Sunday 12th November 2006

I felt like crap this morning and have certainly been over doing it recently. I am nearly thirty and can’t take the strain like I could even five years ago. Indeed even two years ago I was a lot better. I am going to have a detox for a few days (alright, until the Bond film on Thursday) and give myself a chance to catch up with some early nights and absolutely no booze. It would be interesting to do a fitness test on myself at the moment, although it would probably just annoy me. From my gym going days of last year when I ran ten kilometres in fifty five minutes every time I went in I’m now a pale shadow of that magnificent beast and although I walk everywhere and it wouldn’t be unusual for me to walk for an hour every day, I reckon I’m miles off the pace. I certainly am, in fact.

I need to get back to kicking a football around for a couple of hours every morning as I was doing in the summer. That’s amazingly good at getting you fit, especially if you can’t stand jogging or going to the gym like me. It’s also fun. Get three or four footballs, a big open space, a wall or something to aim at, and let yourself go like a dog off a leach. I suppose that if you’re running around on soft grass wearing football boots it does your joints a lot less damage than road running. Then there’s swimming… I quite enjoyed that. Why did I stop doing that?

I need to burn a few kilos too… Getting flabby. But I hate the gym and refuse to join another one. When the last gym sent me a letter saying how sorry they were, but they were going to be closing down, I did a back flip I was so happy. It was the perfect excuse not to go. “I would… But they’ve shut down.� It was such great news.

And gyms are going to be more intolerable over the next few weeks as every bloke that goes to watch Casino Royale will want to get a physique like Daniel Craig and get a personal trainer. Then they’ll realise they can’t get a physique like Daniel Craig and go back on the pies but for a month or so those infernal places are going to be jammed.

I felt so rotten today that I took myself off to bed for a mid-day sleep and was woken by a call from comedian R David reminding me that I had a gig in Crosby (part of Liverpool, really) tonight in a pub. I would have given just about anything not to have to do this, and turned up to see The Crosby pub full of people (as full as the gyms will be next week) who had all got in for free and felt a sense of dread.

Two rules of comedy.

1. Don’t go a gig where the audience have not paid to get in.
2. See above.

I was on first and whilst David did a good job as MC in quieting the rabble down by slagging them all off (he is scouse so can say that to fellow Liverpudlians) I sat at the side knowing it wasn’t going to be as easy for a southerner like me and indeed it wasn’t. Dreadful, dreadful, dreadful gig. I did fifteen minutes and gave up, put my coat on, didn’t even bother hanging around for my wages and went home feeling even worse.

I don’t think it would have been any easier had I been feeling well so I didn’t blame it on that, but it was a harsh reminder that gigs aren’t always fun and easy – some are just torture.

Oh well, another day in paradise. I’m going to immerse myself in work over the next week and try to get a little more focussed and remember my age. So expect a thrilling week of Pathetic Lot entries you lucky, lucky people.

I wonder if logging my weight here every day might be a motivation… I’m an active person after all, and not confined to a wheelchair, so surely a good period off the beer will see some results? We shall see.

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