London is Freezing and other poor puns...

I woke with a fright yesterday morning at 5am and knew instinctively that I wasn't getting back to sleep. Whether it was the genius who put the central-heating system behind a paper thin wall that had loudly kicked into action, or the previous nights kebab that was well and truly knocking on the door, or the massive dehydration and stonking big headache from 16-pint Friday, I just knew I wasn't getting anymore sleep. Not at least until I got out of my work trousers.

This inauspicious start was hardly a precursor to what was to come. If the alco-binge on Friday was almost a direct result of the malaise expressed in my last blog (nothing like a depressant to get rid of the blues...), yesterday was the best antidote possible to rekindle my spirit and enthusiasm for training, our trek, cricket, and life in general.

It was to be action-packed, exercise-heavy, and concentration-sapping day. So my choice to turn up feeling like Paul Gascoigne after an FA Cup final was an interesting one. The first section involved a freeze mob. Organised by Kirt and Dave K, we went to Parliament Square, Buckingham Palace and Trafalgar Sqaure. At each location we had our trektators wrap up in sleeping bags, before our 2 umpires Curry and Bung Shoulder

marked out our 'pitch'. On walked the 'fielders' to raucous rounds of applause from the trekkies, myself placed at first slip. On followed the batsmen, with Dave marking out a guard on the concrete and all the fielders shouting encouragement to Wes, our 'bowler'. By this stage we had the attention of all the people around.. as you'd expect when 30 people turn up wearing cricket whites and 'trekking' gear such as goggles, harnesses, beanies, and scarves. With ball in hand Wes would pretend to bowl, Dave would play forward, and Joe (your archetypical short-leg) would dive forward and 'catch' the chance... although the ball was in his hands the entire time... but lets leave that as our little secret. In unison, we would all jump into a massive appeal, Curry would raise his hand to begin giving him out, and then we all froze in that position without making a sound for 3 minutes. After 3 minutes, Dave would 'walk' as if given out and all the fielders would jump into spontaneous celebrations. 

The first one at Parliament Sqaure went ok but there wasn't many people directly around us, probably because you aren't actually allowed onto Parliament Square itself (a technicality in the law that is vigorously enforced to prevent the permanent protesters taking over, similar to the Aboriginal Tent Embassy). It was a good practice though and got us in the mood for more. The coup de grac was definitely Buckingham Palace. It took some excellent determination, quick thinking, and a touch of arrogance from Wes to get us past the Police... the conversation going something like

Rozzer: It's not going to happen mate

Wes: It'll only be 3 minutes

Rozzer: I can't let you do it I'm afraid

Wes: But it's for charity, it won't take long

Rozzer: Which Charity?

Wes: .... ermmmm... The Prince's Trust....

From the moment the freeze occurred, we had tourists swarming in and around us, all curious at first before they got into the spirit of it and started taking pictures, mock appealing with us, high-fiving a perfectly still Wes, and even going as far as molesting my backside as I stood perfectly still. By the end of it there were so many people in and around us that we couldn't see each other, but it did provide some hilarious shocks when we sprung back into life again. We were thwarted in Trafalgar Square somewhat by the giant Christmas Tree, however the stunt there managed to get us onto cricinfo

All of this was quite a good rush and great fun. I can now see why actors and musicians get addicted to performing on stage. The ability to get people intrigued as to what you are doing is invigorating. Funnily enough, it's exceedingly difficult and also tiring and a bit painful to hold one pose, particularly a full-blooded appeal, for 3 minutes. Then again, in the state I was in, spelling my name was also an issue. There are some photo's attached (with thanks to Zooby) and there will be a video coming soon. I've seen the unedited footage and it looks brilliant.

Following these stunts we headed to the home of cricket for a full expedition meeting. Loads of great stuff came out of this as we sipped on coffee's overlooking the nursery ground. Amongst them, a possible change of charity was floated, Blinky showed us his skills with the interweb that could see us being able to send back daily video updates from the

 mountain and also be 'tracked' online, and a kit sponsor was announced in MKK - run by former England cricketer James Kirtley (Dave's brother and Kirt's cousin). The designs look sensational, and will see us kitted out in training kit, polo's, and coloured match kit. Tenzing's gear will be navy trousers and a fetching pink top with navy piping, similar to the Middlesex 20/20 kit. Although judging from what Graham Napier had to say about conditions at GorakShep, we will need some base layers underneath and some thick jumpers on top. Present at the meeting was a member of the Lords Taverners, who as an organisation seem very impressed with what we are doing and are keen to get on board. I can assure them that, with their reputation and impressive alumni, the feeling is more than mutual.

Hammered home was the need for fitness. Kiwi reminded everybody of his fitness sessions, as did the Terminator, which was a stark reminder of what was concerning my massively hungover brain. There was a bleep test coming. As I was trying to avoid making excuses, I had hidden my hangover from everybody. But when somebody said 'we've forgotten the bleep test CD, so we won't be doing it today' I 'fessed up that

 I was horribly hungover and celebrated by doing a lap up and down of the nets at Lords without any pants on. 

To my horror, Kirt had remembered he had it stored on his laptop and I almost died. Much to Butler's delight, I started puffing during the warm-up. I had wondered what he'd be like in this environment. Petrified would be a word to describe him in the meeting when asked to introduce himself. Obnoxious would be the word during the warm-up. As I took in the deep breaths I could hear comments such as 'Your Mum puffs like that when I'm with her' etc etc. Several insults were exchanged before he trumped me with 'bleep, bleep, bleep' and the horror that I was about to encounter shut me up. It started OK, but my lack of sleep and recent exercise, combined with sweating pure Peroni, saw me conk out at 9.3... which is similar to what I achieved in June. I'm willing to argue that this points to me being fitter. But I am now under no illusions, it's time to get back off the beer and into the gym or the trim trails (coincidentally I'm watching Run, Fat Boy, Run as I type this). 

Further illustrating the point was the ensuing 2 hour net session. Conducting a bleep test prior to this was a stroke of genius as it will give us a good insight into how we play with the oxygen reduced by 34%. It also displayed that, whilst we whooped Hillary in our only matchup so far, they have some quality to fill the void. Dave Kirtley, as you'd expect from somebody captaining Cardiff CC, was a different class and Kiwi doesn't hit the ball so much as murder the fricken thing. We were all genuinely scared and I found myself quickly running to the side of the pitch post-delivery as he is especially good at hitting the ball straight back at you. By some stroke of luck however, I did manage to make him my bunny, getting him out twice and also seeing him survive a french cut. How this was possible considering I'm incapable of swinging the ball and bowl at a speed regularly described as 'backwards', I'll never know. I did feel for Mark, who was bowling directly after me (and, incidentally, is much better than me) as Kiwi would take out his frustrations on him and marmalised several of his deliveries. It was like watching footage of the Iraq war, for the balls took on the form of ballistic missiles once they'd hit nothing but the middle of his bat. Amusingly, the Kirtley name doesn't guarantee that everybody has cricketing talent. Kirt, whilst improving, still has trouble getting the ball down the other end. Genealogy is an interesting thing.

An excellent day was capped off with a couple of brews and a warm glow was felt on the way home. A massive thanks to Kirt and Dave for organising the freeze and to Lords for donating their venues for the day, particularly the impressive indoor nets. An invigorating day was just the tonic and has refocussed my wandering and blue-funked mind. Long may it last.