LEJOG 2017

LEJOG - THE BOOK I woke up this morning and the first words out of my mouth were "Don't be an arsehole today." I tried but it was difficult (I'm a professional telemarketer which scores highly on the a'hole scale). When I'm not doing office work I go walking in the country and make up stories about dangerous sea creatures, yogurt and passive-aggressive telemarketers. I thought it would be a good idea to combine these two hobbies into one - I don't mean being an arsehole while walking/writing, I mean writing a book while walking LEJOG.  The challenge: to write a book while walking 1,000 miles in 6 weeks. That's 166 miles a week. 24 miles per day. 8 hours per day at 3 miles an hour. 1 mile every 20 minutes. The book must be over 40,000 words. That's a minimum of 40 words a mile.   FAQs: 1) What does FAQ stand for? F*** Al Qaeda? Frequently assaulted queers? No, it's a symbol of laziness showing that the wr...

Why becoming a writer is a bad idea When I'm not working or walking I'm writing. Writing begins as a dream. A vanity project. A hobby, a passion...a chore. You read a lot and have ideas and those ideas create characters and plots and spark stories. You write them down, connect the dots...and one day, far into the future, you present your friends with a bloody awful PDF containing your magnum opus, your re-working of The Bible. "I've written a novel! I want you to read it and tell me what you think!" You leave them to it with a self-assured smile. You're a writer now. Job done. That triumphant smile lasts as long as it takes you to figure out what lukewarm responses and the oft repeated phrases 'It's very well written, well done" and "I'm sure you'll find a publisher" really mean. They mean "Christ, I hope he doesn't ask me any questions...I'll actually have to finish the damn thing!" That's when you...

Doubt All the early enthusiasm has gone. Doubt creeps in to my thoughts. It suggests that spending too much time away from home - time away from loved ones, a month and a half off work unpaid that will drain away my finances - is a bad idea. Will I be able to cope with the schedule - 1,000 miles in 6 weeks? That means walking 24 miles a day, every day. For me, 24 miles is a standard training walk I can do drunk, backwards, at night in a hurricane. But not day after day after day. That is a different animal. I will need to become a different animal too. Forget the mile counting, I'll be walking on the clock. One third of my day needs to be walking. This is a 9-5 job. 8 hours a day. Done. If I can't do that I'm screwed. Why the schedule? The guys who are currently walking LEJOG are just taking too damn long. Day 60. Day 65. Day 70. Day 80...I don't have time for all that faffing! It's not in my nature to dawdle - and I'm not saying you guys are dawdling, b...