Movember Drawing to a Close

For those who haven't been following it, Movember is drawing to a close. Our team has raised nearly €3,500 for The Irish Cancer Society / Action Prostate Cancer fund, €200 of that from friends of mine.

I admit growing a mustache doesn't seem like much, when I ran a marathon I actually had to do something rather than just letting nature take its course, and you all donated more than €1000! Nonetheless, I found it much more annoying. I subsequently ran two more marathons, whereas I will never be growing a mustache again!

So it is nearly your last chance to donate.

• Click here to see my Movember page
• Or click here to go straight to donation page

Many thanks to if you have done so already. Here are the before and after pictures:-

What do you think? On top of looking like a wierdo, it adds about 10 years to me! I'll be glad when this is over.

Horay for the Mo!

Well, it is now at the stage that two people have said it suits me. It looks like a proper mustache, see what you think:-

Just to re-iterate, this is what I'm aiming for:-

Remember folks, this isn't just for me to make a fool out of myself it is for charity, so please donate now (or the mo gets it)

Mustach Update - The Ominous Shadow!

I am now at the ominous shadow stage. Is that a mustache or have you got a medical condition? Really, unless I have just the right lighting conditions, and you are uncomfortably close, it just looks like I got some cappuccino froth on my lip!

Tomorrow it gets its first exposure to customers, myself and another xCoiffure team mate and my boss have an all day meeting. The boss already has a beard, so it'll be a facial hair overdose for the folks in London. I hope they don't mind, it being for a good cause and all!

If you haven't already done so, please donate!

The Tache Blog

As previously mentioned, on various other channels (facebook, twitter), I'm growing a mustache for The Irish Cancer Society in November.

This is all part of the Movember charity website, and was actually Stephen Collin's idea, I just joined his team.

Frankly, I'm not even sure I can grow a mustache, I tried to grow a beard about 20 years ago and it was a disaster, it took ages to get beyond the fluff stage, and I have ugly bald patches on my cheeks! But I'll give the mustache a shot.

This picture shows what I looked like, relatively clean shaven, on Monday, and my bit of photoshop (actually pixlr) of what I might look like in 4 weeks!

(OK, the eyebrow additions are just my little joke!)

I need money! - so DONATE NOW - even a little will help the mustache grow, and if I get a decent pot together you can all vote for which mustache style I should aim for. Come on... it is for a good cause!

Come back here for regular updates, or listen in on facebook, I'll mostly use facebook, and some occasional blog posts (which also appear as notes in facebook), I don't think my facial hair grows at sufficient rate to merit twitter updates!

Coming up... some customer reactions, my next face to face meeting is next Tuesday!

I admit I was wrong about Ubuntu... going back to Windows

I'm not sure how long I stuck with it, must be about 6 months since I switched from Windows to Ubuntu on my laptop, which is also my desktop at home and in the office and on the road, so basically my only computer. (Actually my employer's computer. But they are cool with technology people testing out technology, the CEO uses Ubuntu, as do several developers. And this is not, and need not be, an issue, unlike some prior employers thought... but I digress...)

Unfortunately I have to concede defeat.

I can't stick with Ubuntu because Dell, Nokia, and Nvidia don't support it well enough. It doesn't run MS Office (well enough) and Open Office is only 90% there if you are a heavy user. The screen and docking station were a daily nightmare. Constantly booting Windows in VMWare a real drag. There were some devices and apps I never got to work - webcam, Skype with voice, VPN to the office, printing on my home network.

There were good times too.

Times I could boot, reboot, and shutdown about 4 times faster than Windows. Times when Windows under VMWare was faster than Windows running natively (don't know whether to laugh or cry about that one). Times when having posix command line meant I could do twice the job in half the time. Also, it was cool. I have to admit that.

But it is an OS for geeks. Still, after all the compromises and ease of use features, unless your PC is built and tested for Linux and has built in all the apps you need (i.e. a netbook) then it is just too complex. I like command line and editing text config files, but whenever I did it I thought, "there's no way I could talk my Mum through this on the phone".

So back to the loving embrace of Bill's progeny I go. (A process that might take more than one weekend).

Of course I could try Apple's MacOS... but what I need is a real operating system running on a real computer, not an expensive dvd player and a lobotomy.

Adventures in Blippo by Brian Heffernan

I haven't been to an art exhibit in 10 years but yesterday I went to my second one in the same week. Hosted in the Broadstone Studios, it is "Adventures in blippo : An exhibition of 10 abstract typographic compositions" by Brian Heffernan.

Blippo is a font, and the exhibit consists of various prints (mostly black on white), of characters from the font arranged in interesting ways. With the exception of one work, the characters aren't spelling out any actual message, but forming high contrast abstract images and patterns.

I thought it was cool.

Brian has drilled down into a very specific and obscure (for some people) cultural artefact from the 1970s, and created a range of interesting and unique new works. (Of course, Blippo isn't obscure if you know typography and fonts or have done design work, and everyone will instantly recognise it when they see it, but before I went it was pretty obscure to me, now I'll see it everywhere of course).

Today is the last day unfortunately, so if you have 20 minutes and are around Dublin 7, check it out.

Prague Marathon - Personal Photo Album

Some pics taken with my phone:
http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/marklen/PragueMarathon?feat=directlink

finished

3hrs 45mins. Way off my target of 3:28. Came apart around 35k. Got too hot (i've been training in Ireland after all), got big blisters, wanted to lie down and sleep in the street.

Anyway, the real reason I didn't do it was not enough training. In particular missing 3weeks of the last 2 months and not getting enough long runs in.

Excuses excuses!

I'll do better next time. It was a great marathon, lovely route, perfect weather. Next I might do London or New York, still thinking about that.

I'm having a beer and a schnitzel in the old town square with Andrea.

40k

Just went past 40k at almost 3:30 exactly. So now I have all the time in the world! Shite! Oh well...

last report

Past 30k. Feet sore. Too hot. Slowing down.

20k

I have just passed 20km.
I'm feeling ok ish.
1:35:50
Feet getting sore

10k

I have just passed 10km.
I'm feeling ok.
My time about 47:25
I think it is a bit warm. That might get to me later.

marathon innovation

Porta-urinals!

They fit 4 of them to the same space as a normal cabin. Though open they are pretty private, you step into a narrow alcove. Maybe for that reason the queues to the normal loos were only 3 deep.

Of course it help that we're surrounded by restaurants who are willing to let runners use the facilities.

{Edited after race to fix predictive text!}

ready steady...

I could have slept in for another 30mins. Not much to do here except wait (apart from one well timed visit to portaloo). Seems well organised. There's only one muster lane, it is divided by number range rather than time, though I think I specified target time when I registered. I'm number 1020 and hopefully I can do it in 3hrs 28mins.

Marathon today

Don't know if I'll try and blog during the race like I did the first one. I guess nobody but Andrea will be reading at this time. I might upload some pics at the end. Just over an hour to go and I feel fine.