Super Sunday

In Inverurie, the slightly outdated adage of Sunday being a day of rest has become a very literal reality. Following a busy day yesterday (football training, a farm excursion followed by a friend staying for a sleepover) Luca has essentially flatlined today. With the picture below taken at lunchtime today following our return from Haddo House (more on the latter to follow), our young hero is currently as quiet as I've ever known him.




This makeshift sofa-bed is providing temporary relief to his wilting eyelids, with even a scary shark film (the endearingly bad "Deep Blue Sea") unable to deter the attentions of the sandman.

Luckily, such inactivity provides me with a few minutes with which I can update the blog. To refer back to Saturday mornings football training, our young Pele produced another virtuoso performance, culminating in two more goals (sorry Grandad Mikes wallet). However, hints of his previous endeavours returned toward the end of the session, as he began to stand back from play and perform his long-perfected "dance and jig" routine. His excuse upon completion of he session? "I was very tired". Wholly understandable following his earlier efforts. Most pleasing recently is the effort he does put in.

I've always been concerned about his lack of motivation and dedication (inherited, unfortunately, from his father) but his increasing confidence seems to slowly be eradicating this negative character trait. Pleasing to witness.

Speaking of dedication, his Dad's lack of distance running training over the past few months has been biting me in the ass recently. Scotland's snowy weather (allied to Inveruries dreadful infrastructure) has left me frustrated and unable to get many miles under my belt. Due to this, my first ever cross country race today brought more trepidation than excitement.

Already worried about racing offroad for the very first time in my life, my worsening fitness (and the torrential rain) almost convinced me to consider more sedate ways to spend a winter Sunday. However, I eventually dragged myself out the door and drove the short 30 minutes to the event at Haddo House.

Thankfully, my fellow runners seemed to cope no better with the icy, muddy and (frankly dangerously) slippy conditions than I, and despite legs that felt that they were being weighed down by an Easter Island statue attached to each I dragged myself round, finishing pleasingly high up the field. Results still to come in, but estimate 10th to 15th overall or top 5 in my age group.

Speaking if which, in only two and a half years my running classification is "upgraded" from Senior to Veteran. Sobering.

In other news? Harvey is improving now back on the drugs, so an 8 week wait will now prove telling. I took Luca and his pal to the farm on the way back from the race today, and the horse seems to have regained a little of its original exuberance. So much so that the normally aggressive and forthright Ethan cowered a little.

But - now I must go, with Aberdeens biggest game of the season (cup tie V Hibernian) having just started on TV. Rather masochistically considering recent form, I'm really looking forward to this.

**Useless fact of the day - The human brain stops growing at age 18**