Run … then it rather fell apart, can you guess why?

Bournemouth – four days there and I didn’t even walk the 200 yards to the beach

The hill rep session on Monday morning was a very hard 8 reps for 9km and 265m ascent (5.6 miles & 870 feet). A little slower than usual because I developed a cold at the weekend.

The cold became a bit more of a concern when a friend we saw on Friday tested positive for Covid – but I guessed the fact that I had just done the run meant a cold was the worst I could have. I tested anyway as I was planning to give friends a lift to the evening’s swim doctor session … and it was positive … damn.

Does 8 hard hill reps with Covid count as a personal best?

I’ve dodged the Covid bullet for so long, I didn’t think it was going to get me. I can’t be sure where I caught it but everything points to last Friday evening’s musical event in the village church – it looks like that was the culprit as there is now a new wave of infections in the village.

My wife recorded a mild positive and then a negative, so we started taking the obvious precaution of me staying at a distance, wearing a mask and sanitising like it was going out of fashion.

I didn’t sleep very well on Monday with a nose that was simultaneously running and blocked but, apart from that, I felt reasonably good. I decided to drive down to Bournemouth on Tuesday as it would keep my wife safer and me properly isolated (rather thwarted by her confirmatory positive after a bad night on Monday).

The painter arrived at the house in Bournemouth late on Tuesday – luckily with the painting of the outside, my isolation wasn’t compromised. On Wednesday we had to cancel friends who were coming for lunch and I stayed in Bournemouth with the promise that the painter would appear – but he didn’t.

I cancelled Thursday’s intended visit to our older son, again on the promise that the painter would appear – but he didn’t. It turns out that his car had ‘exploded’ when the timing belt broke and the engine wrote itself off. He was typically over-optimistic about how quickly it could be back on the road – and typically useless at keeping his customer informed. I’d decided that he was trustworthy but was now doubting my judgement.

Friday’s gym and shop sessions went by the board too – and the painter finally appeared at about 5pm and painted the front door. That was great except that, it being quite chilly, I was there at 9pm using a hairdryer on it to help the paint dry sufficiently so I could shut it safely and drive home to Oxfordshire.

Saturday’s turn at ride leader for the cycling club was cancelled but in the post I received the invitation to book my Covid booster jab!

We had booked a walk and pub lunch with friends on Sunday so that went the way of everything else and was cancelled – we would have been beyond the standard 5 days of isolation by then but my wife had continued to suffer worse than me and it just didn’t seem sensible to try that much activity that soon.

A week of isolation, hanging around pointlessly, frustration and cancellations. I was lucky that I haven’t felt ill beyond the symptoms of having a cold – but I will be happy not to have another week like it. Under UK guidance I’m now able to get out as people are unlikely to be infectious beyond the 5 days, but I’ll still be taking extra care, just in case.

Almost no exercise, so more ‘interesting stuff’.

Interesting stuff this week

1. African wise words: Sticks in a bundle are unbreakable

2. BBC News website: Media Literacy

Finland is a high-trust society. According to an OECD report, 71% of the Finnish population trust the government, compared to the OECD average of 41%. Parliament, the civil service, the police and the media all enjoy high levels of trust. Critical thinking and media literacy is part of the school curriculum and children are taught the skills they need to spot fabricated information on social media.

There is a media literacy index indicating nations’ resilience to ‘fake news’. In 2021, of 35 European countries, Finland topped it with a score of 78, followed by Denmark, Norway, Estonia, Sweden and Ireland all scoring at least 70. The UK scored 62. At the bottom were Bosnia and Herzegovina with 19 and North Macedonia with 15.

Ah, but could this be fake news?

A high trust society is good – as long as the institutions you trust are trustworthy?

3. BBC News website: Fat Bear Week

Fat Bear Week 2022, saw people from around the world vote for the fattest bruin at Alaska’s Katmai National Park. Brown bear 747, tipping the scales at an estimated 1,400lbs (635kg), won 68,105 votes, beating Bear 901 with 56,876 votes.

Bear 747 nearly didn’t make it to the final because of an unprecedented case of voter fraud in the semi-finals as someone decided to spam the poll, but this was spotted and corrected by officials.

Chess, poker, match fishing and now Fat Bear Week – does (alleged) cheating know no limits?

4. BBC News website: Dame Angela Lansbury dies aged 96

The three-time Oscar nominee had a career spanning eight decades, across film, theatre and television and won acclaim as the star of the TV crime series Murder, She Wrote. She also won an honorary Oscar for lifetime achievement in 2013, a lifetime achievement award from Bafta in 2002, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Very sad. Thankfully, no suspicious circumstances … who would have investigated? 

5. BBC News website: Gaming not a medal event at 2026 Commonwealth Games

Esports was a pilot event at the 2022 Birmingham Games, but the organisers of the 2026 Games, in Australia, say esports will not feature.

They have refused to give any specific reasons but there have been many high-profile cases of competitive gamers taking substances such as the drug Adderall to enhance concentration and performance. It is thought that doping in esports may have been a factor with concerns about the problems of arranging year-round drugs testing across the various gaming titles.

6. BBC News website: Brain cells in a lab learn to play video game

The research team grew human brain cells grown from stem cells and some from mouse embryos to a collection of 800,000 and connected this mini-brain to the video game via electrodes revealing which side the ball was on and how far from the paddle.

The mini-brain learned to play in five minutes. It often missed the ball – but its success rate was well above random chance.

Great potential heath applications, no doubt, but l find this a little unsettling: ‘Call of Duty’ next and then Skynet?