simple running

I quite enjoy running. I’ve been an on/off runner for the last ten years I suppose. It probably started around the last time I was a member of a gym getting fed up with the membership prices, then seeing others running around the neighbourhood with all the freedom you could believe.

I wanted that.

And I’ve had it. But it comes in bursts of enthusiasm before petering out. If i were forced to put a label on it, I’d say I was a summer runner, finding it much more difficult to pull my running gear on when it’s blowing a gale outside in the black of a winter’s morning. But even that description isn’t quite right either. I’ve managed to lose my enthusiasm in the middle of long summer months, and reduce my running efforts to once or twice a week, before dropping them completely.

But I’m not a fool. I know that exercise is good for me. Especially so for someone who spends so much time sitting down in his day job; I need to get off my butt and lose a few calories. So, I’ve decided that from today, I’m starting running again.

Now what website should I use to track my runs? What mobile app should i use on my iPhone to keep me motivated? What’s the best music to get me through hard stretches?

Those were seriously the first things I thought of. Not how great it will be to get some fresh air on my own, or won’t it be nice to be able to eat without feeling quite so guilty. It’s sad isn’t it? But once I thought a bit more I realised it was these same things that are meant to motivate, that are actually holding me back. I want to go for a run. I don’t want to enter a marathon. I want to be alone with my thoughts. I don’t want to listen to some dance tracks with a good running beat. i want to put my running shoes on, and be out the front door in five minutes. Not faffing around the house, grabbing my iPhone, making sure the app is running, stopping when a GPS signal is lost, getting home and uploading, then following a rigid training plan.

No. i don’t want to do that. So I’ve decided not to.

I’m going to run. Simply. Run.

Jodrell Bank

My dad took our family to Jodrell Bank when i was little – probably close to 30 years ago. Things have changed with a brand new visitors centre and new exhibition centre, but the most impressive thing there is still the Lovell Telescope. It was impressive when I was a little boy, and it was even more so now. That thing is huge. Seeing it on the television diminishes it somewhat. What a feat of engineering. Whilst we were there eating our picnic alongside it, the telescope would regularly turn on its tracks – impressive.

Now the geek in me can’t help but look at a radio telescope and think one thing – ‘the end is near but the moment has been prepared for. but alas, it transpires that Doctor Who didn’t film there. Shame.’

Manchester Airport Viewing Platform

We went on a great day out yesterday to Manchester Airport’s viewing platform. We took binoculars and Mandy took her camera with high zoom lens but we couldn’t compete with the hard core plane spotters. The guy next to us on the large viewing platform had all of that, plus a radio tuned into the (what I presumed to be) the chatter from air traffic control. It’s strange the hobbies we find ourselves falling into. I don’t suppose his passion for plane spotting is any different than mine for a certain 50 year old TV show about a man flying around in a police telephone box. Although I’d still wager that society would label him slightly below me on the ‘normal’ scale. Those of course who can recite every fixture in their football team’s history are considered perfectly ‘normal’. <where did that digression come from>

A surprise highlight came when we approached the restaurant on site. In a large covered hanger adjacent to the restaurant, Concorde’s distinctive shape peered out at us behind a wall of glass. You can pay to have a tour of Concorde but with the two kids in tow, we thought it might not be the best time to do this. Even behind the glass, Concorde evoked strong feelings of British pride, and a strong sense of pathos. Such a distinctive powerful piece of engineering, retired and left as a museum piece. I don’t understand all the reasoning behind its retirement but it seems tragic that we don’t have anything comparable to replace it with.

don't let software get in your way

Today I got round to starting my new short story - this is an accomplishment in itself. I'm often guilty when it comes to my writing to put more effort into the process, than the actual writing. A case in point was my efforts this morning.

I've been browsing through the nanowrimo.org message boards recently (I've made a commitment to taking part this year after a 4 year gap). One of the threads was discussing the various software available to writers, and from a post I followed a link to a piece of software called ywriter. I thought I'd have a play with it and see if it would help me organise myself enough for plotting a short story.

After ten minutes I stopped and realised what I was doing. Sure, I'd made the effort to start another short story, but I'd made it that little bit more complicated than it needed to be. I already have Word 2010 on my laptop and I love using it. I already have Onenote and I love using that too. Why then was I so keen to try another tool? When I recognised I was asking these questions I paused and considered what I was doing and why that particular piece of software might not be a good thing for me:

• Ywriter like a lot of writing software is geared towards writing novels not short stories. I'm not sure I'd get much benefit from the organisational features of the tool.

• It introduced another writing environment into the mix. As I've said, I'm using Word 2010 for most things and loving it.

• Due to installation restrictions I wouldn't be able to install it on my work laptop. This restrict me working with it to my home laptop only.


• Learning software, no matter how good it is, can be a distraction from the practice of writing. And writing's what it's all about for me.

So my next steps shouldn't surprise you. I uninstalled it.

Sure, the next time someone recommends some software, I'll be eager to see what it's like, but unless it simplifies the writing process for me, I won't be using it.

Why I no longer have any friends

I've been looking at my habits with my iPhone recently. All too often I found myself checking the twitter and Facebook app to see what's new in the world. Even after being out at work all day, I'd find myself picking up my phone and checking status updates to see what I'm missing. It's addictive. With the 80 people I'm following on Twitter and 50 friends on Facebook, there was always something to 'catch up on'.

And then I realised that what I was missing was spending more time doing the things I wanted to do. Like playing with the kids, or reading, or doing the writing that I always claim I don't have time to do. Twitter and Facebook rather than helping forge connections with people, was actually driving me away from those closest to me.

My solution was simple. I looked at my Facebook friends and spent 5 minutes defriending anyone that wasn't a member of my family, or a close friend. This brought my number down to 16. That's a good number. I can manage that. I can look at that list of friends and see how I might be interested in what they have to say. A great side-effect of this I hadn't thought of until I went through this exercise, was that I'm much happier to share a bit of my real uncensored thoughts on Facebook. If like me, you have a lot of colleagues in your friends list, you might be reluctant to share your true thoughts.

After sorting Facebook, Twitter was easy. I set myself the target of going from following 80, to a rather arbitrary 10. It took less than a minute.

Today, my iPhone has stayed on the mantelpiece all night. I haven't felt that compulsion to check it once. And tomorrow in the office, I can actually converse with my colleagues to find out what's going on in their lives.

what kinds of mistake are you making?

I attended a change workshop at work today. This month's theme was "Mistakes, when they do happen are viewed as learning opportunities’’. This is a worthy topic for discussion and we ended up sounding out a lot of perspectives from different parts of the business.

However, at one stage we were taught about the different types of mistakes (apparently there are 3), the different types of responses to mistakes (again there are 3) and asked to make connections between them.

It all seemed a bit overkill. Why restate such a well known adage? I've decided to focus on the original and best:

'learn from your mistakes'.

What's wrong with that?

 

the start

First things first. I don't expect to ever become a minimalist - right now, I'm not even sure what that would really entail. When I started thinking about doing a blog on simplifying my life I didn't for one moment think that would lead to any drastic change in how I lived my life.

• Have you ever sat down when you've suddenly got an hour or two free, only to waste time considering the best ways to fill it? Should you watch that DVD that's still shrink wrapped; read that magazine from last month; do some reading… For me that debate happened frequently enough to want to make a change.


• At work I've been getting a reputation as 'the organised one'. I've been asked to share some of my tips with others and that in itself has made me look again at how I organise my time and work. To me, organisation and simplicity are natural bedfellows (although others disagree).


• A need to find focus. Inspired greatly by the work Leo Babauta has written at zenhabits.net I've come to appreciate that focus is an incredibly powerful method of achieving greatness. I've seen how my lack of focus over the last few years has ultimately led to the stalling of a big writing project of mine. Looking at how I can find focus in my life is therefore vital in how I see myself moving forward again with my writing projects.

So this is why this blog exists. What I want to achieve is explore how simplifying aspects of your life can have a positive impact. If you're anything like me, if you feel there's too much noise in your life, then this blog may have something in it for you as well.

Is my house haunted?

I don't believe in ghosts but I desperately want to believe in them. Wouldn't a world where ghosts existed in, just be so...cool?

The young me used to believe in anything that was a bit off the norm. UFO's - check, Alien visitations - check, Loch Ness Monster - well, who doesn't. And Ghosts - big fat double-tick mark next to that one. Mum even told me her great ghost story once, can't remember what prompted her to blurt it out, but she was convinced she'd seen a ghost.

But as I grew up, I got more cynical and read more, and really came to my own conclusion that if they did exist, we'd surely have some kind of proof by now. I mean, we're technologically advanced enough to send the Hubble telescope into orbit, and build the Hadron Collider but you're telling me we can't even get some hard evidence that the spirits are among us?

Being a cynical grown up I'm naturally going to be a bit disturbed when my four-year-old daughter starts saying things that don't sit with my world view. It started a couple of weeks ago when she started crying for no evident reason. My wife was in the garden and heard Emily crying inside. She asked her what the matter was - there were real tears streaming down her face, my wife thought she'd seriously hurt herself. Emily said she could hear someone talking and it was scaring her. Not once did Emily say 'ghost' which for me, makes it all the more disturbing.

Two nights ago, after putting Emily to bed, there was the sound of running footsteps heading from where Emily's bed is, out onto the landing, then back again. Rather nonchalantly I assumed it was Emily being unusually restless. When I heard Emily start to cry I went up to check on her. Emily was sitting in her bed, upright. I asked her if she'd been out of bed. She said she hadn't. I asked her which room she'd been running to. She said she hadn't left the bedroom.

Last night, Emily woke me about four times. A couple of times it was the usual woes of her bedding needing straightening, or she can't find her monkey toy. But about half past three, I woke up hearing her talking in her sleep. I'm a pretty light sleeper so it really doesn't take much to wake me. There were lots of mumbled phrases and I won't pretend to remember them now, but she wasn't happy and seemed to be arguing. The last time she woke me, she was crying and upset. She told me that someone was in her room and she could hear breathing (BTW I'm getting a load of goosebumps writing this). I reassured her that there was no one in the house and that she'd just had a bad dream. She went on to explain that I shouldn't go in my office again - the door to my office is left open at night and from where Emily lies, she can see straight through into the room - although she accepted that I would eventually have to go in there to earn money to pay for the electricity.

I lay there with her for about an hour whilst she slept, not for one moment trying to tie together any of these separate occurrences. She is only four, and four-year-olds have vivid imaginations and do odd things pretty much on a daily basis. But tonight, I've closed my office door so she can't see in, and turned an extra light on, and when she calls me in the middle of the night - which will no doubt happen - I'll get myself out of bed just that little bit quicker.