In which I can't think of anything much to write.
I've had to get my brother with his enormous ladder (no, that's not a euphemism) around yesterday. This was because Mad Middle Child had decided to throw the front door keys onto the roof. This may require some explanation, I realise.
A little while ago he (Mad Middle Child (MMC), not my brother) bought himself a new bike with his pocket money. As children will he's treated it quite roughly, but this week the handlebar stem snapped, which I'm pretty sure is not supposed to happen unless you drop it off a building or something.
The people in the shop were very apologetic about this and replaced it, despite the fact that he'd taken the "peggies" off and it was generally a bit wrecked. They also said he should wear a helmet in case there was an issue with that specific model and the new bike does the same thing - it could have been quite dangerous, after all, and they gave us a free helmet for him.
To say that MMC was a bit upset at us telling him he couldn't go out on his bike without a helmet on is like saying that the sun is a bit hot. Incandescent would be about the most gentle word you could use for it. So he decided to grab the keys to the garage, and when I went to stop him getting the new bike out he threw them on the roof. At least it's better than the times he decides to throw shoes at us.
He's still refusing to wear his helmet and we're still refusing to let him out on his bike without it. It's a war of attrition that will be won by the side with the greatest willpower.
If you don't have children yourself and are planning to tell me how to deal with this in the comments, feel free; but I suggest you get some children first - it will be the last time in your life you have all the answers.
Right, where was I? Oh yes, training and dieting and stuff. I've been skipping the fried breakfasts this week and eating quite disgustingly healthily at lunchtime and dinnertime, at least most of the time, and I've been for 2 5.5k-ish runs with the guys from work, which is more than I've run in any week since starting training. So I was a bit disappointed to find that I've only lost a pound this week. It's quite important for me to lose weight since the heavier I am the harder it is to run, but at least it's going in vaguely the right direction (just slowly).
On the plus side, I'm not feeling so tired after runs and am generally managing OK. My legs still ache a bit, but I don't have to virtually crawl up the guest house stairs when I get back; and on the second run this week we managed the distance in less than 40 minutes, which I felt very proud of until I realised that to make my target for the half-marathon I have to do 4 times as much distance and each 5.5k needs to take less than 30 minutes. Oh-oh.
I have a week and a half left at my current contract before I go off to a place even further away. In one way I'm looking forward to it since I'll actually get to use all the software development stuff I've learnt over the years, but in another way I'm approaching it with some trepidation. I know it won't be such a relaxed environment as I'm in now, and I doubt the people I have to work with will be as nice (but we shall see).
They have sent me the source code for the application they currently use; I won't go into technnical details, but if it was a building it would be on a show with a name like "return of the worst cowboy builders from hell ever - the baddest of the bad". This is code that was not so much written as perpetrated.
I think I'm starting to ramble a bit now, so it's probably time to sign off. Until next time, folks...
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