Spring is here... sort of...

Spring is both magical and incredibly frustrating. In my neck of the woods (St Andrews, Fife, Scotland) the sun is shining gloriously, the grass is an amazing emerald green and one is tempted to charge down to the beach, frisbee in one hand and beer in the other. And there you'd be, laughing and drinking and throwing the disc around until dark, which wouldn't be until 8 in the evening. Idyllic?

I'd say so.

Anyone who said it wasn't would be a puritanical bore no doubt, claiming that such behaviour was the road to communism and satan.

There is another, colder side to the story. And that is the bloody wind that thumbs its ephemeral nose at the sunshine. We're talking gale force, white horses on the water sort of wind. They call it a lazy wind up here, because it can't be bothered to go around you. It just goes through you. And it is bloody cold.

So we're at a sort of half-spring point of things. They've got the aesthetics right but the heating hasn't been switched on yet.

So in the meantime I've been getting into shape. Well, trying to. You see, my lunatic friends of mine and I have decided once again to throw caution to the wind and compete in the Ma Bells 7s Rugby Tournament. For me, being 3ish stone overweight (1 stone = 14 pounds), this is requiring a certain amount of memory jogging for my body.

Running for instance. It's hard work, but it seems to be working on a number of levels. One is that it actually feels good. I know, I know, so does sitting in the pub, deciding which pint number you're on (it's the higher number), but this actually makes you feel you've accomplished something. Though, admittedly, to start with that something is "very little", because if you haven' run properly in, say, 10 years, you've got a lot of work to do.

At least it's keeping me warm!