Author: Phil Lengthorn

Birthday Wishes and Muddy Running

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 4 Comments

Yesterday was my most favourite niece's 1st Birthday and to celebrate we made the trip to Kent to spend the day with her. Firstly, let me just say that since the birth of Grace my sister has gone slightly mad. And considering she is once again pregnant things are only going to get worse. On arrival we were forced given our own hand-made party hat to wear.

Jill had gone all out to make sure we had a great day: loads of food; birthday decorations; home-made cake; AND party games. Although I was slightly disappointed not to have won pass-the-parcel, amazingly Grace won it, what are the chances of that? Grace got some lovely presents, including her first doll named 'Baby Gracie' which she was very intrigued by. We all had a great day….

This morning the plan was to get very muddy with a run on the trails of Bourne Woods.

I had the iPhone for some pictures and had the Zombies, Run! app on the go. I had already decided on a pretty gentle run this morning and once I spotted how muddy the trails were a gentle run was the only option.

Pretty much covered most of the trails including the hilly ones, did loads of slipping and sliding, which actually reminded me of this ice-skating outing….

Billy Boy was with me this morning, so after about 4 miles we headed to the ponds so he could cool down and clean himself off a bit.

Overall a good run around the woods, loads of people out enjoying the morning, and I did indeed finish very muddy….

Same again tomorrow? Yes please!

 

An educational trip to Alton Towers…

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 2 Comments

I can hear the shouts:

“Alton Towers ain't educational!”

“You're having a tin bath!!?”

But yesterday saw around ninety Rutland County College staff and students travel to Alton Towers in Staffordshire for the annual trip. In the past this trip was for Psychology students only, but this year it had been opened up to all college students.

In the preparation for this trip AS Level Psychology students had designed an experiment to test the effects of stress on memory. The idea being that different intensity of rides will have a different effect on participants being able to remember things. We await the results with baited breath.

As for the day as a whole, it went fantastically well with no issues or dramas. Even the responsible adults managed to enjoy themselves…

The park wasn't very busy and queue time was pretty good, the longest wait was about 15min. We managed to get on virtually all the rides we wanted to, even some we didn't.

As is normal for a trip to Alton Towers, there is usually a 'new' ride to go on, and today was no different: Nemesis Sub Terra. After various reviews from students that included 'rubbish', 'really scary' and 'you get squirted with egg', it was decided that four brave souls would risk it. Nemesis Sub Terra is loosely themed on the park's famous Nemesis ride and revolves around the discovery of eggs from this original monster. Anyway, to cut a long story short it means you enter a mock lift to see said egg only for an alarm to sound, people to poke you, shout at you, move you around into mock lift again, chase you down a very dark alley with various scary people/objects inside before exiting into daylight. Dave managed to sum it up in three words: “very unpleasant experience”.

Towards the end of the day we were left with probably the biggest dilemma of the day and one we took an age to decide, do we risk getting wet on the Congo River Rapids….?

After much deliberation it was decided that we would risk it, and despite a surprise squirt attack from the bank by some local yobs, all was well.

Overall, a really good day out, really well organised and impeccable behaviour by all except maybe some inappropriate language on the occasion roller-coaster.

 

Great Eastern Run

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 5 Comments

A lovely bright morning welcomed all runners of the Great Eastern Run to Peterborough. The course has changed slightly to last year, it now starts on the Embankment rather than in the city centre, but more importantly, it is still 13.1 miles long.

The past three weeks training has been pretty non-existent due to various niggling injuries. Therefore today's plan was a nice steady pace. Got to halfway in 52 mins, and feeling pretty good, ran the second half in 50 mins. Finishing in a pretty respectable time of 1.42 which I was happy with considering the last month. You can probably tell that the race was pretty uneventful, Peterborough is not known for its fantastic scenery, although I did spot what I think was a tree at one point. But I was given a goody bag, medal and a ridiculously bright t-shirt for my efforts.

The real fun and games began at the finish….

Firstly, when I went to pick up bag from the storage point, they couldn't find it. I had to hang about watching some bloke desperately searching for it, at the annoyance to other runners. I had borrowed Amy's rucksack because mine had somehow disappeared. Therefore when asked what colour it was I said it was black, which I thought it was, it was in fact more of a grey. Doh!

Secondly, I had parked in the closest car park, not realising that the exit to the car park was actually on the race route. Therefore, it was not opened until most of the runners had finished. So in conclusion it took me an hour and forty minutes to run the race and the same amount of time to exit the car park!

And now for something completely different….

A crazy Austrian man jumped from 24 miles up in the air in an attempt to break the sound barrier….

And….he did it!

Bunting, Books and Bungle

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 3 Comments

The final week of the first term is finally over and since it has been one whole week since the last blog entry *bows head in shame* I feel I should write something, even if very little has actually happened.

My classroom is now the owner of beautiful new energy efficient lighting. Fitted after school on Thursday to enable a day's trial, before a decision was made to fit them throughout the block late on Friday. Although this is great news, being able to see students in the classroom I feel is an essential part of teaching, it did threaten our chances for winning a tin of chocolates. Earlier on in the week my tutor group had completely decorated the room in Union Jack bunting to celebrate 'Red, White and Blue Day' to bag said chocolates in a school competition. I had, of course, completely forgotten that the engineer would appear on Thursday to fit lights, bunting was taken down, as was our chances of winning the competition.

A visit to the school library meant a collection of teenage fiction to read over the holiday….

Not that I'd actually get round to reading them because of the MASSIVE stack of marking I have to do….

Friday evening came to a close with a walk into town to partake in a few pints of the black stuff in a local hostelry. Who should be at the bar when I arrived? One of my neighbours, already slightly the worse for wear. It was quite easy to recognise this due to the fact that despite being neighbours for three and a half years he didn't seem to know who I was, he shook my hand and said, “I know you from somewhere”. After giving him a couple of clues the penny finally dropped, before he began to introduce me to all his equally drunk mates. The next half hour was spent discussing such subjects as: literature, education, darts, beer and….. the 80s TV show Rainbow…mainly because one of them had the nickname 'Bungle', and did look surprisingly like him…

 

Failure. Blood. Running.

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 2 Comments

Failure. I hate to admit defeat, but for one reason or another I am officially announcing that September's challenge has been extended into October. I'm slightly disappointed that I've had to take such drastic action but with a two week half-term coming up, together with the fact that my body is finally starting to feel better, I feel it is the best option. The challenge of learning to ride a unicycle was always going to be difficult fully fit, but with various aches and pains appearing (none I think directly related to unicycling) completing the challenge in one month was near impossible.

Blood. It has been a busy week at school. Various assessments taking place and an ever increasing pile of marking that needs completing. Thursday saw the school's open evening, and the annual 'teach the parents' classes I put on. All was going well early on, I was doing the old descriptive writing session using sweets to encourage the use of senses in our writing. We had got through the sight, sound, touch, smell parts without any problems. At this stage I did the old comedy healthy and safety speech before tasting sweets, “please don't eat sweets if you are allergic to anything that could possibly be contained within the sweet”. I should also have mentioned loose teeth! Before I knew it I had a prospective student in front of me in tears, blood flowing down her chin and tissues being stuffed in her mouth by her mother. She was quickly whisked out of the room passed other prospective parents and students, leaving a trail of blood from the English classroom. Not the 'English is Fun' look I was going for. Needless to say that could be one less student joining us next September.

Running. Today I went for a run, the first for three weeks, and although my back was a tad sore it felt good to be finally running again. So I'll be partaking in the first Frostbite run tomorrow morning at St Neots. The Frostbite Races are a great little series of six races held throughout the winter (hence the name) for local club runners to enter. I'll use tomorrow's race as a nice training run and take it pretty steady. That should put me in good stead for next weekend's Great Eastern Run, a half-marathon run around the picturesque streets of Peterborough. Followed, of course, by the Zombie Run later in the month.

 

Unicycling on hold…

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 5 Comments

After what has been a disastrous monthly challenge so far, I felt a post was needed to explain to my fans followers exactly where we are.

It has been over ten days since I last sat on a unicycle, due to a touch of sciatica. I don't intend on boring you with the details, you only need to read Unicycle Day 15 to find out more. Needless to say the chances of successfully managing to learn to ride the unicycle has taken a battering. It may well be that September's Challenge moves into October *sharp intact of breath*.

I'm also very aware of the fact that the Zombie Evacuation run is getting closer. After bullying persuading various teachers to join me in running away from zombies whilst overcoming obstacles I need to ensure I'm fully fit. So I've done the sensible thing, stopped the unicycling and I haven't actually been running for the past 10 days. I have also penciled in running the Great Eastern Run in Peterborough next month, so depending on how the next fortnight goes will decide if I do that or not.

The drugs seemed to have worked, my leg is nowhere near as painful as it was last week, it feels more like a 'dead leg'. This weekend I have done next to nothing in an attempt to get back on track. Well actually to be more precise, I have done nothing interspersed with a whole lot of nothing.