We're all goin' on a Roman Holiday...

Flight's booked, hotel's booked, time off from work is booked [Jesus, that could be a proper disaster!] and movies shot in Rome have been shunted to the top of the screenclick.com wishlist. [Go on, guess what's Numero Uno. I dare ya.] Now we just need to find us a Vespa so that we can dice with death while booting around the Colosseum with no helmets on...

The trip is to celebrate Himself & myself's 5^th Annimaversary. Previously, we have travelled to such exotic and far-flung destinations as Portlaoise, Galway, Cork and Killarney to mark our Annimaversaries. So although I am getting majorly exasperated with the "Will you be asking any important, life-altering questions while you're there?"/"Jesus, you're not getting married are you?" line of interrogation, I suppose you can maybe perhaps sort of see where the crazies are coming from. Sure, we're going for a city break "out furrin" and, better yet, to a city whose very name puts you in mind of romance. [Dean Martin has a lot to answer for.] City of romance where loads of people get engaged = proposal, right? Eh, no. Sure we escaped unscathed from New York and Paris, didn't we?

In truth, we are just a bit fed up of the unashamedly, unrelentingly crap weather that the last week of October brings with it in Ireland; I don't think we've had an Annimaversary break yet where we weren't absolutely flooded out of it. Cork 2004 was a particularly memorable rainfest: we went down for the BH weekend when the Guinness Jazz Festival was on, thinking that there'd be loads of people around and plenty of gigs etc to check out... And I'm sure there would have been, too, if it hadn't been for the pesky rain that caused the River Lee to burst it's banks and put half the city under water. We crossed from one side of the city to the other without incident on the Saturday afternoon, but by the time we had finished our dinner and were wondering about teas and coffees, I think we were the only people left in the restaurant and the water in the street outside was rising steadily. Not known for choosing waterproof footwear at the best of times and unwilling to subject my feet and legs for a prolonged soaking, I had a bit of a brainwave and proceeded to procure some bin liners from the waiter which we fashioned into casually elegant thigh-high waders before stepping out the door of the restaurant onto what had previously been the footpath. In the space of a few hours, it had transmogrified into a 6-inch deep stream. Patrick Street was under feet of water; there was actually an inflatable dingy travelling up and down this particular newly-formed branch of the Lee. We made it back to our hotel on the far side of the river before the bridges were declared impassible. As it was, we had to hug the side of the bridge as we crossed to avoid being knocked onto our asses by the river torrents rushing over it.

So this year, it's arrivaderci to shite Irish autumnal weather and ciao bella to four balmy October days in Roma. Apparently, today in the Eternal City it's predominantly sunny with highs of 23 or 24°C and not a single pair of home-made waders in sight.

Ah, fantastico!

Cruelty rays. Don't make me come back there and use them...

It has come to my attention that certain segments of the population have branded my treatment of Himself as nothing short of cruel; there was some fretting recently about who my, quote, "cruelty rays" would focus on next. I would like to take this opportunity to state that Himself actually instructed me to be a bee-atch when it came to His "training". In retrospect, the theory behind may have been that He would be motivated to go running in order to get the hell away from me. Which is ok because I am obviously so lovely when just being myself that I am un-tearable-awayable-from(able). So there! In other news: the Kerry Running Weekend failed to materialise. I understand that Alan had a sniffle touch of pneumonia. Typical boy! Meanwhile, in the absence of a jaunt to the southwest due to Alan's sniffle touch of pneumonia, Himself, Jennifer & Marielle took themselves off to the Pheonix Park on Sunday for an 18 mile run [that's 1.5 times further than the Half Marathon, people] and I nosed around the shops for the duration. While I tried to find nice winter boots in a size 3, they managed to complete three x 6 mile laps at 55 minutes per lap in some seriously mingin' weather. Trés impressivo, non? After all that madness [that's right, the smallest size they had was a 4, pah], some serious chillaxing was in order, so myself & the troops headed to Marielle's gaff for dinner where some very interesting and ultimately very tasty things were done with salmon, bruchettas and spinach. Admittedly, I wouldn't previously have known a bruchetta from a hole in the ground, but it was all still very yum - even Himself ate all his spinach, quite unprecedented treatment of a non-pea vegetable and a pretty impressivo testament to Marielle's chef-erry!

Ah, is there anything nicer than a little freak-out on a Friday afternoon?

I think I have of late been having a mid mid-life crisis. Well, a more sustained feeling of impending doom/what am I doing with my life-ness than usual at least, and since my quarter-of-a-century birthday is zooming towards me with the speed of a... a... a very fast, unstoppable, disaster of a thing, what else could it be. Things came to a bit of a head last Saturday night when I met up with Denise "Been To South America" , Elaine "Just Finished My M.A." and Steven "Hmm, Will I Do A PhD This Year Or Next Year?" for dinner and a few drinkies. After a few red lemonades in some sports/republican hub of a pub, talk inevitably turned to what everyone planned to do next.

I hate, hate, hate this line of conversation. I feel like such a lame-ass when it comes up because I am then forced to assess the lie of the land and think about my career plans [or lack thereof.] Mostly, I dunno what I want to do when I grow up :) but I would like to earn at least €60k base p.a. for doing something that I love [or as little work as possible, whatever. Truly, I am a person of integrity.] There are lots of jobs that I like the idea of. They're all the usual suspects, I think: I mean, who wouldn't want to be a best-selling author, or a fantastic magazine columnist, or a top beauty/fashion/magazine editor, an award-winning newscaster, or a superhero in the vein of Wonder Woman/She-Ra/Supergirl/Cheetara? Well, someone who abhorrs words or spandex mightn't be overly enamoured with any of those, I suppose. But I like the sound of all of them. I am wary of pinning my colours to the mast of any of these prospects for a number of reasons:

- They're all a bit pie-in-the-sky, pipe dream-y, aren't they? It's ok, you can say it. I know it, you know it, and they sure as hell know it.

- They're all kind of... I dunno, unworthy or irrelevant or something. I mean, I could pretend that when I talk about author-dom, it's because I have a burning desire to write something that would change the course of humanity or bring about world peace [or harsher penaties for parole violaters, Stan.] But I wouldn't fib to you like that.

- They're probably just like every other job when you do them day in and day out. I mean, wouldn't it be a b*tch to land what you think is your super awesome dream job and then discover it's actually crap in real life?

Anyway, most of the things I *think* I would like to do seem to involve writing. And since the only way to actually produce anything is to stop thinking and start doing [insightful, huh?] and the one time I did pull out some paper and a pen and actually scribbled down my random thoughts people stared as though I was a crazy lady [how could they could they tell without speaking to me?!], I think the time is right for the purchase of a laptop*.

* So that I can write in full view of others, thereby enhancing my career prospects, without apparently looking like a madwoman. The fact that I will get to play Solataire and watch 'Miss Congeniality' on DVD on the train is completely irrelevant...

Nutters

Himself and a few of the peeps from work have been in training for the Dublin City Marathon for the last few months. I have to say, I use the word "training" pretty loosely when it comes to Himself's, emmm, "regime". Initially, of course, there was much impressive talk of gruelling runs supplemented by super-frequent gym workouts. Paradoxically, there was very little talk [of any kind] of a marathon-worthy change of diet. There was the expected reaffirmation of the "All Vegetables Are Evil [With The Possible Exception of Mushy Peas, Mmm], How Could They Be Good For You" doctrine and a not-very-suprising resuscitation of the "I Just Need To Eat More Steaks [For Protein, Not Coz They're Tasty, Mmm]" mantra. The Crunchy Nut Cornflakes/nice things breakfasts were to be ditched in favour of the disgusting, smelly, mushy, puke-inducing, grey pulp popularly known as - I'm actually shuddering as I type this - porridge. Bleeeeeuuuurrrrgh.

A Marathon Masterplan™/training schedule was duly composed and distributed to all the relevant nutters those involved in the scheme. It dictated the day and nature of each of the aforementioned gruelling runs: run for X minutes, walk for X minutes, run for X minutes, collapse for X minutes... [ok, ok, so I made the last one up; it actually said "collapse for 10 minutes", jeez people!!] Himself followed the plan religiously for... oh, about 4 days, and then the improvisation began. I won't go into the minutiae of the digressions. Suffice to say, He somehow arrived at the conclusion that:

Seriously Curtailed Training* + Zero Modification Of Diet + Normal Alcohol Consumption** = Appropriate, Correct and Totally Safe Preparation For The Undertaking Of A 13- or 26-Mile Run

In fairness, Himself did complete the Dublin Half Marathon which I was vay impressed with; He decided to run/walk/run/collapsewalk the last mile but in retrospect [and possibly in the course of that mile!] felt that this was actually a bad idea as His legs started to sieze up. [Man am I glad I'm not athletic-ally inclined.]

After the success that was the Half Marathon, the impressive talk started up again in earnest. The probability of Himself joining an Athletics Club was given an airing. And yet... there has only been one [3 mile] run since the Half Marathon.

Now, all involved have pencilled in a training weekend down in Sneem, Co. Kerry for the 6^th/7^th/8^th October. Himself will, of course, be in attendance. Good. Great. I am all in favour of this whole marathon thing. I'm just worried that what seems to me to be a very sporadic approach to preparing for such an ordeal as a 26-mile run [let's just call a spade a spade here] for someone who's not all that involved in sport etc [ditto] might not be very, well, safe.

Anywho, while I give myself ulcers worrying about Himself, have a gander at the photos below of Him and Marielle from work giving it socks at the Dublin Half Marathon on Saturday, 23rd September last. [I didn't make up the captions, that's what they were saying. True story...]

"This is a piece of p*ss easy peasy! Dunno what marathon runners do be whinging about."

"Me either. Wonder where the Kerry representative is?"

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"Yep, still dead easy. Aren't we so cool with our running?"

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"Oh sweet merciful Jesus, we're gonna die. We are actually gonna die doing this stupid goddamn marathon (half marathon, lads -Lyndar). Whose goddamn genius idea was this again?!"

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"I wa--wa--want my Maaaammy! Blub blub blub."

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* Yes yes, we all know about the injuries. I'm just saying, is all.

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** I should point out that, the Friday post-work Heineken and the very odd work-related, boss-imposed Sambuca [ewww!] notwithstanding, I'd say Himself's Normal Alcohol Consumption, or NAC as it is often termed by no-one, is well below that of the average punter. I just thought that nutters those preparing for a race were supposed to abstain totally..? Or, at the very least, not spend most of the Saturday 5 weeks before the race drinking with a mate in a Sligo pub and trying to negate the disapproval surrounding the revelation of same by inferring they spent the "Sunday" surfing. Huh. Last time I checked, "Sunday" was a bit more than two hours long...