Juneathon Day 3

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 1 Comment

Last night we continued with the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations by attending the Bourne Festival – with every other person in Bourne – it was very busy. ‘The League of Mentalmen’ were on form – Madonna, Proclaimers, Steps (just no name a few) – all in a rock style! I was keeping Sam company (Amy’s fella) while she was at work. Yes you’re right – he is an actual real-life giant.

After Day 2 of the Bourne Festival the Sunday run, normally the home of the long run, was never going to break any records. With constant drizzle all morning, coupled with watching the pageant on TV, I decided to hang on until the rain stopped. Although by about 4ish the pageant was wearing a bit thin, once you’ve seen one boat you’ve seen them all. I’m sure the same thought was rattling around in the Queen’s head. So what looked like a slight break in the rain I pounced, got changed, and went for a run. However, as is normal in these circumstances, as soon I was about a mile into the run the rain got steadily heavier. I don’t particularly like running in the rain, today was no different, I decided to cut the run short and head home, by which time I was absolutely soaked and not happy:

Summary
******
Distance: 2.81mi
Time taken: 00:23:32
Average/Max Speed : 7.16/9.35 mph
Average/Min Pace : 00:08:23/00:06:24
Calories: 332

Total mileage after day 3 = 11.49

Music accompaniment = nothing (ipod and rain does not mix)

Number of times I cursed the rain = 15

Juneathon Day 2

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 3 Comments

Up reasonably early this morning considering we had attended the first night of the Bourne Festival and supped various local ales that I can’t actually remember the names of.

I also feel the need to consider the dignified pigeon I spotted on yesterday’s run. Having thought about it further, the said pigeon may have actually just flown into a tree and was just standing dazed as I ran pretty close to it and it just stood there, staring.

This morning’s run was a nice gentle 4ish miles around the town. I ran through the Wellhead, site of the beer festival, which was very peaceful this morning, no drunk teenagers or pools of vomit in sight! It will be very different come tonight – ‘The League of Mentalmen’ are playing!

Summary
******
Distance: 3.89mi
Time taken: 00:31:59
Average/Max Speed : 7.30/8.72 mph
Average/Min Pace : 00:08:13/00:06:53
Calories: 463

Total mileage after day 2 = 8.68

Music accompaniment = The Passing Fancy

Number of runners passed = 1 (complete with beer fest wristband)

Juneathon – Day 1

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ 8 Comments

This was probably not the best week for Juneathon to start. Today marks the start of the Bourne Festival.  With its particularly catchy slogan, ‘It’s more than just beer!’:

Also, today marks the start of half-term. So the plan was to get out of school pretty quick, get home, get changed, set off for a nice gentle run around Bourne Woods with Billy Boy to dispatch Day 1 of Juneathon, go home, get showered, eat, blog and get to the bar!

Billy Boy went for a swim in the ponds for a cool down:

Sweet Deals! I’m off to the bar!

Summary
******
Distance: 4.79mi
Time taken: 00:42:21
Average/Max Speed : 6.79/8.97 mph
Average/Min Pace : 00:08:50/00:06:41
Calories: 566

Total mileage after day 1 = 4.79

Music accompaniment = St Etienne, Words and Music

Number of dignified pigeons spotted = 1

Unencountered – Part 9

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Just in the nick of time the final part of May’s Project is published. Original idea was a short story in around about ten parts, so I consider the project to be a success. As for the quality, that’s another story altogether. May I present the concluding part of ‘Unencountered’…..

Part 9

It was difficult coming to terms with what had happened over those turbulent few months, but time is a good healer and a year down the line I was beginning to understand. The endless police interviews, the physical tests and the psychological consultations had all played their part. Steve had just left. Steve was the coroner that had very nearly killed me, and over this past year we had become good friends. We had discussed that day in the autopsy suite many times and had reached a conclusion. A conclusion that, even now, seems impossible. That unencountered presence was a warning.

For Steve it started about five years earlier. A seemingly dead body that he had to conduct an autopsy on. Only the man, like me, was not dead. And again, like me, as Steve was about to begin he felt a presence that delayed him long enough for the man to ‘wake up’ from what doctors later described as some sort of extreme sleep paralysis.

Once I heard Steve explain this story I began to piece together my own dealings with this unencountered presence. Those weird notes I was writing myself during sleep were not notes aimed at me, they were warnings for Steve. A man I had never met, but soon would. They were warnings of what could happen. And my old friend John, the incident in the pub. The incident that seemed so real at the time, was, as I found out later, a warning. The very next night John was involved in brutal attack from a drunk, that left him needing stitches for a six inch wound to the face. The incident in the alley that ultimately left me on the autopsy table, the deafening hum that I heard, merely the hum of the fluorescent lights at the morgue.

We hadn’t told anyone about our theory, it seemed so far fetched, and actually I’m not sure if we believed it ourselves. But over the past year neither or use had felt the unencountered presence and, for that, we were truly thankful.

The End


 

Unencountered – Part 8

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I know what you’re thinking, you only posted part 7 yesterday. Well you are absolutely right – I’m making a big effort in an attempt to finish May’s Project. The aim was always about 10 episodes, so tonight’s episode and one tomorrow will get us to nine (which is virtually ten), and success! May I present the next part in the pathetic enthralling story…..

Part 8

I was no longer watching from above, I was in the room, back within my ‘lifeless’ body. I was still on the gurney, unable to move, but I could feel the light on my eyelids. I tried to lift them and slowly the light seeped in. Everything was blurred, holding my eyes open for only five seconds took a supreme effort, even then I was unable to focus on anything. I could sense the coroner, he was moving around in a very agitated way, grasping for tools, talking to himself. I continued lifting my eyelids in an attempt to see a way out of the situation. Every time I did this the world began to come into focus. First I could make out the lights above my head and then the notices on the walls. Then the coroner.

He was walking towards me, scalpel in hand, tears rolling down his face. He was muttering to himself, questioning, deciding. “I don’t understand….so much death….it’s too late…stop….?” He was getting closer and closer. I could smell the unmistakeable smell of death on his clothes. Still I couldn’t move. I opened my eyes, wider and wider, tried to blink to show him how desperate I was. Then his face was above mine, but still he didn’t look at my eyes. I was pleading with my eyes, my whole body screaming at him.

He was distracted by something, he looked over his shoulder, and that is when I felt ‘it’. The darkness was in the room, that same unencountered darkness, was above us both. That was when it happened.

He looked directly into my eyes – he saw I was alive.

At that precise moment I felt the darkness disappear. “Oh my God!” He gasped. He leapt into action, tools went crashing to the ground, sirens sounded, telephone messages were exchanged, syringes were filled. I was unaware exactly what was going on around me. I was slowly overcome with tiredness….

[To be continued]

 

Unencountered – Part 7

~ Phil Lengthorn ~ Leave a comment

It has been a week since Part 6 of May’s Project. Not good, I know. How about a list of excuses:

  • Busy at school: exam workshops, marking, etc.
  • Running: been putting in a bit of extra effort.
  • Still looking after mother-in-law’s dog: he is very annoying.
  • Actually finding the whole short story writing quite difficult. No idea where the story is going, no plan, I’m just writing AND on top of that I need to try and get to an ending that actually makes sense!?

So here goes, another short one….

Part 7

I was now looking down on myself, a body laying on a table, I felt nothing, no fear, no worry, nothing. It was as if I was dead. But I was dead?

The coroner calmly approached the lifeless body. He carefully lifted the scalpel from the tray, the blade glistened in the overhead lights. Was this it? Was this what death was? I was dead on a gurney, surely that was it. What was I waiting for? The heart to be cut out? The soul to be destroyed? Or perhaps this was what happened after death, you were left in this weird lifeless existence. I would seem that I only had a matter of minutes until I found out.

He began speaking into the microphone, “The chest has considerable bruising….this would indicate extreme trauma shortly before death….about to make the Y incision….what’s that….is someone there….?” He looked around a confused look on his face. He spun round, dropping the scalpel and scattering various other tools of his trade across the floor. “Who’s there?!” His shouts sounded desperate. The coroner’s calm exterior had disappeared, replaced by a tense, psychotic image of himself.

There was no one else in the room. He began pacing about the room looking for something, I could see the fear on his face. He began shouting, incomprehensible words that echoed throughout the room. “Away…..wrong…..rising…blood….death…..darkness!” Suddenly he dropped his head, seemingly afraid of what he might see. Darkness? Then it dawned on me what I was watching. I was watching a man experiencing exactly what I had gone through for the past two months. He could feel ‘it’ too.

[To be continued]