so this week, week 7, was pretty much a bust in terms of my training so far. i haven’t always stuck to the requisite days or number of runs in the previous weeks, but i’ve always stayed within the required range. if it said, 4-6 days, then i did at least 4. 

this past week, was impossible. long days at the studio, or dealing with things like getting my car fixed (i’m ONLY R6000 out of pocket this month what with the deductible due from the attempt to steal my car, and then 4500 to replace the clutch and do the 75 000k service – maybe it’s a good thing i’m training to run. i might just need to!)

tuesday night: went to the market theatre to see comedian stuart taylor’s very funny show, “techni-coloured”. he used to co-host “going nowhere slowly” (http://www.goingnowhereslowly.com) which used to be one of my favorite shows when i first came back to south africa. i remember struggling to sleep one night, still trying to get used to the new time zone, when i caught an episode in the wee hours as the night was beginning to steep itself in daylight. i was hooked. such a simple concept. 2 guys (plus a possible celeb) in a big ol’ red american gas-guzzler, going off the beaten track and discovering some of the most beautiful places in south africa. don’t know what’s happened to it, but at the time, i loved it. anyway, stuart’s show was slightly uneven, but still roaringly funny. at one stage lasz almost fell out of his seat into the aisle, he was laughing so hard.

wednesday night saw us taking a trek to the east rand to carnival city (though only after i went to the track and slogged my way through 10 seemingly impossible laps). a guy called marc salem was opening his show called “mind games”. the PR included free tickets and a hotel room for the night, so we took a little mid-week jaunt. the show was ok, though the place seemed like a high-school auditorium and the evening a little long. he calls himself a “mentalist” and has an amazing talent for reading body language to get information. it’s just that when you mix pieces that genuinely make you go, “wow”, with crap like, “think of a number between 50 and 99, it has to be an even number, and consist of 2 different numbers – were you thinking 86, no wrong, 68!” ok. so with parameters like that, it could only be 68 or vice-versa. but then when he blindfolded, replicates a drawing someone else has done, he has me floored as to how…
anyway, if you want to check it out, “marc salem’s mind games” at carnival city.

thursday i worked late, and friday we had 2 events to attend. “curious pictures” were celebrating their 15th birthday and were throwing a huge shindig. bumped into my agent and a few people i either knew or vaguely recognized, but otherwise felt like a wall-flower. we quickly got out of there and headed over to the house-warming of a few guys from work. it’s really funny how the soap storylines sometimes have strange real-life parallels. in the story at the moment there are a few guys setting up a batchelor pad with 3 single guys living together in a big old house. that’s exactly what these 3 guys are doing.

just about everyone from work was there. actors, crew (past and present), the boss (but then his son is one of the guys moving into the house), etc. everyone was tossing it back – i even had a few drinks for a change, though was reminded again the next morning, why i don’t like to drink these days. anyway. marvin and i spun some fire in the garden and i lit up my L.E.D. psi-hoop (www.psihoops.com). friedrich (the show’s producer, my boss) actually came and gave it a whirl! not very successfully, but kudos for trying!

we left the party early enough, but the 3 drinks i’d had over the course of the night made me wake up grumpy. i just didn’t enjoy the feeling. funny, cos i’ve been known to throw down with the hardiest of the hardy with consequences and shenanigans not about to be mentioned in this public forum! i also was feeling a deep sense of failure for not having made all my runs this past week. decided that the only way out of my funk was to head for the track. i had to psyche myself out in order to finish my 5k’s, but i did it. i started feeling some aches during the run, i think because i was trying to change from my usual “plod” to more of a “lope” and i’m sure that changed my foot-strike. i did roughly the same time as my first 5k’s. possibly a few seconds off.

have decided that i need to repeat this past week, rather than moving on to week 8 in order to give my body time to recover and to get used to these distances. so, this week’s social calendar nearly derailed (detracked, or should i say, detracted from the track) my running program, but hey, i did manage almost 15k’s this week. 3 out of 5 is not bad. not great, but i’m going to pat myself on the back, give myself a pep talk, and get back on track. pun intended.

i’m not done yet!