Swimming Into Trouble

Another few more lengths this week, but some turmoil in the pool too. My timing was out, to say the least. Let me explain;

Wednesdays, never forget, you need to be in the pool to ensure an early finish. From 9:00 the Blue School arrive and take up three of the six lanes, as well as the training and lagoon pools. With two more lanes being combined for general swim this leaves only one lane for those of us keen to do lengths. I foot this, arriving in the water at quarter to nine. The lane was empty for my first four lengths, sixty to go, when I was joined by an nice old fellow who swims breast stroke like me, a fraction quicker he is, and then alternates with back stroke - he has a bad neck he once explained - when I catch up and a little more. We share a lane well, efficiently.

I was in the early twenties when the children and their high pitched frivolity joined the fray. Into 'our' lane came an Asian lady who's quite fast going forwards, but on her back, very slow. Lane swimming is all about the slowest swimmer, tricky. As the attendants combined the other two lanes another lady joined us too and the sensible maximum of three per lane was over. As it was, after a couple of lanes we'd all sorted out our rhythms and were working well as a small community. I felt proud in the human ability to all get along.
Until, the testosterone macho-man dived in. He had as much right as the rest of us of course, I would never deprive him of that freedom. He proceeded to impress with his pacey front crawl, probably twice the speed of any of the rest of us. And those fancy forward-roll turns too. Not being able to swim past us with the frequency required he opted for turning before a lane end, quite a good solution, until he was suddenly spinning as we all limited the middle ground. Time for a blistering strike through the crowd he decided. Gulping the water, not my favourite pastime, damn. None of us where going to submit. I wonder what the attendants made of it all, and what my comrades were thinking too. The Asian lady decided to relax on her back more often. I lost count of my lengths, or did I?

The microcosm of the world had fallen apart. My relaxing swim, when I sort out my brain, calming gently into the day, became a whirl of frustration, misunderstanding, doubt, conflict. Somehow, I managed to reach fifty lengths before giving up. That five individuals, all keen to swim, weren't able to do so with an amount of consideration, cooperation and thought. Is it any wonder we have a world we have?

It's Just Waffle Today

Good. Easter's done. Have found all those long lost notes about losing weight, my motivations, my monitoring of food, the regime, the recipes etc. Despite another very late night following games at Andy's - the less said about one of those the better - I was up relatively earlier as Basti had an inset day today and had promised to coming swimming with me early. We arrived about 8.15 i guess and it was pretty busy for a Tuesday although it cleared reasonably well. He reckoned he was going to try and get to twenty lengths and I said I needed to do at least fifty not having been for almost a fortnight.

I like the pool, but the photographer's made it look amazing!

As it was we both did well. I hit my usual sixty-four lengths, a mile, and he got up to thirty-two much to everyone's surprise. We both felt good afterwards too, hurrah. Just as well as we needed to go school trousers shopping and get the groceries. As ever, I didn't have the right change for the car park so we dashed in to the uniform shop but ended up trying on three pairs before finding the ones that need taking up by at least five inches. Never mind. Our supermarket trolley race didn't go too well with him constantly asking me how much longer we had on the parking ticket and what else was on the list. If he'd have just got the blinking stuff maybe we would've been less stressed!

Anyway, I sent him out whn the ticket expired and finished off in the shop. After paying I took out a huge display scattering some produce all over the place and giving one old fellow the fright of his life. Ooops! The car was fine but as soon as I got home I realised I'd forgotten to buy any meat. Damn. Off to the butcher's in a mo' then.

At home I took his trousers up. They're quite neat and I doubt anyone will notice that I could only find the navy cotton and no black. Then made another tomato soup, provencal style the recipe reckons. Not sure about that but it tasted beautiful. As Mrs Hora put it, 'like real tomato soup without that bought after-taste. Certainly good for the diet. Have booked myself in for a service, am due to consider how the reduced medication has been. Seems ok to me although I'm worried about the next step, went a bit fractious after missing a couple of days of the early morning ones and I can't sleep without the nighttime ones.

A beautiful new chunk of vinyl arrived today too. An And Also The Trees 12" produced in France for RSD14. It's so pretty in it's huge sleeve. There were discussions about the box for the game Splendor over the weekend. The contents take up about 10% of the box it's sold in. But then would gamers buy a tiny box and believe the game is as good as it is. I have several small boxed games that don't get the merit they deserve because of that. Strange. Anyway, a 12" sleeve looks brilliant, so much nicer than a cd cover, never mind a downloadable photo.

Wonder what David Moyes is up to today. Bet he's inundated with journalists dreaming they're going to get something amazing to write up, plus friends and colleagues trying to be supportive I hope. I haven't looked at the news since I heard an announcement in Lidl. I think I'm in the camp that will say he wasn't give enough time. But then you look at how well Martinez, Pellegrini and Mourinho and have done since last summer and I think, mm, what has he been up to? You could easily add to that list Pulis, and even Sherwood. Still, he'll never have to work again if he doesn't want to. Will probably be the next Scotland manager if he fancies that... And then who's in at Man U? Some big name, for two or even three seasons before he moves on again.

Subbuteo Swimming

As an avid fan of Subbuteo when I was growing up I loved collecting teams, playing leagues and cup tournaments. I even got Subbuteo Cricket and Rugby and successfully played those solo too. And Football Express, their 5 a-side football game, was superb. In 2000, when I started working from home, I found myself surfing and stumbled back into a whole world of Subbuteo I hadn't thought existed. I also discovered eBay and the two combined into a ridiculous collection. Amongst April Fool's Day jokes of the past Subbuteo came up with a few, and swimming was one of them. For me, it's my way of keeping track just how many lengths I've swum each morning. Let me take you through the mind of an hour's swim...

I get up whenever I get up and head off to the local baths before breakfast, I don't want to be too awake when I start you see. And then it's quick shower and into the pool. Lane selection is crucial. Wednesday's are tricky, along with Monday and Friday they tend to be quite busy. And come 9am, a time I'm usual in the water, the Blue School arrives with at least ten thousand children eager to swim and probably just as many eager not to. The ensuing high-pitched kerfuffles go on for half an hour and concentration is easy to lose. Not with my system though.

Mustn't count strokes. That's really tough. Early on I know I can do a length, twenty-five metres, in twenty-four strokes, but as time goes on that averages out at twenty-six or twenty-seven and I always feel that's too many. My breast stroke is not great, but I figure that the less fluent my style the more work I must be putting in to travel my morning mile. Makes sense doesn't it?

So, I need to keep track of the lengths. The first ten I see as my warm up. It'll take me those to get into what ever rhythm I'm going to swim to for that day. It's easy keeping up with the first ten. After that I need to turn to the classic Subbuteo 'heavyweight' figure as they are called amongst collectors. The first 190 teams Subbuteo produced are considered to be the perfect collection despite the fact that that model reached references around the 324 mark and higher in Italy. My counting takes me through the first sixty-four of those. As mentioned the first ten don't need much monitoring but from eleven - QPR - I'm checking where I am by going through the catalogue. Twelve - Bristol Rovers, thirteen - Blackpool, seventeen - Ipswich, white sleeved version, my team, hurrah!

In the twenties though I start getting confused; too many Scottish teams. Never sure whether Hamilton Academicals or Queens Park are twenty or twenty four respectively. But I do know that Hearts are twenty-seven and those Canaries are twenty-eight. Into the thirties and I'm completely lost. Fortunately, thirty-two lengths is half way so I align myself to that. Thirty-four is Juventus, thirty-six Floriana from Malta and then Grimsby and Poland make up the last of the thirties. During all this time I am thinking of what the day will hold for me, stuff I need to remember to do, dreams I'm like to have. And there are my fellow swimmers too of course. Such a huge number of regulars, people you only see in just one item of clothing. My self-loathing is high out of the water, I must look horrendous! Never mind. We all say hello, talk about how busy the pool is, how noisy the children are and the water temperature of course.

Ajax

Where was I? Thirty-nine, yes, Poland, didn't reach forty-one, that's easy to remember, Liverpool, followed by Chelsea, Coventry, Falkirk, Hibs. Hibs is another landmark as it means I'm into my last twenty lengths, and then forty-eight, Spain, three quarters of my swim completed. Never count it in percentages, that's my top tip. It's a mess and feels horrible, not sure why. Anyway, fifty is Brazil. Then Sheffield Wednesday, Exeter, Portsmouth, Plymouth, Fiorentina, Ajax, AC Milan, Inter Milan. Who the hell within Subbuteo chose which teams to be numbered like this? Why are there so many Scottish teams so early on? How do you get from South-West England over to Italy, and the Netherlands.

Thankfully, by the time I reach fifty-eight I start counting down the lengths to go. Just as well as I can never recall what teams are referenced in the early sixties, I know they're actually quite rare in collector's terms, which equates to unexciting in football terms. Especially when I was ten. The last lengths and I allow myself to count strokes; four lots of seven, twice. Done.