Bonking...

It was pointed out to me that I should be more careful with my language. When I stated earlier this week that I “bonked” during my weekend run, I was using the term in its American sense, which as everyone knows is to become exhausted while exercising due to the depletion of glycogen.

I was not using it in its more proper English sense, which according to the American’s Guide to Speaking British is "Bonk - Same meaning as shag. Means to have sex. E.g. 'Did you bonk him/her?'."

However, I was similarly surprised and amused at the sponsored link that popped up when I Googled the term “bonking”.

Now you all know where you can get it – just go to eBay.

Anti-Bush Protests...

In recent weeks, there have been protests against the Bush government here in Sacramento (just down the street from my house actually). A motley crew of sign and flag waving people gathers at the intersection of Broadway and Land Park Drive and solicits responses from the passing traffic. As far as I could see they were getting a lot of positive support.

It’s good to see this reaction going on again. For a long while there were weekly protests against the Iraq war, but they fizzled out last year. Now it seems there is a bit more enthusiasm for this type of thing.

Way Too Cool

Saturday was the Way Too Cool 50K – the run I have been training for all this year. The weather forecast was quite foreboding, with possible snow in the area, and a sever storm warning. Thankfully the weather people got it wrong, very wrong, and it turned into quite a nice day – cool, but dry and even some sun at the end of the day. There was a lot of water from the storms earlier in the week, so all the stream crossings were in full flow and for most of the course we were slopping through mud – all good fun!

I finished in just under 7 hrs and that felt like quite long enough to be on your feet – I was pretty tired. There were some dark times for me in the middle of the course when I bonked pretty bad coming up the infamous “Ball Bearing Hill”. I did a lot of walking after that, and a lot of evaluation of why I was doing this silly thing. But by mile 25 things picked up and I sort of enjoyed the finish.

So what’s next? During the middle of the run, I had vowed never ever to do a long trail run, but now I am thinking - I am somewhat trained now so why not keep going .That means the American River 50 Miler next month – now there is something really foolish.

Lunchtime encounters…

At lunchtime today, I went over to my local REI to get some essentials for everyday life (Gu), and I had the strangest encounters. In the store I saw two friends who I hadn’t seen for quite sometime and I got quite opposite reactions.

When I walked in the store I was greeted by a hearty “Hey Steve” and my first encounter came up to me shook hands and then hugged me like a long lost brother. Now you know, we Brits do not do this hugging thing very well, particularly between the male of the species, but that was all right; it was good to see him and we chatted for a while and all was well with the world.

Then I walked to the back of the store and saw my other friend, who I called out to – “Hey Jim!” (Name changed to protect the identity). He didn’t respond, so I called out again, and this time he did look at me and I said hello again, but again no reaction. So I said, “Jim, it is Jim isn’t it?” and he looked at me blankly and said “No”. On that I moved on. Now, I would normally assume that I had made a mistake, there are indeed people that look similar out there, but no I couldn’t have, Jim has a distinctive car which just happened to be in the parking lot, and there is just no way it was not him.

So I was left wondering what on earth is going on with the world. How could I bump into the extremes of friends within 5 minutes of each other? Even with the hugging (full frontal might I add, we Brits do better with a side on hug sometimes) I preferred the first encounter and was just baffled and troubled by the second.

A couple of good films

This last week I saw a couple of very nice films. The first one was The World’s Fastest Indian (as in Indian the motorcycle). I read a review and it said that it was a must see for anyone who has been saying they are “too old for this sort of thing anymore” and, I must admit, I have been saying just that lately. So this sounded like the film for me.

I thought it was wonderful, a great story, even a true story, a great piece of acting by Anthony Hopkins, and it even had motorbikes in it! What more could you ask for? And yes, for those of us saying we are too old for this sort of thing, it is an inspirational movie and you know the answer, we are never too old.

The other movie I saw was Grizzly Man. I missed it at the theatre so I watched it on DVD. I had heard the story line of this movie and it hadn’t really interested me so much, but what a great piece of film-making it was, both by the subject of the documentary, Tim Treadwell (who shot some great scenes of bears in the wild), and by the director Werner Herzog (who put the whole thing together). Tim Treadwell was the man who lived with the Grizzly Bears in Alaska. He was quite nuts I am sure, and he inevitably got what was coming to him, in that he got eaten by the bears, but the amazing thing was that he survived for 13 years in that extremely risky position before succumbing and in the process he captured some very good video records.

One of the bonus things about the DVD is that there is a added film about the making of the soundtrack to the main film. The main person involved in that effort was Richard Thompson (of whom I have a great deal of respect and admiration). So anyone who is a Richard Thompson fan, get the DVD and watch the soundtrack movie. For me it was as interesting as the movie itself.

Its a shame that none of these films got any nominations for the upcoming Oscars this year.