LE JOG

[Nigel]

Some belated catching up is long overdue around here. My last posting left me lying in a February ditch, cold, uninspired (and unemployed, to boot).

But as Andy says, we all need time to think.

I picked it up as the month went on, plodding the lanes of South Devon with the energy of renewed motivation and a desire for change. A detour or two detained me -- first to Ivybridge on Dartmoor, where my parents celebrated their honeymoon many years ago. From there, on to Torquay where my grandfather retired when I was a boy. Beside the beach and the harbour, along the road where he lived out his final years and eventually on to the cemetery in Newton Abbot where now he lies deep amidst the red Triassic marl.

A reflective step took me then on February's final leg, alongside Britain's most famous and spectacular stretch of coastal railway -- built by Isambard Kingdom Brunel himself -- from Dawlish into Exeter.

A difficult month, with the faint shadow of an unknown tomorrow lurking beyond the dark winter horizon. After a slow and heavy-stomached start in January, February might just have been the month when the weight gain train was turned around, as 4 kg fell behind me on the hedge-lined lanes set between Plym and Exe.

The durability of such progress is never sure, as the appetite for change is always measured out alongside a reckless hunger for the moment. Month end was duly celebrated with a homage to the great engineer and his Great Western Railway at Exeter Railway station, over a West Country scone, fat trouser-fittingly adorned with Devon clotted cream...


February 2010 distance run: 106 miles
February 2010 days run: 16

2010 to date: 202 miles
2010 days run: 33

Weight at 01 Jan 2010: 95 kg
Weight at start of February: 94 kg
Weight at end of February: 90 kg

LeJog 2010 - A Year of Running - February