**Disclaimer: I suspect that this selection of rants and raves may be more random than usual. As always, all rants and raves and moans and groans represent my own views. Numerous far less negative running blogs are available**

As always, I’d like to start by saying Good morning/afternoon/evening to whoever takes the time to read my latest blogging masterpiece. I hope that you had an amazing weekend. If you didn’t, I also had a pretty average weekend so you aren’t alone. I’ve already waffled on far too much, so here is my latest selection of rants and raves. I apologise for any repeat rants and raves. Ever since I turned 40 last May, my memory has been getting increasingly dodgy.

Rave: Women’s Running Magazine

As a runner who also loves writing, one of my long-term goals has been to have something I’ve written published in Women’s Running Magazine. A couple of weeks ago I managed  to tick this goal off as my ‘Why I Run’ interview was published in the most recent, January 2020 issue of Women’s Running Magazine.

I must admit that I found seeing the photo of me approaching the finish of the 2018 Cathedral to Castle 10 mile run in print a little bit upsetting. The Cathedral to Castle run was quite possibly one of the best runs I’ve ever experienced. I managed to complete a challenging course in a reasonable time and didn’t feel like taking a sneaky walking break once.  Unfortunately, the same race was the cause of my right knee injury, an injury I don’t think I managed to fully recover from.

Rant: My complete loss of confidence

I started 2020 vowing to be more positive, to cut down on how much time I waste procrastinating, to be more confident in my ability to do my job etc etc. I think it’s safe to say that 2020 hasn’t got off to the best of starts. I’m not sure if my inability to run regularly is impacting my mental health, but I’ve been struggling on an almost daily basis. Whenever I receive a work email asking for technical help, I feel what I can only describe as a sudden rush of fear. On more than one occasion I’ve woken up at 2am and then struggled to get back to sleep because of work-related pressures and a fear that I’m about to be dismissed.

I’m meant to be planning and running a two-day hydrology training course. I’ve been putting off setting a date and location for the training course for months, as the thought of having to spend two days presenting to a room of people makes me feel incredibly anxious. I don’t think my line manager is very impressed and I don’t think he understands why I’m so lacking in confidence. I’ve written and rewritten my letter of resignation a few times as I want to resign before my lack of technical ability is unearthed and I’m found out. I genuinely have no idea how I managed to complete a PhD a few years ago.

Rave: Action for Happiness

Founded in 2010, Action for Happiness is described as a movement of people taking action to create a happier society. I hadn’t heard of Action for Happiness until I worked in the Wallingford office. Each month, Action for Happiness publishes a calendar packed with actions people can take to help create a happier and kinder world. I thought I’d share the latest calendar.

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Action for Happiness recently developed an app that is based on the themes and actions from the monthly calendars. The app aims to give users a couple of friendly what is described as “nudges” each day. I personally love the inspiring message towards the end of each day.

Rant: Blobby pens

This may be the most random rant ever, but am I the only person who hates writing with what I call ‘blobby’ pens? You know the type of pen. You can innocently be writing away when the pen suddenly deposits a blob of ink on the page. I must be a messy writer because I then inevitably end up with ink all over my right hand, smudged all over my technical notebook and on my desk. It’s definitely a special skill I have.

I also hope that I’m not the only person who has ‘favourite’ pens. I had a suboptimal day in the office last Wednesday as I’d left all of my favourite pens at home. This meant that I had a day of smudgy note-taking. I won’t mention my sudden inability to spell what should be simple words and getting my letters mixed up. I did a spot of Dr Googling and scared myself. I need to stick to hydrology, a subject I sort of understand.

Rant: Drug cheats

After learning that two-time London Marathon winner Wilson Kipsang had been provisionally suspended by the Athletics Integrity Unit for ‘whereabouts failures’ and ‘tampering’ offences, my heart sank. I used to love athletics and would spend a significant proportion of my wages travelling around the UK to follow my favourite sport.

This latest revelation means that I’ll no longer spend money to travel to athletics events. I’ve reached the stage that I don’t believe a lot of what I see. When I hear a commentator saying a performance is out of this world or unbelievable I tend to agree with them. I have so much sympathy for clean athletes as it must be incredibly frustrating knowing that you aren’t competing on a level playing field.

Rave: New parkruns

For several years, there was a major shortage of parkruns in and around the Sutton Coldfield area. The introduction of Sutton Park parkrun back in August 2018 meant that I finally had a parkrun I could actually run to. Unfortunately, an injury and dark mornings – there’s no way I’d walk through Sutton Park in the dark – means that I’ve had to rely on getting lifts to and from parkrun. Not ideal when it means getting to Sutton Park between 8:15-8:30am when I’m volunteering.

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Step forward Beacon parkrun in Beacon Park in the centre of Lichfield. Beacon Park is located less than a 10-minute walk from Lichfield City train station. This means that I can let the train take the strain and my friend can have a Saturday morning lie-in. The inaugural event took place on Saturday and although I stayed away, I can’t wait to test out what looks like an already popular parkrun. I love Lichfield and have a feeling it may become my favourite parkrun.

Rant: Faulty clothes

One of the problems with being tall is that I have to buy my clothes online as the vast majority of high street stores have stopped stocking ‘Tall Range’ clothes.  After trying on what felt like every single jacket in my local TK Maxx, I was thrilled when I found a jacket that actually fitted and didn’t make me look like a female version of the Michelin Man. I parted with my £39.99 in a flash and left the store feeling happy.

Last week, I went to wear the jacket and was gutted when part of the zip snapped off leaving me with a sharp piece of metal and no way of fastening the zip. I’ve tracked down the receipt – easier said than done due to my pre-Christmas TK Maxx addiction – and will have to see if I can get my £39.99 refunded. I can’t see the store having a replacement jacket.

Rave: New trainers

And finally, I’ve got a bonus rave for everyone who has read this far. After several years of knee niggles and random foot injuries, it’s “farewell” to my Brooks Adrenaline GTS trainers and “hello” to these rather ugly looking Hoka One One Arahi 3 trainers.

I’ve been wearing my new trainers around the house and I think I’m falling in love. Hopefully, I haven’t spent a not insignificant amount of money on another pair of house trainers. I’m looking forward to taking them on a short test run soon.

Once again, if you managed to make it to the end of my latest selection of rants and raves, thank you! As always, I hope that my rants were reasonable and that I haven’t offended anyone.

Did you have a good weekend? Although my weekend wasn’t what I’d describe as thrilling, I had a productive weekend and managed to complete some slightly overdue adulting related chores.

Are your local parkruns getting more and more popular? A number of local events have broken their all-time attendance records on consecutive weekends. I wonder if parkrun will ever become too popular.

Do you wear new trainers inside first or do you risk it and wear them outside on a run? I’m not usually sensible, but I don’t want to risk ‘upsetting’ my temperamental right knee.

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