The Adventure Continues...

Rants, raves and random observations from an itinerant epidemiologist.

 
100 in 1000
  1. Spend a week up a mountain learning to ski
  2. Visit Karoline's place in Moravia
  3. Hold a conversation in Czech (only)
  4. Drink 500ml of each of the following beers:
    1. Pilsner
    2. Staroprammen
    3. Budvar
    4. Velke Popovice
    5. U Fleku
    6. Gambrinus
    7. Krusovice
  5. Respond to at least one GOARN request (WHO and MSF are also acceptable)
  6. Travel across the Atlantic
  7. Return to South America
  8. Read a book to, or with, an impressionably aged child
  9. Participate in one NanoWriMo Challenge and come within at least 10,000 words of the goal length
  10. Have my nose pierced
  11. Have my next tattoo drawn
  12. Purchase the perfect jeans (x 2 pairs)
  13. Attend a spin class 3 times a week for 8 consecutive weeks
  14. Bake Viv's cheesecake
  15. Make David's casserole
  16. Make David's Chicken Cashew-nut Stirfry
  17. Invite 4 people who don't know one another too well to dinner
  18. Ride from Vienna to Venice on a motorbike (pillion acceptable, those less desirable)
  19. Attend a book group for at least two books
  20. Go on a choir weekend (learn and perform difficult piece in two/three days)
  21. Visit Madame Tussaud's (in London)
  22. Take an architecture appreciation course
  23. Join an all-girl group and sing a solo
  24. Publish in a scientific journal (top two authors)
  25. Cook a duck or other 'waterfowl'.
  26. Locate the Al-Timimi's from Doha Veterinary Practise
  27. Have a pedicure
  28. Maintain a Brazilian (ouch) for three months.
  29. Find a trustworthy Czech hairdresser
  30. Treat my inner-6-year-old twice a week (at least)
  31. Do the liver-cleansing diet properly (12 weeks)
  32. Don't eat out for one month
  33. Find a flat and flatmate
  34. Purchase one Joseph sweater
  35. Purchase one of the following pairs of designer shoes (they MUST also be COMFORTABLE, and be able to be worn with 4 different outfits and 2 types of occasion): Jimmy Choos, Manolo Blahniks, Christian Louboutin (Ebay or 2nd hand are acceptable)
  36. Send 5 books to the booksphere and track them.
  37. Go hanggliding
  38. Read 10 'classic' books (from 1001 Books to Read before you Die)
    1. Moll Flanders
    2. Everything is illuminated
    3. Madam Bovary
    4. Zen & the Art of Motorcycle Maintainance
    5. Catch-22
    6. Odysseus
    7. On the Road
  1. Run (non-stop!) for 5kms outside (preferably in a street race thingy)
  2. Send Christmas Cards on time
  3. Make a collage/mural out of street lights on my wall
  4. Buy a bed, build it, and sleep soundly in it
  5. Go to Africa
  6. Host an 'event' (classified as and when)
  7. Organise a 30th Birthday Party
  8. Wear a costume
  9. Sing on stage
  10. Buy a painting that evokes memories of Prague (cannot involve queues!)
  11. Learn a god-damned card game that stays in my memory (other than fish/snap)
  12. See sunrise. Be sober. Have woken for it. Excludes months Nov-Mar
  13. Take a walk and flip coins at each intersection
  14. Win something
  15. Draft a will
  16. Take a roadtrip
  17. Go to Italy already
  18. Sea Kayak around Abel Tasman Park (NZ)
  19. Get plants
  20. Take a train to another Eastern European Destination (accession countries are acceptable) alone preferably.
  21. Get UK to give me a provisional motorcyclists license and simultaneously get a 'card' license.
  22. Go SCUBA diving again - at least two dives lasting 30mins each.
  23. Go to a dentist. *sigh*
  24. Do a Czech Wine Trail. And live to tell the tale
  25. Make an 'outbreak emergency kit'.
  26. Go to bed prior to 11pm every night (inc weekends) for four consecutive weeks.
  27. Marvel over lack of tiredness
  28. Dine at a Gordon Ramsey restaurant (or Nobu)- preferably for free.
  29. Bet on the nags
  30. Do something for charity (applying and getting a 'red card' will count)
  31. Walk along the Champs Elysee
  32. Do 100 sit ups in a row
  33. Do 50 pressups (arms in tight)
  34. Make branston pickle (or nearest substitute)
  35. Cook something 'new' and 'adventurous' at least once a month
  36. Find a mentor
  37. Be a mentor
  38. Learn what mentoring is all about
  39. Meet an online person in real life
  40. Resist the flirt. Once. Just one night. It's okay if people don't immediately succumb to my natural charm. Really it is.
  41. Spend time at a spa (spa towns in the CR don't count)
  42. Send a care package to someone
  43. Get a Tata Bojs CD
  44. Take a French/German/Dutch course and SPEAK THE DAMNED LANGUAGE WHEN I HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY EVEN THOUGH IT MAKES ME SOUND LIKE AN IDIOT!
  45. Order new contact lenses.
  46. Make a list of things I take with me when I pack for different occasions
  47. Eat lobster. Prepared by someone else.
  48. Back up the blog
  49. Put everything onto an external hard drive
  50. Find a DDR mat and console and 'dance, I say dance!'�
  51. Go to the beach and lie on the warm sand. For an hour. (with sunscreen on, natch)
  52. Take and complete a course in either: Tango, Salsa or Flamenco
  53. Join the Municipal Library of Prague
  54. Move to another country
  55. Go to a live concert of a band I actually like
  56. Pay off debts (student loan excl.)
  57. Send thank you cards for every gift I receive (other than the gift of happiness, blah blah blah).
  58. Get an agent (literary or theatre)
  59. Go to a sports bar without cringing, by personal choice
  60. Ride a rollercoaster
  61. Hold a snake
  62. Spend a day wandering around a museum (not art gallery!)
Mild Obsessions
Monday 30 October 2006
Okay, I admit, shoes are NEVER far from my mind. I don't quite know where this mini obsession (are there standardised descriptions for ranges of obsessive behaviour?) originated from, but I'm fairly certain Mum's patent leather maroon 4" pumps had something to do with it.

oh, how I covetted, even WITH the felt-tip-coloured-in bit by the seam on the back, and I can't describe how distraught I was when my feet outgrew those shoes. Not that I ever wore them. Oh no. Certainly, not when Mum and Dad went out and a babysitter was in charge. No siree...

But for the last, ooh, 4 weeks or so, I've not been to visit Jim. We're both suffering from the separation, but there's little I can do about it until I've found replacement shoes. See, I have reasonably normal feet, but they're a European size: "Oh my God, no wonder your ex-fiance mistook you for a drag queen" and it's quite a challenge to find sensible sports shoes, that provide sufficient cushioning for my more-than-svelte self, along with stability across the bridge that maintains the foot in a neutral running position. (mine have broken - finally - after 4 years)

For I have had an operation on my right knee (unrelated to running, I assure you) and am now paranoid.

Anyway. This morning, I woke with the singleminded determination that has seen me through a PhD, half an EPIET traineeship, and many 'boyfriends' (yes, I enter the relationship certain of its failure - I've yet to be surprised). I left the house at the ungodly (on a Saturday) hour of 09.30. I had plotted my route with fastidiousness only known to my mother's side of the family, and had tram numbers and routes written down on a small scrap of paper (so as not to appear the loser I am).

Fooling nobody, I was first at the door of the Tri-Expert shop. Apparently, they're experts in all things triathlon. Running is part of those things, and they're reputed to have staff who know what pronation is and why it's preferable to avoid it. Sadly, I was there before the owner/operator this morning. Despite it being an hour after their supposed opening time. A phone call to the number on the door resulted in a wincing cowering Nomes as the fax machine informed me that nobody cared about my problems.

Back to town (for yes, this shop was in the midst of a very pretty nowhere): Shop II. Also closed, despite being purportedly open on Saturdays. Shop III I abandoned on principle (principle being "fuck this") and headed back to the relative haven-like safety of malls. They're guaranteed to be open.

One cellblock tango serenade to a slightly bemused gentleman and his son at a bus stop somewhere west of the centre later, and I was even further west of the centre. At a large(ish) mall, staring at a wall of shoes. Ordinarily, this would make me salivate with delight, but since these shoes were predominantly white and had breathable material uppers that were only a mere inch from the floor, I was not so drooly.

The 12 year old assistant came over to 'assist'. I showed her my pre-printed list of shoes that would do the job. She looked at it as though it were covered in slime. I pointed at the word "Nike". She cowered, and pointed in the vague direction of a shoe. I said, "yes, but Nike WHAT?" for the shoe had no name tag. She shrugged. I rolled my eyes (oh come on, I couldn't help myself) heavenwards (actually, they may have gone further) and said "nevermind" in a horribly dismissive way. She returned to arranging tennis balls.

I left. Shop IV: No. Shop V: one shoe. HOORAH! (out of the list of 81 possible models) - yet not in my size (which is "Oh my god etc." plus 3 sizes in this shoe!!!).

Shop VI: nope. Shop VII: yes. IN MY SIZE. Sadly, it was possibly the least comfortable shoe I'd ever put my foot into (ugly-sistering into a Nine West 41 excepting).

Shop VII: no. Shop IX: no. Shop X: no. *sob*

So here I am, at 18.21 having spent an ENTIRE DAY walking around this city in the empty hope of finding a running shoe.

Question for the readers: do I give up and merely perform stomach stapling surgery on myself (I figure: swallow enough staples, one will do the job!) in order to shift the persistent knedliky that finds itself attached to my stomach - or do I make another attempt with the apparently brilliant running shops that were shut today?

At what point do I turn to Ebay and have a pair of shoes go missing like the replacement mobile phone did?

Meanwhile: I did get to see the following on my epic quest:
Police indulging their inner teenager by cramming four into a car, parked by the river (including one motorbike policeman) smoking. Hilarious. I'm sure there was a bottle of vodka in there too. Because we all know that vodka doesn't smell...

Half of the army. The youngest half. Being clung to by limpet like teenage mothers who managed to simultaneously scan the crowded metro to make sure everyone was noticing them. The dpm-clad boyfriends, on the other hand, are managing to look embarrassed at being the hulls for their barnacle like girlfriends (all barring the penis thing, obviously) while concurrently carefully checking out the limpets attached to their brothers-in-arms and barely concealing the urge to eyeroll in a kamaradly kind of way.

Since I was shopping for sports shoes, I wore my old ones (as advised by all running websites). However, I cringed at the idea (jeans and white sneakers!!! Ick!). I've valiantly not looked down once today (I have no idea how much dog poo I stepped in), and have thus ignored them. However, at one point, I saw some elderly female American tourists who's 'sneakers' were so blindingly white, that I was snow-dazzled for at least 30seconds. How do they keep them so? Are there special manufacturers of 'touring' shoes as for bikes? Boggled.
Oh great. The smelly 15-year old next to me is checking out porn. *sigh* Time to go home to my drug pushers, sex dealers and Eddie Izzard DVD's. Roll on Sunday.
posted by Nomes @ Monday, October 30, 2006  
4 Comments:
  • At 9:56 am, October 30, 2006, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I don't have your e-mail address (mine is g_wielenga@yahoo.com). :-)

     
  • At 12:07 pm, November 02, 2006, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Dear Nomes. As your doppelganger in the foot department (lord, imagine a phrase encompassing *that* in German!), I will vouch for the more-than-reasonable nature of your feet (drag-queen indeed), and recommend you write directly to Nike bewailing your plight in the hopes they'll take pity and grant you a free pair of shoes (and advertising contract, natch). You'll be please to learn the red pair of shoes you gave me I still gaze upon fondly whenever I open my wardrobe door, look upon my shoe rack (yes, singular) and contemplate summer, and friendship :) mx

     
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