25th July Ironman Zoorick Just Pissing About..

"Funnily enough it's the swim I'm most worried about." said Old Nick (42) doing his first Ironman. "So long as I've got space in front of me to swim in I'll be ok - It'll be ok" He assured himself. We shuffled barefoot along with two and half thousand other rubber suited clones through the muddied grass towards the early morning lake. "Yeah and then your goggles mist up halfway through and you don't know where the hell the bouys are." i interjected, "DON'T TALK IT UP MATE! DON'T TALK IT UP!" That was the last I'd see of Old Nick and buddy Tone until 5 mins before the end of the race...  Now you can always pee in a wetsuit but try as I might I just couldn't relax the old bladder enough to get the flow started whilst I was front crawling. So I kept on, tried to forget about it but the pressure kept on mounting, Bloody Hell! Carter! it was becoming unbearable - I'd  just have to break off and tread water to finally get some relief. I knew what would happen though - as soon as you stop swimming the nearest bloody race marshal in a kayak thinks you're in difficulty. Well I WAS but not cos i was gonna drown. So this Swiss German comes paddling over just when i was in  warm relaxing midstream ach I just had to get swimming again and make straight for the porta-loos in transition one. The cycling was something best forgotten about and there was two laps of it. I stuck to coca cola and water and I think I only needed one roadside urination in the whole 112 miles. What sticks in my mind is umpah bands and steel bands and pretty girls coming past in Lycra with names like Jolleen. Any girl's name that was part of a song made you want to break out of delirium into an  appropriate refrain - "Jolleen Jolleen Jolleen JO-LLEEEEEEN! " or whatever. So the run? - well you could drink yourself silly on that and there were handy urinals every few kilometres but then I wasted so much time at the urinals I missed getting under the 14hours by 13 seconds. God damn it to hell!

24th July Prelude To An Ironman

"Have you got anything for diarrhoea?" I enquired from the steps of the medical caravan "Sorry?" "DI-A- RRHOEA" "? You have to speak slow-er" "Have you got any Immodium?" "?" "IM-MO-DI-UM" A smile of recognition appeared on the, until then, blank face of the Swiss German stand in nurse. " One moment..." I am then allotted one capsule scissored of with its foil backing. "Not good for race tomorrow!" I proffer. I'd been walking along quite happily whilst Tone was wheeling his alloy framed Ribble to the bike check-in for numbers over 2000 when a routine release of gas surprised me with that inter-cheek ominous squirting sensation instead of a satisfying trump. Bollox! Fuck it! I thought I was actually going to make it to the start line with no more than residual Natural Weakness this year. The Swiss toilets were made entirely of stainless steel with hydraulically damped retracting loo seat and integral handwash facilitiy. It seemed like a desecration - akin to shitting brown water inside a new BMW but the flushing action, something like the whirlpool of Corryvreckan, was second to none. My arse was certainly going to be additionally challenged on the 180km cycle...

20th July. Here We, Here We, Here We Fucking Go!

I had this nightmare... I mean dream... of doing Ironman Zurich... What I mean is I'm Living The Dream, shortly, which may feel like a nightmare.  This morning  I was down the leisure pool for a last splash around and the Tattooed Ironman was in the showers. I said "Ironman Zurich on sunday."  The Tattooed IM had told me some other time that "He'd never been able to get under 10 hours." And that's like saying I'm better than you, you're weak, you're just playing at it, not serious, it takes discipline to get up on dark winter mornings to train (like him).

But what if you entered an Ironman with virtually no training?  just relying on one's general state. Is it inevitable to end up in the medical tent wrapped in a space blanket with a drip set up for hydration? Its an interesting concept and to be honest I'm gonna find out on Sunday. The T. IM. is overweight and has let himself go a bit, like FB and needs to train. See if Man A. is 2 hrs faster than Man B. does that mean that A. is better than B? cos he's made more effort? Its like when FB got that award for not being fat anymore - it was for being a "better person". I didn't get an award for being thin, cos its all about Self Improvement innit? But What's the point of devoting every hour to training in order to"Improve" ?  it's a sort of perverted narrowly defined mentally ill version of Self Improvement. 

14th July. Gok Fucking Wan.

How To Look Good Fat, with that fat gay chink. Everything on the telly is for women worried about their weight apart from fucking football and if you hate Football well you're fucked aren't you. What happened to The Sweeney? "YOU'RE NICKED!"  Is it some kind of conspiracy? "SHUT IT!" I mean even Inspector Morse wasn't that female friendly "LEWIS!"  Top Gear? well that's just an exception that proves the rule. As for all those perfectly coiffed CSI style melodramas, well... and worse still that tedius saccharine sweet Grey's Anatomy dripping with cliches, bloody hell!  In turn that's only surpassed by the narrator of that gruesome Desperate Housewives, fucking desperate alright..

12th July. The Black Bull, Rothesay.

"I don't know about some of those birds in there though, they're just like eating machines with chins. They could demolish a steak in 2o seconds but I wouldn't want to shag it."

"Yes but some of them could have important jobs you haven't thought of that."

"Like what?"

"Well... like a casualty nurse."

"NO way they're fit for nothing, they couldn't even do secretarial work cause their fingers would hit more than one key."

"You mean they should be just melted down or something...Is that what you're saying?"

"Yeah made into soap. If your BMI is above a certain level you shouldn't be allowed to have children."

"Why, because its genetic?"

"No because sex between fat people is disgusting.."

10th July. Tesco Fatties (continued).

"I can't believe there's so many fat people in there" said Fat Boy, "The reason I took so long was there was this huge bird in front getting a mochafrappelattechino or something really special which came in a mug with two handles about the size of the FA Cup. Took bloody ages and the Tesco cafe's gone it's Costa now ten quid for a snack!"

"Bastards!"

~Just about everybody's misshapen nowadays."

"Bacon misshapes,"

"I don't know where they get the money from to keep themselves that big there's supposed to be a recession on."

"Do you want to try a bit of my Frescato?"

"What's that in it - ice cream?"

"I think so"

"No wonder you were such a fat cunt."

6th July. The Most Boring City In Europe

Medical Imaging Man last in a line of difficult and boring clients told me that Zurich was "The most boring city in Europe" and I can believe it, he should know. And in fact I have been to Zurich before but can remember nothing about it other than the reason I went there which was to find a Royal Bank. The Boringest City In The World! and We're goin' a Zoorick! for what is the easiest Ironman in europe perhaps the boringest Ironman, who knows? Course back in those days you couldn't get money just like that, and I'd blown my budget for a months Interailing in 3 days that's why I ended up there cos I knew as much that Zurich equals banking. Reviews of the only campsite are mixed?: "A shower will mark one, when you pay with euros, sold for 1.50." "1 weeks. but to dwell on the camp is idiocy" "Only the true great location on the lake to one at any time allows a refreshing swim, speaks for the square." "Much to see there are not on the camp. For seniors are not suitable." ?????

5th July. The Fucking And The Fighting.

Last time I was round at the flat They were just moving in with a bright future ahead, now the flat was empty save for a certain amount of detritus - hair grips, one pence pieces, fluff. Back then the main concern was that the grill wasn't working and so He wouldn't be able to make cheese on toast "Can't live without cheese on toast! (Chuckle chuckle)." I remember scrabbling about looking at the back of the cooker in vain for a serial number. She was young but then so was He but not as young as She, I didn't want the grill to cast a shadow over their relationship. Still nothing further was heard about the grill malfunction as greater concerns must have taken hold, like the fact that they couldn't live together, with or without the cheese on toast. Well I was hoovering everywhere and under the Ikea bed some of the supporting struts had come adrift like the springing had taken more of its fair share of cyclical loading... Then, "They must have had a fight!" pronounced IB indicating that one wardrobe door had a big dent right through the MDF wood panel effect panelling. Well there we are Love's Young Dream - gone wrong. Next tenant in the pipeline a single mum, apparently. Scratch the surface and there's nowt but failure and loneliness but the babies keep coming.

26th June. Still Basking In The Glory! Yes!

FB naturally made light of the resounding and conclusive defeat claiming that he "hadn't been on a bicycle since last June." However, much of the cycle was gravity assisted, the additional bulk, an unfortunate by-product of newfound cosy lasagna filled weekends 'having people round' in Stockbridge, would have been no handicap. Latest news from FB centres around the acquisition of a titanium frame to form the basis of a machine that is both light and yet strong enough for the heaviest of duties without fatiguing. And for me, I have found hidden depths to my own self - bask bask, bask bask. (Deep down I'm really really shallow.) I mean let's not worry about the other 112 that finished in front of me, this was a two horse race - Age and Decrepitude V. Youth and Vigour, The Whippet and The Walrus. Gloat gloat, gloat gloat.

20th June. Highland X. Victory Blog Entry.

"You just took off like a fucking whippet" was the description given by Fat Boy of my bid to get past some of the other competitors and away from his constant farting and belching on the narrow footpath through kintail. Then something got into me - why always try to conserve energy for what's ahead? why not just blow the whole fucking lot and see what happens? Besides, they were begining to annoy me - the other runners, pussy footing around on the descents especially wimmin. "Oooh That guy's motoring" shrieked one to another as I barged between their conversation mid sentence. Now I was just running willy-nilly off the track at every descending bit passing runners 6 at a time. "It looked like you were only running a 5k" said FB. Then I was out of sight, thank fuck for that, if I could get far enough ahead he might not catch me on the bike... Anyway George, who'd elected to join the walkers for the 20 miles and get sunburnt, told FB when they exchanged words at the bike changeover that " I was about 10 mins ahead" . Answer - "I'll catch him up!". Yes, I knew it! Didn't I just! Once FB got those massive thighs over the cross bar of that kindly loaned carbon bike he'd be down on those fucking aero-bars "Gunning it all the way" and confident oh so confident. Now that excess weight would be a positive advantage on the downhill closed to other traffic road out of Glen Affric. There I was on that crap old Raleigh with this vision of those massive quads powering down in a high gear and his eyes peering through dark glasses at the road ahead like some sort of Hunter-killer closing in to pick me off like the weakest member of a herd of wildebeast. I had to use every advantage to the max, getting 6 inches behind anyone elses back wheel who was going faster than me in this draught legal cycle section, flying new road chips or not. My calves ached and my knees objected and surely this bloody pedalling into the wind would end soon CHRIST!, I daren't look behind, some kid sat in a roadside deck chair shouted "9 miles to go!" Then there were a few uphills. SCHISSEN! the 'peleton' disbanded when someones chain came off, BASTARDS! I'm losing momentum, I was shagged. Beauly 2 miles. OH GOD! it would be such a waste if he caught me now! Beauly 1 mile Come ON!. Some guy playing the bagpipes, people with beer clapping, one left turn past the Local Polis, just one straight bit with a tiny rise, I glanced over my shoulder, no sign of the black helmeted hulk looming large and breathing heavy like a bull, then some guy waving his arms towards the finish, I'm gonna do it! I even past someone else at the line, 4 hr 52ins YES YES YES YEEEES !!!!!!

23rd May. Motorcycle Tour of Arran, Islay & Jura.

There comes a time in every woman's life when they have to 'let themselves go' or more politely - 'surrender gracefully to the years' . However a woman is held in considerable disdain by other women if they 'let themselves go' at too early a point in the aging process, naturally the converse is true (mutton Vs. lamb), so every woman walks a tightrope when it comes to appearance and more specifically levels of macquillage. These thoughts passed through my mind on the bumpy and twisty road between Brodick and Lochranza with Isabelle riding pillion and a rucksack of cosmetics jammed up my arse. Each woman judges anothers efforts at attempting to recreate the authentic bloom of youth, a look that shouts to the world "I'm still viable!!" This inevitably losing battle supports a vast industry of supply, (every point of deceleration served as a pointed reminder). Techniques involve basecoat, primer/filler, application of David's Isopon, meticulous sanding down with 1000 grade wet or dry, custom metal flake and then it's all topped off with up to 40 coats of cellulose lacquer to acheive that desired lustrous deep sheen. To be fair every attempt had been made to whittle the number of products down to an absolute bare minimum for ' travelling light'. But it's not easy - a badly done paint job is so easily held up for ridicule which would be far far worse than simple disdain.

20th April. All The Speed of a Dying Turtle

This morning there was this kid, 16, going up and down the pool at a rate of knots I'd only be able to keep up for 2 lengths, and he wasn't red in the face or out of breath or anything and by the time the fire alarm went off he'd already done 150. It's just depressing i mean the likes of Talkative ken, Feisty E. and the Tattooed Ironman, even Durham Dave they're all faster but not that much and they all had to stop and make way for that bloody kid and they just stood and stared from the shallow end it was just depressing. "I could never be that fast whatever i did" bleated Feisty E. "What sort of attitude is that? I said. But secretly as a consistent loser I'm warming to my latest idea - Lands End to John O'Groats without a bicycle, just running. That's been done, even somebodys Granny did it in 12 days 15hrs and its 840 miles. It's unlikely anyones done it barefoot though even the Naked Rambler had boots on if nothing else and besides he's only got as far as The Bar-L. This would be a sort of a variation on the "If you can't be famous you can always be infamous" thing. Currently I can only manage about a quarter of a mile on tarmac. Maybe the whole thing's not possible? Chavs and broken glass, needles etc could be a problem, have to keep the route hush hush.

9th April. Ultramarathon - My Fucking Arse!

"I really think you should go to A&E with that foot thing" I gloated from the comfort of my single bed at The Gladstone B&B, which I was really really really pleased wasn't a dream I was having somewhere in a forest by the side of Loch Ness at night. Yes, Fat Boy was certainly incapable of running the morning after the very long night of the lying down and staring up at spruce trees and drizzle. "It could be serious" I emphasized. The Great Glen Death March had been cancelled in a stealth move by the organisers but several competitors had started anyway, there just wouldn't be a burger van. Kevin from Bristol and Billy The Bulgarian from London soon got ahead despite the bulgarian being weighed down with polenta as he had a gluten allergy, "Guys you want some polenta?" so the lack of the burger van was no loss for him. In fact what was the sixty quid entrance for anyway? A couple of older seasoned dudes brought up the rear shepherding The Only Woman. Nausea set in by about 2 or 3 am together with an overpowering need to go to sleep. " I'll set the alarm for 6 mins" said FB as we lay and stared up at spruce trees and the drizzle. I kept saying "I'd perk up when the dawn came" but after about 15 hours of running I was just talking even more nonsense than usual and the lying down had got more and more frequent. "We'll never make the 24 hour cut off" whined FB and "I'd perk up soon" but also that it was "funny how everything was made of plastic". FB said that if I continued for the last 16 miles he'd be forced to accompany me because he doubted that in a worsening state of delerium I'd ever be able to find Inverness. So we ended up having steak pie and chips with me nodding off and saying WHAT WHAT WHAT? every mouthful and then got a taxi. In effect an abject failure at 50 miles again. What a brilliant steak pie though. And a 2 hour wait at casualty revealed Repetitive Strain Injury for FB. Awwww...

26th February. Ultra-Marathon Showdown.

Fat Boy, rather foolishly IMO, signed up for this self supported 100k Fort William to Inverness race, I felt obliged to follow suit in a spirit of bitter rivalry. FB is untried over anything more than 38 miles following biomechanical breakdown in last years Great Glen 5-0. It's unclear if this event is a sort of mutually supportive buddying thing or another Demolition Derby where the 'winner' is the one who starts crying last. "I'm not sure about the logistics, we could drive to Ft William and run to the start at Banavie as a warm up." "You must be feckin joking, there's no way I'm adding another 2 miles to it." My official Great Glen Way mug which I'm now drinking tea out of says 73 miles, since when did 100k equate to that? The whole thing kicks off at 9pm at night, the highlight is a burger van stationed somewhere halfway with haggis for sale so it'll be heartburn & indigestion as well as joint pain the rest of the way to Inverness ?

22nd February. Showing Off In Front Of Girls.

The climbing wall environment, particularly if heated, brings in roughly equal numbers of males and females. The obese tend not to frequent the 'Avertical World' and even the slightly portly are disadvantaged, so there is both 'fitness' and as Fat Boy puts it 'Proximity'. The 'Young Bucks' vie with each other on the bouldering section with ever more wild gymnastic displays, this is an indirect showing off in front of girls, they pretend to be not interested. There are 'couples' who stop to embrace or even kiss in between climbs, if a man is part of a couple he must be very careful not to look at another womans arse halfway up the wall and concentrate only on the arse of the woman he is with and the management of her rope "ARE YOU WATCHING ME!! FOR FUCKS SAKE." I look up at Fat Boys arse somewhere above as he endeavours to pull his top down over any residual love handles when he gets a chance. Yes the climbing wall is like a giant fallopian tube and the men are like sperm undergoing some sort of selection process. What use is a fat sperm that can't get off the ground? Better a graceful one that makes a 6c+ look effortless. I attempt a 6b, all rounded black smooth things with nothing to get hold of, this results in me spinning round in space on the end of the rope like those useless sperm destined to go round in circles.

20th February. Another Complete Arse Up.

The S's new house was the sort of house where simply entering it seemed to make a mark, somehow cause a blemish on it's pristine interior. Left alone with whole floor areas designated for walking on by the laying out of dust sheets I made my way to the bathroom, the inner sanctum. The bathroom is always first when it comes to cleanliness and order, these days everything is white. Actually making use of the toilet seems like an insult, as if the bowl is there purely for display only. These new houses have a high standard of insulation, which means the attic is basically a sea of fibreglass several feet deep. Needless to say this makes stepping from one obscured ceiling joist to the next a matter of a certain amount of guesswork. Things had been going quite reasonably with a constant back and forth down the whole length the attic when, inevitably, lost in a vaguely erotic reverie brought on by boredom I heard the tell tale crack of the ceiling giving way underfoot like a skater on thin ice. SHIT SHIT SHIT. I made my way down the loft ladder and opening the door of the spare bedroom, where "things" had been put for safekeeping out of the way of any potential dust and mess. You could hardly miss it, there was no pretending, a 2 foot square piece of plasterboard was hanging by one edge like a second loft access. There was also a fair bit of mess. To cut things short, I had to "fess up" immediately on the S's homecoming and also reveal that I'd managed to break part of the hoover. "I'll have to buy you another vacuum cleaner" "??"

9th February. Thoughts In Maccy D's.

As recently as 1980 I remember being dragged across central London by Harry H. to "Have a real burger!" "Lads you've got to try this!" It's almost unbelievable that there was probably only about one McDonalds in the whole of Britain but it was like one rogue cell, a restaurant that had gone wrong, a cancer that just kept multiplying swamping everything in mediocrity. That's what's good about McDonalds - you know what you're going to get - something mediocre, which is better than something that's really really bad, so with that and the ease of parking it's a formula that has worked for long enough. I'm not really a fan of Maccy D's, don't get me wrong but I kind of feel at home with the mediocrity and I like to look at the fat people and think how they'd never manage the cut off in an Ironman just to make me feel better about my own mediocre achievements. There was a woman there tonight who almost wasn't human, it might have been her uterus sticking out or maybe she had lost a lot of weight like down from 40 stone to 20, but it just didn't look natural - when something hang downs like that below the belt, I couldn't see her getting very far on a bike especially with Tri bars. Some people are dead against MacDonalds cause of ranching in Brazil or additives or de-skilling of the workforce or the McDonaldisation of the globe. but if it's so shit why are they everywhere? The answer is mediocrity and I'm comfortable with that, not an abject failure as a human being but not an unqualified success either...

7th February. Night Of A Thousand Gulps.

Imagine the sound of a slowly but intermittently dripping tap about 2 feet from your pillow.  2 am, then it stops, maybe it's stopped for the night? Just have to wait and see. Yes it's definitely stopped now - peace.    Plop... ARRRGGHH!! no it's off again plop plop....plop...............plop....plop.  That fucking fish is driving me mental! It's only doing it on purpose and it's just the one that does it. "Why don't you put the gulping one down the toilet then they'll be more oxygen for the one that's left?"  "No way! they're great friends they've been together for over 12 years." 

 

5th February. Old Rope For Money.

I'm standing looking straight up at Fat Boy's arse which is about forty feet above me at "The World's Largest Indoor Climbing Arena" my thoughts are turning to Health and Safety a subject that seems to haunt these diatribes like a restless malevolent spirit. Although accidents are very infrequent at artificial climbing walls FB had still expressed some concern about "trusting the rope" and me as well for that matter, when, at the top of the climb one is required to lean back and be lowered to the ground. "Purely psychological" but privately, to be quite honest how much can this particular rope really be trusted? It looks ok no signs of mice but since I picked it up at Errol car boot sale a few years ago along with a well used ice axe I began to wonder... As soon as the mind gets on that track paranoia sets in and the whole thing quickly becomes an accident waiting to happen, FB plummeting like a sack of turnips seems guaranteed. I mean say the rope's only been used once but that one time it was well used in a 60 foot drop? maybe it dates from the mid 70's? a clmbing harness should be "retired" after 3 years so what about rope? Preoccupied with the snapping/fraying idea I fail to see the remaining coils on the ground getting in a complete fankle whilst FB is being lowered gently, to avoid any undue strain on the possibly UV degraded fibres. "Just hang on a minute!" I say. FB is ordered to cling back to the wall whilst I unravel the mess of old rope... I cast an eye round hoping my level of incompetence has passed unoticed.

1st February. The Role of Genes In Common Illnesses.

"We are inviting you to take part in a research project..." began the letter, the essence is to take blood, measure everything then see whether you go mental and die or just die. Course my interest was piqued straight way being pre occupied not only with death but also going nuts, the only snag was the "Providing a blood sample bit.." but you know you cannnot spend your life hiding behind a screen of Trypanophobia, it's a bit like saying your still afraid of the Daleks. "We are particularly interested in people with a large family?? well I'm afraid the results are already in for the majority of them because they're all fucking dead. Auntie Ruth went a bit Dulali-tap it's true but how much of a genetic component was involved? Mother had it that Auntie R. began a downward spiral after seeing a horror movie something about a Mummy in a waxworks with boyfriend Steve, it was either that or a lifetime with Steve that drove her mental. She did stand up and take issue with the minister at the crematorium during Steve's funeral. I've got a half brother and he's reached that point where he's on drugs to combat the effects of the drugs he's on, then drugs to combat the effects of the drugs to combat the drugs he's on and so on, so his questionaire would be quite a lengthy piece of written work. So I may be barred because I haven't got enough relatives. My brother's father - we'll never know if a lifetime with Mother would have driven him mental or not because he never got beyond about 23 thanks to Rommel's panza divisions.