My friends Rosy and Olive came to visit this weekend. We met up in Birmingham where we went to the UK Schools Poetry Slam. There was a good mix of work, with the best being very good indeed. There were a lot of political poems and we learned that war is bad, carrying knives is foolish and we need to take care of the planet. For me the quirky and personal poetry was more effective than the serious preachy pieces, just as with adult poetry slams.
Saturday we went to Coombe Country Park where we fed squirrels, were chased by a swan, ate ice-cream, played catch, and messed around on an adventure playground. We went back into town and, after noodles, watched Kung-fu Panda. It was one of the best films I’ve seen this year (along with The Orphanage and 3-Iron). It has everything I wanted from it: superbly edited martial-arts, training montages, kung-fu mysticism and tragedy.
After a lazy Sunday I waved Rosy and Olive onto the coach and did another run. I managed 7.5 miles but it was very hard work. I’m supposed to be doing the half-marathon in a month and right now I’m not sure how I’ll manage it.