Turning 30 hasn’t been so bad. I had a fantastic weekend with my friends and my family doing what I generally do best (eat lots of food). And recently so much good stuff has been happening.
Having a birthday that sits on a Tuesday is pretty lame but actually I had a really lovely day. I’d obviously brought cakes in for everyone but I was really chuffed to find my work colleagues had bought 12 brownies from the amazing Melted cafe in Hilsea in Portsmouth.
I’ve tried these brownies before and honestly they’re probably the best brownies I’ve ever had. They’re really dense and stodgy. I’m not really a fan of the more cakey and light brownies. I like them to be gooey. And these are so gooey. There were two kinds: Oreo brownie and peanut butter brownie. I thought it was caramel so went with that one.
I’m not a huge peanut butter fan but actually this was crazy good. Chunks of peanut butter in it with all the dense chocolate. It was so so good. My colleagues know me well clearly! Of course I shared them, though it was like a dagger to my soul every time someone took one… 😉 I did make sure I snagged an Oreo one to take home and put in Anna’s Glorious Cake Freezer though!
Speaking of good food and lovely people, the amazing Jude (@RunnerViking) sent me some WHITE CHOCOLATE Lion Bars all the way from Scotland.
I’d been moaning about not being able to find them in shops and she was kind enough to buy me a few and send them to me. They arrived in perfect timing for my birthday. I’m SO excited. She’s an awesome person and an awesome runner 🙂
And as we’re on the theme of awesome people and white chocolate… my lovely lovely uni friends bought me the BEST present for my birthday. A white chocolate crazy rocky road chunk of heaven. It’s from Choccywoccydoodah. White chocolate covering marshmallows, jelly babies, nougat, honeycomb. I mean MY GOD.
I won’t lie, I’ve cracked into that bad boy already. I meant to only have a bite but ended up eating maybe almost half (OK OK two thirds). It was just phenomenal. I mean what was nice was that every bite was different – which is probably why I kept going.
They also got me a jar of hand-picked sweets from the Brighton sweet shop (Sugar Sin) which I’ve been to a few times and ADORE. The sweets aren’t you’re usual pick ‘n’ mix sweets, they’re crazy sweets you can’t get in the UK. So needless to say, I am very chuffed.OK one last food-related item… I saw this at my new gym and it really made me laugh.
It’s a twist on that famous line in Notting Hill (one of my favourite rom coms). Don’t get me wrong, I do love a salad (as long as it’s a big salad) but I think we can all agree there are definitely days when you just wish it was a giant doughnut.
Speaking of my new gym (how good are my seamless tangents today eh!), I’m really getting into the spin classes. I’ve tried Les Mills Sprint, RPM and The Trip. RPM is probably my favourite as it’s hard but the instructors and music really keep you going. Sprint is just Go Go GO and The Trip is…well, a trip really.
You basically follow a route on the screen and put your resistance up when you get to a hill and then beast it on the downhills. The “routes” you go on are either normal places like San Francisco or they’re crazy worlds (very trippy). It’s good fun though.
Does anyone remember the old skool ipods? My dad is a proper technology geek and as a family we were early adopters of most new technology and gadgets (like game consoles and mp3s – anyone remember the Microsoft Zune? No…?) so I was the first one in my school with one (yes really, it was 2003 – it wasn’t mine though I hasten to add, but borrowed from my dad) and I remember people looking at it in wonder and asking what it was. Yes I could really keep 1,000s of songs on there. This wasn’t even the first version of the iPod we had. I dropped it about four times and as it was in warranty I could keep sending it back and they’d send me a new one (oh those were the days…). And then the last time I dropped it they sent me the updated version. It’s amazing because now we just use our phones to store music. Mental. I can even remember when they became colour.
And one last thing I’ve recently been loving is the episode I listened to from the Ben Coomber Radio podcast. I have a love-hate relationship with Ben Coomber. I do rate him as I think he’s super hardworking and driven and has a lot to give in terms of knowledge and passion, but there are also things he does or says that I struggle with (or cause excessive eye rolls). But I listened to his interview with James Haskell and I really enjoyed it.
James Haskell has such a no nonsense approach to training and keeping fit. He has a very direct and blunt way of talking and a lot of sound solid knowledge. It’s worth a listen if you’re into that kind of thing (strength training, fitness in general and social media). Also, he has a very weird fascination with diggers (to the point he actually has one loaned out to him…).
Did you have the iPod back in the day?
What podcasts do you listen to?
Chocolate or sweets? It’s probably chocolate for me but I ADORE pick ‘n’ mix from the cinema.
Afterwards I grabbed a cold drink in the cafe with my friends and we chilled outside in the sunshine.
Despite eating stupid amounts I really fancied some pick ‘n’ mix for the film. It’s been a while since I’ve had some. You can’t beat some super cheap sweets in my opinion. Yes they’re full of awful ingredients and so much sugar, but sometimes you just need something basic.
The film we saw was Logan Lucky and it was brilliant. If you like Ocean’s 11 then you’ll love this. It was quick, quirky and hilarious. Daniel Craig is fantastic. It’s one to see twice I think.
We struggled a little at the end. Mike was starting to feel a bit dizzy. I was now dreading my four solo miles, wondering if I should just call it quits after 12. It was very tempting. But I decided that when we stopped I’d run up to my flat, drink some cold water and grab my phone and headphones so I could keep motivated by listening to a podcast.
My four miles went well. I suddenly had a second wind and was able to zone out to my podcast and focus on just getting the last bit done. I told myself just do three but went a route that meant I had to do four (oh the games we play to get through tough runs). I felt really good when I finished. Gave me a bit of confidence for the marathon!
By this point I really was drained and had a terrible headache. I was staying at my parent’s house that evening (I haven’t moved in yet) and couldn’t seem to work out if I needed a nap, food or water. I was probably quite dehydrated. I camped out on my parent’s outside furniture with a Starbucks I’d bought on the way over, but also made sure to drink water as well.
I text Mike and he said he had a bad headache too. I reckon we both caught a bit of sunstroke, being out in the sun for 2.5 hours. I’d never sunbathe for that long! Even after taking some headache tablets the headache still lingered. The next morning it had thankfully disappeared but god my legs ached. I am definitely not in peak marathon running shape!
We thought it’d be about a mile and a bit but it turned out to be almost 3 miles! And it was really warm. But it was a nice walk, and it helped shake my legs out a bit.