Winner Takes it All.

 Ah, politicians.  Not ya luv' em?

Not a day goes by without some attempt to score a point, any point, in the interests of 'The Party'.  Take My Starmer for instance - he has received some criticism  (mainly from inside his own party) for agreeing too much with Mr Johnson's government on too many things, notable Covid restrictions et al, so we now have a situation where he argues the opposite of everything, just (so it seems) to be seen to be opposing, rather than agreeing.  No matter that his opposing views are sometimes contradictory to earlier opposing views, it's all in the interests of  'The Party'.  A good example today where he is arguing for the easing of quarantine restrictions to be brought forward, thereby jumping on the 'I don't want to be quarantined' bandwagon, which seems to me to be partly in conflict with his opposition to the easing of quarantine for US and EU visitors in the last day or two.  Pesky foreigners eh? 

The Olympics is now 1 week old, and we're moving onto track and field, so I might understand some of the sports.  Not that I haven't enjoyed those so far, its' just that (apart from cycling) I have never been that interested in BMX, surfing and Taekwondo.  Mind you, covid rates are climbing steeply and there seems to be a chance the whole thing will collapse like a stockpile of LFT tests although it wold probably take a huge rise in infections with top athletes testing positive for it to stop it completely.

Back to the Future

Covid infections rates continue on their downward trend, and even though hospitalisations are up it's looking like this 3rd wave (as it's called) is not going to be half as bad as the doom-mongerers predicted.

I'm sure that your personal view on covid i.e. pessimistic or optimistic is a reflection on your general outlook to most things.  Covid is one of those rare events where history only partly helps, that is we cannot lean on past experience to influence our views despite some parallels with Spanish Flu, SARS etc.  I even see this in the 'experts' where there are so many different interpretations of the same data and surprisingly enough, no-one can see into the future. Pity, or maybe it's a good thing.

Power Up!

 It looks like the government is funding an electric truck pilot near me at Scunthorpe.  The plan is to install overhead cables (similar to those used by trams) which the lorry will 'attach' to along the motorway.  The initial project will be for 12 miles of carriageway/cabling on the M180.  A tiny distance in trucking terms, but I guess enough to find out if it's practical/safe/cost effective before they invest in more of the same.  I read that batteries will be in the lorries for the non-cabled part of the journey, which in this case will be the majority unless they've discovered a regular Scunny to Keadby lorry route. It will be interesting how this fares, and even more interesting if they can go on tracks, oh, hang on we already have that option. 

I'm a Sole Man.

 There's a possibility my right foot is poorly.  Specifically, the heel. After my bike ride home yesterday I struggled to put my heel down without a bit of grief as though it was bruised.  After a bit of googling, there's a chance that its plantar fasciitis, which I know can be a bit troublesome to get rid of.  What's odd, is that I have never felt it after a run, so I'm not 100% convinced on my diagnosis, but it does have all the classic symptoms.  If it is, it will be a bit annoying to say the least.  Evidently its some sort of inflammation of the bit of 'stuff' that runs from the heel to the toes, brought about by excessive use when e.g running or jumping, which doesn't quote add up from my bike ride issue, but some say it can be exacerbated by that, especially if the seat is a bit low (which it probably is).  I'll be raising it this evening and trying it again later on this week if the rain manages to clear.  I did quite a bit of strimming on the banks of the ditch on Sunday, so that might easily have made it worse. I need some better shoes/boots for that job that stop me slipping down the bank.

The Winged Horse

 There's been a lot made of The Pegasus Project - sophisticated spyware developed by some clever Israelis that can capture valuable information from someone's smartphone.  It appears to have been used by all sorts of organisations, political and commercial to gain knowledge and use that info for all sorts of uses.  Some commentators say it's the worst thing to have happened since the last bad thing, how it gives way too much power to those that have the data, and I can see their line of argument, but surely the issue here is our reliance on the mobile phone as our primary form of communication/information source.  That in itself is not a bad thing, so it's no surprise that it's a target for unscrupulous parties to exploit it.  I guess the first telegraph communications were targeted in a similar way, so we have to learn to live with it, fight it, or switch to something else.  Now, where did I put that pager? 

 

Lies, Damn Lies, and Covid Statistics

In the UK, we have had a worrying steep increase in the number of covid cases over the last 2 or 3 weeks, but suddenly, a similar rate of decline has happened in the last 4 or 5 days.  I'm much encouraged by the decline, because the rate of increase was so steep it looked like it would surpass the worst days earlier on this year, but now it's looking like a blip rather than a trend.  If it continues downwards, it will prove the strategy of letting it rip through the youngsters was a good call, but if the downward trend is itself a blip, then it's back to the drawing board, or lockdown as this particular drawing board is called. I'm guessing the downward trend will flatten out the nightclubbers bump the figures up, or it could be that those were also the footy watchers in pubs that might have caused the jump upwards.  Time will tell, but we are all watching those statistics.

  

Crowded House

 The delayed Tokyo Olympics start today, but I'm (so far) not in the least bit interested in it.  I think some of that is due to the time difference, for instance the opening ceremony is on as I write this (13:00) but I'll only watch the highlights later, or possibly not.  Maybe I'll be more interested when the action starts.  The organisers must be a) relieved it's going ahead in the pandemic, but b) annoyed they can't have spectators present.  

In The Shuffling Madness

It only occurred to me a couple of days ago when I was listening to MP3s in my car that some of my favourite songs are those that start with a 'slow bit' (I think there might be a more technical musical description) before breaking into the song proper.  I'm thinking Locomotive Breath by Jethro Tull, 5:15 by The Who and Whole Lotta Love by CCS in particular.  There's probably loads more, but they always incite me to turn the volume up when they come on so that when the loud bit starts I get the full sensation.  Strange how music makes you feel like that.  I'm sure there's been some doctorate written about it and found there was part of the brain that was affected, but I'll just stick to this brief summary. 

 

Sunburn

 Freedom Day, it has been dubbed today.  Free from restrictions day I think is the more correct description when we can ditch the masks and go clubbing.  I've never been a fan of mask wearing, mainly because I see it as a major inconvenience, nothing to do with the lack of evidence that it's necessary.  I know that they can stop/restrict one's droplets spraying on everyone else, but I don't think it's a convincing argument to wear them whenever you come into contact with someone.  Anyway, at least I now have a choice, and those that think they have to wear them can, that's their choice too, so we should be all happy, except that I read that plenty are not.

Managed to get a 10 mile run in yesterday, it was very hot (around 27) but I hadn't run for a week so I saw it as essential.  There were about 20 teenagers jumping into the Ancholme and having a good time, then I bumped into a couple also having a good time in the sun about a mile down the riverbank.  I hope she had suntan lotion on because she wasn't covered up at all!

Literally Speaking.

 Summer's here, or maybe not.  We're well into July and although we have had a bit of warmer weather, the rain has not really stopped much.  It looks like we're in for a better week next week, but then the rain is forecast to return.  I always keep in my mind the old 'you can't do anything about the weather', which is undoubtedly true, but no use if you want it to stop.  Anyway, 'make hay whilst the sun shines' is another phrase that helps justify doing almost anything, and in my case we cut the grass yesterday to make hay.  Did I take it too literally? 

Coasting.

 I had a week in Cornwall last week in our caravan, my first visit for over 20 years brought about by the Covid restrictions on international travel.  I can foresee  a bit of a dilemma in future years where I will have a really good almost new caravan needing to be used and the opportunity to go aboard at the same time.  It gives me options, but I expect 'decent weather' will trump 'potential decent weather' most times so watch this space.

I managed to get some decent running in though in the South West, just over 40 miles for the week and most of those were up and down, not at all like I'm used to in Lincolnshire.  The main route covered the SWCP (South West Coastal Path).  I also reduced my deficit to my plan, down to about 12 miles from over 40 so I need to make sure it doesn't slip[ as far as that again.  The 1000 miles plan works at about at just under 3 miles a day, which on the face of it sounds easy but coupled with my 5000 mile cycle plan is proving more difficult than I imagined.  In theory, I should be able to build a cycling buffer up with a running deficit in summer, then catch up with running in winter but at the moment I'm tracking just a bit below on both.  Hopefully a bit of dry weather will allow me to up my cycling, it's been a very wet late May and June even if it has been warm.