Dublin mini-marathon

Lots going on and lots I want to write about but it's too much, I'm overwhelmed again and it's stopping me from writing anything at all. So I'm going to ignore most of it for now and at least get a few small things down.

In January I signed up to do the Dublin Women's Mini-Marathon - it's a standard 10k through the streets of Dublin with the only discernible difference to any of the 10k events I've heard of here being that you don't have to run it. They have runners, fast joggers, slow joggers and walkers. I did it once before (a long time ago, I think perhaps 1999 or 2000) and didn't really train much at all and was able to do it in 2 hours almost to the second.

Of course, I'm far heavier (although I was overweight at that time as well) and definitely far less fit now so I really need to get some training done. I did a 10km walk in January and have tried to be better at walking places, or at least cycling since then but it has been a bit hit and miss. As an aside, work is absolutely shit and has been since mid-March, which doesn't help. Anyway, after saying to myself a couple of weeks ago that it was now eight weeks to go, need to get my act together and then doing nothing. And then last week thinking, oops, only seven weeks to go, better get my act together and still doing nothing. Well, now it's only six weeks to go so if I don't get a move on, I might not be able to make it at all. That 10km walk in January was just about doable but I did stop three times for seven minutes each time and there'll be none of that on the day.

So this evening, after spending the day in work (spending more of it on the internet than actually working - that's the kind of stupid thing I'm doing at the moment), I planned to cycle home and then go straight out for an hour-long walk. According to the training app thingy from the mini-marathon site, this week I should be up to three x 1 hour walks at a moderate pace, 1 day of other exercise and then a 7km walk at the weekend. I could tell that I wouldn't go for a walk if I came home though so instead I cycled in the other direction from home. I kept going for about 20 minutes, getting turned around twice, so lots of cycling round in circles while I tried to figure out where I actually was and eventually made it out to the river down by the trade fair grounds, approximately where I wanted to be. In all I cycled 11.23km and that took me 52 minutes 14 seconds (probably spent about 3 or 4 minutes on the two times I was trying to figure out where I was and various waits at traffic lights). So that's something at least.

My plan now is to get up early tomorrow and go for an hour's walk before work. If I get up and leave about half-seven, or any time up to eight o'clock really, it'd be fine. That gives me time to walk for an hour, come back, do some stretching and maybe even get the hoovering done (haven't done it for three weeks - my apartment is a disgusting mess at the moment). But we'll see. I'd be more than happy with a walk and getting to work on time.