London + Marathon

(... but not, sadly, the London Marathon)

I haven't really been involved with Gemini for the last few months. Apogee, the server I wrote earlier this year, never got all those cool features I intended to give it, and my plans to work on a client have also been shelved. My free time has been taken up with other "projects", principally moving to London from Dublin. I've also been training for my first ever marathon, the Amsterdam Marathon which I will (hopefully) run on 17 October.

Moving to London

My partner and I decided to move to London for a while. She was offered a new job over here, and my employer has an office in London that I can work from, so we figured we'd give it a go. As both cities emerged from lockdown, we were both looking forward to being able to actually do stuff again, but we realised that in Dublin we'd just be going back to doing the same stuff we've been doing for years. So why not move to a new city and country where we can do everything for the first time?

Also, call it a complex, but I was very conscious that I had never lived abroad before, which in my social circles at least made me quite an outlier (in fact I struggle to think of someone my age that has never lived outside of Ireland). I'm not sure if this propensity to migrate is a general millennial thing but it is certainly an Irish thing. Emigration has played a central role in Ireland's history for at least 170 years (though I am of course very fortunate that I am doing it out of choice, rather than economic necessity).

As far as moving country goes, moving from Dublin to London feels a bit like cheating, as it's probably the easiest international move one can undertake, even post-Brexit. Culturally the two cities are extremely similar, and in fact the neighbourhood where I live in London feels remarkably like my old neighbourhood in Dublin (which is nice because I do miss it). You can also scarcely walk down the street without hearing a few other Irish accents.

Still, there are some differences which have really struck me. The main one, unsurprisingly, is the sheer size of the city. I still fall into the trap of assuming that, because two places appear beside each other on a map, it must be reasonable to walk from one to the other. I've also definitely noticed a lot of empty shelves in shops, though I have to say most shortages are not quite as dramatic in real life as they have been portrayed in the media (the exception being the run on petrol, which really is crazy, but thankfully I don't drive).

More than anything I am excited by how much there is to see here - and how easy it is to see it, with so much being within reach of the tube and the (highly underrated) bus system. And yet, already I have identified a few favourite local places I go back to again and again.

Marathon

I've been running casually for a number of years now, and ran the Great North Run (a half-marathon; the world's biggest, apparently) in 2019. I had originally intended to run my first marathon last year, but... well, you know. So 2021 is the year. I chose Amsterdam principally because they actually had places available - many of the more popular marathons were particularly difficult to get into this year, as so many people rolled over their registrations from last year. But it's also supposed to be a good course for first-timers as it's so flat. And, well, I love Amsterdam, so there's that!

This is a stupidly obvious statement, but training for a marathon is, uh, tough. Once you get to within a couple of months of the race, it starts to feel like every minute of free time needs to be spent running, especially if you are busy with work or other commitments. Running used to be a way for me to escape and clear my mind, but it has definitely come to feel like a chore. When I find myself wondering why the hell I signed up for this I think back to how much fun I had at the Great North Run and how happy I felt having finished it, and look forward to having that same feeling of accomplishment (fingers crossed).

Running during the pandemic has been easier in some ways, as working from home basically gave me an extra 1.5 hours a day, as well as extra motivation to get out of the house. But in other ways it has been more difficult; for example, in normal times I would probably have signed up to a 10K, a 10 mile and a half-marathon, so I would always have a race not too far away to keep me motivated. Training effectively from 0 to a full marathon has been a long journey. Of course, I have been running those distances as part of my training anyway, but organised races are a lot of fun and give you an intermediate goal to work towards.

In Dublin I was very lucky to live near the Phoenix Park, a huge and stunning park located not too far from the centre of the city. Here in London the parks near me are a lot smaller, so rather than doing lap after lap, I have used my long runs as an opportunity to explore the city. It's been a really great way to get to know my new home (though I do not recommend running along the Thames between Waterloo and Tower Bridge on a sunny Saturday - and I'm sure the million tourists I ducked and dodged between while sweating profusely didn't appreciate it, either).

So, that's what's been keeping me busy. It's been an interesting few months for sure, but I'm looking forward to getting settled in to my new home and rediscovering my other hobbies (including playing around with Gemini). And, of course, to finally trying out all the fantastic looking pubs I've been thirstily running past...

London + Marathon was published on 2021-10-08

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