A bit more from Blighty....

Just a few more pics from the last week of my holiday for you all:

Feeding the ducks down the Boating Lake, Cleethorpes:
Bank holiday weekend Friday: Helen and I managed to blag some free tickets to watch Maximo Park playing a sold out gig at the Leeds Academy. Dan and I have seen these guys play at The Zoo in Brisbane in 2007, they are awesome live!


Sat night out down Call Lane, Leeds, with Helen and Jac.


Getting over the hangover on Sunday at Yorkshire Sculpture Park with Jac.

Strange strawberry shaped like a handbag..!

Monday: Day at Brimham Rocks, North Yorkshire, with Jac and Graham.






Slipped, then hit the wall running!

It's been so wet lately I haven't got as many runs done as I'd like to. I saw a break in the clouds this morning and decided to go for a long one. It was still a bit wet though and around the 8k mark I slipped :-(



I picked myself up again and managed to do 36k total in 3h8m. Which isn't too bad at all! More importantly I hit the wall. That's the point where your body has run out of readily available energy and has to get all your energy from burning fat. Burning fat alone doesn't get your muscles nearly as much energy as they'd like so you feel really drained. In the actual race I'll have to have sports drinks or gel packs to avoid hitting the wall. I just wanted to do it out of experimentation, hopefully it wont happen in the race, but a least I know what it's like and that I can carry on running through it.

More shopping...!

The last few days, I've been hanging with my sister, mum and dad. On Tuesday, my sister and I had a fab day trying on some wedding dresses; I didn't realise they actually take 6 months to order and 12 weeks to fit, so need to be planned way in advance! Here's a couple of pics (obviously not including the ones we really liked!).


Here's a couple of pics of Cleethorpes beach, approx 1 mile from my parents house. These were taken at 8pm, its fabulous having the light summer nights.

Shop Shop Shopping!

Laura and I took the trip over the Humber to Hull today to go shopping. There's a few more shops and generally just bigger stores than the ones in our home town, so we went on an hour's bus ride across the river....



Some key trends in the shops for summer 09'10 I spotted today were:-

1) Floral; which was kind of round last year
2) Big print maxi and midi dresses, teamed with studded/gladiator sandals or platform wedges
3) Flouro and brights (blue, pink, yellow)- (er, some things were meant to stay in the 80's)
4) Over long t-shirts/cardigans/sweaters, teamed with belts, and skinny jeans or leggings
5) Lots of things in coral (pale orange, you'll be pleased to hear Clo!)
6) Nude shades
7) All in one short jump suits - definately only made for size zero ladies, I would have taken a photo of the one I tried on but it I would never have lived it down, it was hilarious :)!

I will try and take some photos to post, though not sure I can do this tomorrow, as Laura and I are going to try on some wedding dresses!

TTFN
Amy x

Day 2 - more family stuff

Saturday, the weather was beautiful when I got up at 7am, unfortunately it turned into another day of sunshine and showers. Now I remember why we spend so much time inside here!

I spent most of the day catching up with family, then Laura and I paid a visit to Mr Valentino for dinner, then had a few drinks down Cleethorpes.

Back home by 11pm, honest!

Laura's been raving about her Sunday roasts for ages, so I'm finally going to get to try that this afternoon, (roast beef and Yorkshire pudding) after watching the Liverpool game. The plan for Monday & Tuesday is to shop, shop, and er shop!

Surprise!

After travelling 10,000 miles, I was hoping that the two weeks of sunshine they'd had at home in the past two weeks would continue...alas I was a little optimistic, but the train journey from the airport was great, just for the greenery and brooding skies!


It was so wet, my nan's cul-de-sac had some unusual vistors!

Laura did the good thing, and as soon as she picked me up from the train, took me to a greasy spoon for a proper lunch (or was it dinner or breakfast, I wasn't quite sure!!).


Lunch for two ₤4.10 (less than $9!). Brilliant!


Laura and I did concoct a plan to jump out and surpise my parent (complete with video), but unfortuantely that plan was scuppered by my mum insisting on leaving the house....So here's a quick pic of me with the parents just after!


The rest of the day involved a proper Friday supper, and trying to stay awake as long as possible to avoid the jetlag, which appears to have worked, I feel fine today (Day 2).


Proper Grimsby fish and chips!




The Piggott ladies

Marathon -9 Weeks

Not a great week of running, but hopefully rescued today by a 28k. Unlucky for Amy, she has to listen to me moan about my sore legs all day!

Thanks to Tim for pointing me to mapmyrun.com it's a cool site and I've spent ages drawing out my routes! I'll try and work out how to get it on the blog, then I can stop boring everyone for the next 8 weeks!

Running these longer distances it's become apparent that doing the marathon is going to be as much of a mental battle as a physical one. I always picture myself successfully at the finish during the run, this seems to help a lot, staying positive. It's hard staying positive for that long though. By the last lap all I could think was thank f... it's the last lap, thank f... it's the last time I have to run past this stuff!

Wed:14k
Fri:7k
Sat:28k (2h36m)

Total: 49k

Good luck tomorrow Stacey :-)

My 7k loop. It's really good, hardly any roads or traffic, beautiful river and city views.