Month: February 2025

Whose idea is this return to cold weather? I know, ‘March comes in like a lion…’, but honestly, when I checked the weather app before my morning run, the temps in my morning running time were consistently below 5°. It’s blessedly good to have longer days, but it would soothe my spirit to have a bit more warmth concomitant with the light.

This was a timed-run morning (that’s another ‘Whose idea was that?’), so I put my head down, gasped and wheezed through two miles, and made it home in a good time; the rolling average stands at 19:24 now. Coffee and fruit, cleaned up and dressed for Morning Prayer, I’ll have a meet with our training LLM, then home for the rest of the day (sermon prep, putting together my presentation on the Incarnation for Sunday’s Faith Forum). Today’s New Testament Seminar will be held online, saving me the three hours or more getting into and back from Oxford. Hey, I might even indulge in some pleasure reading.

I took a non-timed morning jog/walk (we had a spell of rain exactly in the middle of my run, so I sheltered under an overhang for a while); home to coffee and fruit, shower and dress for Morning Prayer, then to Oxford for three tutorials and a talk by Jarel Robinson-Brown. Then, home at last.

I took a non-timed run yesterday morning after not running at all on Sunday (rain and inanition, if I recall correctly). It was just as well — I felt as though I were running in treacle. Then on Monday: coffee and fruit, cleaned up, Morning Prayer, home for coffee and a Teams meeting, sermon work, marking, afternoon Communion service at Old Station House, some groceries at Waitrose, and home for the day.

Yesterday, as I say, I ran, then coffee and fruit, cleaned up, hurried to church for Morning Prayer, then to Oxford for a Paul tutorial, lunch, then home to tackle some backed-up emails and edit the sermon for today’s morning service, research modern healing liturgies.

This morning my legs and breathing seemed truly sluggish, but it turns out I managed a sub-20:00 run that brought my rolling average to 19:36 (!). It wasn’t pleasant, but making that sort of progress is the reason I returned to timed running, so there we are. Coffee and fruit, cleaned up, Morning Prayer, midweek Communion, then staff meeting, then home.

I slept till 7:00 (unthinkable for me) and it was rainy when I woke, so no run today. Coffee, fruit, morning Prayer, home for more coffee and toast, then marking and work on Holy Week service booklets.

(Quick in writing, not quick running, which I didn’t do.)

I finally got in a weather-able, correctly timed, non-leg-weary run this morning, and at a good time — my rolling average drops below 20:00 for the first time, to 19:50 today. I am sure I’ll have more slow days in weeks to come, but at least I see some progress, which is why I resumed timing my runs in the first place. I do think I may time my runs on alternate days, though, to allow days for not taxing my legs to the utmost.

Coffee, fruit, Morning Prayer, clean up, sercond coffee and toast, off to morning Eucharist, home for a rest, then back for the Healing & Wholeness service.

The other morning I was especially stirred when I read the previous night’s headlines from the Fractured States of America, so I went on a tear on Bluesky. This is what I wrote:

Look, I hate to say this, but from over here it looks as though the US has turned the corner and entered the emergency zone.
If GOP elected officials are afraid of Trump goon squads, if Musk can threaten advertisers with cancellation of state contracts if they don’t spend enough on X, if Trump can ‘joke’ about being king, if Hitler salutes are now normalised in public (though even Bannon held back a little), if there is no organised, articulated opposition, if Trump can tell blatant falsehoods on mass media (Zelenskyy ‘dictator’, attacked Russia) without being vigorously rebutted by an allegedly free press, if Trump governs by executive orders rather than legislation, if the POTUS and VPOTUS have repudiated their alliance with the liberal democracies of Europe, and thrown in their lot with unabashed tyrants… well, there you are.

I had a bit of a lie-in this morning, at least by my standards, waking up at 6:15 and not getting out of the house till after 7:00. I promptly decided that the way my legs felt, I would take today as a restful day — walking and jogging my two miles, but not asking much of limbs. Just as well, cos my right knee kept flashing me warning pangs, and everything felt exhausted. Then some doomscrolling, las, redeemed by a hot breakfast, hopeful prospects for the Orioles and their first spring training game today, and productive sermon prep time.

Perhaps more to the point, I timed my morning run but botched it somehow — I wasn’t on my best pace, but I am 100% confident that I did not take 2:56 to get around my two miles. No big deal, though if I wasn’t running to time, I wish I had had the chance to take a more relaxed pace.

Coffee, fruit, clean up and dress for Morning Prayer, check messages at the Parish Centre, then home to work on sermons for Sunday (two services, two sermons), And to Oxford for the NT Seminar, where Tyler Brown gives his presentation on the Sign of Jonah. Then home.

Lovely evening at Exeter with the churchwarden and his sister; high marks for another ancient college (with an exquisite chapel)!

It was raining when I woke up at 6:15, so I (with relief) opted not to run. I poured a cup of coffee, had some fruit for breakfast, will clean up and dress for a day in Oxford. Morning Prayer, then off to Oxford for first tutes with Anna, Mimi, Ottavia, and Alex — then home for dinner and an evening with Margaret for the first time in several days.

Last night, I had the chance to talk with three of the students whom I’ll meet in tutorials for the first time tomorrow, Fifth Week, halfway through Hilary Term. We had good conversations (not about Luke), and Sarah (their HB tutor) has been very encouraging about them. The next four weeks — with my four first-years as well as my two finalists — will be a bit wild and wooly on the workload side, but it should be fun as well.

Ran my two miles at a good pace today, another sub-20:00 time, bringing my rolling average to 20:02. Shortly the rolling average will start flickering over and under the twenty-minute mark…
Coffee and hot breakfast, I’ll clean up and go to Morning Prayer, then I’ll sift parish emails and fine-tune my homily for this afternoon. This evening I’ll be a guest of one of our wardens at dinner at Exeter, so I’ll add that to my College Dinner Life List (actually not a very long list — I think it’s just Oriel (obvs), Trinity, Keble perhaps, Lincoln, Univ…).