Bank Holiday Monday saw the traditional open-topped bus parade for Ipswich Town’s promotion to the Premier League. I’m not bothered about football, but was tempted to head down to meet Dave, Sally, Rob, Jo and Neil for a quick glimpse before what I expected to be lunch and a few pints in the Cricketers. As it turned out, this dragged on into the evening, followed by an additional stop at the Fat Cat on the way home. Even Neil, who until recently was rarely seen drinking more than the odd half, ended up having five pints – apparently the most he’s had since being a teenager.
Despite that, I managed to get up and cycle to work on Tuesday, then also cycle to Felixstowe and back for club training in the evening. I went out for a solo trail run on Wednesday evening (mostly missing the rain, but still getting soaked by oil seed rape plants either side of a narrow path, which were like wet sponges), then on Thursday evening I jogged out to Specsavers to finally pick up my latest pair of reading glasses (technically VDU glasses, which makes them free from work), and to vote on my way home. Sadly Suffolk County Council fell to reform, but Ipswich is still Labour-controlled for the moment.
I’m beginning to think the walkway outside our office may be cursed. When it was first built they (allegedly) put the decking planks on upside-down and it was almost immediately closed because it was slippery when wet. Then a few years later the rotting wooden surface was all replaced with plastic, and some time after that the steel frame was found to be rusting away, and last year the whole thing was removed and replaced with a raised concrete path.
This week we had an email saying the walkway is “temporarily closed due to an outbreak of caterpillars”.
Kafka is alive and well in our corporate IT processes. I got an email “escalating” the fact that I hadn’t reviewed registrations on the email relay service. Unfortunately (a) the “review” only allows you to confirm that an entry is still required, not indicate that it isn’t; (b) it says it’ll be disabled if I don’t review it by three weeks ago; and (c) because apps have four kinds of owner, and I’m all of them, the “escalation” involved CCing me three times on the email.
After Run for Coffee on Friday and parkrun on Saturday (obviously), I ran the Stephen Williams 10k on Sunday. I didn’t get too bad a time, what with it not being a fortnight after a marathon (last year) or the morning after the Twilight 5k (the year before). I still just about had enough energy to go out and cut my front hedge in the afternoon, before people start complaining about it encroaching on the pavement again.
Finally, we finished the week the way we started it, with dinner and slightly too much beer at the Cricketers again.