Yup - I think I must be  

I've agreed to run this race with Barry (from work):

http://www.lakelandtrails.org/Garburn%20Trail.html

It is - apparently - the most scenic run in the UK - and if you take a look at the slideshow on the website, I'm sure you'll agree it is a good looking course with stunning scenery.  A fit looking run in fact.

But if you look at the height profile of the course you get a very different perspective.  It looks like one of those curious courses that somehow manages to be more uphill than down, and uphill in the extreme as it happens. 

So there you go. Its good looking and scary all at the same time, a kind of Lara Croft of the running event world if you like .

On the plus side, not only is it cheaper than the ridiculously expensive and oversubscribed Manchester 10k, they have Kendal Mint Cake at the water stops and a beer tent at the finish...I only need to find a hill to practise running up now...

Major panic at home yesterday...the mouse is back!

Just after Christmas, Jane and I went out for a beer and a takeaway, and received a panicky call from Jane's Dad, who in turn had been phoned by the girls (although why they couldn't ring directly is an unanswered question - we both had mobiles) to report the sighting of a mouse in the house - time for a bad scottish accent for anyone old enough to remember

Anyhow, said mouse had been spotted behind the telly and then around the fireplace.  A bit of investigation by yours truly discovered that the mouse had found one of the christmas tree decorations and had been feasting on it.  The decoration in question was a chocolate ball with Smarties in it, which the mouse had chewed through and emptied leaving a partially consumed hollow ball under the grate.

So, next day, I went out to B&Q, and bought a humane mousetrap - on the insistance of the kids - Jane wanted an automatic electric mouse slaughterer with rotating knives and a death ray, but they had sold out of those...  I installed a few cashew nuts in the trap - thinking the mouse would be fed up with choc by now and would probably want a bit of protein - and carried out a fairly thorough investigation of the front room.  Other than the chewed up foil and a few remaining chocolate crumbs, there was no sign of it.  There were also no signs in the kitchen.  Phew!, a lucky escape.  All the screaming and running about must have scared it off, allowing it to escape out the front door as the girls looked out for us returning from the takeaway. Or so we thought...

Last night, I'm on the phone in the office and my mobile rings - its home, so whoever must know I'm on my other phone, my mobile stops ringing and I get a text - its straight to the point "Call me asap.  Mouse back".  Now in case you hadn't realised Jane hates anything rodenty, and particularly hates anything small and rodenty and mouselike, so I finish up what I'm doing, drive back home, half expecting to see that the SAS had deployed a crack team of rodent assassins, but instead I found Jane half way up the stairs and refusing to come down and the kids finding it all pretty funny.  Once again the mouse had emerged from behind the telly and wandered in front of the fireplace.  The door had since been closed tight shut, thus allowing me full access to the crimescene. 

I retrieved the trap from the cellar (where we had moved it when visitors came round) and placed it by the fireplace, and then went hunting.  It didn't take long to find that the mouse was living in a window seat cupboard and had made itself a comfy nest out of wool and a nylon netting bag.  I also discovered that the mouse had also made a collection of the remaining smarties and stored them in a little plastic pot - presumeably to prevent other mice from getting at its stash. Hence the reason it hadn't been tempted by cashews - I mean, which would you eat first?

Next, came phase two - Operation Mouse Capture - which involved trying to tempt the mouse into the trap.  Didn't work - the mouse clearly wasn't going into it, although it did walk through the little corridor at the trap opening a few times.  It probably needed some choc and a HD telly to tempt it inside...so next I decided to improvise, and placed an empty Pringles tube in its path and started to slowly move the sofa to expose the mouse...and calling in re-inforcements, armed the girls with a ruler each to help guide the mouse in the right direction.  After a few minutes, the waft of sour cream and onion did the trick, and the mouse went in the tube allowing Georgia to push the tube against the skirting board and trap the mouse inside.  I then placed one of those free CDs you get with weekend papers on the top of the tube and picked it up.  Ta da!

Great elation all round, but now, what do we do with the mouse?  Feed it to next door's cat?  Launch it over the back fence using the tube to make sure it goes a decent distance?  Not a bit of it.  Being an old softy, I persuade Jane that its safely locked up, and we get in the car and drive two miles away, and allow the mouse its freedom in some local woods, where its skips merrily off on its way...I wonder if it'll write?

What do you say when someone asks you to be Godfather to their son...?

Tricky one.  My initial response was that I'd be more than happy to become a Godfather.  It'd be an honour in fact.  Of course I'll do it. I was dead chuffed to be asked.

There is one slight fly in the ointment though, in that I'm a committed atheist, and therefore not really an ideal candidate to look after someone's religious upbringing - unless of course the upbringing includes a healthy dose of scepticism, a fair smattering of suspicion, a liberal sprinkling of evolutionary theory, and a deeply cynical view of organised religions as control mechanisms to keep the general population in their place.

So in order to help my choices, I did a quick Google on Godparent (as you do - what did we ever do before Google...? ) and found this very helpful site: http://www.egodparent.com/Ivebeenasked.htm# ( - see I wasn't being stupid, even the church knows about t'internet these days ).  Anyway, the site has a handy questionnaire for prospective Godparents which looks something like this (all rights belonging to their respective owners etc etc) - to which I've also added my own answers...

Are your views on religion, spirituality and morality similar to the child's parents?
The child in question's father is also an Atheist like myself, so that's alright then
Will you be around?
I live on the same street as my prospective Godchild so yes I will
Do you have an interest in the child's well-being? 
I think kids are great and enjoy looking out for them, and occasionally sit in as needed

So with a healthy 3/3 it looks like I pass all the required criteria.  Good news 'cos I've ordered a very small kid's Chelsea home shirt as a Christening present.  That should go down well in a predominantly Man U supporting household. 

Maybe there is a God after all, but she just has a wicked sense of humour...