Month: January 2014

Janathon day six: red faced and sweaty

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As Ginge was off today, I took advantage and went to the gym for the first time in, ooooh, ages. This sentence makes it sounds like I was full of enthusiasm and raced down there like a gazelle on roller skates. What actually happened was I tried to hide behind Mini-Ginge’s needs until Ginge senior gave me a very hard stare.

I was dreading going because:

  • I haven’t been for ages – it’s going to hurt
  • I can only use three bits of equipment – this is rubbish
  • My baggy running top is no longer baggy

    • And probably a whole host of other reasons that I don’t even realise.

    You know what? It wasn’t half bad. As a warm up I walked on the treadmill ramping up the incline ever so often (thus satisfying my need to press buttons while I’m on it), 15 minutes of random hills on the bike and then 20 on the elliptical trainer doing 2:1 run/walk intervals. I finished up satisfyingly red faced and sweaty before offsetting the minuscule number of calories I burned by having churros for dinner (lunch).

    I didn’t get round to doing my Physio exercises yesterday, which is a challenge to the ‘all or nothing’ approach that my brain tends to take.

    Physio (at the time of writing) 4/6

    Janathon day five: Spar treatment

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    It was wet, there was housework to be done (well Ginge had to deal with the twelfth night aftermath of choosing a ten foot tall Christmas tree) and I spent much of today in fleecy pyjamas. To be honest, the day took a while to get going because I’m finding that I’m completely knackered in the mornings at the moment. Before Mini-Ginge came along, I was an early bird – I consider morning to be the best part of the day (and am convinced that the day is pretty much over by about two in the afternoon). At the moment, I’m getting up to do a 4/5am feed and feeling quite awake afterwards. I keep thinking about getting up and doing stuff, but choose to get another couple of hours shut-eye before his next breakfast. When I wake up for this feed, I’m much sleepier than I was pre-dawn. It is annoying.

    Anyway, whinging over. Today’s Janathon was a family walk up to the Spar to pick up a few bits that we needed for tea (the meal, not cuppa or cream, abradypus). We did try to add a bit more of a loop on, but the wind was bitter and the only one of us not bothered by this was tucked up, asleep and cosy in his pram. It was just over a mile.

    Oh, and I did do my physio exercises before the midnight cut-off, but I’m still a set behind because I’ve only just eaten and Sherlock’s on in a bit.

    Tomorrow I am venturing to the actual gym. I can only use two pieces of equipment, can’t find my locker padlock and am not sure that I have any kit that looks ok or at least doesn’t run the risk of indecency charges.

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    Please note the time at the top

    Physio exercises (at time of writing 4/5).

    Janathon day four: Napping valley

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    After a morning of milk and nappies, Mini-Ginge and I readily accepted an invitation to go for a walk with his gran this afternoon.

    We decided to venture into Cuerden Valley (home of the Cuerden Valley parkrun which started when I was pregnant and I am, perversely, looking forward to doing. I say perversely because I have a neat trick of forgetting that ‘valley’ equals ‘hills’). The walk was spent setting the world to rights, discussing diets and working out the best way to manoeuvre a pram through kissing gates. Oh, and working on my canine recognition skills when I saw a very bouncy dog that seemed to have springs for legs and cheerfully announced “you can tell why they’re called springer spaniels” for my mum to reply, “it’s a red setter…”. Back to the I-spy books for me.

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    I’m not sure how far or how long we walked for, but it was at least an hour and there was definitely some valley involved with the route. We would have kept going for a bit longer, but the daylight was going and as mum pointed out, his pram doesn’t have headlights. Himself (of course) slept for the duration.

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    Oh, and whilst I am medically exempt from the pyjama plank challenge, Mini-Ginge tried his best with one this morning.

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    The boy has better core stability than I could ever wish for.

    Physio 3/4 (at the time of writing. I do intend this to be rectified, I’m just waiting for my tea to settle).

    Janathon day three: canal yomping

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    Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer walking along water (along, not on, I’ve not got that much of a complex) than say, a dual-carriageway. I had toyed with a new route, but twitter advised me that the area was on flood alert, so I decided to have a yomp on the canal where the tidal risk is somewhat lower.

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    With the Met Office threatening heavy rain all day, I realised that I’d have to time this well to avoid looking like a really irresponsible parent. It wouldn’t be so bad if I had been taking Mini-Ginge in his pushchair, but I had a feeling that the towpath might be a bit too puddled and I had opted for putting him in his sling. If there was a downpour, I would have a very soggy baby…

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    We opted for my usual stretch with the intention of just doing half an hour. However, the sun kept shining, the sky was blue and himself was sound asleep, so we kept on going and ended up doing 50 minutes. Now, I must be suffering from Garmin deprivation because I found myself thinking “I could just round it up, just five minutes extra on the end and then turn back round…”. As I started to set off on my just five minutes extra, the sky darkened and I made it back to the car just in time…

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    Oh, and I did my physio exercises as well. They are still hard.

    Physio 3/3

    Janathon day two: Bird on a stick

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    Alright, I’ll admit it, one of the reasons that I didn’t practise my physio exercises was that I was a bit cocky. “This is just like dead easy yoga” I said to myself, “this will be a walk in the park” said I. Ha. And double ha. At today’s class I moved up to Level Two and I was rubbish. Some exercises I was fine with, but trying to do a clam with my bottom leg raised off the floor? No chance. I was wobbling like a jelly on a seesaw.

    Once I recovered from the embarrassment of being caught trying to look better at it than I actually was, I swore blind that this time I will practise them before the next class (23rd January if anyone wants to nag).

    After the class, Ginge and I took the mini one for a walk round the lodge, stopping to get a bit of lunch before we headed home. At this point I made the rash decision to go back up the short steep hill rather than the long, slow hill. Now, I can’t actually run this hill at the best of times and judging by my inability to push a pram up it without going extremely red in the face, I won’t be running it any time soon. On the plus side, Mini-Ginge and I have found our hill training (he slept through it despite the bumpy pavement and the sound of his mother wheezing). With an added loop from walking to baby clinic, this was a good three miles and is likely to be one of our regular Janathon walks (I apologise now for the repetitive bird photos).

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    Physio exercises 2/2Miles walked 3