Cars or cards?

I cooked, but before you think of me as a capable kind of guy in the kitchen, I know only how to cook two things: the ubiquitous male Bolognese and a chicken dish that has bacon, leeks and honey.  Last night it was the turn of the latter and Nick came to share so we also had a couple of bottles of wine between the three of us to help it down.  Which is probably why I have a headache right now.

The spare bed claimed another admirer: pretty amazing for a relatively inexpensive, light as a feather, one-sided mattress on an old futon base.  Whatever its secret, it’s zzzzlicious so if you’re suffering from sleepless nights let me know and we’ll try it out on you!

It was beautifully sunny when we got up and after the obligatory quadspresso, Nick and I set off in our running gear.  It was really springlike and for about ten minutes I wished I’d just worn shorts & a t-shirt.  Until I realised how cold it was in the wind on the exposed stretches.  We headed out across the Common and then took a path south that I’d not introduced Nick to before.  He had complained that his shoes were dirty (barely so, readers!) and that he planned to wash them later, so I chose this path partly because I knew it would be good & muddy.

It didn’t disappoint… it was the muddiest I’d ever seen it down there.  As we slithered and slid, laughing all the way, so I enquired as to whether, given the choice, he preferred cars or cards.  Well used to my daft questions he obliged with a comprehensive answer (basically, cars) and he was not then in the least fazed five minutes later when we were faced with a small river to cross by a pretty cottage.  I took the bridge whilst he had to contend with the Ford, which he did with consummate grace!

As the mud got worse, so I was forced to tighten my shoelaces so I didn’t lose my runners as I ran through the middle of it.  We turned west onto a tarmac road and cut down and through Ditchling and carried on behind Keymer to the railway line.  Then our run started to fall apart.  There were a series of grassed fields, each with a well worn path around the edge, so we gradually headed north until we suddenly ran out of path.  There was a well worn cut-through so we ducked past a fence onto another path and headed north again… except this turned out to be someone’s driveway.  Someone with a dog.

I grew up around dogs and even used to walk two in the lunchtimes at my primary school, but somewhere around aged ten an Alsatian bit my football, the owner was unrepentant and I no longer felt comfortable around them.  So as this dog challenged us and Nick quickly folded his arms to make it more difficult to lose them, I quite literally cowered behind him!

The owners were lovely and very helpful and allowed us to continue through and down their lane.  But then we had a really close call.  There appeared on our right a gate of the kind that walkers and runners are very familiar with, so thinking we had found a bridle-path we headed through into a field.  Something didn’t seem right and as we paused so a lady shouted for us to get back on the lane.  We obliged and as we headed down to where she was standing, a large Alsatian came racing across the field at full pelt, gnashers out ready for breakfast.  Which we clearly would have been and ‘Trespassers will be Eaten’ would not have been an inappropriate sign!

Back on the right side of the law again, we headed back to the house for breakfast ourselves.  Ten miles in one hour 54 minutes works out to a pedestrian 5.3mph, but it was muddy, we did get lost and we also had to stop a couple of times to save our bacon.  If success can be measured in terms of the amount of mud Nick would have to wash off his runners when he got home, it was a very successful morning!

The run didn’t clear my headache and neither has the writing, so I may just have to go and catch forty winks on the spare bed!