Oh hai Internet! Long time no see!

Remember me? I know, we used to be so close and now we barely see each other. And I’ve changed so much you barely recognize me. I’m sorry. I’m sure we’ll grow closer again and hang out all the time. In the meantime let me tell you what I’ve been up to.

See I’m on another one of my health freak streaks. It all started with the bike of course, but it seems now I can’t stop. It’s an addiction like any other, but one that’s actually good for me so I shall make the most of it while it lasts.

See on Monday I went for a bike ride. It was only gonna be a short trip, it was already quite late (I’d worked until 8.30), but in the end it was actually quite long. And it was friggin’ AMAZING!!!! I struggled up some pretty bad hills, which is rewarding in its own way, but then of course you get the additional reward that there will be a downhill afterwards. Oh man I’m such a sucker for speed!!!! 49.8km/h (31mph) max. What a rush! =P~

And since I have the cool Runkeeper app Tobias recommended, you can see the full trip here. So not only does it show you the distance and the way I went, but also the elevation and speed along the route. And if you hover along the graph with your mouse it shows you whereabouts along the route that corresponds to. So so cool! 😀

After that it was quite late and I went to bed after a late dinner of boiled vegetables.

On Tuesday I decided to go for a longer and more “planned” trip (Monday was more like “oh let’s try to go up that hill. ok, now I’m here where shall I go… oh what about Rottingdean?” etc). Did I tell you I bought an Ordnance Survey Map? So using that I planned a route to Shoreham Harbour. Ok it was only semi-planned in that I thought “I’ll go inland a while, then turn left and drive to Shoreham through all those little residential streets”. It actually turned out interestingly zigzaggy – a lot more than I was aware of at the time. You can see it here. There was a lot of up and down going through those streets – which was exhausting but planned. What wasn’t planned was the awful wind I had going against me on the way back along the sea. For 10 fucking kilometers!!! I was so fucking dead when I got back.

That did not however keep me from going for a swim in the sea the next day (yesterday that is)! (I do recover easily from death *lol*) I am happy to report that this is now much less cold than a few weeks ago and in fact rather pleasant, even tho it was quite cold getting out (it had suddenly got cloudy and windy). My ears also didn’t like the sea much (sore skin outside and pressure problems inside). So I made the decision not to go again for a few weeks.

After a light dinner of a sandwich and a bowl of spinach I went for a short bike ride – really short this time, not 17km short lol. I put the “going against the wind” thing to the test by doing the same route both ways: wind ahead and wind behind me. The results were surprising to me: even tho it felt a lot harder going against the wind, the difference was minimal (avg speed 21.14kmh vs 23.53kmh). It must be noted that the wind was not actually pushing me on the way back since I was still faster, but I did have less wind resistance than on the way out. Anyway. So that was interesting.

Today I threw my no-sea decision to said wind and went for a swim on my lunch break. OMG it was so cool! I mean how many people get to spend their lunch break in the sea!? The weather was also lovely (really hot), and there were fun people around, and one guy with a dog that was obviously having a blast in the water! The first leap it made into the sea was sooo cool! :))

One reason I’d gone at lunchtime was because I figured it would be too cold after work. But then it wasn’t and the sea was calling again (seriously, once you’ve been you can’t keep away) so off I went again. I was in for 15mins or so, went to dry off, then went in again for a final paddle. And just as I’d decided to go home cuz it was getting cold comes this lady “oh I’m so happy you’re in here!” and started chatting to me (turns out she doesn’t like being in the sea on her own cuz she’s from South Africa and there are sharks there and if there’s one around a flag goes up and everyone leaves the water. Then when the shark’s gone the flag goes down and everyone gets back in the water! So being alone probably feels wrong and “haven’t seen the flag”-like or sth :)) ).

So she sorta coaxed me into staying in with her, and to swim way out with her (further than I’ve ever been I think – all the way to the buoys that mark the limit of the swim area), and we were pretty much chatting all the way. She was so cute, getting super-excited about the water. :)) She was also quite interesting, a behavioural therapist from Essex (well that’s where she lives now) who’s travelled all over the world and settled in Britain for her gf, and she was in Brighton for a conference (along with lots of other behavioural therapists from Essex :)) ). So there’s me the lazy introvert small-talking with a complete stranger while swimming in the sea. Doesn’t get much less Clarissa than that. :)) I’m very glad I stayed in tho, it wasn’t so cold anymore once we were moving, and well, she was fun (apart from the ZA accent, which I’m not too keen on), and it was more exercise for me. 😀

So yeah as already hinted at I’m also eating healthily again. I’m probably getting about 10 of my 5 a day at the moment. 😀 And eating next to no meat. The only thing that’s still very me is my hair, which is currently being dyed bright red in preparation of (and that’s again less me) the upcoming London week-end meeting lots of scary strangers (and I’m not allowed to get drunk to make it less scary, heh). I am very excited about meeting A tho, the girl who emailed me about “befriending someone” before the gathering to be less scared. She sounds sooo cool and we’ve been emailing back and forth (something I’ve not properly done in years) so it’ll be like a proper old fashioned “meeting an Internet person” thing. 😀

Well that’s all my news Internet. I won’t be seeing much of you over the week-end either, maybe I’ll spend some time with you next week. I hope you still love me though!

I’m off jogging now! (seriously. I don’t like that my Runkeeper is cycling only. It needs some variety :)) )

PJ (post-jogging) Ok never again. Never ever! I hated every single minute, every second of it. Why should I torture myself to get fit when I can get fit doing something fun – and that actually has a point!! Stupid stupid jogging. Stupid.