Seasons Celebrations And Southern Migrations

Evening friends,

Seasons greeting, salutations and wishes to you all. I trust you have had a pleasant festive season as I have, trading gifts, pleasantries, and jokes with those friends and family you hold dear. 

The festive period holds a litany of traditions myself, including, but not limited to; playing with my young cousins christmas presents, partaking in ridiculous swim sets, postulating over a career as a Christmas cracker joke writer, as well as the predictable overindulgence in all manner of edible extravagance. Of notable mention was this years Christmas eve set with the Lawnton Swim Squad, which my choice of 40 x 250m (10km) was a surprisingly amicable option, given the ‘proper’ set of 72 x 250m (18km) for the open water swimmers. Insane. Inspirational, and impressive, but still insane. 

In other news germane to the blog, I have started hosting a column in the bastion of triathlon literature, Australian Triathlete. Fans of the rambling narrative idiosyncratic to this blog, should find the dialogue to their liking, so be sure to grab a copy, or subscribe to the iPadable edition, for those who scorn the feel of parchment under thumb in this digital age. However, fear not, this blog shall not remain bereft of updates, and the trivial narrative will continue unabated right here, although if I should chance upon some mildly entertaining subject matter of around 700 words, odds are it will find it way to the pages of Oz Tri. 

The winds of change are howling through the world of Wilson in the new year, with several  new changes ushering in new challenges for the future, largely aimed at ensuring my body stays in one piece for 2013. Most significantly, this will involve a change of locale from my long time stomping ground of the North-side of Brisbane, to the daunting, inner city (still Brisbane!!!) scene, featuring close proximity to my new home away from home, the QAS gym. Of significance, commuting impracticalities will mean I no longer grace the aforementioned Lawnton Swim Squad with my truncated swim sets. A big thanks to the squad for their hospitality over the last 2 years, and a special thanks to supercoach Harley Connelly. The Lawnton cognoscenti was given the dubious honor of a ‘Wilson Song’ a the recent going away soiree for the departing superfish Pilar Geijo (departing to Argentina, distance 12,000 kms), and yours truly (departing to Toowong, distance 25 mins, depending on traffic). Sharing the vocal work with Pilar lent a somewhat more mellifluous juxtaposition to the hideously familiar Wilson monotones... 

Also, in a stimulating test of cognition, I will be dabbling in some uni work over the upcoming year in an effort to keep what remains of my mental function supple. I’m studying psychology, which I hope is not, as some have taken great delight in pointing out, the mental equivalent of an obese person studying nutrition. It will provide myself with some much needed mental stimulation to match the physical exertion inherent in my current profession, also inaugurating the pathway to my admittedly romantic post-triathlon dream of helping the headspace of humankind, one nutcase at a time...

Physician, cure thyself...

Take care friends,

Willy

Christmas Day masterchef-ing with my uncle Wal, and a lurking cousin Maddy. You can imagine those sausages are low-fat, low salt and fully organic, if that's what you would like to believe...

A fatigue-induced dummy spit at poorly made East German paddles. This one is about to get spiked. 

Love song dedications, Pilar Geijo singing straight from the heart to Codie Grimsey.

Some deep thinking moustache wearers… The Grimsey brothers and I at our spiritual home of Sizzler.