Chris Worfolk's Blog

York Community Woodland is a park on the west side of York. It is being turned back into a woodland and over 200,000 trees have been planted, mostly saplings. It also has a parkrun: two laps on hard-packed dirt roads which go through the park. It is fairly exposed at the moment but will be cool to see how that changes over the decades.

I picked this to get my Explorer 100 badge so that we could celebrate with a breakfast at Dobbies garden centre after. As you can imagine, Venla was delighted to be dragged out of bed to go stand in a big field, but she did find some new squishes, so it wasn’t all bad. Explorer 100 is parkrun’s new name for the Cowell Club, which you get for visiting 100 different parkruns.

Unmasking Autism: The Power of Embracing Our Hidden Neurodiversity is a book by Devon Price.

I didn’t think I would find a book I loved as much as Neuroqueer Heresies, but here we are. Price explores the experience of masked autistics (those who hide their neurodivergent traits) in depth.

Neurodivergence is often defined by how much it impacts neurotypical people. For example, a children that can often be noisy or moving around in class might be described as “very” ADHD. Whereas another child who hides their kinetic traits and experiences a large amount of mental health issues and exhaustion as a result might be described as less ADHD, or not ADHD at all, even though their internal experience is the same.

Price goes on to describe how the messages we receive in a childhood can often lead to opposing reactions. For example, a child who is told they are too needy and intense may become hyper independent, emotionally avoidant, and struggle to ask for help. Those told they are selfish and robotic may become overly helpful people pleasers, unable to assert their own needs.

Engagement in interests is also defined in terms of its ability to make money or fit in with society. If someone spends all day playing with trains, they might fit an autistic stereotype. But what about individuals who are obsessed with work, spending 80 hours a week at the office? Many people in tech are self-taught having spent their entire teenage years sitting in front of a computer. Others spend their teenage years studying people: fashion, makeup, conversation, social dynamics, treating learning to fit in as a science.

All of this, and much more detailed in the book, leads to much of autistic experience being hidden.

The Children of Men is a dystopian novel by P. D. James. The book tells the story of British society after the world enters a state of complete infertility. No baby has been born for 26 years and the country, now run by a small council under the leadership of the Warden of England, has to cope with an aging population.

It differs from the film, which was also excellent but much more action and violence oriented. The book is slower, more exploratory of the impact on society. Less happens and it is more interesting for it.

What an incredible race. At no point did you have any idea who was going to win it. And I watched the full nine hours. Thankfully, I managed to avoid the result and watch it on the Sunday so I spent the whole day carrying my laptop around with me as I did housework.

On the men’s side, Schomburg had a go off the front, then Ditlev was leading for ages and continued that for most of the marathon before having to walk. Luis and Blummenfelt were chasing him down with Iden not far behind. Luis dropped Blummenfelt and Idan ran out of road to catch up, giving Vincent Luis winning at his first visit to Kona. Lindars was the top British male in 17th.

On the women’s side, Charles-Barclay led out of the swim (standard) and Knibb chased her down on the bike but then they were fighting it out for ages and swapping positions before Knibb put a few minutes into her at the end of the bike. Charles-Barclay stepped off half way through the marathon and Løvseth overtook Knibb only to collapse just over a kilometre from the finish. Matthews ran her way up into 4th.

This is somehow hillier than than Bowling Park. Maybe. It is three laps of the park with only a short flat bit at the top and bottom: most of it is along the sides on the hill. Think Potternewton. Well worth a go if you like hills and asphalt, and I don’t mind either.

We went to Gravity Active for Venla’s birthday this year. It was pretty good. They get an hour of bouncing on the trampolines, then pizza and ice cream. The pizza was surprisingly good. Surprising because children’s parties often tend to go for low quality but this was lovely pizza and most of the adults had some.

Lovely parkrun. A busy one and well marshalled. It is three laps and there is one hill on the course, but pretty flat for Bradford. Maybe that is why it is so popular.

Never Let Me Go is a novel by Kazuo Ishiguro. There are a couple of mild spoilers in this post. The book was originally unimpressive according to the critics, but has since been shortlisted for multiple prizes and appeared on lists of the best novels of the year, and even all time. And rightly so.

The book is a fictional memoir written by a woman who recounts her time at an elite boarding school. It tells of the friendships the students make, and how they make sense of their world and what it means to be alive. Also, everyone is a clone being raised for organ harvesting. While that is integral to the plot, it is not really what the story is about though.

I was a little unsure at first but soon found myself hooked and excited to read more. That stayed with me the whole way through the rest of the novel and I was surpised at how gripping it was. The only thing I wasn’t so sure of was the big reveal style section with Miss Emily at the end. But that is a minor complaint in a novel that was otherwise excellent.

The Eyre Affair is a novel by Jasper Fforde. It follows a literary detective as she chases down a supernatural criminal through various novels including, as you might guess, Jane Eyre. Also there is some time travel and England is still fighting the Crimean War.

It’s not as world building as Early Riser and Shades of Grey, but it is still a fun read. Many readers, may in fact prefer the fast moving narrative in comparison, especially if you enjoy ther literary references.

Last weekend, Elina and I headed up or a long weekend in Inverness. We went for the Loch Ness Marathon but decided to make a long weekend of it.

It made for a long drive up on the Friday, taking about nine hours in total. We took the A9 up through Scotland which passes through the Cairngorms national park. Though, perhaps the best bit, is the stretch from the border to Glasgow as that has the least amount of traffic. Scotland is huge. It was quicker to get from home to the border than it was to get from the border to Inverness.

On the Saturday, we went to Torvean parkrun before heading over to Drumnadrochit to have a wander around and get some lunch. Then back to Bught Park to register for the marathon. That took almost an hour and standing for that long was almost as hard as doing the marathon.

Sunday was race day: you have to get the bus at 7:30 but the race does not start until 10, so it is 3pm by the time you are finished and exiting the event village. Just time for a quick lie down and then heading out for dinner at The White House, which is a local restaurant in the city centre. I had a lovely venison dish.

On Monday, we went to the Scottish Kiltmaker Visitor Centre to learn about kilts. They have a small exhibition upstairs including two films. One of which is rather dated and needlessly sexualised, but the second talks you through the process of making a kilt, which was much more interesting. You can also peak into the workshop. We finished our time in Inverness at a cafe named Comfort Foods before heading down the A82 to Bridge of Orchy. The road takes you along the Great Glen Fault. It’s the first time I’ve been through Glen Coe and it was stunning.

We stayed the night in Bridge of Orchy and used the afternoon to hike the West Highland Way. We covered about three kilometres in an hour because my legs still weren’t working post-marathon. The remaining drive took as along the shore of Loch Lomond and around Glasgow towards home.