Running with Dogs No. 30

I thought that I would celebrate my thirtieth run with the dogs, on my return to fitness campaign, by taking them a little off their usual track.  I do try to vary our running routes, although living in the Fens, where farmers are queuing up to shoot you for stepping off the public road, it's not really that easy.

So I took them (with the lurcher protesting that he needed to stop and sniff/piss even more than on normal runs) on an 8.1 mile linear there and back run down to Coldham Windfarm.

All went well, except when the dogs heard some nearby gun fire.  The lurcher responded by having a panic attack, and hiding at the bottom of a deep ditch.  Photo below:

I had to climb down the steeply cut banks through stinging nettles, and literally pull the quivering dog out.  What a strange dog.  The whippet wasn't at all bothered.

We had a good run back, passing through the village of Friday Bridge: 

All photographs taken during the run using my Sony Z3 phone cam - unedited.

1st February 2016

Photography

The above photograph was captured on my favourite little Olympus XA2, loaded with Rollei retro 400S film.  I have been really concentrating the past three months on compact camera 35mm b/w photography.  On one hand, I use the Yashica T2 AF compact, loaded with Kodak Tmax 400, that I then develop in Kodak Tmax developer; on the other hand, I use the XA2 loaded with Rollei Retro 400S, that I usually develop in Ilford LC29.

The Tmax camera produces smooth, clean, "nice" b/w negatives.  The Retro 400S camera produces high contrast, rough and ready negatives, that often suffer from underexposed / under developed - but above all, high contrast and grainy.  On the latest couple of films, I've been setting the XA2 exposure one stop up to ISO 200, and I've added a minute to developing time.  They look better.  However, it is because Retro 400S looks so odd and high contrast that attracts me to it.  It makes interesting images.  The film (as I understand), was initially produced for aviation aerial photography, and has near infrared range - for better cloud and mist penetration.  Even with no infra red filter, it produces some interesting infra red-like results.  I like it so much, I recently bought a ten pack.

Running with dogs

I've just completing my 23rd run in the campaign.  Last month, with the dogs, I ran over 60 miles.  Go our canicross team.  I feel pretty confident at keeping it up.  I have let the strength training go, but I'll pick that up again when I feel ready.  Nutrition plans, I've been pretty good.  Okay, I slip a little from time to time, but I have eaten one hell of a lot of vegetables and fruit over the past three months.  Weight loss really slowed down after losing a stone and a half.  I'm lucky to lose a pound a week.  Still, I'm not going to let it put me off.  This is a long term thing, not just a weight loss diet.

The below image is from Rollei Retro 400S in the XA2.

Ancestry

 Right at the moment I'm feeling a little concerned and annoyed with 23andMe.com.  I don't think that they are really looking after their European or outside-of-the-USA customers as well as they should be if they are serious about our markets.  All information, updates, and shipping appear to be two class - USA, and Others.  I'll let this journal know how it goes, and to be fair, it is early days.

On the paper maternal genealogy chase, I have today received from the GRO, a copy of the marriage certificate between my great great great grandparents, Reuben Daynes, and Sarah Quantrill, on the 26th April 1848, at Besthorpe parish church.  Reuben's father is confirmed as Reuben Daynes (senior).  It tells me that Reuben Dayne senior was actually a publican.  Sarah's father was a Robert Quantrill, a labourer.

In my search for my mtDNA line, I must return to the Norfolk Record Office next, and search for a family of Quantrill's, headed by a Robert Quantrill.  On more than one census, Sarah claimed that she was born at Wymondham, Norfolk, around 1827.  I'll first look for baptisms of any Quantrill children in Wymondham or Besthorpe, around 1815 - 1840.  I have seen what may have been my Sarah, staying with a family of Long's in Wymondham, age 13, in the 1841 census.

The above photo, taken on the Yashica T2/Tmax 400 film, is of my mother, my surviving mtDNA donor, standing next to (not the donkeys) a headstone for a William Quantrell.  I don't yet know if he was a relative, but this is at Besthorpe church last week, and this William was several years older than my Sarah.  He could potentially be an older brother of Sarah, and therefore my G.G.G.G uncle.  If he indeed is, then his bones in that graveyard would contain the same lineage of mtDNA as myself and my mother here.



New canicross and lurcher running video

I made this Go Pro video today, on Running with dogs No.21.  We ran the dog's default and favourite route again, around 4.6 miles long.  Not a great average speed, but as you can see, we were also film making.  I cut the video down to less than ten minutes this time, and I fitted the lurcher with the Go Pro dog harness, for when I ran him off leash.  Otherwise, I used the chest harness.

I had no idea that naughty dog went into that drainage ditch until I watched the video at home.

23 pairs of chromosomes

Crease Drain and the Red Tile Wind Farm

I took this photograph yesterday, using the Yashica T2 loaded with Kodak Tmax 400 film.  We actually had a little sun on one of my days off work, so I took a day trip with the Yash to Huntingdon.  The late sun on the way back looked great for shadows and landscapes, so I pulled up here at Crease Drain, to take a few photos of the Red Tile wind farm between Warboys and Chatteris.  I wanted the capture the straight lines and black soils of the Fens here.  I'm quite pleased with this one.  I don't photograph landscapes too often.

23andMe

Night shifts can be a bitch.  Tiredness, upset metabolism, before you know it, you have a break, and you've bought something that you don't need from the Internet.  On a recent night shift, I ordered a 23andMe personal genetic profiling service.  I'm now waiting for the DNA sample kit to arrive.

I've been attracted to genetic profiling for some years.  Particularly for any ancestral data that such a test might provide.  Genealogy was a past interest of mine, and using traditional archiving materials (it was before I had internet access), I had already collated a family tree of over 1300 individuals for my kids - going back on their mother's side to the early 17th Century.  That along with my good knowledge of British prehistory, and landscape archaeology, I'd say that I have a pretty good idea of what my heritage is.  However, at the same time, I have been very skeptical at some of the claims made by Ancestral DNA companies, that appear to target New World customers, with suggestions that they can pinpoint the European (and other) nationalities, and even ethnicity, of their ancestors.  I can't believe such claims, surely in truth, the genetic map of Europe is too blurred from thousands of years of migration and genetic flow, to be used as a tool with such accuracy.

However, what attracted me to 23andMe, is that they don't appear to make such promises with their genetic profiling.  Instead of ridiculous claims to show percentage of Celtic, Slavic, Germanic, etc.  They at most divide Europe into wider geographical zones such as Irish/British, French/German, Scandinavian, East European.  I expect that my 23andMe ancestral profile will be mainly Irish/British, perhaps with a percentage of Scandinavian, and even French/German.  I'll see if I'm correct.  Even then, I hope for more reliable data such as my haplogroups, my mtDNA, my Y chromosome - where they may have been and when.  However, on the Ancestral aspect, what perhaps helped me to plunge into the bank account, was that 23andMe are now producing your percentage of DNA that is believed to have originated in a Neanderthal genome.  Not necessary to know, but for the armchair anthropologist in me - very cool.  I'm guessing around 2.6%.  I'll see again if I was correct.

Another aspect of the 23andMe approach that I quite like though - is that they don't focus just on the ancestral, but instead, offer the service for health information.  This aspect has been very controversial.  Critics have suggested that this could lead to a World where we select DNA for our offspring, where insurance premiums could be set according to your genetic profile.  However, my father's family suffered dreadfully from cancers and Alzheimer.  I would rather know if I should be doing more about my lifestyle, in order to adjust for the genetic probability.  Genetic profiling isn't just about fun, it could extend my well being.

I'll see if I still feel the same in 12 months.  What will I learn, how will I find the 23andMe service, will it change my life at all?  Come back in a year's time if I'm still here.

Running with Dogs No.15


I've been quiet on here the past three days. I actually fell a little bit off the saddle, into a man-well perhaps.  A large glass of brandy, a whole box of chocolate coated brazil nuts, and a bit of cake just made me feel that I'd let myself down.  Then I missed an opportunity for a run.  However, I'm back in the saddle now.  I will cross that twelve stone barrier any day.  Today I ran with the dogs in stormy cold weather (some sleet, 0 C) for 4.5 miles at a pace of 5.9 mph, in 45 minutes.  A slight improvement in performance. The hold ups are now less to do with my poor fitness, and more to do with my lurcher's desire to piss up every tree.

Back on track.

10th January 2016

I normally run following at least one day rest (at least from running), but this afternoon, the dogs were asking, no-one else wanted to walk them, so I thought, "why not, maybe a short run?".  I at least took the dogs on a different route, down to Friday Bridge, up the Stitch and around Bar Drove - but it turned out to be a similar length to my recent runs - 4.4 miles in 46 minutes.  That was Running with Dogs No.14.

What really inspired this post though, was what I was just reading in that Richard Askwith book Running Free (2014).  He cites a number of surveys and studies from across both Europe and the USA, that seem to praise running outside in green areas, as opposed to treadmill work inside gyms.  The studies appear to correlate that exercising outdoors, particularly in green areas, appears to offer tremendous benefits to our mental state, our health, our sense of wellness, even perhaps our fitness, compared to working out indoors only.

I have not read any of these studies, but I'm not at all surprised.  It is something that I have considered at length many years ago - the benefits of being close to other species of animals and plants - being out in Nature.  Biophillia.  We are drawn to it, and appear to benefit from it.

The above photograph is of myself.  Taken last week in the pocket cemetery by Anita, using my 50p camera, and that strange Rollei retro 400S film.

The Upgrade Culture

One of the things that I want to frequently discuss in this journal, are the ways in which I see English society, and the World at large, changing within my lifetime.  That has to be worth recording?

I am presently reading Running Free by Richard Askwith  2014.  I found the second hand book for sale in a local charity shop.  Reading it for running inspiration.  In the early sections he discusses the rise of consumerism in British running during his lifetime.  When he started running, all that he needed were a pair of gym trainers, and to put one foot in front of the other.  Now, a multi-million dollar industry convinces us that you need to spend thousands on the latest running socks, branded running shorts, nutritional recovery drinks, GPS health monitoring systems, and of course, ultra-expensive running shoes.  The markets and their sponsored magazines promote the belief, that without buying their latest necessities, we could never be real, or serious runners.

I was really pleased to read Askwith's views.  I've been expressing the same views with regards to photography for years, in my previous blog The Tight Fisted Photographer, and with my 50p Camera Project, where I used a thirty year old 35mm film camera to take photographs.  I bought the camera from a car boot sale for 50p.  I've also witnessed it in British angling.  You can't be a real or serious angler, unless you sit on that latest, branded, state of the art tackle box.  As if a tackle box could catch you more, or larger fish!  It happens in almost every pastime or interest, and in society at large.  We are told by the markets to buy stuff that we do not need.  To keep spending, to keep upgrading.

Of course, Capitalism, and even Consumerism, is nothing new.  As I've said before with regards to photography, George Eastman soon replaced his first box camera at the start of the 20th Century, with an improved Mk II box camera.  None-the-less, one of the aspects of change that I have witnessed in English society, has been the accelerating expansion of consumerism.  Karl Marx thought that Capitalism was doomed to die, as it would milk the poor, to benefit the rich, until all resources were depleted, and all markets fulfilled.  Maybe he failed to see how Capital could generate new markets, and new desires?  Look at the mobile phone.  We lived perfectly well without them for many thousands of years.  I lived without them for the first thirty plus years of my Life.  I could have never predicted that they would become fashion accessories, and status symbols for young people.  A solid state device that (let's be honest), in casual hands, has a life of six months to three years.  A device that apparently out dates within that time scope, and needs to be upgraded.  Who would have thought that children would be carrying them to school?

The point is, that there was no desire for mobile phones before it was created.  Young people suggest to me, that it must have been incredibly boring and unexciting to live before the Binary Age (before Internet, small computers, smart phones, etc).  Of course it wasn't!  Life was at least as rich, before we felt pressured to carry the latest upgrade Iphone!  The Upgrade Culture.  Perfectly created by Capital.  Keep people working, obeying, paying tax, and of course, consuming the products of the markets.


Running with dogs - canicross


I just can't understand how some people go out running for fitness - and leave their dogs sitting at home.  It seems perfect logic to me, that you can exercise yourself and your pooches at the same time.  It also gives you the chance to bond with your dogs, in a way that benefits all.

Canicross (Cani-X), is the activity of simply cross country running with a dog or two, harnessed to your body.  The dogs wear suitable activity harnesses (I swear by the Manmat H harnesses over the X back style), attached via a bungee enforced line, with clips to a runner's canicross belt.  The trick is to train the dogs to trot ahead at your comfortable running pace.  Strictly speaking, it is organised as a competitive event, but there is no reason that it cannot be enjoyed purely for pleasure and fitness.

I first started running (and competing) canicross, years ago with a Siberian husky, and also later, with a dalmatian.  I ran this style for around four years.  Things happened in my Life, and I became separated from my dogs.  Without them, I lost my pack, my confidence to run, and slowly, my fitness.  Over the past four years, my health has started to go, I'm aging, and I'm overweight.

I started canicross running again at the beginning of December.  We've completed twelve runs now - each three and a half to a little over four miles long.  I'm feeling so much fitter - and younger!  With a healthy living plan, I've so far lost 22 pounds of weight. Meanwhile - the dogs are looking fit and happy.

The above far too lengthy GoPro video was recorded last week on Run.11.