The spirit of the adventurer

It's day 79 today and Nicky and I ran just over 2 miles after our adopted cat woke us up early. Nicky has done brilliantly as today was day 31 of her 40 days running for Lent. That's the second time in the last week that we have extended our mile and a bit.

When I got my iPhone I downloaded a free application called Running Log, which I really like and its very simple. It allows me to enter my distance, which I get from my GPS device, the time I took and the time of day I ran. It takes seconds to enter.

I went back and entered all my runs since January 1st and it's great to see number of rest days zero, and also it's now saying total time running just over 24 hours, which feels quite a fun statistic. Although my little runs don't take that long, in total I have spent an entire day and night running. I like that.

We watched the last part of the Eddie Izzard documentary last night of his 43 marathons in 51 days. What a fantastic example of mind over matter and overcoming adversity he is in the way he dug so deep to finish that incredible challenge!

What made it even better last night was the bit where Rosie Swale Pope came out and ran a bit with him. I have almost finished reading her book "Just a Little Run Around the World" at the moment, which I can highly recommend.

Eddie and Rosie both really inspire me and are made from a similar mould. They both have a liberal sprinkling of grit, determination and an inability to accept the limitations that a "normal" person would. There's something of the historical British adventurer spirit going on there.

I wonder where that lies in me and how I access it?

Not a lot to report

Day 77 and not a lot to report. Nicky and I extended our usual daily circuit today making it a 1.75 mile route.

Ticked off, or at least passed the baton on, 12 tasks from my to do list today, although I did scribble down a list of some 26 items this morning. I knew I would never complete all 26, so 12 is pretty good, I feel.

A trip to London tomorrow, which should be fun.

New Facebook page

After struggling a little working out how to do it, I eventually managed to get a new Facebook page up - "Run a mile each day".

Completed day 75 of a mile each day this morning.

When the weather's like this sometimes it seems a shame to go so early and miss the warmth of the sun, but it does work so well to get the day off to a great start. Running later would somehow be trickier in helping the rest of the day flow.

Another couple of quotes from "Born To Run" - "Nearly all runners do their slow runs too fast and their fast runs too slow... So they're just training their bodies to burn sugar, which is the last thing a distance runner wants."

The second quote is "The way to activate your fat-burning furnace is by staying below your aerobic threshold - your hard-breathing point..."

So that seems to confirm that my running with Nicky, below my aerobic threshold, is actually good for me. Not that I would consider myself a distance runner at this point in time!

The best day of my life

I heard the story of a football manager (don't know his name) who started each day by saying "today is the best day of my life". Apparently the story was told by this manager's chairman, who went on to say that everyone loved this guy because he was so positive and so uplifting to be around. He was always open to new possibilities and opportunities.

I thought of this story and quote in the shower this morning and decided to take on the intention that today is the best day of my life.

I've run my mile, with Nicky, which was my 70th consecutive day of running and Im just preparing to go up to London to meet a couple of friends, who are ex clients and ex colleagues respectively.

I'm intrigued to know what the day might bring and know that it is completely up to me to be open to it being the best day of my life.

Day 66 - another extra mile

Although I didn't post to my blog yesterday, I did still run my mile.

Today I ran a mile with Nicky and then did an extra couple myself, so I completed just over three and a half in total, my highest for a good couple of months.

Another absolutely gorgeous morning, cold but glorious. There was a bird in our back garden, just as I was waiting for my GPS device to find a signal, doing the most beautiful singing. It really did lift both our spirits even higher than they were.

Very pleased that we knuckled down yesterday morning and cleared most of the rubble from under our floor to allow it to dry. Three sorties to the tip then followed, and then a warm glow of satisfaction from a job well done.

My Rosie Swale Pope book arrived from Amazon yesterday and I've already read the first two chapters. What an amazing, inspiring and yet ordinary (I guess that's where extra- ordinary comes from) woman she is.

I'm dumbfounded as to how little publicity she received for such an incredible feat!