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First Park Run for a while this morning - it's been tough to get down due to Phoebe's football or gigs or illness, so I was definitely going to get my PB for 2024. It's been a tough to exercise over the last 8 weeks in general, but I felt strong during Personal Training yesterday and full of energy this morning and it turned out to be an easy steady run, coming home in just under 30 minutes. So a bit of a rubbish time, but I felt good all the way round, so hopefully it means I am fit to get back into running again. I've been a bit nervous of going out on my own in case I got hit by the dizzies when out in a field miles from home, but hopefully the dizzies have passed. Anecdotally I've heard that the latest strain of Covid is making people a bit wobbly and affecting ear canals, but I didn't think I'd had Covid (but who knows? I've had some colds and I didn't test). It's odd that that disruptor has faded so far into the background - I am not going to get all conspiracy theory, it's because the vaccine was so good that we can now go back to our normal horrible lives. But now it's a thing that you don't have to test for, or seemingly mention or check up about. I prefer this version of life, but presumably it's still taking people out of the game.
I finished listening to
The Wager by David Grann as I ran. It's a fabulous book about a remarkable true story of shipwreck, mutiny, death, near death and unlikely escapes.
It's hard to believe anyone went to sea in the 1700s willingly (though some were not willing of course) because even if things went well you'd have to contend with scurvy (no one knew it just took a bit of fruit and veg to sort it out), storms and a high likelihood of never coming home again, so the whole story is a fascinating window into human endeavour and a reminder of how lucky we are to live now (in spite of everything). The European sailors who don't die are finally washed up on a remote island with little to no food. They get lucky and are visited and helped by some South American locals who know how to get food and to navigate the waters, but the Europeans racism and sense of superiority, even in a situation where they are totally fucked, leads their saviours to rightfully abandon them again. Not that they learn anything from this suicidal behaviour (some of them because they then die).
This would have been a very famous story back in the day, but I'd never heard it before and I can only imagine the author punching the air with glee when he discovered it. There are so many escapades and unbelievable twists in this tale - ingenuity, stupidity, the break down of social barriers, the madness and desperation that the sailors went through and the impossible escapes (for some of them) and plus a whole sub-story of sea battles and treasure from a ship in the fleet that didn't get ship-wrecked. And then the repercussions for the survivors. Can't recommend it enough. I doubt I can get David on the Book Club, but I am trying.
The acknowledgments ended just as I ran up the hill at the of the Park Run (I didn't listen to the
whole book in under 30 minutes obvs), which is the sweetest way to go. Nothing worse than finishing a book halfway through a run then struggling to find something else to listen to.
Literally nothing worse. I've had cancer and it isn't as bad as that.
