Phill’s Weekly Wrap – Week 6 – Running, Disorganising and Cake

Gosh it’s been a hard week, and I’m not entirely sure that I’ve done a lot. It’s been a bit of an up and down week really. It’s mostly consisted or running, disorganising and cake. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about cake, a little bit of making cake and far too much eating of cake.

My long run on Saturday was limited to 21.5 km, and it felt really slow. On Sunday I did a 2 km jog and some sprints, but I felt exhausted. I don’t think I really did a lot over the weekend. I intended to, but I feel that it wasn’t all that productive. I chased a couple of my charities about paperwork that needed sorting and permissions that needed granting but mostly I spent my time tidying my room, doing my laundry and all that real life stuff I’ve been neglecting. Real life is overrated.

Monday saw me have good intentions about organising a charity gig and album. I asked about getting the correct permissions for releasing an album, and I asked a venue about whether they were available. I never quite got around to asking any bands to play and the venue told me to return on Tuesday to speak to the manager. I never quite made it back.

Tuesday happened. Or at least I suspect it happened. A rather mad work colleague pointed me in the direction of an insane challenge. So I signed up for it. I’ve not even completed my marathon yet and I’m already signed up for a 50-mile race. I’d clearly forgotten how exhausted I had felt over the weekend. Still, it’s good to keep pushing, I think this year is going to test me to my physical limits, in which case I’ll need to go out and find new limits, better limits.

Wednesday saw Laura and I finally send out the e-mail requesting cake donations for the Bake Sale. It’s all gotten a bit complicated, but I think it’s mostly sorted now. I started designing the poster for the bake sale and trying to work out how to keep track of who is donating which cakes, how to manage the allergies lists and all that sort of stuff. I didn’t finish any of it, but I made a start. I seem to be metaphorically juggling so many balls that I’m sure sooner or later one of them will land on my head and something will be a disaster. Where would be the fun in knowing that everything would work out?

By Thursday afternoon I’d had an overwhelming number of offers of cake. It’s amazing how many people have offered to help. There are some really great people here in CUED. I felt guilty that I haven’t managed to reply to them all, or organise a system for managing cake donations, or finish the poster. I need more time.

A friend had suggested that I shave my head for charity, and provide before and after photos. Given that I already have a shaved head I decided this was a fantastically silly idea, and so spent I Thursday evening shaving my head and having my photo taken. It was good to finally get around to doing a silly little shenanigan. I’ve got to try and do these more often.

Back around to Friday and I started the morning with a 5 km run. It’s clear that wherever my limits are, I’ve left them somewhere else, because this was another tired run. All the long distance stuff has really made me slow, so it was good to get some short, sharp training back in.

I’ve still totally failed to organise my charity gig or album, but there’s always next week. I’m feeling better about the bake sale and that’s something which promises to be a lot of fun. I’ve raised a little more money and still have my donation tins to open. I’ve reached 1%, so only 99% to go. I’m feeling really positive about things again. This is going to be awesome.