Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Up in Castlemaine to do commentary for the Australian MTBO Championships, having first warmed my mouth up with a session on Channel 9 this morning (not about orienteering). Oddly enough, the last time I was on 'Today' the big story of the day was also a sports drug scandal (on that occasion the Chinese swimming team being caught by Australian Customs with an impressive supply of illicit material). I was half-expecting to see illicit material of a different sort in the celebrity dressing rooms (the one I waited in was signed 'Jimmy Barnes') but didn't see any - not that I'd necessarily recognise it if I saw it. (Those with long memories may recall that an inability to determine what sorts of white powder are illicit is shared by the Goulburn police). I also stayed out of the labelled parking spots, not that I'd expect there's much chance of seeing S.Newman at 7.45 on a weekend morning.

The original plan was to combine this weekend with a couple of nice runs in the highlands, but that isn't happening for obvious reasons. My base also isn't quite as planned because if the youth hostel is booked out (which it is by the New Zealanders), there's not much in Daylesford for under $200 a night (and most places won't accept one-night bookings on a weekend anyway), so I'm in Castlemaine instead.

C • :D 1

Pool running at Fitzroy. The warmest morning we've had so far this spring, and the crowds were out (it also makes a difference that the squads were out in force, perhaps because I was here a bit earlier than normal). A reasonable session.

There's a sign outside a shop on Alexandra Parade 'Last Coffee Before Frankston'. This reminded me of the venue in Deer Park which used to have a sign 'Last Pokies Before Melton'. The sign disappeared not because it was bizarre, but because with the development of Caroline Springs it was no longer accurate.

Well, that didn't last long - took only a few steps to work out that this wasn't a goer. I'm booked in to get the knee properly looked at on Tuesday - can't see myself doing much before then except perhaps in the pool.

Stories from some of the more far-flung places I visited last year occasionally grab my attention (there was a piece on the weekend about the Vatican opening an impressively large collection of Aboriginal artefacts from Kalumburu - presumably collected by the mission, whose museum has an impressive collection of its own). Today's was a piece in the Financial Review about what sounded like an extremely ambitious development proposal in Kalbarri, involving 11 square kilometres of land (at a guess, probably five times the size the town is now), a six-star hotel and various resort properties. Unsurprisingly, the proposal ran onto the rocks - the council started to get suspicious when they didn't hear anything from the developer for two years - and the receivers are currently picking over the carcass and have thus far found the sum total of $2000. Equally unsurprisingly, the would-be developer was "unavailable for comment". (Whether ASIC, the AFP and/or the WA fraud squad will find him similarly unavailable for comment is unknown).

Not really much better this morning - will give it one more go tomorrow but suspect I'm going to have to bite the bullet and get it looked at properly.

9/11 conspiracy theories have been in the news a bit today (courtesy of an MUA official on the ABC who hasn't learned that it's better to keep your mouth shut and have people think you're a fool, than open it and remove all possible doubt). Through this I did find out that the entry for Osama bin Laden on the FBI Most Wanted webpage fails to contain any reference to September 11 - it mainly refers to 1998 bombings of American embassies in Africa, then rather understatedly says that he is "suspected of involvement in other terrorist attacks". This could mean any of the following:

(a) the FBI think the 1998 attacks are more than enough to get him put away and that adding anything else would just complicate the paperwork
(b) the FBI doesn't think he did it
(c) the FBI are so hopeless at updating their websites that the page concerned hasn't been updated since 2001 or earlier

Knowing how long it can sometimes take for things to get done in a large bureaucracy, my money's on (c).

Morning session from my place along the Yarra Flats and back up through Eaglemont. A nice morning for a run and enjoyed it on the whole. Knee was OK on the run itself with none of the stiffening of the last bit yesterday, but didn't feel great later in the day.

Life's little mystery #359: why is a quarterly rise of 0.9% in Melbourne house prices (which, last time I looked, was still higher than the rate of inflation) regarded as a "slump"?

C • Being a lesser rate than that required in order to double prices within 7 years? 2

Decided on a pool running session rather than a swim as the elbow is bruised and swollen up a bit. Generally a pretty good session and no issues with the knee - also not unpleasant conditions (certainly compared to what Friday would have been like).

The person who had a Labor sign on their balcony overlooking the pool during the federal campaign is at it again for the state one. Much as I'd like to be able to support Richard Wynne (unlike one or two others under threat from the Greens who won't be missed), he's not in my electorate.

Politics in a more distant land also came to my attention today, in the form of one Art Robinson, running as a Republican for a Congressional seat in Oregon. He's (in)famous in the climate world for being behind the Oregon Petition, an internet statement "signed" by 31,000 "scientists" (whose ranks include numerous cats and dogs, and Ginger Spice) denying the existence of man-made global warming. That wasn't what got our attention, though; rather it was a statement accusing his opponent of sending money to a tax haven, New Zealand. I'm sure that the idea that New Zealand is a tax haven will come as news to the New Zealanders.

Monday night runs from my place are often sparsely populated, but this was the most sparsely populated of all - no-one else turned up. I was thinking of not going out, too, as the knee was a bit sore (riding seems to irritate it a bit more than running does, which may alter my commuting plans for a bit). It was fine for most of what was a reasonably pleasant run - but then stiffened up significantly in the last 5 minutes. Will need watching.