Kev's Extreme Pow-Wow!

The last time I visited Accident and Emergency was a few years ago for my eye. Well I returned to A&E yesterday after getting a bit over-exuberant on the mountain bike in South Wales.

I failed to control the bike properly on a section late on the Skyline trail just up the road from Afan forest park and went flying over the handlebars. Unfortunately, rather than my helmet breaking the fall, I careered straight into a rather large boulder’s square edge with my forehead.

After picking myself up and realising I was bleeding quite heavily, I managed to get back to the car park to find a nasty gash above my eyebrow and an already swelling nose. Fortunately I hadn’t knocked myself out and was feeling ok so I was able to drive myself down to Port Talbot hospital.

Within about 90 minutes of the original injury I’d been glued back together (the gash didn’t need stitches) and sent on my way.

Today I’ve had to deal with the embarrassment of such an obvious facial injury but hopefully it will all heal ok and I shouldn’t be left with any permanent injury. My nose swelling has turned more into a pair of black eyes and the gash will soon be healing over but other than that I’m doing fine.

The lesson I’ve learned from this is to spot the signs… if you’re getting sketchy on your bike, chances are you’re trying too hard to go fast. From here on I vow to spot the signs and rein in my enthusiasm a bit when that happens.

The weekend of the Monk wedding arrived this bank holiday, and the rain showed no sign of abating. The weekend started with a meal at a lovely Rog-recommended pub to celebrate Kath’s. Standard fish kissing antics aside, nothing too untoward happened. Unfortunately I got challenged to eat a second slice of birthday cake and managed to down it in one (hiding a near-choking experience in the process).

The wedding day itself started with heading over to Gamblingay church for the ceremony. We were transported by David Soul, who turned out to be happy to drive his own buses in the absence of a hired driver. Fortunately we chose the party bus, which led to much hilarity and drunken behaviour… actually we all fell asleep.

The ceremony was a nice one with excellent hymn choice, although a verse of Yogi Bear was distinctly missing from the proceedings. The vicar also managed to confuse Jon by likening turning water into wine to turning beer into furniture. The rain continued to fall heavily and unfortunately led us to make a dash from the service to the reception.

Arriving at chez Monk sr (David), we were welcomed with numerous umbrellas leading us to the safe haven of a kitchen and lounge with pimms to quaf (is that how you spell it?) and nibbles to chomp. Official photos were taken inside the enormous marquee erected in the back garden like a scene from Four Weddings and a Funeral, but without the embarrassing couple singing with a guitar. Instead we were serenaded by a steel band providing a fun backing number.

Dinner arrived at our tables in the marquee and I appeared to have been positioned right in the corner. I was wondering why this was until I realised that the rest of the table was also slightly mad, up for a laugh and pretty loud! Also the table was positioned within an arms-reach of the bar.

I had a arrived at the reception with only 10 pounds in my pocket so I must confess to adopting student tactics when the wine arrived, in order to keep to my Whistler-winter budget. This meant tucking into Rose, White Wine and Red Wine in equal measure. Needless to say, by the time dinner was over I was starting to feel tipsy.

The speeches were all excellent, with a great double act (not the Krankies) from Rog and V, and a particularly good best man’s speech from BJ; showing again a knack for exceptional comic timing.

Post dinner and my recollection of events starts getting a bit vague… We embarked on a mission to join in on the ‘just for kids’ bouncy castle; being encouraged by the official photographer to do so with increasing vigour. We discovered the bar in the house, with a keg of local beer that had (I hope) been bought specially. I then discovered that the bar in the marquee had been free all night and rediscovered the old pairing of guinness and red-bull and vodkas!

Much dancing then ensued, triggered by the excellent band, which was complemented for a number of songs by not only Roger on drums but Jon on trombone and Kath on sax. Unfortunately my video of that has good visuals but all you can hear is me starting an over-loud chant for Roger.

As the band finished, Alex requested ‘Living on a prayer’ and was crestfallen to find that the band didn’t know it. Instead we sang it ourselves… badly! We then proceeded to create turbans with the girls’ scarves and run into the house to play table football.

On the way home I was pushed over one of Milton Keynes’ light storks and finally we capped the night with a cheeky Baileys. All in all an excellent, if rather drunken wedding for some!

Just recovering this afternoon at Mum & Dads’ after running the Chester Half Marathon this morning.

This is the third time that I’ve run a half marathon, having run the same one for the previous two years.

My target this year was to beat the 1h 30m barrier, after running 1h 36m and 1h 34m for the last two. Bearing in mind that the last one was run a couple of weeks after recovering from chicken pox, I knew there was scope for improvement…

So to cut a long story short, this year’s time was 1h 27m. Am delighted by that and am wondering whether I’ll ever run a half marathon faster!

The problem is that my legs ache… A lot! And tomorrow I’m due to go biking with Neil in Wales!

Despite a number of people knowing about this, I realise that I haven’t made the big announcement. So here it is…

This time next year I’ll just be returning to the country having spent the winter working as a ski instructor in Whistler, Canada.

This is something I’ve been working on for just over a year now and has taken quite a bit of sorting out. Well I’m pleased to say that in that time I’ve achieved the following:

• Qualified as a CSIA Level 1 ski instructor in Canada in April last year.
• Got my CSIA Level 2 teaching qualification a week later
• This March I passed my CSIA Level 2 skiing exam in Whistler so I’m a fully fledged level 2 instructor
• Made some great contacts in the ski school so I’m all set to get a position out there in September
• Got clearance from my employers, Nationwide Building Society, to take 5 months off work!
• Got work clearance from the Canadian authorities in order to be allowed to work in Canada
• Sorted out some lovely accommodation in the village in Whistler in preparation for the season.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love my job, but the appeal of spending a ski season living in luxury and actually teaching people to ski is pretty appealing having spent nearly 7 years in the office.

I’m really pleased to say that my boss has been very positive in backing me on this. Almost too positive; it’s almost like he wants me out of the office ;-)

As you can imagine, I can’t wait for this but am having to set goals for the summer and autumn in order that I don’t lose track of what I’m doing in the meantime.

Well anyway, that’s my big news for the year. Hope as many of you as possible (that I at least know already!) can come and visit in order to help make this the dream winter that I’m looking for. Some Canadian hotties would be nice too.

Last weekend I spent a fantastic few days in Belfast, Northern Ireland, attending Nich & Liz’s wedding.

Thursday night was a late arrival at Belfast airport after work and when I finally got there, Lou and Neil were relatively trolleyed thus meaning that I was defaulted to drive the hire car! (What a hire car it was too; we found that a Peugeot 307 1.4 has all the power of a very weak hair dryer!)

Arriving at the hotel, we soon dashed out for a late night couple of pints only to find the majority of the gang heading back from the pub. Drinking was obviously being saved for the wedding day itself.

The wedding day arrived and after breakfast it was an amusing sight to visit the hotel’s ironing room and find the groom, groomsman and best man all ironing their stuff. Little did I know that I would have to fend with the iron myself later, only working out that it was switched off after a couple of minutes of cursing!

We all jumped on the party bus in order to head to the service at Rasharkin Church. The service itself was a lovely little affair and we learnt all about 3 fold chords. With hindsight, this might have been a solution to my earlier ironing problem.

Liz looked spectacular on the wedding day and Nich scrubbed up pretty well too; seems rather different to when I normally see them mid bike ride or rainy weekend in Wales. Liz also seemed taken aback by my efforts in wearing a flash pink shirt and tie!

Nich and Liz departed from the church in a lovely open top Beetle and arrived at the reception at Belfast Castle looking suitably chilled and happy. This was the way that the guests were feeling as they tucked happily into champagne, tea and scones in the sun.

After lots of official photos and some harp playing, we headed inside for the reception. Blair, Nich’s best man managed not to cause Nich too much embarrassment whilst still providing entertainment.

The food was great but I can’t remember much other than the 6 creme brules and clotted cream that I had as a challenge after the main meal.

Each guest had been issued a place card complete with a compromising photo of the guest. With Hicksy and Jim on my table, it was only a matter of time until these cards were all collected and modified into top-trump cards. I was quite pleased with my 10/10 speed rating and was rated as apparently quite eligible, although the 0/10 for style was a bit gutting (not sure whether this was despite or because of my pink shirt ;-)).

Subsequently we piled onto the dancefloor and enjoyed Bon Jovi’s Living on a Prayer just like the guys had a few weeks earlier at Nich’s stag do. This led to Sweet Child of Mine and the most amusing scene of the weekend when Tim launched into an outrageous Back to the Future inspired air guitar solo. He later described his horror as he picked himself up to see the shocked faces of the onlookers.

The fun went on late into the evening until finally we piled back to the hotel in a convoy of taxis ready for, guess what, more drinks!

Saturday started with a significant headache and I feared a nasty hangover would ensue. Fortunately a cooked breakfast and some nurofen seemed to do the trick and by lunchtime I was causing chaos in the party-car along with Neil, Lou, Amanda and Richard en route to the northern coast. Not sure if the rest of the cars in the convoy knew what had hit them but we found it amusing.

A quick tour of the not-so-local whisky distillery was soon dealt with and then we took a walk around the Giant’s Causeway, which was suitably picturesque. All this in time to get back to Belfast for a pizza.

Post pizza, we piled off to Nich and Liz’s hotel in time for their post wedding swoiree. Waiter service was available, leading to much entertainment as we ordered large rounds and then played mind games with each other in order to determine who would pay!

Sunday was much more chilled out and whilst Neil and Lou caught up on sleep, I joined in on a political tour of Belfast in a taxi. This was fascinating and really brought home a lot of the reasons and background to the events that have dominated UK news for so long. It was also great to see the positive attitude being shown by the locals with regards to the peace process.

A quick tour of the East coast of Northern Island led to a lovely pub lunch and then a relaxed trip back to the airport in time to catch my flight home.

All in all this was a lovely weekend. Nich and Liz of course made it by laying on such a fantastic wedding and I wish them all the best for their married life. Looking forward to catching up with them when they return from their honeymoon so we can get some more biking in!!!