A bit of a catch-up

Things have been occurring, and I've not really been keeping track of them. This will be a bit of an attempt to cover the majority of them...it will probably fail.

First off, La Manga. As my previous post pointed out the weather was fantastic. The whole weekend went rather well really, and I fully recommend all-expenses paid holidays to everyone! Some highlights;

• Breaking the jet ski's - We blame the Spanish bloke. There were 6 of us out, and pretty much the only instruction we got during the Spanglish safety briefing was "follow the speedboat". One of the guys at the back had to swerve to avoid the wake of a large boat, and went over a reef, sucking a load of stones into the engine. The speedboat turns to get him sorted (basically turn off the engine, and get towed back in) and we all dutifully follow him...back over the reef. 4 dead jet ski's later, and one very stressed Spanish guy hating us for laughing in the boat back.
  
  
• Spa - Spent about 4 hours here...firstly got my sweat on in the gym, then a massage, followed by a prolonged jacuzzi session and generally vegging around. Lovely.
  
  
• Sugababes no-show - The shitty no-pro's that they are the decided that they couldn't be arsed to turn up, so instead the MD gave us all a £1000. So far I have heard from no-one who would have preferred it the other way!

Great weekend, and really enjoyed it. Just the right mix of relaxing, and doing stuff for me. I also found out that one of our senior managers (board room level) like a bit of foosball, and he's keen to get some in the new office we are having built. I, apparently, am already banned :-(

Work has been a mixed bag, and while projects sit in the "what are we going to do" phase, I've been doing some tech support work with XML formats and Schema's. Not really my area, but I'm picking it up fairly well, and no-one has blatantly labelled me as a fraud as yet. We've moved office, and while the new place has more space, there are less good facilities (no kitchen, and we are back to sub-standard drinks machines). I've blagged myself a window seat, though the view is less than stellar.

The running training continues. Roadrunners is brutal at the moment, and we are in the middle of a 6-week distance training improver series. It must be helping though, as I did Dorney Lake on Saturday (same race as I did in April), and I set a new PB over 10k of 39.32...my first time under 40 minutes, which has me really chuffed! I've signed up for Reading Half again, and this puts me about a minute faster over 10k than I was at the same point last year. I've set myself a training target of 40 miles a week by the new of the year.

Cricket is faring less well. A combination of bad weather, and holidays has meant that I've played very little in the last couple of months. This really showed in the game yesterday, with huge strides backwards, and a developing bruise on the right thigh (yeah, it's me that smells of Deep Heat...you can probably smell it from there...). The season is over soon, which means that at least I get my Sundays back for a while. It will probably mean more time dedicated to running, and getting stuff sorted in the house.

Ah, yes...the house. The garden is all done now, and has had its inaugural barbecue. There is still stuff to do (put up some arches over the stairs, some more painting, and I'd like to get some light systems out there to make it more evening friendly), however that can wait until next year, and spring. The next area of focus will be the bathrooms. I have cashed in some under-performing share-options, and should be contacting some workmen soon to try and sort out a window. I need to do some measurements and plans first, as I'm a little concerned that the door is going to get in the way quite royally for some stuff I want.

So there you have it...my life in a small, bite-sized capsule. Don't chew, and take with food!