Pulp, Oasis then to finish 1996, sorry 2025, Radiohead.

I mentioned last year that I like to pick a band and then listen to all their albums in order. Even better if I can read a book about them at the same time. For R.E.M., another band I loved in 1996, I read ‘The Name of this Band is R.E.M.’ and it reminded me that I’d never actually listened to their last two albums. They just drifted away until I didn’t even know the names of their last albums, which is fair with Accelerate, a forgettable album, but their final album, which they knew would be their last when they recorded it, had some of their best material since, well, 1996 too. A pleasant surprise even if re-listening to all their albums just reminded me that Murmur is their best, Automatic for the People is too famous to judge, and Out of Time is mostly awful.

But then I started listening to Radiohead and, just as I was finishing my re-listen, they announced a tour and I embarked on a re-relisten and re-re-relisten and re-re-re-relisten in preparation.

Album of the year was an easy one this year: In Rainbows by Radiohead, closely followed by A Moon Shaped Pool, Kid A and Hail to the Thief. But for something newer nothing came close to Lux by Rosalia

Rosalia: Berghain

Lily Allan: Pussy Palace

Pulp: Got To Have Love

Turnstile: Never Enough

Model Actriz: Cinderella

Getdown Services: Dog Dribble

Blood Orange: Mind Loaded

Tyler The Creator: Don’t Tap The Glass

The Horrors: Ariel

Djo: End of Beginning

For the last few months I have had an itchy back, which is annoying, as I can’t quite reach the itchy parts without first stretching and warming up with a full Yoga practice. Instead I’ve learned to scratch using the corner of a table, like a dog.

To help my skin I switched to using a non-soap body wash. If you don’t know, a non-soap body wash is one which doesn’t produce a lather and is meant to be kinder on your skin. The only side effect is that it’s impossible to tell which parts of your body you’ve washed as there no suds to wash off. You might as well be rubbing your body with an invisible gel. There’s nothing to see. How can I be clean if there’s nothing to wash off?

While the non-soap body wash helped reduce my itching I thought it would be an idea to check with my GP if there was anything else I could do. And he told me something I never thought I would hear. He said:

“Wash less.”

“Like don’t take a shower?” I asked

“You need to shower less,” he said, “washing too much can dry your skin out and you only need to shower a few times a week, not every day.”

I might have fibbed. When he asked “Do you shower every day?” I said “yes” because I didn’t want him to think I was a dirty stopout. But, with a shower every two days and often more than one shower in a day as I might shower in the morning then shower again after doing some execise, I probably do average 7 – 8 showers a week.

“It’s too much,” he said, “I can see from your back and neck that your skin is not getting enough moisture. Just use some moisturiser and don’t worry about washing every day.”

Like I said I never thought a doctor would want me to be less hygienic but, according to him, washing less is more hygienic than washing more.

Of course, if you start to smell, or start looking like you’ve spent all day jumping up and down in muddy puddles, you should still wash. Washing less may improve your skin, but it’s not going to improve your social skills if no one will venture near you.

So, if you’re currently on a training programme for a summer event and training most days, then remember that it’s okay to not wash. Not washing may be the key to getting you the start line fit and healthy (if not smell free)!

Every beach in Orkney must be a viking beach. Just as every pub in Glasgow is a stabbing pub. They are one and the same. You can’t find a non-viking beach just as you won’t find a pub in Glasgow that hasn’t had some point had someone say “R use looking at ma pint!”

But just beside Scapa Flow, you can find the titular Viking Beach itself, a name that stuck out on the map when I was looking for somewhere to swim and with a beach that looked decent, at least on the satellite view.

My mistake though was to drive past all the calm seas and other beaches on the way and to still swim in this one despite the strong breakers on the shore.

Orkney has hundreds of beaches, and, around Scapa Flow, you can chose many that are either side of the island and only minutes apart. Yet I still carried on with the one that had the strongest current.

The beach was shallow and I was never in any danger. I remained entirely in areas where I could still stand up. But it was a tough swim and I was glad I also had Mrs TwinBikeWife onshore as a spotter.

An important lesson for today’s swim: if the conditions look dicey, just change location. Or don’t swim.

And an important reminder: don’t swim alone.

REVIEW

Ease of Access: There’s a small car park next to the beach with room for 6 – 8 cars. The car park also has a toilet block, which is handy for getting changed – and for washing sand from feet in the sink!

Water quality:  There’s also plenty of room to swim before the beach starts to drop away.

Swim Quality: I imagine it would be great on a good day, see above.

Other People: Despite it being a sunny evening, no one else was around.

Would I go back: Yes but I would check the waves first.

There are some secrets that are so secret that not even the President knows about them. Those secrets are above “Classified”, they are more closely guarded than “Top Secret”, they are only known to a select few as “Swimming Pool Opening Times”.

I don’t think I’ve ever been able to find the opening times for a swimming pool on any council website. Glasgow City Council can easily tell you if their gyms are open, but if you want to know whether a swimming pool is open, or, even worse, whether the sauna will be open too, then you might as well have been asking for nuclear secrets. 

I used to swim regularly in Tollcross Swimming Pool, Glasgow’s only pool with a 50m pool, but I stopped after I realised the only way to find out if the pool was open was to turn up as anything written on their website had to be read Jamie Oliver style: with a pinch of salt.

Highland Council is no better. I spent a good 10 minutes trying to work out from its website whether Dingwall swimming pool would be open in the morning for a 7am swim. In the end, I could only confirm the leisure centre would be open as every link to a swim timetable led nowhere. I would just have to turn up and see.

Luckily, it was open, though whether you can use that as guidance for any other days, I’m not so sure. I don’t have the clearance.

Cost: £8 as a non-member. Pricy.

Facilities: £1 for a locker.  Decent size cubicle and nice and clean changing area. 

Swimming pool: Having grown up with a swimming pool that had a viewing gallery on the first floor, it felt reassuringly familiar to see this 1970s design in action again. The pool was divided into lanes and was 25m. Curiously, the steps/ladder into the pool was on the opposite side to the entrance into the pool from the changing facilities. Why not have it at the same side? Why make people walk to the other side? As I say, there is no logic to swimming pools.

Other facilities? A jacuzzi and steam room. There was also a flume pipe sticking out of an outer wall but I couldn’t see any evidence of it in the pool itself. Where does the flume go? Don’t ask, no one will tell you!

Busy? 10 – 15 people first thing on a Thursday. I was the fastest but I was also one of the youngest. 

Recommended? Yes.