2013: The year that whizzed by

It really did, didn't it? It flew and on this last day of 2013 I am left feeling very restless. I guess if I have to sum 2013 up: I did a heck of a lot of stuff but perhaps not quite what I wanted to do.

In June I stopped working at Bassline:

During the 3 years there I developed a wonderful appreciation for African music: reggae and its big grand-daddy – raga, kwaito, hip hop, township jazz to name a few – and stand up poetry was a winner. I was certainly shaken out of my tame musical ‘rut’. I found out that I love very, very loud music and I knew about twerking years before Miley Cyrus did her stuff on stage this year. The Bassline twerkers knock spots off Miley - her twerking would be classified as ‘novice’ by some of the Bassline gals!

The gaiter business carries on:

Our desert gaiters are becoming a firm favourite around the world. Quite a bit of business is word of mouth but a lot comes via Lisa’s website. www.ar.co.za. She gets 12,000 – 15,000 visits a month (her blog gets about 10,000) – with this audience our little business is doing well. An interesting thing is how different the markets are for each of the 3 gaiter products – the desert gaiters are by far the most fun; apart from standard stock items in very ordinary colours, we frequently get requests for the brightest, most flamboyant colours and designs you have ever seen.  This amazing photo of a team racing down a sand dune in Abu Dhabi shows our bright green gaiters (made to match the shirts) is a real winner!

Reading, reading, reading:

I read a lot this year – favourites that really stand out are: The Auschwitz Violin (very haunting), The Luminaries, The Goldfinch, The Signature of all Things, Silent House, The Book Thief, Big Brother. And lots of other bits and pieces thrown in for good measure.  

Travel:

Nothing to speak of this year but I do have plans for 2014 and 2015. Hopefully this will take care of my restlessness!

Bracken:

Our little tabby cat is still going strong – she turns 19 on 1 April 2014. She is quite vocal these days and sets up a howl of many decibels when she wants someone to go running to her. It amazes me that one little cat can generate such a huge sound! We really are blessed to have this little animal in our lives.

2014 plans/goals and resolutions:

My only resolution is to write down all the goals for 2014 – plan properly and make sure everything (well just about everything) gets done and ticked off.

With 2014 in mind, my very best wishes to you all. May it be a fun filled, productive and interesting year.

Conniving Kitty

2 years ago we decided to lock all the downstairs windows at night – thus keeping out the bully neighbourhood cats that came in to the house to steal Bracken’s food and beat her up if she happened to be having a midnight snack. At that time she was 16 years old and no match for some of the local thugs. She was in fact quite terrified and becoming a bit withdrawn.

The one problem we faced was with battening down the windows, was that she refuses to use a litter box – flower beds are the only things she will use for her toilet. But, within about 4 days she had trained us to respond to her standing with her front paws on the bedside table as a sign that she wants to go outside. If the response is not fast enough, a gentle tap on the head usually does the trick and gets us moving. Whoever has been chosen as the toilet maid for the night has to get up and go out into the garden with the little cat whilst she has a drink out the birdbath and then heads for the bushes. Then, with much ado about ‘what a clever girl’ and little pats, it is back to bed for the 2 of us. (NB: whilst writing this I realise that I am the toilet maid 99% of time – hmm)

In case you think this happens every night – it doesn't  If we get the timing right pre-bed time when we take Bracken out for a last pee, she can usually last until I get up at about 5.00….but now that she is 18, the night can sometimes be a bit long.

She also has me trained, when it is raining, to stand in the middle of the lawn with a large golf umbrella. She dashes out, stands on my feet and we shuffle to the edge of the flower bed where she does her business; then we do the shuffle back to the front door…thus achieving the least amount of rain splatter on the kitty back.

Now for the conniving kitty part:

Lately, when we take her out pre-bedtime, she just might not want to do a pee. But because she doesn't want us to know this, she dashes into the bushes and almost immediately exits about a metre from where she went in, hangs around for a little pat and praise, and then bolts inside. Because we cottoned on to this little trick, she is quite happy when we give her a little nudge towards the bushes again – she repeats the performance and comes out looking all pleased with herself and bolts inside and upstairs.

And we think they are just animals.

Customer Service

Just before Lisa went off to Argentina she decided that she didn’t want to take her down jacket. Not because it wasn’t going to be warm enough in Bariloche (it is about 1200 km south of Buenos Aires) but because it is really bulky and difficult to lug around. So she found an amazing Columbia jacket in a local store – this jacket is water proof and has special Omni- Heat thermal lining and insulation; and is not at all bulky.  The problem was that she needed one size bigger. The shop wasn’t all that helpful about sourcing her size and when she phoned around no-one had one in her size. By this stage it wasn’t even about the colour! The worst thing was that no one was really too concerned or helpful, even the local distributor.

So Lisa emailed Columbia in the US to ask about retail outlets in Argentina and guess what? They got back to her immediately, asked for her size, colour preference and address in Bariloche – it was waiting for her on her arrival at the hostel. All free of charge including the jacket. 

Lisa in her jacket

Writer’s Block No 2.

Yip. I still have it. I have ‘written’ countless, brilliant blogs in my mind but they just don’t get onto paper. But there are 2 things I want to mention.

Winter Blues:

For the last 3 weeks or so I have been coughing, hacking, blowing my nose, sucking sweets that promise to soothe my sore throat and watched in horror as my nose changed colour to bright red and increased somewhat in size.

It all started when I sat in a tiny office next to my boss and new client. My boss looked like a wet chicken and all I could think of for the duration of the meeting was ‘please don’t exhale’. He was quite sick. Next morning I woke to a sore throat which I promptly labeled psychosomatic and off I went to work. By mid-day I couldn’t swallow and my nose was blocked up; a couple of days later it settled in my chest and I nearly coughed my lungs out – many times.

A lot of people asked me if I had the flu. ‘No’ said I,’ I have an upper respiratory tract infection’.

You know if you have flu : you cant get out of bed and you feel like you might die. You need/want people to bring you soup, orange juice, water, asprin and cough mixture. You need tea and to be left alone to sleep it off because that is all you can do. You have a temperature, your bones and muscles ache, you sweat like crazy or feel you might freeze to death; in other words you feel like absolute hell. Note: Stay in bed if this is you – you don’t want to spread it around and you will get better much quicker if you pamper yourself a bit.

But if you have what I had you can still function albeit the brain, well my one anyway, is bit addled from all the cough mixture. You just don’t feel quite that bad that you should go to bed.

And just when I thought I was better (nose back to normal and the cat wasn’t annoyed because of me coughing all night) I got a dose of rhinitis…and what is that? Well, anyone who lives in Johannesburg knows that awful little itch in the nose which suddenly erupts into a steady stream of snot and there is nothing you can do to stop it. Your nose is very, very inflamed – this is not a cold, cough or ‘flu’. This is an attack on the delicate mucous membranes inside your poor little nose. This is the result of the dry, dry, very dry Highveld winter, the dust, smoke from fires and who knows what else is lurking around in our air.

Ouch – my poor (I would like to say little) nose….bottles of nose spray and boxes of extra soft tissues later have left me, once again, with a red, red nose, chapped lips and yes, my nose does look much, much bigger than usual.

Product descriptions:

The great Seth Godin once commented that he didn’t understand why the people who make cat food give the various concoctions names like (and I paraphrase): Lamb Casserole with vegetable or Roast Chicken with young potatoes. He suggests names like: Sparrow Stew or Mouse Pie…much more to a cat’s taste.

This leads me onto my Shampoo and Conditioner labels. Mine say: ‘for thin, fine and lifeless hair’ and ‘smoothes dry, rough and frizzy hair’. Jeez…can’t they be a bit nicer about it? A Body Shop body wash thing I have says: ‘lavish, opulent cleansing oil’…Now that is labeling!

Writer’s Block

Writer’s Block

I have it so bad that I even began to angst over where the apostrophe in ‘writers’ went and almost threw in the towel again. But a Google search on ‘writer’s block’ saved the day.

The funny thing about writer’s block is not the lack of ideas or subject matter. It is what happens when that blank piece of paper appears on the screen. I tried inserting a picture to get me started, that didn’t work. So now I am going to try something different - listing some of the issues that have been bugging me for a while and should make a good blog:

Education:

Did you know that one of China’s objectives in their country vision statement/country objectives is to be the most educated/intellectual country on earth? Their average IQ has gone up 10 points in the past decade. Meantime the western world is dumbing down its kids. I think China must shake its head when it reads that in some US states they have taken algebra of the curriculum because it is too hard. And how about our simple arithmetic course being labeled as functional maths – it is not maths and probably not functional. And need I even mention the 33% pass mark.

Feminism/Feminist:

If I hear one more person (woman) say any of the following I think I will throw up:

• I think I might become a feminist – what the heck are you then?
• I don’t like women – well this must be really tough for you.
• I think women bosses are such bitches – well this must be really tough for you.

And if I hear one more person (man) say the following I think I will take him out at the knees:

• If you want to be like us – just listen to yourself……and you wonder why there is such discrimination still. You have missed the pointed entirely.
• All you women are the same – ag get a life.

Death and closure:

If I hear one more person say the following I think I will throw up:

• He/she died doing something they love (ie. Cyclist gets squashed by a truck) – I am sure the person liked cycling but I am damn sure they are not pleased to have died doing it.
• They (wife/children/siblings) will find closure once the funeral/memorial/cremation is done. Or: they need to find closure – closure on what for goodness sake? Even so, I am sure they won’t find closure…not just yet anyway. The grief process takes a bit of time. Can’t people find something else to say other than this glib comment?

On being humbled:

This is so overdone now that it sounds really stupid. Every second person who wins a race, gets an award, is given a pat on the back is humbled and some are even truly humbled – you know what they are going to say before they even open their mouths. Cant they just say: I worked really hard and I deserve this.  Good quote by Golda Meir: Don't be humble... you're not that great.

And now that I have read my comments above I know why I have writer’s block *grin*.

Denial

I have been thinking about writing this blog for ages – but time passes and I sort of forget about it.

The events during the past week though have reminded me of this and perhaps it just the right time to my thoughts on paper.

Have you noticed the initial responses from people close to those US school killers and the guy who let rip in the Spiderman movie? Comments vary from: he was a quiet person, loved his family, a genius (oh yeah), his mother loved him, didn't have many friends, shy, withdrawn – I could go on forever. It is only after the initial shock of the shooting that the ‘dirt’ comes out. These people were actually aggressive, deranged, anti-social, and difficult to get on with, angry, chips on shoulders the size of the Statue of Liberty, abusive, tortured cats when they were kids and probably still do, and so on. And people (their parents and friends) were scared of them. And they owned guns. Well, in the US it is pretty easy to get a gun but none of their friends or family took the damn things away from them – or asked the police to take them away. You can’t tell me no-one knew about the guns. But, the fact is the folks and friends probably were bloody terrified to confront these little psychos.

The scariest things though, are that the nearest and dearest live with it and put on a ‘brave face’ and pretend to the outside world that everything is OK. I do understand that is quite difficult to say to an outsider that you kid terrifies the living daylights out of you and you can’t stand the little sod anyway. Parents aren't allowed to make those sorts of confessions are they? So what happens? Well one day the wheels come off and all hell breaks loose; people of left shaking their heads wondering what the heck happened. I can tell you that these things don’t just happen – they have been on simmer and a rolling boil for a long time but no-one says anything.

Six months ago I had an experience that I will share with you: An old friend phoned me. He was at the airport, on his way to the UK. He asked if I could pop over there because he would like to say Hi. It was 10.00 on a Tuesday morning, I was at work so I said I wouldn't be able to and my whole day was busy. We chatted for a bit and I thought that was that. At 3 in the afternoon I get a call to say he has cancelled his flight and booked for a week’s time – can he come and stay. He obviously heard my hesitation – he got a bit narky and said he was now in a sticky spot….So I collected him from the airport. I knew the minute he got in the car that something was very wrong. The first thing he said was ‘have you read about me in the papers today’. I said no and why should I have? To cut a long story short – he was psychotic, he was hearing voices, hallucinating, communing with little men on Mars and convinced that he was being tracked via his cell phone – who was doing the tracking was a mystery. He was intent on telling me that he was OK, that he was cured (long history of mental illness) but just took his meds to keep ‘them’ happy. The meds he takes are Lithium and Serenace. Google ‘Serenace’ and see for yourself what it is used for. He also said that the police had given him a licence for his gun, yes a gun licence – so therefore he must be fine. I told him he couldn't go to London and said he should go back to his family in the small town. So he phoned his mother to tell her that Liz thought he wasn't well enough to go to the UK. What did his mother say? She said: Is Liz qualified to give this diagnosis? Of course I am not qualified to give a psychiatric diagnosis – but hearing voices, seeing things, talking to little men on Mars, being terrified to turn on your phone because they are tracking you ….Nay, I’m not qualified at all. But I do know that something isn't quite right.

So a day or 2 later Lisa and I managed to get him on a plane back to his family – they were a bit miffed but there was not much they could about it – I said I refused to have in with me a minute longer and he was their responsibility and they should book him into the nearest facility until he got this psychotic episode was over.

Now I fully understand that the family were probably relieved when he flattened his Mum’s credit card to buy his ticket to the UK and he jumped on the plane to Johannesburg. But how could they let him go to the UK; he was clearly ‘not well’ when he got on the plane (and flattened his Mum’s credit card). And how could they get miffed with me because I refused to look after him. How can they let him have a gun? They were happy to ‘get rid’ of the problem onto me and the UK for a bit. Have they actually told him his behavior is just not on – probably not.

And so we get to the week that kept the entire world sitting on the edge of its seat watching the Oscar drama play itself out.

And the dirt started hitting the headlines – people say he is an aggressive, out of control, raging, and arrogant person. His family say he is a sweet as pie. Well go figure. Sweet as pie just isn't so – sweet as pie doesn't need all those guns. The reports of his aggression, previous fights he has had, his room mate at the Olympic village had to move because of Oscar’s rages,  and so on kinda says he wasn't as sweet as pie. Why didn't his dad and siblings say anything – they must have observed this. Why didn't they tell him his behavior was not on. Why didn't they get him some help – even just some anger management or something like that? Why didn't his agent/manager (how must have been collecting a packet from his earnings) insist he have some counselling – he also must have seen this out of control behavior.

I’ll tell you why. Typically no one wants to tell ‘the difficult person’ that their behavior stinks – they don’t want to upset the person. They might even be scared of the person. As far as offending the difficult person is concerned – well who really cares at the end of the day if he is offended – he is damn offending to everyone around him….

Same goes for the guy who bashes his wife – yes, you can indeed get involved and tell the guy that you will stuff him up if he does it again. Yes, you can tell the alcoholic that his behavior drinking are offensive and he has to get help. And yes, you can tell the nut case and his family to go get help.

For as long as we remain in denial of what is happening in our lives or the lives of our family and friends; for as long as we keep silent and pretend that everything is OK, or say that  we don’t want to get involved because it is  none on our business, the abuse, beatings, rapes, killings will continue.

We cannot be in denial any more.

A few little things

 Your name in print:

I don’t care who you are but it is really nice to see your name in print.

Towards the end of last year I was interviewed for a couple of hours by a young journalist from a magazine called Modern Athlete. They wanted to do a story about my Camino walk. The journalist was really interested and found most of what I said quite fascinating and she hung on every word – well I like to think she did! I submitted photos with smart captions and waited to see the story – only to see it in full glorious technicolor, finished and published in the magazine. I didn't get to proof it.

So why aren't I jumping up and down with excitement and waving it under everyone’s noses? Well, there are few things that aren't quite correct but the one ‘error’ that has me blushing and, lets face it, cringing a bit is the sentence that says I said ‘I ate like a pig every day’. Whereas what I said in reply to the question about the type of food I ate along the way was: ‘I ate a lot of pork…in fact I might have eaten a whole pig by the time I got to Santiago (joke, joke, joke)’

Where is Mac when you need him.

Good reads:

I have just finished reading The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak. Read it, it is wonderful

Another really good read is: The Garden of the Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng – a fascinating story and you will be surprised by some of the characters that pop up. A friend said it could have done with a bit more editing but I enjoyed it tremendously. One of the books you don’t want to end.

Good jazz evening

On the last Saturday of each month there is a jazz night, the Classic Jazz maters entertain for a few hours at the Radium Beer Hall on Louis Botha Avenue. The music is fabulous and the Radium has a large menu and the food is great (and reasonable). It is a lovely way to spend an evening. The music is of the bandstand style and I can guarantee that you will know almost all the songs.

11 truths of running endurance

Needless to say these fortune cookie bits of advice by Lisa apply to everything - not just endurance running. Enjoy!

11 truths of running endurance

By AdventureLisa on Jan 03, 2013 in Featured, Training

I love fortune cookies. It’s the frivolous words of wisdom and positive prophesies that I enjoy more than the cookie itself. While preparing a special treat for a night-time, orienteering-like navigation event that I organise I went in search of pearls; those wise words that motivate and inspire and say it like it is. These are my favourites.

1.       Ask yourself: ‘Can I give more?’. The answer is usually: ‘Yes’.

I’m not much in favour of running ‘til I puke, but there’s something to be said for finishing a race having given it everything.

2.       Relish bad training runs. Without them it’s difficult to appreciate the good ones.

I dread those chest heaving and legs dragging runs. They make an appearance when I spend too many hours for days on end at my computer; when I’m not eating right and not hydrating sufficiently and when I’m not running at least four times a week. Eliminating the causal factors is an easy solution to making more sessions good. Right?

3.       Believe that you can run farther or faster because you can.

I have a ‘rule’ for ultras. If it is up, walk. If it is flat or down, run. At the 2005 Coastal Challenge in Costa Rica I hit the 52-odd kilometer stage running, literally. As the route ran North to South along the beach, it was all flat. I had to run it all – according to my rules. And I did. The whole way. Bar maybe one kilometer of slight climb on a dirt road. In doing so I reached new personal best for distance in one chunk. In adventure racing I see this over and over again – racers achieving personal records for distance across the disciplines. Yes, you can. And this leads me on to the next gem…

4.       Running won’t kill you, you’ll pass out first!

Sports scientist Ross Tucker wrote a series of articles on fatigue on The Sports Scientists blog (www.sportsscientists.com) some years ago. In short, according to Tucker, fatigue (or the slowing down of pace) results from the regulation of performance to balance all the body’s physiological systems, which happens BEFORE any physiological failure can occur. So, in theory, I’d conclude that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

5.       Every day is a good day when you run.

30 minutes. That’s all you need. When you’re cranky, tired, irritable or down-in-the-dumps, a run tints the World rosy again.

6.       Run often and run long, but never outrun your joy of running.

Event after event, packing and unpacking, weekends that are anything but restful and recuperative and week days of squeezed-in training to prepare for these weekend activities… This cycle, although fun, can demolish that love for your sport, regardless of discipline. Back off to find and keep that joy.

7.       To be the best runner you can be, start now. Don’t spend the rest of your life wondering.

Substitute “runner” for biker, paddler, adventure racer, orienteer, kayaker, mountaineer… You may not have tomorrow.

8.       We are all runners, some just run faster than others.

Regarding adventure racing I often hear, “I’m not fit enough”. I usually answer, “Some run Comrades in 5:30 and others in 10 hours. There’s fit and there’s fast. You don’t need to be fast to reach the finish.”

9.       Run when you can, walk if you have to, crawl if you must; just never give up.

There are only two reasons for pulling out of a race.

One: when you’re badly injured or severely ill. Just being ill is not good enough reason. Remember that over a multiday adventure race you can easily rest in the shade of a tree for a few hours or even overnight. It’s amazing what a few hours of rest, food and hydration can do to improve your situation. You will regret it later if you pull out, let your team down and then wake up in the morning feeling like a million bucks.

Two: when you’re so far behind the field that the race director ends your race and gives you a lift to the finish. These are the only times. Everything else is an excuse, not a reason.

 10.   Everything you need is already inside.

Forget fancy-pants, top-of-the-range gear and apparel. These don’t get you up hills or through tough kilometers. You do.

 11.  And finally, a lesson I have to re-learn all too often: “Any day that you are too busy to run is a day that you are too busy”. 

‘Nuff said.

Author: Lisa de Speville | Originally published in Go Multi Magazine, May/June 2012