatively sheltered part and ran there instead.

Running into the wind was harder than I thought, rounding one corner was like hitting a wall or running in treacle, but I did it and week one is now complete – I’m looking forward to running for longer periods in week 2.

Island life

kirses — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 23:09:12 +0000

The one and only thing I miss about my previous job is the friends I made there. There’s just very little camaraderie at my new job.

I think the reason we were good friends at my last job was because we were united by a common adversary. By that I mean that we were all generally overworked, underpaid and under a lot of stress. This caused us to band together by way of drunken nights out, much needed fag breaks or cheeky lunchtime wines. Colleagues were pretty tolerant of each others foibles.

Life gives with one hand and takes with another. I feel very little camaraderie in my new job and I think it’s because it’s just a job. We’re under a lot less pressure therefore work isn’t the all consuming, life swallowing beast it was in London.

On one hand this is a shame as my social life has dropped considerably, on the other hand I no longer feel the need to go out, debrief and get drunk just to cope. The sides of my mouth are no longer ragged as I’m not chewing on them like I used to. I’m no longer in the habit of finding my teeth habitually clenched. Best of all I don’t wake up in the middle of the night thinking about work.

I guess at some point I’m going to need to go out and actively seek friendships because no (wo)man is an island, but for now i’m pretty content on my wee island.

Run – the second

kirses — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 20:05:52 +0000

After one day of rest, during which my muscles were reminding me why I don’t usually run, I hauled myself out of bed at 6.45, did a few stretches and headed back down to Oriental Bay. I’m still, as ever, an awkward runner, my posture isn’t great and I’m not sure where to position my arms. Watching other runners – they seem to have a very comfortable way of running, however they do all have different styles. Some run with arms hung loose, hands waving about. Some run with clenched fists, arms bent at a right angle. Some run with arms bent but raised slightly higher and pulled into the body. I haven’t find a style that’s comfortable yet, my arms feel stiff, my hands, lightly clenched, feel wrong. My speed is off too, as ever I’m trying to quash the urge to run as fast as I am able and instead jog lightly. It’s hard as my natural inclination is to do everything as fast I can then have a sit down, but I know that on a longer run that isn’t sustainable. So I’ve been trying to concentrate on a more plodding speed rather than roadrunner speed.

My next run will be Saturday or Sunday morning. I’m not looking forward to it as I know there will be more people about and I’m still self conscious about my chaotic style. As an antidote to the self consciousness I will no doubt feel, I plan to take a long cycle in the weekend – riding a bike feels as natural to me as breathing.

A New Year, a new fitness scheme doomed to failure?

kirses — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 21:29:59 +0000

With the beginning of a new year and the inspiration of several running friends I’ve decided to start running regularly. I’m attracted to running for the simple reason that it’s exercise that requires little kit/maintenance of kit and is largely not weather reliant.

In the past I’ve embarked on runs with seasoned runners and made the mistake of keeping up with them despite my complete lack of experience. For example the last run I went on I ran for 35 minutes as fast as I could – achieving 4.5 km without stopping. Whilst this is pretty good in terms of timing and distance, the down side struck me the day after and the day after that as I found myself severely disabled. Every muscle in my body hurt – it quite seriously took me a week to recover. That was about 5 years ago, I think I may have learnt my lesson that time.

This time I’ve consulted the internet and found what sounds like a sensible schedule that allows me to build up to 30 minutes of running:

Week 1   Run one min, walk 90 seconds. Repeat eight times. Do three times a week.
Week 2   Run two mins, walk one min. Repeat seven times. Do three times a week.
Week 3   Run three mins walk one mins. Repeat six times. Do three times a week.
Week 4   Run five mins, walk two mins. Repeat four times. Do three times a week.
Week 5   Run eight mins, walk two mins. Repeat three times. Do three times a week.
Week 6   Run 12 mins, walk one min. Repeat three times. Do three times a week.
Week 7   Run 15 mins, walk one min, Run fifteen mins. Do three times a week
Week 8   Run 30 mins continuously.
(Source: Runners World)

I started this morning. I felt like quite a fraud headed down to Oriental bay at 6.50am this morning dressed in my pristine proper runners gear. Thankfully once I was on the path along the bay I realised that there are many different types of runners and probably no one cares what I’m doing or not doing out there.

Instead of using a stopwatch timer which seemed too difficult, I organised my iTunes by song length then chose songs of appropriate length so that I could just switch to walking on every second track. It wasn’t easy getting songs of 1 minute long – I look forward to choosing songs of 2 minutes length for next week’s run portion..a slightly easier task.

So wish me luck – I’m hoping to report back on progress at the end of the week (this assumes that I will stick to the schedule this week).

It’s an illness

kirses — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 20:08:22 +0000

Having now spent what I like to call ‘a crapload’ in the sales and on holiday I now find myself confined to quarters. As suggested by a kindly shop assistant observing the full flight of my addiction – the only way to stop this madness is to isolate myself from temptation.

So far this holiday I have purchased:

1 necklace
1 skirt
1 striped vest
1 running shorts (I don’t yet run, but am trying to motivate myself)
1 3/4 length running tights (see above)
1 dress
1 short sleeve cardigan
1 racer back converse vest (to go with the rest of my converse addition influenced purchases)

This list doesn’t include the money I’ve spent on camping, booze and boat trips etc… I never do dry Januarys but this year I’m making an exception, if only to reduce costs and increase the likelihood of gym use and possibly running.

On that note, I’m off to the gym (in about an hour when I get my shit together).

Devicetastic

kirses — Wed, 16 Nov 2011 08:25:14 +0000

My first digital camera was the gorgeous looking Canon Ixus (the very first iteration). It was 2 megapixels of chrome encased goodness. Fast forward 10 years or so, I’m now the proud owner of a device which not only phones, texts, plays music, emails, browses the net, games, but also takes photos and videos with an 8 mega pixel camera. It’s like all my dreams have come true…well not quite but it’s still pretty fantastic.

So far…

kirses — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 07:25:58 +0000

It’s been a week, I’m over my jetlag and am now suffering from child induced sleep deprivation (which of course is nothing compared to my brother and sister in law who are suffering the cumulative effects of 2 years of sleep deprivation).

So to my first impressions;

Things are easier here. It’s literally a case of ‘no worries’. The bank people were pleasant, an estate agent showing a flat I liked made a decision on the spot and I’ve found a lovely little clothes shop where the lady will sew a version of something to your specifications, I’m having a sun top made and if that works out perhaps a dress in a similar style.

When the sun is shining there aint a cloud in the sky, so even if the thermometer is barely topping 18 degrees it feels quite hot in the sun. On the flip side when the sun is hiding for the day and there is a gale force southerly, the cold cuts right through you.

It goes without saying that the coffee is pretty amazing in most places you go and I’m even learning to make a decent cup myself.

The hills can only be described as dramatic but thankfully the flat I’ve found is only a little way up one. It’s also about 10 minutes walk from the city centre – which is nice. It has a dishwasher (wow!), and a dryer (which I will tell myself I won’t use but no doubt when my jeans are wet and I am going out in 30 minutes, my resolve may crumble). It also has outdoor space – and it’s outdoor space that I don’t need to maintain (paved).

Work is different in a number of ways. It’s a much smaller company which is very much lead by the MD (my brother), therefore decisions are made faster and with what seems like more pragmatism. Also we are quite similar and therefore have a very similar outlook. I’ll be learning a whole new process for running projects and undertaking new tasks. I’m looking forward to getting stuck in.

On my way

kirses — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 12:37:26 +0000

Well that’s it, I waved goodbye to most of my worldy goods today as it was loaded into a truck to start it’s journey across the oceans to New Zealand. I’ll be following October 31st.

In 8 weeks time I’ll be back in the country of my birth after 18 years, enjoying views like this: