my Henri Cartier Bresson moment

my Henri Cartier Bresson moment, a photo by Auswomble on Flickr.

I woke up this morning wondering if WD40 would work on my knees. And ankles. And everythign else. I think I'm paying a bit for the slightly quicker run at lunchtime yesterday and my lack of any warm-down in this week's colder conditions. Proper siezed up. But I hit my metaphorical starter motor with the hammer of Move You Bastard and made my way towards work.

A slight detour to begin with this morning, courtesy of my bad memory and awesomeness in the field of responsible dog ownership. Rowlf had taken a crap before we got to my coffee stop, which I'd bagged but not managed to bin before I got to the coffee shop. Not wanting to stand and chat to Alison with a bag of shite in my hand I left said bag at the foot of a tree about 20ft from the coffee shop. I then walked straight past it when heading to the park. So, the first stop today was at that tree. I picked up the bag of now cold dog shit and run it up the hill and into the dog park where I deposited it in the shit-bin. I ran past a couple of people who, had they noticed would probabaly have been confused: was that a bloke running with a bag of dog shit but no dogs? Odd. Once through the park I was back on my usual straight-to-work route. Down through North Sydney and up on to the bridge where I copped my second soaking of the day as the rain came at me almost horizontally. Mind you, the feral weather did take my mind off of the general achiness. For a while. Once off of the bridge I was again thinking about little other than how rotten my legs felt this morning.

I picked up the cuorse I run most weeks that hugs the harbour foreshore. The rain hadn't eased much and there was a fairly stiff wind blowing. The harbour reminded me a bit of the English Channel. Only with a really big bridge. And an Opera House. And ferries. I stopped once I had run around Farm Cove and took a couple of pictures, having posted a quite random shot yesterday. When I started again the specific aches were replaced by a general achiness in both legs that actually made me feel a bit better. I doubled back towards the Harbour and then cut across the city to the office, brigning up 16km and leaving myself a run home to bring up today's total.

A couple of wet weather gripes. People of Sydney - you still need to look where you're going when it rains. Please pay attention. And if you have a fucking great umbrealla how about standing in the rain and no in the undercover spaces that people without umbrellas might be happier occupying? Or you could just put the umrella down...come on people, it's not all about you y'know.

It was Pete's last day at work today. He's a top bloke, so I dug deeper than usual and bought him a big coffee table book about the Pirelli Calendar that I would like to have on my coffee table. But don't tell the wife. So that and his leaving lunch meant it was a run home. My legs had not loosened much at all; in fact they felt decidedly ordinary. And it looked as if fate was trying to stop me from getting home.

I called Sal to see if a run home was OK and she said yes. I then kept chatting on the phone, which was a bit dumb, so I said seeya soon and hung up. Only our Japanese website had decided to blow up. Bugger...but Steve fixed it pretty sharpish, so I went and got changed, hung my work togs up and got in the lift. Which went nowhere and instead started screaming an alarm at me in an alarming way. Sod it. Lift open, I went to another and managed to get to the floor.

In the City the Garmin struggles to get a fix. I do wonder why, considering that the satellites are (I think) geostationary, the thing doesn't first look to see if I am standing in exactly the spot I was in when I switched the thing off in the morning. Nevermind; I ran to Observatory Hill, gifting the oppositing about 700m. Away from the tall buildings I had 3 satellites locked on and another 8 flashing away as they got their fixes. Then the device asked if I was indoors. No, I'm not fucking infuckingdoors! I am standing gulping car fumes in the rain, now get a fix! It did, then lost it as I went up the bridge steps; but soon enough it was all good and I was off and hobbling. I felt pretty tight and bleugh and don't have much more than that to say. As I ran along the dark bike path about a km from home I heard my phone ring. Could be work, more likely Sal wondering where I was. Neither. It was a wrong number. Some lady from Melbourne. I knew fate was against me.

I said bye-bye to the Victorian stranger and hobbled the last small climb home, very glad today's miles are over. To and from work doneski.

But hey, half way.