The end of the world today?

Carat Manchester blogging event

Last week a friend of mine got invited to a bloggers event in Manchester and asked me if I'd like to go along even though I have no connection with his blog. With the promise of free wine, food and some freebies thrown it would have been rude to say no. The event was hosted by Carat, a media company with a wide portfolio and was held in their Portland Street branch. A quick write up of the night can be found on their website here.

The event was for those with blogs on health & fitness and sport and included several presentations from their staff on how to improve your blog and especially how to monetise it. As I have no ambition of ever creating a blog with the aim of making money out of it I concentrated on the wine but did learn a few things and had some good conversations. Amongst those present was someone from talkSPORT who I had a good chat with and a representative from British Cycling. A few free things I picked up were nice too.

In the gym today with U.S. Olympians

Over the past few months there have been a few semi-famous people at my gym. I've seen actors, comedians, singers and some athletes, naturally. I think this is because of a few hotels nearby. The vast majority though have been z-listers. Today I saw and actually talked to some current Olympians.

Although the vast majority of the 2012 Olympics is taking place in London there is some action around the country, specifically football. There has been quite a few tourists here in Manchester watching games, Brazilians, and Americans especially. I haven't seen many (if any) North Koreans knocking around though. I wonder how many have actually travelled, apart from officials.

Yesterday the American women's team beat the North Koreans 1-0 at Old Trafford and today I saw about half of the American team in my gym as I was leaving. I had a brief chat with a few of them and for the record they were very friendly and approachable but I didn't want to pester them so I wished them good luck and made my way home. I wonder what the North Korean team are doing today? They've been knocked out at the group stage. I doubt they'll be shopping in Selfridges and Harvey Nichols. So far the North Koreans are having a good Olympics as too is the South Korean team.

Gym pentathlon

In the few months before I left Korea I put on a bit of weight. I was drinking a little too much and a little too often. I had stopped taekwondo and the only exercise I was getting was on my bike. I was looking forward to starting a new chapter in my life.

I got back home in the UK and I enjoyed the pleasures I was largely denied over the years in Asia, namely particular food and beer. Oh bitter how I do indeed love you. Consequently I put a little more weight which became a little to noticeable in my midriff.

So I joined a gym and I've been going their for over half a year now. In the first few months I didn't take things too seriously, even getting to a stage where I just used the swimming pool and the jacuzzi. And then I came back from a trip to Barcelona and decided I wanted to lose some weight. It's slowly started to happen.

Recently I had a fitness test and one instructor gave me a new plan for weekly exercises and I've stuck to it so far and more importantly I've been enjoying the exercise and the challenge. A couple of weeks ago the gym put up some posters for a pentathlon and I signed up. I thought about it for a few days and thought I'd give it a go as there's no fee to do it and it may motivate me to get fitter.

There are five disciplines that you have to do and you have four weeks to complete them. The total number you need to do to be entered into a prize draw is twenty but to qualify for the draw you need to have done each discipline a minimum of two times. To qualify for a t-shirt you need to do each discipline at least once and have a total of at least ten. So far I have done four of the disciplines with a total of 8/20 done with over two weeks to go. Some of the challenges are harder than others but none are against the clock.

Swimming. You have to swim 25 lengths (any stroke in the 20m pool). This is easy for me because at the moment I am swimming about three or four times a week, often 30 lengths+  and am really enjoying it.

Treadmill. You have to run or walk at least 3 kilometres. Again this is fairly easy and is one of the things an instructor has set me to do as part of my exercise routine.

Rowing. You have to row 1,500 metres. I find this easy as part of my weekly routine is to row 2,500 meters as often as I can. I find this great exercise as I try to beat my previous best.

Spinning classes. I had my first one last week, and even though I use the bike in the gym a lot I found this brutal. I particularly found the standing upright and then doing something similar to push ups tough. I was buoyed though by the man in front of me who appeared much fitter actually stopping a few times as I ploughed on. I felt great the next day.

Bodypump classes. I haven't been to a class yet as the times haven't worked out for me so far. Although I have seen some on-line videos I am a bit wary of how hard this will be for me because one of my elbows clicks when I do certain exercises (tennis elbow?).

I hope to get through the twenty challenges before time runs out. Damn it, I am one class away from getting the t-shirt! Regardless, I feel a bit fitter right now and am probably at my lightest in twelve months or so. Hopefully all the cardio work will pay off at some stage. I have a target weight which will be difficult to get down to and will involve a bit of sacrifice, commitment and changes.

Last week a man died in Manchester city centre. I know because I heard it happen.

I live in the Northern Quarter, and area known for its pubs, bars, restaurants, fashion and shopping amongst other things. My apartment is less than a minute away from the Manchester Arndale shopping mall where the man died last Friday, July 6th.

In the morning my wife and I walked past the Arndale and saw the main street (High Street) next to it blocked off by police, diverting traffic and bocking the route of the city's Metrolink tram. As it was raining we just concentrated on walking as fast as we could. Five hours later we came back the same way and things were still blocked off.

The crowd was bigger, people speculating about things and we looked around to see what we could before deciding to go home. And then we heard a noise, similar to a gun shot, though not as loud but still dramatic given the police involvement. I thought there was a siege or a robbery gone wrong but it wasn't that. Then people started to say someone had jumped. And someone had.

I'm still relieved that I hadn't directly seen it happened or the aftermath that and more importantly that my wife hadn't. We sped up because my wife still didn't realise what had happened and I waited to tell her when we got home. Some six weeks previously a similar thing happened but police were able to talk a woman down but not this time.

Their has been very little written up on this since it happened - and I have looked - quite possibly to respect the man's family's wish for privacy but some of those that were there will never forget.

In the gym with Kangaroos

Recently I joined a gym in the city centre. I'm enjoying it so far but haven't been of late due to travel plans and illness. After a few days away I settled down on an exercise bike yesterday and started to pedal. Seconds later a slow stream of men in 'better shape than me' started to enter the building.

After a while I twigged that they were the Australian rugby league team - the Kangaroos - who are in the country for the Four Nations tournament. A few went for the weights and the running machines but most of them started on the bikes, on either side of me. I continued to peddle away but it definitely put me off as they weren't even breaking sweat despite generating a lot of power and speed.

I can testify that they are all big blokes and I wouldn't like to be the one who spilled their pint! I am hoping I can use the chance encounter as inspiration to work harder and get fitter.

Step by step

Up and running and online. Slowly the red tape that we have encountered seemingly everywhere is starting to unravel. It looks like my wife now has finally set up a bank account too. I am still frustrated at how long things can take but at least now I know not to expect anything different in the future.


So now what? Well I'll leave that for another day!