After weeks of rest, gym work and marathon cycling I finally got back onto the trail around Richmond Park yesterday.
I went slowly, aiming for a 1 hr 2m lap and though the last mile (of seven) was a push I upped the pace and made it back to the start in 1 hr 1m 53s. The Park glowed in the chlorophyll greenness of spring and the air tasted clean and cold. It was good to be out there running again in the wind, to haul ass up the big climb by the Kingston gate like a 15 stone locomotive.
And now my cocking right arsing knee is fucking fucked again.
Choo choo.
Saturday, May 20, 2006
Thursday, May 18, 2006
10:35 BST Thurs 18th May
Funnily enough Sri Lanka's Great Escape in the 1st Test at Lords last weekend was probably the best bit of work I've done in the last year's trading, even though we came out of the game breaking even. It could have been quite a lot better (I was pretty aggressive on size) and it could have been a cover-your-eyes-awful lot worse (I was extremely aggressive on size). I got in at the top and out towards the bottom and if I hadn't gone to work on Monday it all would have been plain sailing. Although Monday's trades were theoretically smart they didn't pay off but that's life and you have to "dance with the one what brung ya".
The first vindication for my Taleb-inspired concern with the limits of induction and the Black Swan problem, in so far as any randomness-related activity can ever be vindicated.
Saw the London Handel Festival production of Tolomeo on Monday night - they cut lots of the B sections of the da capo arias but as a result it hummed along. The singers were astoundingly good - all students at the RCM Opera Conservatoire. They have to be some of the best in the world.
On the subject of music I've added more Stolen Soul to the sidebar. Time to confess that I don't actually own a ridiculously cool collection of obscure soul 45s. No, I subscribe to Downtown Soulville, Mr Fine Wine's awesome show on WMFU.org which is easily available as a podcast. Then I butcher it with an MP3 splitter for your delectation. It is high time you all went over my head to the source (don't take my word for it alone).
The first vindication for my Taleb-inspired concern with the limits of induction and the Black Swan problem, in so far as any randomness-related activity can ever be vindicated.
Saw the London Handel Festival production of Tolomeo on Monday night - they cut lots of the B sections of the da capo arias but as a result it hummed along. The singers were astoundingly good - all students at the RCM Opera Conservatoire. They have to be some of the best in the world.
On the subject of music I've added more Stolen Soul to the sidebar. Time to confess that I don't actually own a ridiculously cool collection of obscure soul 45s. No, I subscribe to Downtown Soulville, Mr Fine Wine's awesome show on WMFU.org which is easily available as a podcast. Then I butcher it with an MP3 splitter for your delectation. It is high time you all went over my head to the source (don't take my word for it alone).
Friday, May 05, 2006
The Thrill Of It
I did warn you last time about the vanity that will cloud all my orthognathic posts.
Big progress. Lloyd Searson passed me up to Professor Hunt at the Eastman Dental Hospital in Gray's Inn Road where I had my first consultation today. It takes the best part of forever to qualify as a maxillo-facial surgeon - you have to become, serially, a doctor, a dentist and a surgeon. 19 years from start to finish.
My teeth. They look even worse in colour. Note please the underbite, the fangs and the skewedness of the jaws in relation to each other.
Professor Hunt threw me though with his first question. I thought he would dive in to the mouth, armed with pointy instruments of torture and start clicking his tongue and shaking his head at the teeth themselves. Not a bit of it. Instead he asked me what I would I would like done to my face. What don't you like, what would you want to change, tabula rasa, money no object.
A successful course of orthognathic treatment will not only correct the appearance and function of my teeth but will also aim to improve the aesthetics of my face overall. Chin implants, skin tightening, a cursory nose job, the works.
Professor Hunt was at pains to stress to me that part of the preparation will include simulated photographs and psychological assessments to see if I am adjusted to the idea of not looking like myself anymore. I just want to stop looking something like this:
Perhaps I can start flicking through magazines (What Chin?) and picking my favourite jaw lines. I may even pick one of my friends and say 'give me one of those.' It could even be you. If it isn't, don't take it personally. I've always thought you had a lovely mandible but I don't think yours would match my curtains.
None of this will happen overnight. I will wear braces for 20+ months that will align the teeth but make the overbite worse.
Then surgery will move the maxilla (top jaw) forward. God only knows how you detach it from the skull - God and Professor Hunt anyway. I have a growing suspicion that they may be the same person.
The lower jaw gets most of the operating theatre action though. At the point where the two red lines meet in the photo below the surgeons will cleave the jaw bone, move the horizontal section backwards into its new, improved setting and remove the excess. The words 'bone' and 'saw' were used in the same sentence here and I felt a little twinge of squeamishness.
Amazingly it seems as though the National 'Elf are happy to foot the bill for all of this. What's a mere 20 jibs when compared to the joy of making Alex very slightly happier? New faces for all!
I'm seriously grateful and more than a little excited by the thought that within three or four years I will be able to smile. I left The Eastman and walked out into the bright London streets humming a little song.
Big progress. Lloyd Searson passed me up to Professor Hunt at the Eastman Dental Hospital in Gray's Inn Road where I had my first consultation today. It takes the best part of forever to qualify as a maxillo-facial surgeon - you have to become, serially, a doctor, a dentist and a surgeon. 19 years from start to finish.
My teeth. They look even worse in colour. Note please the underbite, the fangs and the skewedness of the jaws in relation to each other.
Professor Hunt threw me though with his first question. I thought he would dive in to the mouth, armed with pointy instruments of torture and start clicking his tongue and shaking his head at the teeth themselves. Not a bit of it. Instead he asked me what I would I would like done to my face. What don't you like, what would you want to change, tabula rasa, money no object.
A successful course of orthognathic treatment will not only correct the appearance and function of my teeth but will also aim to improve the aesthetics of my face overall. Chin implants, skin tightening, a cursory nose job, the works.
Professor Hunt was at pains to stress to me that part of the preparation will include simulated photographs and psychological assessments to see if I am adjusted to the idea of not looking like myself anymore. I just want to stop looking something like this:
Perhaps I can start flicking through magazines (What Chin?) and picking my favourite jaw lines. I may even pick one of my friends and say 'give me one of those.' It could even be you. If it isn't, don't take it personally. I've always thought you had a lovely mandible but I don't think yours would match my curtains.
None of this will happen overnight. I will wear braces for 20+ months that will align the teeth but make the overbite worse.
Then surgery will move the maxilla (top jaw) forward. God only knows how you detach it from the skull - God and Professor Hunt anyway. I have a growing suspicion that they may be the same person.
The lower jaw gets most of the operating theatre action though. At the point where the two red lines meet in the photo below the surgeons will cleave the jaw bone, move the horizontal section backwards into its new, improved setting and remove the excess. The words 'bone' and 'saw' were used in the same sentence here and I felt a little twinge of squeamishness.
Amazingly it seems as though the National 'Elf are happy to foot the bill for all of this. What's a mere 20 jibs when compared to the joy of making Alex very slightly happier? New faces for all!
I'm seriously grateful and more than a little excited by the thought that within three or four years I will be able to smile. I left The Eastman and walked out into the bright London streets humming a little song.
Thursday, May 04, 2006
09:35 BST Fri 5th May
A 260 mile roundtrip yesterday to Worcester to watch England A playing Sri Lanka.
I love England at this time of year. Trees coming into leaf, lambs hither and yon, blue skies and so on.
I’m much too young to be getting Proustian nostalgie, aren’t I? But seeing the countryside in May revived memories of the same feelings from past years.
About 10 miles east of Wincanton the A303 climbs up onto Salisbury Plain. One year, probably 1999, driving my much-missed Citroen BX from Exeter to London on a fine May evening up that hill I was utterly dumbstruck by the serene beauty of the rolling fields and the freshly-broken out greenness.
The sense of fertile homeland stretching to the horizon in every direction was very powerful. I’m not ashamed to say that I love England, only with the necessary condition that I dislike the English, at least the ones I don’t like very much.
The other Madeleine-esque trigger for me is seeing horse chestnut trees flowering. There was one in the far corner of the Worcester County Cricket ground. The candles weren’t quite fully out but the tree still looked lovely.
In four or five months those will be conkers and summer will be over.
I used to want my ashes scattered at Goodwood racecourse, which is in an incredibly pretty ‘England, oh my England’ pastoral setting. I think though my heart really wants to go back to the earth in the shade of a horse chestnut on the edge of a village cricket ground.
No, I didn't vote BNP.
I love England at this time of year. Trees coming into leaf, lambs hither and yon, blue skies and so on.
I’m much too young to be getting Proustian nostalgie, aren’t I? But seeing the countryside in May revived memories of the same feelings from past years.
About 10 miles east of Wincanton the A303 climbs up onto Salisbury Plain. One year, probably 1999, driving my much-missed Citroen BX from Exeter to London on a fine May evening up that hill I was utterly dumbstruck by the serene beauty of the rolling fields and the freshly-broken out greenness.
The sense of fertile homeland stretching to the horizon in every direction was very powerful. I’m not ashamed to say that I love England, only with the necessary condition that I dislike the English, at least the ones I don’t like very much.
The other Madeleine-esque trigger for me is seeing horse chestnut trees flowering. There was one in the far corner of the Worcester County Cricket ground. The candles weren’t quite fully out but the tree still looked lovely.
In four or five months those will be conkers and summer will be over.
I used to want my ashes scattered at Goodwood racecourse, which is in an incredibly pretty ‘England, oh my England’ pastoral setting. I think though my heart really wants to go back to the earth in the shade of a horse chestnut on the edge of a village cricket ground.
No, I didn't vote BNP.
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