Weeknote 38/2024
My back hurts. I don’t like to start with a whinge, but it really does. I think it’s due to my running shoes. Whether it’s psychosomatic due to reading this article, I’m not sure, but the Nike ZoomX foam isn’t as bouncy as it was, and my back has definitely hurt after my three >10km runs this week.
I think I’m going to try some ones I snagged at a discount which use Adidas Lightstrike Pro foam and see if that makes much of a difference. I don’t need my back to hurt any more than it usually does in my forties!
In my post at the start of the month, I mentioned trying to get back to swimming so I went twice this week with my son and daughter, separately. I didn’t do lots of lengths, but it’s good to return to the pool. Combined with an arms and a legs session at the gym, I’m feeling good (other than my back!)
Laura‘s been away this week, and will be away next, so although I’ve been co-working with John, I’ve also done a few more hours than usual. That’s been on a range of projects, including wrangling the AI sustainability principles work with Friends of the Earth, writing a report for JFF and IRC around a Verifiable Credential for New Americans, starting to put together a proposal for Skills Development Scotland, and working on materials for a couple of upcoming workshops on badges for N-TUTORR.
In addition, John and I have been doing some business development in the form of responding to requests for proposals (RfPs), some of which are speculative, and some of which I think we stand a good chance of getting.
My end of module assessment (EMA) is due on October 15th for module TB871 of my MSc in Systems Thinking in Practice. After a couple of sessions this week, I’ve got it all planned out based on my three tutor-marked assessments (TMAs), blog posts, and quotations from various places. Now all I need to do is write it.
It’s been 14 years since I bought Scrivener to help me write my doctoral thesis. I downloaded it again yesterday because, although it’s only 4,000 words, keeping everything in one Google Doc can get a bit unwieldy. Scrivener is the best thing I’ve come across to write stuff based on existing research. Having bought v2 I get a discount on v3, but I’ve still got plenty of time left in my trial.
Other than that, my son attended the Northumbria University open day yesterday which he’s thinking of applying to as a backup option. He’s interested in doing Environmental Sciences, and the standard offer there is only 112 UCAS points compared to the 136 points required for his likely first choice at Loughborough University, where he wants to pursue Geography and Sports Science.
He attended the event with a couple of friends after watching his sister, my daughter, play and score in her football match. Newcastle is only 14 miles from our home, so it’s quite close, but he would probably still choose to live away if he decides to go there. It’s all part of the university experience, isn’t it? My sister also lived away from home while attending Northumbria.
After my daughter also won her football match today, scoring another couple of goals to complete what we call a “weekend hat-trick” we went to McDonald’s for lunch. Given my son’s basketball team cruised to victory yesterday, the pressure is on for his football team to win the local derby game this afternoon. That would make it a ‘perfect’ weekend of four wins, which I think has only happened a couple of times before.
Next week, I’m taking my Dad to watch the mighty Sunderland play Derby County on Tuesday night as part of his 75th birthday celebrations. My son’s coming, but my wife and daughter chose not to. They don’t know what they’re missing: Sunderland are second in the table, and the half-time pies are fantastic.
Other than that, I’m going to keep on keeping on with all of the things mentioned above, and hopefully resolve the issue relating to running hurting my back. I’ll keep you posted.
Update: my son’s team did win their derby game, but he came off after 70 minutes with a suspected broken toe. Thankfully, the x-rays showed nothing major, but he’ll be off sports for a couple of weeks. Hopefully he’ll still be able to do his driving test in 11 days’ time!
Photo: one of my Nike Pegasus Turbo Next Nature running shoes. I really like them, but they’re less springy than they were. Apparently the recycled ZoomX foam only lasts 400-450km — and I’ve done 399.5km in mine…
Nice one to all on the perfect weekend! I’m guessing you’ve at least considered barefoot shoes in the past? It certainly takes some time to transition but I don’t think I’ve had an injury since I did and I used to get a lot of aches, pains and pulls.
I have considered barefoot but I’ve got very high arches so it tends to hurt. I had endless conversations with Dai back in the day 😅