Disco Dancer

I’m having what the pros would call a cut-back week.

This stems from lots of work travelling and one of those head colds that makes you sniffle like a 20-line a day city trader. I’d rather let it sort itself out and get a long run in at the weekend rather than make myself worse with easily missable 6 – 10 mile stuff.

While in this state of hyper-snot production and no running I’ve had one of my increasingly frequent revelations about running. I am having so many revelations recently that if this were biblical times I’d be sitting in the desert in a lion skin shouting at strangers.

No analogy there so on with the revelation……………………

Anyone who has crested the hill of 35 birthdays and still has a keen interest in running will start to spot some of the same faces they knew from a past life in their teens and 20’s.  Albeit with the gaunt look you only get from avoiding horseburgers  but the same faces nonetheless.

Most of the faces I see out running and lining up at races are working off their penance for a decade or more of a more hedonistic way of life. For hedonism think a lash of pints  and a big gut rather than sitting on a beach in Ibiza with oiled pecs.

I thought we were all the same and then I cast my mind back to those smoke-filled nights of my youth and I remember that we weren’t the same then and most likely we aren’t now.

So far I have only been able to categorise today’s distance runners into two groups of clubland people. You might be able to help and add to this list but for me (old age and all that) I only have two categories.

1.The  Rave Bunny

Visualise someone in a pair of hot pants and a road worker’s reflective vest. Thery’re grinding their teeth on a whistle whilst running on the spot. They probably have a pierced nipple. They have the dilated and demented pupils of a thousand yard stare lunatic and despite their endless energy and fanatical looks they are very friendly (the pills ‘n yokes and all that). They avow water in favour of anything else and have boundless enthusiasm.

A good example of this sort of person would be Rob Heffernan or Thomas.

 

2. The Irish Heterosexual

You have to think about the joke:

How do you know an Irish Homosexual? They prefer women to drink.

You know who you are.

 

Perspectives

One of the things you realise if you play with a camera for long enough is that the most interesting images come from being able to see things with a different perspective.

That’s why holiday shots always seem to produce more of these images. You are attuned to seeing the world with a different perspective because you don’t have the time to develop a cognitive pattern for your environment (a flashy way of saying nothing is familiar).

But, sometimes,if you’re just lazy about tidying up your kids toys, you can get different perspectives right outside your back door.

click on the image – he even looks cold with the frost growing off his back!