Twaddle Free Zone

flickr-scotland.blogspot.com

Training is going well. I know you care. Last Saturday, I had to go to school to be present for an hour or so as the kids walked up and down the Jabriya walking track, to raise money for the school charity. I also had, according to my schedule, to run for 150 minutes, which I concur, sounds a little excessive. So off I went on a fine morning, at 8.15 and headed for the Gulf road and turned south, to Bida, where I wove my way through the impressive new mansions around the Regency Palace Hotel and the Palms. I then headed to Messila, keeping off the road as much as possible, running around the new Messila Beach hotel, now to be known as the Jumeira. Its opening is long overdue, having been mooted for National Day last year. It won't make it this year either, it seems, that day being barely ten days away.
There was a vaguely rural lane which ran from Messila all the way to Fintas, until two years or so ago. They dug it up as part of the hotel development, I guess, although there are also major house (barely the right word, 'palace' would be more appropriate, they are huge) works going on. I could not get all the way down, without circuitous detours and detour I did, right through a glutinous sea of apparently crisp dry mud. So, a bit of cross country meets quick-sand desparation. Over the bridge into Sabah al Salem, bought a bottle of water, 50 fils. Wiggled around, then calculated it was time to head to Jabriya. Arrived at the school dead on 2 hours 30 mins, just in time to do my duty. In the school courtyard was a bazaar where precisely the identical bottle of water rushed me 250 fils! Usurers! Shylocks! Pound of flesh indeed! Litre of water!
After such runs, quite naturally, I get stiff, despite the stretching. Later that day, I had reason to go to the embassy, ostensibly to watch the rugby. I decided to ride my bike. 13 km each way, 26km. One might suspect that this would exacerbate the dire muscular situation but quite the opposite; I arrived home limber and loose. The following morning, I sprang from bed, no stiffness. Brilliant! It'll become part of the schedule.
I am on target for a 3:15.
I know, I know, I shouldn't have said it but you know I don't believe in twaddle. No twaddle.

Football. The Most Un-beautiful Game in the World. After Basketball. Unless.....

What a monumental load of absolute nonsensical rubbish.
I laugh to the very depth of my boots about the stupid obsession of the world (or is it only the bbc?) with the so-called beautiful game. I have rarely witnessed such garbage spoken about what is a mere tedious pastime. A game. Put the ball in the net. That's it. Phenomenal.
The bbc has been bangin' on for weeks about the African Cup of Nations.....great swathes of time taken up by interviews with what can only be described as lunatics, screaming that their country must win because they love their country. For God's sake. African football. It's really not that important. Paternalistic colonialism at its worst.
This, the beautiful game. More than 70 supporters killed in the stadium in Egypt last week. Mayhem in Latin America and South America on a regular basis. And elsewhere. Nancy boy tantrums and theatrical fakery. Beautiful.
"He's good at sticking the ball in the net."
"We have to focus on results."
Oh God I want to kill myself. (That was me).
"As we speak there are unconfirmed reports that Carlos Tevez may be on his way back to premiership football; you can be sure that World Football will keep you up to date on this...." bbc
Oh God....a sharp knife, please.
Or maybe there is another way.

I still say a church steeple with a lightning rod on top shows a lack of confidence.

blog.thoughtpick.com

Look, I started training for the London some time ago and it's a strict regime, which requires adherence. It's at times like this that if I were not already atheist, I would seriously question any faith to which I had arbitrarily attached myself. I am collecting money for charity, which I reckon god would approve of, but I have had to take a day off here, pulled muscle and a day off there, today, if you must know, with a cold or flu or Dengue. Now if god were so bloody almighty don't you think he would benignly protect me while I assist him in his good works?
http://www.justgiving.com/Colin-Wells1 I have attached this for you to make your generous donation.

nakedhungrytraveller.com

All civilised people agree that the finest fruit drink is the avocado mango mix. Crazies may disagree but should be taken off the streets.

#263

funstoo.blogspot.com

Hey, globe-trotting or what? Last weekend, Dubai. This weekend? Bahrain! Splendid. Good old cosy Bahrain. Just for one night, get away again from Q8. As the taxi drive from the airport gets under way, I feel civilisation oozing over me. Yeah! It's the difference between half-hearted, aggressive, slovenly Kuwait and generous, mannerly, civilised Bahrain. Sorry but that's the way I see it. And I know more than a dozen Kuwaitis of intelligent persuasion who agree. So, large pork breakfast, (all day), perhaps two of them, and copious flagons of fine ale. And what is better, a granddaughter's birthday, her fifth, on the Saturday, followed by a visit to the embassy to....er....to watch rugby. Yes.

Crossing the Line

flashydubai.com

Went down to Dubai last night on flydubai. Cheap and cheerful. Took 80 mins. Arrived at terminal 2. Oh dear what a contrast with terminal 1. Long, long queue at passport control. Don't all the other queues seem to move faster than the one you're standing in? It took almost as long to get to the front of the queue as it took to fly there. Bonkers. So, mustn't dwell on the negative. But while we're on about queues, why is it that there is always some insensitive goon behind you, who has no awareness of personal space who constantly bangs into you. As soon as I had given him a mouthful of invective, in return for his blank stare, a child took his place and started swinging the sides of the barriers, into me! I swung my bag sharply into his head. He promptly stopped. I think his mother pulled him away from me, in horror.
I went to Dubai to run in the 10km race. Long story short, Dubai was looking fabulous. The day was perfect, could not be bettered. The morning was chill but not too much so. The organisation was breathtakingly good. The whole experience was so, so un-Kuwait. Stunning. These trips to Dubai always leave me deeply disappointed in Kuwait, where I have spent almost a quarter of a century. The race started in the shadow of the Burj Khalifa and was run with the Burj in sight, the whole 10km, out and back. What an astonishingly beautiful building it is, its sparkling silver cylinders fading in the seeming mist of the stratosphere.
The marathon departed and we lined up, 5327 of us. Fortunately, based on my estimated time, I was given a low number, allowing me to start near the front. And so, when the gun was fired, I was running. Some others, further back, took minutes even to cross the line.
I had predicted 45 minutes; a little optimistic, I knew. However, as often happens in a race, the very excitement and stimulation of it pushes us beyond that which we thought we could achieve. It went well; I was even able to finish with a spurt, crossing the line in 42mins 53secs. I know you're not interested but I was 3rd over-60 year old of 53, and 243rd overall of 5327.
We returned to the hotel, showered and changed and then beered and porked at the Irish Village. Then to the airport, Mihin Lanka, back to Kuwait. To shabby, half-hearted, ill-conceived, astonishingly rich, Kuwait

I Want Money.

I am astonished and my daughter is chuffed as a pig in body waste. We set up a web site to help collect sponsorship for my London run and in a matter of days, it has attracted 260 quid! My aim is £3000, so there is a way to go and you can be part of that achievement.
http://www.justgiving.com/Colin-Wells1
Go on, click and give just a large small amount to help kids with cancer.
I too am collecting in Kuwait and together with the website I have pledges of just over £1000. Ain't that brilliant?

More of the Same

recreateyourlifetoday.blogspot.com

Well thanks for the less than inspiring response, followers. What does one have to do to rattle the conscience of some people?
Anyway. You have read in the past of my less than inspiring experiences of running/walking events in Kuwait. Shocking. Well, putting all of that behind me and despite that I had sworn never to take part in another, I succumbed to the temptation of a 10km race on 21st Jan. Registered, donated to the charity and raring to go. There was a rumour on the eve of the race of a cold morning and the threat of dust. Around midnight the text message came through to the effect that due to "unsettled" weather, the event was postponed until further notice.
The morning dawned. It was damned cold, no doubt, and indeed there was a level of dust. But hell, races in the real world are run in sub-zero temperatures, blizzards, blistering heat, hailstorms and downpours. For God's sake! A bit of dust and a little chilly! WIMPS. That's it. Mark my words. Never again!

London

http://www.justgiving.com/Colin-Wells1
As you will know I am running in the London Marathon in April, in aid of Clic Sargent, a charity which works in support of children with cancer. My daughter suffered for three long and painful years and is now clear and has been for six years. Please take a moment to click on the link above and consider making a donation. Thanks.

More Trivial Nonsense

www.royalfamily.org

How's this for an enclave?
Suite 212 at Claridge's Hotel was ceded by the United Kingdom to Yugoslavia for a day, June 17th 1945 so that Crown Prince Alexander could be born on Yugoslav soil.

An exclave, on the other hand, is a territory legally or politically attached to another territory with which it is not physically contiguous

http://en.wikipedia.org

Yesterday, casually browsing, I looked at a map of Oman, as a side product of my curiosity about the Trucial States, I think. It's true, I am nothing if not trivial and random.
I homed in on Fujairah, one of the afore-mentioned but my attention was drawn to Madha, just inland, which appeared to have a national border around it. Ok. But within that was another national border. How very odd, I thought. And I still do. Madha is an exclave of Oman, in UAE, with an exclave of UAE, Nahwa, inside it! The British were sorting out that particular area at the time and no doubt cobbled it together to please this emir and that sultan. But really, how odd. Next time I travel to Oman and UAE, I will make a point of driving through those exclaves. It will bring me a warm childish pleasure.

I'm Just Going Outside and May Be Some Time

people.tribe.net

I know it is astonishing, but at 14 degrees last night, dressed in a t shirt, a roll neck sweater, a shirt and a wool overcoat, with a silk scarf, I attended a birthday party on a roof in Salwa. There was even a 'snow machine'. As guests arrived they walked out on to the roof through a commendable attempt at a blizzard. Very UK. But hell, that's what I ran from. Whether the 'snow' affected my sensation of the Arctic, I don't know, but it was perishing on that roof. My hands were blocks of ice; not helped I guess by holding a gin and tonic on the rocks. There were some people, better upholstered than me, in no more than a shirt. Had they hailed from the Midlands, they would have accused me of being nesh. Nesh or not, I legged it back to the warmth of my flat.
People quite naturally think of the Middle East as hot. It is. In summer. But make no mistake, in winter it can be bleak.

The End is Nigh

http://www.scienceagogo.com

Tempus really does fugit. Increasingly so it seems, as one approaches the end. Ha! Thought I'd start on a high point, to satisfy the expectations of the 'anonomii', that pair of ne'er-do-well stalkers.
So, the legs have now come in to line and are doing what they were bought for. Two weeks of running and all is well. Though we know, don't we, how tempting it is to fate to suggest that all is well. Anyway I don't believe in all that superstitious nonsense. Ouch. A twinge.
So, two weeks today it's off down to Dubai to run in the 10km race associated with the marathon. Should be a gas. Then early April, a half marathon in Jordan, part of the Dead Sea event and two weeks after that, London, which at times I held at arm's length, in doubt.
The London I am running in aid of Clic Sargent, the charity which cares for and provides holidays for children suffering from cancer. So if you would like to sponsor me, hey, go ahead.

Kilroy Wasn't Here

turbosquid.com

I have posted before about the graffiti in the tunnel under the Fahaheel expressway. Recently it has proliferated with such offensive content it is quite uncomfortable to run its gauntlet. God knows how the women who use it every day feel. One piece threatens death to all single women, another to sodomise the entire great Satan that is the US of A. Most are full of hatred of one thing or another.
While in Thailand for 16 days, I saw only one solitary sprayed word, on a wall near a Buddhist shrine. The word? LOVE

Nothing Else?

                                                                                                                                                       web2txt.co.uk                                                                                 
Is that all there is?
I have realised in the last few days as I searched online for sad lost-love songs how much I remember of the music my father played at home. Not for a moment that he played much melancholy stuff. Far from it. He loved the big bands, Stan Kenton, Benny Goodman, the crooners, Bing, Frank and others, and the ladies, Ella Fitzgerald and especially Peggy Lee. "The Folks Who Live on  the Hill" used to make his eyes mist over. Probably still does.
I stumbled upon her timeless classic, "Is That All There Is?" the other day. I recognised it immediately and yet I can't see it as a song my father would play, often at least. Perhaps I am wrong. But it was lodged in my brain from somewhere as a profoundly poignant lyric. It sums up pretty well the way I am thinking now, along with, in a confusion of emotions, Annie Lennox's finest song, a beautifully desperate, pained question, "Why?" With no answer.

Aah! Forky Wert!

An anagram of twelve plus one? Eleven plus two!
Freaky or what?

Serenity

alloilpaint.com

Strange isn't it how one's perception and memory of an incident; the delivery of a comment; a sequence of events, can differ so utterly from that of another, who experienced the same event. Who said what to whom,  the reporting of words said or unsaid, apportioning blame; the tone, the intent.
Passions intervene, desire imposes curves on the straightness of truth. Denials, accusations, anger and lies, lies, lies. We embelish and crop to suit our purposes.
Some serenely maintain the highground but rectitude is not their preserve. There are many truths. Those who, hurt, spit accusations and bile possess no less truth than the aloof. You are not right because you say you are right. He not wrong because you say he is wrong. There is none more likely to be clouded in their recall and perception than one possessed by passion. Passion for all its power and pleasure is not a trustworthy ally of truth.

Placid Turmoil

Tonight is the definitive Christmas party. Every year, very good friends invite guests to their exquisite house, to dine, drink, gossip and, if the mood takes, dance. 3,000 miles from England they create the quintessential Christmas atmosphere; a vast tree, with tiny white lights and red and green decorations, low lighting and warmth which belies the cool outside. The bar is manned by men in black with white gloves who serve gin and tonics et al (real, no ersatz crap here), the food, Marina Hotel, the best I have tasted here, the linen is linen. The cutlery heavy. The wine French, the mood mellow.

Where There's a Will There's a Way

goodart.org

I was devastated to find out my wife was having an affair but by turning to religion, I was soon able to come to terms with the whole thing. I converted to Islam and we're stoning her in the morning.

Emptiness

wine-flair.com

As the bottle fills your glass, it learns of its own emptiness.