Victory, meeting Jesus, fire and a run all in a week

As weeks go, this was a busy and odd one. I am close to melt down it has been so busy, and tomorrow it ends with our Palm Sunday event,'Holy Ghost Walk'. For this event I needed some biblical costumes, so I got in touch with a woman who does the costumes for the Edinburgh Passion Plays (these are plays about Easter and not any other kind of passion). She offered me some of her wardrobe, but it meant going to the church where her cast were rehearsing. On arrival I entered the wrong door and found myself in alcoholics anonymous, but eventually I found myself in amongst the cast of biblical characters....including Jesus (or should I say Duncan!) Strangely enough, Duncan is not a Christian at all, but plays him with real conviction. After a good route through the costumes, I left with an Ikea bag full of them. I was half hoping I could have been mugged for them. How amusing would that be on a police report...items stolen 1 x Thomas the Doubter tunic, 1 x Mary's frock, 5 x pairs of Jesus sandals (and they would really have been Jesus' sandals!).

Wednesday was the inter school cross country finals. I've been training the school team since January and the pressure was on to get a win. Out of 20 kids, only 2 dropped out because they didn't actually enjoy it, and another broke his foot. We then whittled it down to the strongest team who faced tough opposition. In the girls race our rival school took the first 4 places. However, it was all about team work, so if the lads did well and the rivals didn't, we could win. Their lads looked like athletes, whereas ours looked like lads. However we were a team, they were just a bunch of individuals, and it was that which gave us a victory in the race, and ultimately the competition by 6 points. So that is 2 years in a row, which is just as well as the school have bought a trophy cabinet. Photo: Me, the winning team and Mrs Lyle


Thursday was a panic. I could smell smoke in the woods and thought some kids were having a fire. But I realised the smoke was actually coming from near our house, and as I got closer it was very near our house. 'Had I left the iron on again? Was Emma's hair straightners burning a hole in the carpet?' Fortunately not, it was our neighbours shed on fire, which was dangerously close to burning their bungalow down. In an emergency like that there is only one thing to do...get the camera! Everything was swiftly brought under control by our voluntary fire fighting team, and nobody was hurt.
Photo: The shed is on fire


Finally it was my own turn to race. The Dunbar 10km Boundry Race. I had a go faster hair cut done, and with little training behind me I was out only to get under 40 mins. Thankfully I got 39:26 which was slower than last year, but will do. I had to do a sprint finish for an exciting end to my week. I am in Manchester next week so I am hoping to do the Salford 10km on Good Friday. We will see!
Photo: The 'go faster' hair cut saved me valuable seconds