My life on my back

Tonight I should have been at running club, but was thwarted. Thwarted by work commitments! Damn the need to earn a crust.

As I sat alone in the office, pondering the wonders of cytokine inhibition, I ruminated on my recent lack of running. Somehow I had gone a whole week without my trusty trainers. Maybe Barefoot Ted had confused me into inaction? More likely, my new busy schedule was to blame. Either way, I had been doing an awful lot of not-running and this needed addressing.

I was suddenly feeling very tired and decided it was time to head for the tube. Still disappointed to have missed running club, I gathered together my detritus (phone, pen, extra strong mints) and shovelled them into my running rucksuck. My running rucksack? I had a rucksack that I could run with. And in that rucksack was my running kit. You spend your life looking for the key and the door is already open.*

I stripped off immediately. Normally, I wouldn't do an office streak (it wasn't Christmas, after all) but I wanted to get my kit on before the enthusiasm wore off. Fingers crossed, they don't have CCTV. Anyway, I immediately hit the streets of Soho. At first, I felt a bit of a tool. Not least, because my rucksack was so massively overstuffed I could plausibly have had a parachute in there. It was also heavy and a bit awkward for the same reason. After pausing to tighten the straps, I inserted my iPod and hid away with Ed Reardon until I reached Regent's Park.

The run home was absolutely lovely. And the week of resting and eating for England had resulted in a surprising amount of energy. So, it wasn't the fastest time in the world. But it was a good reminder that you don't always have to go for a run to go for a run.

(Stats: 4.73 miles - that's uphill miles with a very heavy bag on my back! 50 very enjoyable minutes; 10.34 minute/mile.)

(Pic: The Berghaus Mach 24 that I carried all the way home. I have put a small ball in the pic too. For perspective.)

(*Apologies to Aravind Adiga for poor paraphrasing from The White Tiger. Fantastic book.)