August 2014 - Man vs. hedge revisited

Around this time last year, I did a couple of blogs

Man vs Hedge
Man vs Hedge part 2

Well I thought I would revisit this part of the blog, as this bank holiday weekend it was conifer hedge trimming time again. The plan was try and do as much as possible on the Saturday and Sunday, as Monday the weather was supposed to be rubbish. However than plan didn't start out very well.

The one thing you need more than anything else before you trim a conifer hedge, is very sharp shears or a very sharp electric/petrol hedge trimmer. Well, we certainly haven't got the latter and anyway I much prefer the finish on the hedge with shears. So my expert blade sharpener was employed (my wife) and sure enough the blades of our 2 pairs of shears were super sharp. However, sharp as they were, they simply would not go through the hedge. It was taking about 6 cuts to do what one cut should do, so I was getting nowhere fast. Despite lots of adjustments, we came to one conclusion, we needed a new pair of shears. So off Deb went to buy some, and an hour later she returned and voila, the new shears went through the hedge like a knife through butter. The only problem was, the best part of the day was wasted now, and we were behind schedule. That meant only one thing, I had to be on top form in order to rush through the job.

However, my body decided to let me down a bit, after lunch I was in a right strop because of the shears problem and was having a bit of a rant, and I had "that feeling" that I get when I am lacking Cortisol....Deb knew it straight away, apparently I have a "look" that tells her straight away. So when she went off to get the new shears, I sat down and had some food and drink and a rest. She returned, and by then my body had caught up with itself and I was off. For about 3 hours I went at the hedge with the kind of vigour I could only dream about prior to this time last year. I sheared almost without rest and my arms just felt like they could go on and on. Then today (Sunday) although my arms were a bit achey from yesterdays (a bit over the top) shearing prowess, I blitzed through the rest of the hedge whilst Deb had started cutting the hedge to height (I'd done the sides). By the time the day was done, We had so nearly finished the hedge, bar about 10 feet of the top, which we'll try and finish tomorrow depending on the weather....had we not had the shears issue, we would have finished. And as I said in one of the previous man vs. hedge blogs, I did really push it for those 3 hours, because there is a part of me that wants to see just how hard I can push myself.....just to see how far I've come. Silly bugger really, but that internal drive to push myself has really come back into play....I think that may be the Testosterone at work.

So I have proved that I have SO much more stamina and strength than I had, better still than this time last year, when I had surprised myself. But still there is that niggle that for some reason, almost always at the weekend, I can still suffer with a lack of Cortisol. I don't think there is anything to be done about it, I think it is because during the week I do a desk job which is not that physically active, then at the weekend, my life is very different and much more active....and sometimes (not always) my body struggles to cope. As I've said before, if the Cortisol 'drop' is just before lunch as it often is, an early tablet dose sorts me out. This was pretty rare in that it was after lunch and when I'd already taken my tablet....so a rest seemed to allow it to kick in. Odd.

So a positive experience, but not without its problems. Never mind though....I'm still feeling very lucky to be in the position I am in.