If at first you don't succeed, do something else

I read Ali's post about the Couch to 5k recently and had a little stab of jealousy. There was a time, once, when I would jog down the canal path full of hopeful energy.

Admittedly it didn't last very long. My knees swelled up and the physio had to be seen and it was All Over For the Running. Some readers might then remember Gawain, the lovely bicycle which was my next great hope for health and fitness.

However. It turned out that cycling along a canal path is both joyfully whimsical and tediously boring, neither of which is condusive to physical challenge. Either I cycled along at a blissful snail's pace, watching the ducks and the shimmering trees, or I pedalled petulantly, with no real goal, having seen the same ducks and the same damn trees a hundred times already. Also, there is enough stuff to maintain around here without having to look after my own brakes. Gawain is in the shed, and has been for some time.

What I needed was inspiration - and I found it on a couple of dozen posters plastered all over the pool where Littlest has her swimming lessons. They led me to Swimfit, a website where you can create personal swimming programmes which build in intensity. You then log them as you complete them, rather than swimming up and down the pool idly in the manner of a lady cyclist on a canal path.

I like swimming. I'm just good enough at it to not feel like an idiot when I step into the pool, and just bad enough at it to have the motivation to improve. I've ordered a Kick Buoy. I've discovered that so few people go to the adults only evening swim at my local pool at present, it's actually possible to swim a whole length of backstroke without hitting someone in the face. (The other session I go to, where every swim costs £1, is full of teenaged girls with mascara flowing down their faces, flirting and shrieking at soggy, unpleasant-looking boys. I am beginning to wonder if I really should be encouraging the Lattes to swim.)

My husband found me logging my swim, and logging my wine consumption on the NHS alcohol units tracker, and informed me that I fit the profile of an internet 'self quantifier' - someone who constantly records information about themselves online. I have two thoughts about this: 1) that as a blogger I have no leg to stand on, and 2) that people with iPhones have relinquished their right to comment on other people's over-use of technology.

Ooh! Whilst typing this, I just remembered that Kelloggs sent me a press release to say they're offering free kids swim vouchers on promotional packs up until March. There's info here. Is this in time for half term? I hope so. 

You may have noticed a new little widget that has popped up at the side there - an advert from John Lewis. I haven't run an ad before but I couldn't turn this down - an advert for company I was happy with, which didn't blink or flash, and which would pay for my trips to the pool for a little while.