Running to London....

It's amazing what an extra glass of wine will do to your ability to think sensibly at a dinner party.

We were at Simon and Gianna's place and had enjoyed lots of laughs, fantastic food, hilarious conversation and a few bottles of wine.  With our dogs snoozing under our feet and placing a deliciously-stinking cheese platter on the table, Simon said, "I've just got confirmation that I'm in for the London Marathon next year."

We - of course - drank to his health and willingness to run his FIFTH marathon in a decade. We drank again to his bravery and a third time to agreeing to meet him at the finish line in front of Liz and Phil's house at the end of the race. Following those three quick glassfuls, my brain had lost the ability to censor my mouth and I heard myself saying, "I'd like to run it too."

So, on the 5th of October last year, I decided that the best way to make a vague idea firm up into a public commitment was to post it on Facebook:

Kath Lockett

October 5, 2013 · 

This could rank up there with one of the dumbest things I've ever done (and it's a long list) but I've signed up to try to complete the London Marathon in April 2014. I'm aligned to a charity so that it not only benefits them but adds a big element of responsibility and risking public shame if I don't do my best - http://tinyurl.com/pcyttyn

Most of you know will know that I'm a plodding old treadmill runner who not only prefers the privacy of staying at home but also the vague attempts at keeping some of the cocoa-butter away from my thighs.  Sometimes, however, yearnings are harder to shove aside than a Lindor box, and this particular yearning to do a marathon was starting to become louder and more urgent. Youth had slid away long ago; family issues in Australia had been hurtful and disappointing; and working (mostly) from home meant that there was no excuse about not having the time to train.





















My little brother David - a marathon survivor and triathlon regular - gave me his timetable of runs, as did my best buddy Jill.  I also searched online to find other 'beginner marathon' lists, averaged them out and developed my own.  Maths, people. Not my favourite subject but useful when it comes to spreadsheets, diary planning and run scheduling.

Each run - the date and distance - was recorded in my little paper diary.  In green pen, so that it stood out among the blue and black appointments.  The aim was to have four entries in per week with the end total slowly increasing.  Every Sunday as I'd turn the page over, I'd (mostly) smile at the achievement.  




















Pointless? Possibly.  Vain? Definitely.  Lonely? Too bloody right!

As the treadmill moved from its locked-state of 6km slowly upwards, maths became even more important.  10.5 kilometres is one quarter of a marathon..... Fifteen kilometres is 5/14th of a marathon... How the hell would I be able to generate the stamina and willpower to run the remaining 9/14ths?  

Trust was key. My trust was placed entirely in the gathered wisdom of the all-holy running timetable, now reverently covered in a plastic slip to protect it from sweat stains.  Some easy runs, some scary long ones; some slightly shorter runs: all helped take the decision-making and potential for procrastination out of my hands. If the timetable had a particular number under a particular date, then that was all there was to it.

 

Music was vital.  Out on the roads, I'd never have anything clamped to my ears as it would be far too dangerous to not be able to hear oncoming traffic or the world around me.  But when I was staring at my bedroom wall from anywhere between 36 minutes and three-and-a-half hours, it was the songs that prevented my mind from convincing my body to stop and to instead stagger (and fart) along to the beat.

At any given time, there were three layers of blisters on various parts of my feet, but my toenails stayed on. This was NOT the case ten years earlier when I lost two of them during my one and only half-marathon attempt.  That was the same race that had me throwing up at the 15 kilometre mark and swearing never, ever to attempt anything further than a fun run every again......

By the time that half-marathon and twenty-something distances were reached before Christmas, the treadmill died.  It was still under a service agreement and was surprisingly (it's Switzerland, remember) affordable to get a new running belt and motor.  The mechanic was impressed: "It's not often we get a treadmill that's worn out before its warranty has ended."  My vanity level soared sky high until I realised that my stomach rolls were still very evident and still prone to unravelling each time I bent over to untie my shoes....

Despite my distaste and avoidance, it was time to do some 'street' runs.  These were more nerve-wracking than increasing the distances as I worried about looking and feeling vulnerable, uneven footpaths, crossing busy roads, dodging walkers, prams, snogging picnickers and the biggest dread of all - running uphill.

Love Chunks had a route that involved a nice run downhill towards the lake, then along the foreshore, through the park and up towards the Botanic Gardens.  

The horrific hill climb commenced as the track wound past the reindeer enclosure, making its presence more painfully felt when passing by the flamingos and spotting the rebel peacock strutting his stuff by the woodpile.

The hell increased many more times as I staggered my way past the World Meteorological Office to the UN headquarters, wheezing so loudly that tourists taking photos of the flags were given plenty of time to step aside and let the dying lady through.  

It was only eight kilometres back to home, but the height increased as it evilly turned left past the Korean embassy, along the side of the Hotel Intercontinental and a final nasty hill through Petit Saconnex before my stinging, sweat-filled eyes spotted our building in the distance.

We spent Christmas in New York and when booking I made sure that it had a treadmill that I could use....  The Caribbean cruise we went on after New Year's had an enormous gym and using a treadmill on lolling seas added an extra dimension of difficulty.

Love Chunks accompanied me on my first long street run.  He made an absolute mockery of my months of training when he not only ran his usual 8km, but then accompanied me on his bike for the second 8km and then ran the third 8km again on foot.  I was incredibly envious and more than a little insulted.  He was - and is - naturally fit and does ride his bike to work, jogs as often as he can and works out at the gym, but surely he should not have been able to bounce through a 24km session and still be able to cheerily chat to me with barely a wheeze throughout it all?  Cocky little git!

The week after, he was keen to do it again.  This time, he wasn't so lucky, pulling up with a very sore ankle after the second round.  I gulped my water and Gatorade and left for the third round.

"You could have waited for me," he sulked. "I was out there HELPING you."

It was my turn to flare up. "Nope, no way. I have worked my not-inconsiderable arse off for ages on my OWN doing this, and the training schedule is MY schedule. You either keep up or you don't."  I'd never be as fit or as thin or as fast as he was, but the plodding regularity meant that my joints and muscles were used to the distances and could handle it.  It was on that day - although not fun for either of us due to having that argument - that I knew I'd be able to do this.

My beloved running timetable worked and I managed four rounds of his 8km route on three separate occasions.  'Andrew' the peacock was less scared each time I passed by his hangout by the woodpile, progressing to standing in my way during the last lap.

Running 'in the thirties' is only recommended two or three times in marathon training, and even then, no more than 32km.  "Any longer than that and you're just trashing your body," Jill told me. 'Trashing' is a polite way of describing the bone-jarring, shattered feeling of knawing, clawing exhaustion that pounded in every cell of my body after those efforts. The entire day was given to running - and then recovering - from 'the thirties' that resulted in the sweat drying on my face and turning into finely powdered salt to moaning in the bath and wondering just how I was going to lift myself out of it.

Carbo loading used to be a week-long phenomenon back in the 1980s, but these days it is only recommended as a mere three day fest.  Despite this, it was particularly enjoyable to inhale spag bol for dinner on Thursday, leftovers for Friday lunch and bread/fondue entree followed by steak and chips for dinner.  

Apart from the off-putting sounds of my greedy eating, the week leading up to the marathon was a quiet one - only two x 3km runs.  On the other hand, the sweat levels were as high as any of the longer, harder runs.

My heart rate had reached 172-180 BPM and didn't go much lower in the week leading up to my flight to London when I wasn't running.  This was making me more nervous than my wedding day.....

Me too, me too, ME TOO!

Now, my mate Pandora has run four half-marathons in two years and my awesome buddy Jill completed an entire marathon last year before suffering a serious brain injury after falling off her bike during the Jacob’s Creek Down-under 120km bike race, so they’re both fully fit, full-on, determinedly powerful women.

...and I feel a bit left out.

See, I’ve been running since making it my new year’s resolution back in 2001. It’s the only resolution I’ve stuck with as stopping being too noisy; picking at my finger nail skin until it bleeds; giving up sugar/chocolate/cake; and trying not to be jealous or too much of a ‘Me too Me too ME TOOOOOO!’ person have all failed before the day was out.

So, here’s my Me Too contribution.

My first run, on 1^st January 2001, was three laps around the second cricket oval at Trinity Gardens Primary School. Four hundred metres times three. I didn’t have the energy to jog the two blocks home afterwards. Walking and gasping my way back, an elderly Italian gent hosing his roses offered to spray me down too. I accepted.

September 2002 saw me run my first City to Bay fun-run in Adelaide – twelve kilometres. My training consisted of asking Love Chunks to drive around my self-designed running courses and measuring them on the car's odometer. 4km, 6km 8km and 12km which I ran regularly. I carried a water bottle in a bum bag for the 12km runs and could always tell what the Robern Menz factory were making that morning from the smell that wafted along Glynburn Road – mint for Crowns or sweet peaches for Fruchocs.

Time achieved – One hour, three minutes for 12 kilometres.

September 2003 – running was now ‘my’ thing and my four year old baby weight had finally gone. It was also the valuable alone time that didn't involve sitting on the toilet or sleeping with the aid of a sedative to figure out a few solutions and ideas. City to bay time – 58 minutes.

August 2004 – My twice-weekly six km runs and a weekly 12km run had swelled to a 6km, 12km and a 17km run by June. I was in my ridiculous workaholic career phase then and used to get up for a run at 5am in the dark. I figured that potential robbers and rapists were more likely to have headed home by then and, besides, they’d have to catch me..... All that and I had showered, dropped Sapphire off at daycare and be at my desk by 7:30am. But I was happy. Wasn't I?

Love Chunks and I had an argument the night before the race. He was (justifiably) concerned about the long hours I was putting in at work, my increased physical symptoms of stress and noticeable decline in energy, happiness and interest in life at home. I disagreed and we went to bed with it unresolved; both of us furious. The last thing he said was, “Oh and I’m NOT going to see you do your half-marathon tomorrow.”

Sunday morning arrived and I was at Pinky Flat by the Torrens River at 6.30am. We were bussed to Lockleys and froze in the darkness until the starter pistol fired at 7.30am.

I was sleep-deprived, lacked the appetite to eat anything before the race and felt utterly depressed. Instead of this being a physical achievement that would set me apart as not only an amazing career woman (already failing) and wife/mother (whump whow!), there’d be no-one to see me or even care if I was there.

By 14km I hadn’t stopped but also hadn’t bothered to check my time or distance. At 15km, I threw up on the bank of the river near the Convention Centre. I wanted to stay doubled over and lie on the cool, soft, unjudgmental grass but..... No. I’d trained too hard and on my bloody lonesome for this and wasn’t going to give up now. Wiping my mouth and sipping some water I started up again.

Soon after I heard Sapphire and LC call out from the other side of the bank. “Go Mum!” “Go Kath!”

They’d come! Just six more painful kilometres via tiring little hills up to the zoo and back with the whiff of gorilla poo in the air before staggering across the finish line in one hour, 52 minutes.

I cried with disappointment: I had estimated one hour, forty five but clearly hadn’t foreseen the technicolour yawn that had left smears of fragrant reminders on my leggings. As LC and Sapphire hugged my saturated, stinky self, my tears changed to those of pride. I’d done it!

That was as far as I had ever run and after having a complete and utter breakdown roughly seven months later I found myself on medication, seeing a psychiatrist, unemployed and exhausted. Clearly it was only going to be little runs for me from now on, in all senses of the word.

However, chocolate reviewing started and became rather serious and time-consuming. Unless I yearned to be the human embodiment of a Lindt ball I needed to do more than 6km trots three days a week.

From 2006 to 2010, give or take a busted Achilles, I’d do three 10km runs and two 8km power walks to counteract the effects of inhaling around 2-3 kilos of chocolate per week. Eventually however, my shins, Achilles (both legs), several toenails, two incredibly painful infected blisters, blood-soaked bras and a couple of severe colds saw me grudgingly accept the fact that my ageing body needed to be treated just a tad more delicately.

Which leads me to now. Geneva. Autumn with fog, rain and slippery footpaths due to the accumulation of wet and increasingly slimy leaves stuck to them.

Five kilometres from our apartment entry door and back.

First phase: Posing under the red light. I jog around 300 metres before being forced to wait until the little green man allows me to cross the road. Swiss lights are ultra careful – pedestrians get to cross without any cars from even the opposite direction allowed to drive as you walk. Nice in theory, but it can mean a five minute wait if you just miss your turn.

Wearing a baggy man’s t-shirt complemented by sticky bed hair and hairy white legs goose pimpled in the breeze means it’s a challenge to stand there pretending to be nonchalant when surrounded by several stylishly dressed women ready to totter across the road in stacked heels, designer leather and furs to work. They don’t bother to hide their stares - I’m a big alien – unkempt, unstylish and publicly prepared to be seen puffing. And not on a French cigarette.

Second phase: Gracious descent. Downhill for half a K, baby! What are my legs – springs, steel springs. And how fast can they run – as fast as a leopard! Oops, that’s unless it’s rubbish day when the mini street sweeper fights with the garbage truck for total ownership of the footpath and I’m forced to leap out into the bike lane and incur the wrath of surprised and then annoyed scooter owners....

....not to mention reaching bus stop Trembley and – without fail – involuntarily letting out a series of sharp and loud ‘Parp Parp Parp Parp’ farts as I run past a bunch of more well-dressed workers....

Third phase: Jogging up Jill Hill. This is in honour of my best friend, who is slowly recovering from a brain injury. This is the hardest spot in our local park – winding cruelly upwards with the cracked bitumen path peppered with chestnuts that could twist an ankle if stepped on. Not to mention skirting around little old ladies smoking like chimneys and ‘omitting’ to see the huge crap just done by their poodles.

Fourth phase: Suffering through Sapphire's Slope. I leave the park and jog back into the suburbs, winding further uphill past several large apartment blocks, a patisserie, Milly’s vet surgery, the most famous fondue house in the city and a primary school. I think of Sapphire and how she’s got through the worst of things with being bullied by an ex-friend in Melbourne and the uncertainties of starting high school at a new school in a new country. She’s happy, stimulated, busy, interested, funny and utterly lovely. My eyes sting as sweat mixes with moisturiser but I smile as well.

Mercedes and Beamer drivers with diplomatic licence plates stare at me blankly as I go by, usually wheezing in agony by this stage. Sophisticated couples and US-accented people having ‘work meetings’ are mildly entertained as I trot past their petite boulangerie, dripping sweat as I pass and trying not to slip on the pretty-but-dangerous cobblestones.

Fifth phase: (barely) Mastering Milly's mountain. Another bloody school up on top of the hill past the Red Cross and John 23 American church. I now think of my dog who would always choose to come running with me no matter how much her arthritis agonised her. Even now, four years after the diagnosis, there’s reproach in her eyes when I put on my sneakers and leave her behind.

Final phase: Kath's Cruise. Downhill for 400 metres all the way home. The apartment keys slide in my left hand, sticky from sweat. The second my feet touch the outdoor mat and the doors automatically slide open, I stop.

Hands on my knees, head down, gasping. A quick glance at my watch shows 26 minutes from start to finish. This is no great distance or time but when factors such as motivation, weather, laziness, time and dagginess are considered, I feel just as proud as I did in August 2004.

Un Chunks

No, I'm not getting a divorce; it's far more worrying than that.














Love Chunks is my jokey pet name for my husband and is sort of the opposite of what he is. He's the last person you'd be inclined to think of as your own Softy Schnookums or Snuggle Puff. Sure he's got buckets of love, but he has never ever been chunky in the Forty-something-bloke-with-back-fat-and-size-14A-moobs sense. If anything he's fitter and trimmer now than he was ten years ago.

Trouble is, he's on holiday at the moment. For most of us, that means eating more, eating worse, sleeping in, avoiding exercise and reaching for another handful of cashews and a cold glass filled with golden fluid and white fluffy stuff on the top.

Not for our Love Chunks. It's only been two weeks of his four weeks of long service leave and he has:

Gone on a bike ride to Point Cook and swum in the sea at Williamstown

Done six workouts in the gym including weights, crunches, lunges and exercise bike riding

Played tennis four times

Gone running - usually 10km each time - too often to count

Taken his canoe out for a spin on the Marybyrnong three times

Hopped on the train to Lilydale and then lifted his bike off to do the old railway track/new bike route around the Yarra Valley and then ridden back home again

Booked some sailing lessons

Signed up for yoga classes and

Played basketball with Sapphire a few sessions a week

......Not to mention taken me to my first psych appointment, cooked every evening meal, done the shopping, helped me hoik the buckets of shower and washing machine water onto the garden, celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary, joined the Greens party, publicly corrected Andrew Bolt to the acclaim of several well known leftie bloggers, taught Sapphire how to make kwai chow, taken Sapphire to school, catered for several lunch and dinner parties, rewired our digital television system and read several good books.

So, last night as we flopped on the sofa in the still hot and sticky heat, he nervously picked out a 45 gram Kit Kat from my chocolate stash in the fridge* and said, "Oh dear, I don't know if I should have something like this so late in the evening."














It was the first time in my entire life that I wished I wore bi-focals so that I could put my knitting on my lap** and look down my nose at him before dryly retorting, "You're right. You shouldn't have that - you should have all bloody TWENTY of them with each wafer finger dipped into a 24 carat gold forty four gallon drum holding double clotted whipped cream served to you by Myf Warhurst and Jennifer Aniston you dim little over-achiever you!"

God I love him.


* They were on special at Woolworths for 89 cents, so of course I bought twenty. And also the chunky varieties, Rolo, Aero, mint, Milo bars etc.
** I knit long squares to my mother's precise instructions (a scarf of seven squares comprising 45 stitches in a row, done seven times) so that she can sew them together as blankets for the homeless shelter she supports. It's a worthy cause, but if I'm honest it makes me feel less slack and slovenly sitting in front of the telly if I've got my knitting with me.

Ungrateful Gits

Love Chunks woke up on Saturday morning and, after he returned from his refreshing ten kilometre run along the Maribyrnong River, he cooled down, fetched the paper, checked on Sapphire and made us both a freshly ground and brewed coffee.

After finishing my cappuccino, I went back to bed for a bit more of a lie down - chocolate and book reviewing is exhausting work and it felt good to be able to get up at 10.00am instead of my far-too-rigorous weekday waking time of 7:30am.

He and Sapphire then decided to whip up a home made breakfast of potato rosti, poached eggs and home made tomato and kidney bean salsa sprinkled with chopped parsley from our herb garden, and called out to me to get up and join them.



















Later that evening as Sapphire was on the phone to Juliet and I was playing on the computer, Love Chunks rustled up a rather nice dinner - BBQ-ed peppercorn salmon, oven-roasted olive oil and rosemary potatoes, seared asparagus and sesame seed oil and salad sprinkled with balsamic vinegar. We ate with plates balanced on our laps in front of 'The Big Bang Theory'.


















But when it was my turn to do something for lunch the next day they weren't so thrilled.















I don't know why - surely they needed a change?

Yackety Sax played backwards




















I've come to realise that the days of loud music, screaming at the top of my lungs, expensive drinks and and hanging out with heaps of other hot and sweaty people in my teens and twenties is eerily similar to being forty and attending Sapphire's school fund-raiser Trivia Night.

Trouble is, it's us that have to perform. We've paid our fifteen bucks a head, brought along our cheese, fruit and dip platters and surveyed the other tables of eager parents, ring-ins and quiz buffs, wondering just who we'll be prepared to chat up during the scoring break. Love Chunks cracks his knuckles in preparation; Marilyn sips her red wine, Dom and Abby are busy hushing beautiful baby Maya, John is nervously scoffing peanuts, Jackie is examining the 'mystery faces' sheet, I'm surreptitiously trying to reach for the M&Ms instead of the strawberries and Helen has got her Game. Face. ON.

We're two people short on our table, and an intense discussion immediately commences on 'phoning friends'. Do we do it? Do we, as responsible, mature and reasonably moral parents, stoop to SMS-ing the internet or brainier mates at home for the answers? We've got three lawyers on our table and decide that they've got enough negative baggage to overcome without the accusations of snakey game tactics.

Instead, we do what most other parents, out on a rare Saturday night unencumbered with kids (except Dom and Abby, who have one out of three still with them) do, and reach for the drinks. It's only the Silent Auction at this stage ("Who for the love of Lemon Lycra Leggings is going to publicly bid for the book titled 'How to help your child overcome learning difficulties'?") but we're already screaming to make ourselves heard. Acoustics in ageing community halls with saggy ceiling tiles that still snag the detritus of tired Christmas tinsel only make the sound louder.

Round one - General Knowledge. Turns out we don't have much.

Round two - Science. Who knew that chlorine is the largest element found in sea water? We didn't.

Round three - Telly. I'm not too proud to admit that I stood up, did a Lleyton Hewitt fist-pump and yelled, "Yessssss" when it was 'Yackety Sax', the theme for the chick-chase scenes at the end of the Benny Hill Show, that had been played backwards.

Round Four. Still seemed to be telly. Poor, tired, father-of-three, trying to help Abby with the baby, Dom. He tried, oh-so kindly and quietly over the chaos and food-guzzling table of tenacious triviers, to say, "It sounds like the theme to 'The Dukes of Hazzard'," but his shame at even knowing that kind of thing prevented him from pushing the point. As he changed a nappy near the fire exit door, we insisted on it being 'Honky Tonky Woman' and lost.

Round Five. Music. Not too shabby, we got Berry Gordy as the founder of Motown but didn't get Hells Bells by ACDC. We felt a combination of happy, sad and tipsy.

John tried to feed himself grapes and missed his mouth each time. Helen and Jackie were yelling at each other like sisters as they grappled with the challenge of writing down neat answers, Marilyn developed a pathological hatred for the two comperes and Abby looked resigned to spending her hard-won evening with a table of snack-guzzling know-nothings who were loudly debating whether bidding for karate classes at a suburb 40 kilometres away on a weeknight was a good idea for a six year old......

Round Six. Sport. All eyes were on my husband of many years, dear, sweet Love Chunks. I was shoving mixed handfuls of salted pumpkin seeds and M&Ms into my gob, knowing I had nothing to contribute other than a satisfied silence. I was glad too, that LC was busy trying to remember who won the Brownlow medal in 2003 and didn't take note of the Cholesterol-straining volume of chocolate that was being inhaled by the woman seated next to him. Alas, it was Dom who starred: Don Bradman's batting average was 99.94.

Round Seven. Famous Faces. Germaine Greer - tick; Ricky Gervais, tick; Charles Manson in the early days - cross. Helen pointed out Kristine; a blonde-bobbed combination of Kate Winslet and Keira Knightley at the peak of health, who sauntered by in tiny designer jeans, knee-high boots and tight top: "She's a GP who has three kids."
"We HATE her!"

Round eight - Acronyms. NIMBY yes, BANANA - no (and I can't remember it now). ADIDAS is to my pontificating, bossy, pompous chagrin, is 'All Day I Dream About Sex' and not the combination of the German sports clothing founder's name - Adi Dassler. For a few moments the table were very impressed with my knowledge as I insisted that this was correct. Ten minutes later when the page was being marked, someone threw a squashed strawberry at me (Love Chunks insists it wasn't him)...
















By the final round, most of us had lost our voices, not won any incidental prizes, drunk all the wine, eaten the best bits of the dip and nuts and found ourselves in seventh place out of fifteen. The M&Ms had not fulfilled their famous promise and were indeed sweating in my anxious hands. One of the comperes was auctioning off the final donation of the night: "What am I bid for ten sessions with a personal trainer?"

Love Chunks expressed what we - eight tired, emotional, disappointed, hoarse and slightly drunk parents out past their bedtimes were all thinking: "Buy them yourself, fat boy."

The demonic Doctor Checks

Walking into my local medical centre isn't a welcoming experience. Several coffee cups have been squashed on the steep front steps with their sticky contents dribbling down the grey tiles and making a nauseating soup when mixed with cigarette ash and butts. The graffiti scratched onto the glass doors doesn't enhance the atmosphere either.















Inside the over-heated waiting room, I'm given the luxury of time to observe my fellow patients and to consider just how the very worst of cheaply slapped-together 1990s architecture has stood the test of time. Answer: it doesn't. The once-white ceiling tiles are blooming with latte-brown water stains, the huge green formica reception desk is so gouged that the chipboard underneath has become a crazy-paving feature and the once-proud 'Chemist next door' enamel sign has been covered with a torn piece of paper with handwriting informing me that the 'Neerest chemist is 300m walk further up the road.'

A three year old boy and his mother sit beside me. Well, she does: he's busy doing lap after lap around the low coffee tables, saying "When can I see Dr Checks? When can I see Dr Checks?" over and over.

Dr Checks? Dr Cheques? Is his mother running some kind of blackmailing scheme...? I put my boring novel down and am rude enough to raise one eyebrow at her quizzically. To her credit, she doesn't say, "It's none of your pharkin' business," but laughs and says, "Hugo likes ---" she looks around, sees her target and points "-----that doctor over there, the one in the houndstooth jacket."

I see a stooped old man in glasses slowly shuffle behind the reception desk to reach for his next file. He most certainly would have been around to see the celebrations at end of World War One.

Hugo rushed over to tug at his mother's skirt. "See Mum, Dr Checks is here! Dr Checks! Dr Checks!"

Hugo is shushed by Mum, and I go back to my book. Both of us still have to wait our turn and she tries to ease her son into the idea that it might be Doctor Blue Shirt he sees instead of Checks. "His grandfather has the same jacket," Mum whispers to me and says brightly and in a louder voice to Hugo, "But blue is your favourite colour, isn't it sweetie?"

"Ye-e-e-e-e-sss...." Hugo's voice had now moved up an octave to a high pitched whine that was starting to rattle the windows. "But I wanna see Dr Checks!"

It was time to plough back into the dull book on my knee and let the mother of Hugo try to cajole him with a trip to the water fountain, the tatty community brochure stand, the toilets and shooshing him again when he saw the enormous nose ring in a punky-emo hybrid guy who'd just sat on the other side of him: "Why is he wearing a bangle in his nose?"
"Um, it's a nose ring, Hugo. Some people wear them as jewellery, like you sometimes like to wear my bracelets and necklaces."
Nice response, I thought, but not Hugo. "Yuk, it'll get boogies on it."
Fair point too.

Dr Checks came back out into the foyer.
"Yay!" yelled Hugo, "It's my turn, Mummy!"

Dr Checks smiled - or was he merely airing his dentures - and said, "Mrs Lockett?" I grabbed my bag and left the room to Hugo's anguished sobbing.

Three months ago, at the urging of Love Chunks, I underwent a cholesterol test.
"We'll call you if something's serious, so no news is good news," said the doctor filling up the test tube with my red stuff at the time.

No phone call was received, so I was in the clear: my cholesterol test was obviously OK and I could continue to inhale chocolate, cheese, chips, meat, pastries, pies, eggs and donuts with greedy abandon. Especially chocolate.

















Today however, found me there to get my tumour checked up on - keep an eye on those pesky prolactin levels and have a wee whinge about the unwanted and increasing visits from Mr Migraine. He was becoming the medical equivalent of a stalker.

"You look very fit," Dr Checks said.
"Oh, I am", I sat up straighter, beaming with pride and huge spadeful of vanity. "I run at least three times a week, power walk twice and am a good girl and eat lots of fruit and veges and-----"
"But," Dr C looked down into the folder. "Your cholesterol level is much too high."
"Wha-a-a-a-t?" My smugness disappeared up the anus from whence it came. "But I was told by the other doctor that no news is good news!"

He affected that pose that's so infuriating because you just know you're in for a lecture and you know it's probably deserved but you just don't want to hear it: he lowered his glasses and looked down his nose at me. Pompous git - and look a him sitting there with his old man moobs sweating in crescent marks on his too tight business shirt, about to lecture me, an educated, intelligent, responsible adult about diet and exercise, the nerve..!

"Your cholesterol level is 6.5 and it should not be anything higher than 5.5. The doctor here has made a note saying, 'Discuss this with the patient when she arrives to collect her test results'."
He pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose to deliver the final pompous, know-it-all, you-can't-handle-the-truth barb: "That was THREE months ago. Surely you must have wondered what your results were?"

As intended, it was now my turn to play the part of the sheepish, admittedly ashamed and naughty patient and the role fitted perfectly. "Well, um, I just assumed that if it was really bad, one of you would call..."

Dr C held up a tired, I've-heard-it-all-before-young-lady hand. "You're not about to be carted into an ambulance, but you need to do something about it now. Seriously."

And the next fifteen minutes involved talk of cutting out full fat milk, cream, butter, cheese, red fatty meats, chicken skin, animal fats, coconut milk, palm oil from my diet entirely. Yep, okay, fine, nod nod nod, can do all of that. Sure, absolutely.

And no cakes, eggs, bacon, biscuits, donuts, pastries, pies, tarts or quiches. Ye-e-s, okay, it'll be a struggle but yes, my health is important.

Of course I knew what was coming next.

I knew it, he knew it and you know it, don't you?

"How much chocolate do you eat a week, Mrs Lockett?"
"Oh call me Kath, you already know so much about me, inside and out, heh heh, although I don't want to have a pap smear today. Did you know that I'm a chocolate reviewer and writer and manage to look only slightly chubby instead of Jabba the Hutt-like due to my dedication to exercise and the proper intake of vitamins and min--"

"How much chocolate do you eat a week----" he paused, to let his authority and moral detachment sink in more fully "-----Kath?"

Like a mathematically challenged eight year old, I went through an average week, listing each block, truffle and bar and counting them on my fingers. "Well, I had lunch at San Churro - so it was a meal really, not an additional snack, but then there was the two Nestle blocks which were a gift from Helen and M&Ms have released an orange flavour that is only currentlyavailable in the 200 gram bags and it's greedy I know, but it took me three blocks before the willpower to photograph it emerged in order to write the review for the daggy but delicious Cadbury Tiramisu dessert block and just this morning I finally got a hold of the new Lindt Classic flavours and...."

I just can't write the figure here. It hurts too much. Let's just say that if Dr Checks had any hair left, his eyebrows had risen high enough to have hidden amongst his fringe.

"You have to cut that by at least ninety percent or you'll be in serious trouble."

He might as well have yanked my heart out with barbed wire gloves and plonked it into a tupperware container and slung it in the staff fridge to rot amongst the ancient sweet chilli sauce sachets and yoghurt tubs.














A few minutes later, I slowly walked home. The morning sunshine was too bright and harsh, and my backpack was heavy. Love Chunks opened the door and the moment he saw my face, said, "Oh my god Kath, what's wrong, has your tumour grown back again?"
My eyes were blurred with tears. "But I love what I do...."

I hadn't dared show Dr Checks what I'd purchased from the supermarket before my appointment with him; just a few treats to see me through a week in central Australia on a 4WD camping trip that was not likely to fully cater for my specific needs:

Still, if I get to eat ten percent of it....?

Forty going on Four or Eighty Four?




















I can drive, drink, vote, read and breed and am occasionally able to cook something using more than one pot but there are still so many more things I do that are really, really immature.

Such as:

• Eating a banana and half a 250 gram packet of marshmallows for lunch. Starting with the whites first and leaving the pinks (my favourite) until lucky last.
• Flexing in front of the mirror after my shower. Did you know that bikini supermodels pose like Egyptians? If you don't believe me, try shoving your shoulders forward and twisting your waist and butt around to the side. Then push out your hip bones and throw your arms back behind you like a troubled ape (or Paris Hilton) and voila, you've lost ten kilos and should be auditioning for the 'after' picture in fat busting advertisements.
• Laughing till I cried at seeing the search phrase "Ashleigh's Peanut Butter Farts" and wondering if I should send it on to him.
• Substituting four-syllable words to replace the 'Mu-nu-mu-nah' that Animals sings in that classically catchy Muppet song. Recent winners have included the Kath & Kim's bat-wing arm fat descriptor 'Foo-doo-bah-dahs' and pornography (but only after explaining what it meant to a horrified Sapphire), simplicity, undoubtedly, unbearable, exaggerate and, most appropriately, 'inanity'.
• Still writing my name or 'Kath loves LC' inside a lop-sided love heart in the steam on the bathroom mirror.
• Knowing that my chances of winning the lottery is about a billion to one, yet feeling absurdly disappointed when the slimy piece of paper is handed back with 'Not a Winner' on it. Refusing to touch that slip, saying 'Oh you can put it in the bin,' as though it'll damage my fortune in other aspects of my life.
• Painting Milly the dog's toe nails (paw claws?) shimmery purple.
• Popping a Lindt Ball into each cheek and letting them dissolve slowly as I read in-depth, thought-provoking articles in The Age. And doing it again for the next article. And the next insert.

And yet there are other times when I'm swear I'm looking towards eighty four instead of four. These are all true:

• Avidly reading the freebie community newspaper from cover-to-cover and then joining the local ratepayers association. And attending the council's community consultation session. Willingly.
• Consider googling where I can find a spiked litter pole thingy to ease the agony of continual bending over to pick up rubbish in my street, the local school, the poo lane alley adjoining the corner shop and the dodgy old flats next door.
• Looking forward to eating soup as the weather gets colder.
• Laughing at the re-emergence of eighties fashions being touted as 'Defying the recession with bright colours and bold optimism'.
• Noticing that the flesh on my neck doesn't turn in time with my head, but instead wobbles and stretches like a hesitant raw pizza base.
• Wondering why antimacassars aren't in vogue anymore.
• Discovering that I have a permanent pink tattoeed belt around my middle - even first thing in the morning - from years of wearing high-waisted elasticated underpants and jeans.
• Following and actively participating in discussions concerning politics. And realising that I'm actually a bit interested.
• Acknowledging that my most frequent thought and deed is determining where and when I can sit down.
• Doing a passable impersonation of a duck's mating call just by farting when I cough.
• Spending a longer time on the toilet and appreciating the solitude.
• Appreciating the fact that there's not one pair of heels in my wardrobe and 10% or less of my clothes need be be touched by an iron.

So yes, I insert the dog's name into ABBA songs and serenade her during the day ("Milly-mooster tell me what's wrong..."), have tried to photograph Skipper's tiny disapproving bunny lips from a weird angle and licked the chocolate cake mix bowl with Sapphire but have also noticed that my face has the imprint of the pillow left on it until long after lunch time and my legs are the physical representation of the blue and red streets of the Melways directory.

But most importantly I am that age - whatever mental, emotional or psychological number is assigned by the relevant experts - where coolness and a posh car don't matter. Just clean clothes and my loved ones. Oh and finding chocolate on special.

You shook me all afternoon long

Since moving here, we've gone from a largish house and garden in sprawling Adelaide to a compact-but-renovated house in Flemington.

The front yard, as you can see here, is miniscule, so apart from Milly deciding it makes the perfect place to drop her butt nuggets, we tend to wrinkle our noses in disgust, slip the key in the front door and forget what we just saw and smelled.

The back garden is the size of a party-pizza box and has a block of flats looming over it from the eastern side with at least one tenant favouring ACDC at level eleven during the early afternoons.
On Auction Day, straight after we'd been the final bidders and had sat in the kitchen negotiating the sale price (the owners were in the bedroom) and signed the documents thrust in front of us with gleeful-but-shaking hands, Love Chunks and I stood outside in the unseasonally freezing November hail for a few minutes, grinning at each other.

"We've just BOUGHT A HOUSE!" He hugged me and I kissed him heartily, only to open my eyes and see an unshaven bloke in trakkie pants in the distance over LC's left shoulder enjoying a smoke on his balcony and the impromptu affection-fest we were putting on for his apparent benefit.

"Er, hello there," I called out, hoping that he'd shift his gaze before me. He did.

It was then that I decided that even though we'd potentially have twelve separate households looking down on our pocket-sized garden, gym shed and BBQ-area, I wasn't going to restrict the way I lived my life.

It isn't as though I'm a habitual streaker who's fond of doing nude cartwheels, or operate a thriving meth-lab in the bike shed. Nor am I a volatile junkie, a Tourette's sufferer with a foghorn voice, a born-again bible reader or into homespun Satanic rituals, but if I want to serenade Milly ("There was a showgirl, her name was Milly, she had blue ribbons in her hair and a dress cut down to there...."), call out to the rabbit ("Hey Spunky Buns, want a bunch of parsley?") or try double-dutch skipping with Sapphire then I'm damn well going to.

Our neighbours on the west side are two quiet Scottish doctors who work nights, so they tend to stir late morning/lunchtimes and the occasional whiff of coffee and the mewing of their cat is a hint they're outside in their courtyard sunning themselves.

Apart from saying "Hi" as we wheel our bins out on on the kerb Wednesday nights or offer to collect each other's junk mail during holidays, they mostly hear our lives rather than see them. Their cat, Hendrix, likes to parade along the wooden fence dividing our back gardens, luxuriating in the thrill of sending Milly berserk and enjoying the fact that he's the only creature that can actually get her to bark.

Kerry says all she can hear is me saying, "Oh shoosh Milly, he's just teasing you. Go find something better to do, like lick your date or eat Skipper's vegan poo poos." Stuart joined us and said, "I tend to hear a lot of heavy breathing and sometimes a bit of really weird, toneless singing, but usually it's only every seventh word."

Ah yes, that'd be me on the treadmill. Headphones and iPods are marvellous motivators (trust me: Neil Diamond's 'Crunchy Granola Suite' is a top song to run to on a drizzly Monday morning) but can fool the listener/runner into believing that their/her occasional heartfelt but heaving sing-alongs are being effectively drowned out by the sounds being pumped into their eardrums.

Afterwards, I tend to flop on this rather lacy park bench (proudly chosen by Sapphire, pictured here with Milly), huffing and puffing, flicking drops of sweat on the ground and scratching Milly's ears, saying out loud, "That was a tough one, Milly-gram. I farted in time to the start of 'Echo Beach', thanks to Love Chunks' home made sweet potato soup last night."

It's only then I look up and see at least one of the twelve balconies has someone standing there, trying to look over the mechanic's shed onto Mt Alexander Road or towards the big yellow cheesestick and red toast-rack on the Tullamarine. If they make eye contact, I'll smile and wave and know that every single time they'll be the first to avert their gaze.

And that's fine by me. When Sapphire sits on the bench and occasionally sheds a tear about the friends she still misses or we're sipping our microwaved hot chocolates and cuddling, I don't want to feel self conscious or as though we should be editing our lives.

Besides, our clothesline is wedged up against the fence of the flats and our jocks, knickers, bras and socks always get hung closest to their side. Why should we have to look at underwear when we're playing in the garden?