Last week, I released the third book in my historic fiction series. It was exciting, especially the part where I got to hold the proof copy in my hand for the first time. Even so, the life of an author is not as full of adventure, intrigue and vast wealth as many people think. Top bestselling authors may have lives like that, but my experience (and I suspect theirs) is very different. If you’re thinking of writing a book, read on to understand the reality.
Continue reading An author’s life
Saturday 2 July 2022 was Southampton parkrun’s 10th birthday. Sadly, event number 448 did not have the brightest, sunniest weather. The wind was whistling across the flats so much the balloons wouldn’t stay still for my photographs, and looking at the clouds, I couldn’t help wondering if we would all stay dry. The possibility of getting wet didn’t appear to have deterred the runners. As the magic hour of nine o’clock approached, more and more people arrived, and the Common began to fill with lots of smiling faces. Soon the crowds began to gather at the start line.
Continue reading Birthdays, bees and blossoms (plus a few graves)
There’s something to be said for starting the day off with a nice walk. When that day also happens to be the first day of a new year, doubly so. It helped that the first day of 2022 dawned crisp and cold, a truly golden start to the year. After all the madness of the last two years, I hoped this was a good omen for the year ahead. I’m fairly sure I wasn’t alone in being tired of all the panic, rumour, conspiracy theories and restrictions at this stage. Commando and I strolled across the Common, admiring the layers of gold, grey and blue through the bare branches of the trees. The wonderful Gareth had already been round putting out his signs and the set up crew were on the flats putting out the poles and chains of the parkrun finish funnel. The sky was the real star of the show though. It looked like being a beautiful morning, which was just as well, because drizzle would have put a dampener on my plans.
Continue reading A fresh start
As 2021 drew to a close my outdoor exercise mostly revolved around parkrun. My first Novel, Plagued, was about to be published and almost every waking moment was consumed by proof reading and panic. The empty boating lake and the bare branches of the trees, like ink blown paintings, were a welcome relief. Even so, my head was buzzing with ideas, flitting between Plagued, in 1918 and my work in progress set in 1937, working title The Luck of the Draw. My plan for the morning was to walk up to the Avenue to try to imagine it with tram lines and trams.
Continue reading Mud, paint, park runs and fallen leaves
A little bird (Kim) had told me there was some new graffiti to be seen in the Beyond Graffiti Tunnel, so for the second parkrun of April, I decided on a change of scene for my morning constitutional. As the park runners began to gather on the flats, I headed past the Hawthorns (still sadly closed), towards the Avenue. Swapping the peace and tranquility of the Old Cemetery for the hustle and bustle of the road didn’t seem like much of a plan at first. Especially when I had to wait to cross. Once on the other side though, I made for Lovers Walk, the relatively quiet trail that runs behind the trees along The Avenue.
Continue reading Beyond Graffiti update
As Commando and I headed across the Common to parkrun, on 11 December 2021, we thought the pandemic was all but over. Well, I did anyway. Of course, we were still all wearing masks in shops and things, and washing our hands every five minutes. Ok, so that might just have been me too, but you get the picture. There was an annoying little variant called Omicron, in the news, but it sounded fairly innocuous, nothing but a bad cold really. The first case had hit our shores at the end of November, but no one was especially worried about it. Well, I wasn’t. It sounded to me as if the virus was doing what viruses generally do, getting weaker. In fact I thought it might be good news.
Continue reading Christmas comes to the Common
On 14 March 2020 when we all said goodbye at the end of the four hundred and first Southampton parkrun none of us could have guessed that it would be more than sixteen months before we’d see parkrun number 402. In those sixteen months, the world had changed. We had all become conditioned to wearing masks, keeping our distance, touching nothing and disinfecting everything. The logistics of organising an event with hundreds of people running in close proximity, queueing for tokens and handing over barcodes was a nightmare.
Continue reading A hint of normality
Strange as it may seem, one of the things I’ve missed the most since the first COVID restrictions were put in place is getting up at silly o’clock on a Saturday morning to go to Southampton parkrun. For someone who doesn’t run, and very rarely even walks the parkrun course, it would appear to be bizarre on the face of it. Even more so because, most of the time, I don’t even hang around to watch the running. Who in their right mind would give up a whole Saturday morning every week to not watch other people run? Why would anyone do such a thing? Let me explain.
Continue reading Most missed
After a night of alarmingly high winds, Southampton Common looked a little the worse for wear when we arrived this morning. There were leaves, twigs and even small branches littering the path as we headed towards the start area. As this path is also part of the course, it was a bit of a worry but we knew ED Rob, RD Kate and park ranger Ian would have walked or cycled round the course to do a risk assessment.
Continue reading A blustery day and a boating lake update
This morning, as we crossed the road to the Common, Ian, the ranger, was letting a black car through the gates. Commando and I wondered what the people in the car were doing but, as it went in the opposite direction to us we soon forgot about it in the hustle bustle of the parkrun set up.
Continue reading Blue green algae