Ben Nuttall | Blog: A Day In The Life...

I was one of the only people not drinking (and also one of the only people who was allowed to drink) at the Sixth Form Party on Friday night. It makes me see how cheaper these sort of events cost me as opposed to the likes of the 17 year old kid who came up to me at one point, pointed at his pint and said "number fifteen", and how much my Liver must appreciate my healthier-than-most lifestyle in which I only drink on occasion and only require a couple of pints to be satisfied in the way of why I do have that occasional drink.

I got in quite late on Friday night, and had to be up early on Saturday morning to get to the train station to go to Manchester for the Open Day at a University I've been keen on looking into applying to, Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU). I arrived and found my way from Oxford Road to the Uni Centre (5 mins away), attended a few seminars of interest, spoke to a few people about the uni and the courses and learned a lot about what I needed to know, it was very informative and I liked what I saw. I'm much closer to coming to a career decision than ever before, I reckon this is where I want to end up next September and I reckon I want to be doing a joint-honours degree in Information Management with Maths. IT being my main area of interest, Maths being something I fancy pursuing further and after finding out how joint-honours courses work, I now know I can decide how much of each subject I want to do, 50-50, 60-40, etc. which makes me more comfortable about taking it, and I like the idea of leaving my options open for now.


After the Open Day I met up with Paul and the other Manchester traceurs at Castlefield and trained with them for the afternoon, had a great session, was really cool to see some mates I haven't seen in a while; Paul, Scott (not seen him since Lisses), Luke (moved away from Sheffield a while ago), and little Jak Sheen; and I met some cool new guys who have recently started training in Manchester, like this incredibly springy kid whose name I've forgotten.

We trained and Paul filmed some stuff for the K-Swiss promotion. Which, might I add, are amazing shoes (they didn't tell me to say that) - I got given a pair before I went to Lisses and tried them out over there to great effect. I honestly think they're great shoes. I was extremely sceptical about them as I thought they wouldn't be able to replicate a decent pair of training shoes but I've no complaints. I love the fact that they're very stylish and trendy and made by K-Swiss, and more than anything, that they were free. They're great for balance and grip, and I can't complain with respect to any parkour movements as I feel comfortable doing anything I would normally do in them; cat passes, arm jumps, precision jumps, running jumps, buildering, etc. - In fact I'd say they were particular good for arm jumps and precisions (which includes cat-precisions). In case you don't know, K-Swiss have launched a Freerunning Shoe, model name: Ariake.



After training I met up with a few mates who I was at Sixth Form with last year who just moved to Manchester for University, hung out with them and checked out their halls of residence. I ran like the wind in what I estimated was the direction of Manchester Piccadilly station as I knew I only had about 10 minutes to get my train home, and somehow managed to catch it, although unfortunately since the train stopped at EVERY SINGLE SODDING STOP between Manchester and the Peak District, I didn't make it back to Sheffield in time to get the bus I was aiming for, so caught a different one and walked the rest. I got in rather late that night too, had to get some directions from Google Maps before I went to bed, then got up at 5:30am to set off for 6:00 to get to Ilkley Moor for the Apex Challenge, which I said I'd help out at by running a canoeing base.



I didn't leave Ilkley until after 7:00pm so after traffic and the long drive home I was in for another late night. Knackered on Monday for school and fell asleep in the afternoon at home before I went to work, where I had the most eventful shift yet. If you don't know, I was recently employed as a Pool Lifeguard at Esporta. It's a rather dull job as I just have to keep an eye on the pool users and make sure everything's running safely and smoothly to prevent accidents and incidents. The epic event that occurred was when a kid cut his lip open when someone bumped into him while swimming, and I had to administer some kickass first aid.



Tuesday is a big midweek jam day in Sheffield, always a very enjoyable session of geographical, physical and mental exploration. I met up with Dave on Hallam and we located Danny and the others, and later on were asked to move on from Hallam by a security guard who was smoking, which brings me to my next rant. We were prepared to move on once asked, as they don't mind us doing it there, but occasionally ask us to move if it's a busy time or whatever and it's best to cooperate to ensure a friendly and polite atmosphere between the traceurs and people we come across. The annoying thing I found was that he asked us to move on, which I was fine with, but he was rather rude to us and was doing something illegal and telling us that we were in the wrong for being there. While trying to avoid offending the guy, I pointed out that we were prepared to move on as asked but what we were doing was no illegal, but he was smoking in a public area (Hallam Square has signs all over saying the Uni Campus is a smoke-free zone), as were many Students, which is illegal. He refused to accept that I was right and pointed out a 'No Skateboarding' sign which didn't really convince me that parkour fits in that category. Annoying how we get told what's what by a man with a Cancer mission when we're trying to do something healthily worthwhile.

The Tuesday before this saw another smoking incident on Hallam. One of our nameless less dedicated members turned up a little drunk and started smoking, and told us how he had stopped smoking for a few years but since he'd had a few drinks it was ok, but I tried to tell him how he shouldn;t give in for that reason and that it was doing him no good, and after gentle persuasion I asked him to hand over the packet of cigarettes, he surprisingly obliged. After a while he asked for them back, but I told him he'd be better off without them and refused to give them back. He knew I wasn't just trying to annoy him, that I was trying to look after him by not letting him smoke, and he was laughing around while asking for them back because he knew I was right but still wanted them back because it would have been a "waste of money", which Dave and I pointed out was complete tosh, seeing as he'd already spent the money and it would be more beneficial to him not to smoke them.

After a while longer he was getting more and more anxious for them back, but was still laughing about it. At one point he ran at me so I climbed out of the tree, then Shane turned up so I went off with him to the bus stop, and he had given up chasing me so I waited at the bus stop for a while with Shane and then about 10 minutes later I turned round to find an angry drunk person demanding his cigarettes back. He actually threatened me and said that if I did it again he'd kick my head in, I told him he wouldn't, but he seemed to think he would. I gave them back.

Smokers are doing my head in at the moment. I rather like the way the Government is dealing with the issue at the moment. It's not perfect but we're getting a step closer each time. First they banned smoking in public places, which means that the inside of pubs and other public buildings is a lot more pleasant, but unfortunately the entrances and 'Cancer Zones' which are technically not covered by the law, these areas are revolting to walk through or past. Also, no-one's going to stop smoking in bus shelters, and if you approached them they'd tell you where to stuff it. The other change in legislation came into effect at the beginning of this month, it states that cigarettes cannot be purchased by anyone under the age of 18, which again, is a step closer to how I'd like it to be. I honestly think smoking is a filthy habit and it should be completely banned for the greater good of humanity.


One thing is, I think the law used to be that you couldn't buy cigarettes under 16 but as long as you didn't buy them yourself, you were allowed to smoke them under the age of 16. Is that still in the case with the new Under-18s law? Is a 17-year old allowed to smoke as long as he/she didn't buy them his/her self?

An issue that has been brought up a lot recently is the debate over whether we should be competing in parkour. I'm totally against competition in parkour, it's completely wrong in the philosophy of the discipline which is about self-improvement, continual progression at a naturally-defined pace, and the achievement of being better than we were yesterday rather than being better than Fred is today. Competition only causes people to find the need to show off, perform stylish flashy moves, and attempt things they are not physically or mentally prepared for and trained for. Competition is about winning and being better than someone else, which is not why we do parkour, and if it is, then what we are doing is certainly not parkour.



The arguments for competition have been pretty lame and often very nonsensical. There was a UF guy (surprise, surprise...) last week who was trying to tell us that what they were doing wasn't a competition, despite him titling his post as 'UF Freerunning Comp' and telling us about the podium and the prizes for impressing the most people. We told him what we thought and explained our views on how pushing ahead of your limits is an unnecessary risk which is out of the parkour ethic and is likely to cause injury. I'm not sure why he posted it on Northern Parkour, seeing as we have a banner on the homepage stating that our community is completely against competition, and the fact that every other member has a similar banner in their signature - I questioned him as to whether he expected a positive response, and he claimed he didn't but wanted to express his opinion. I seriously gave up with this guy a very short way through the discussion as he kept proving our point by saying that people got injured and that there were prizes and a podium and it was all about showing off and impressing people and trying moves that were way beyond their capabilities, plus the stress and nerves of being in the spotlight won't have helped. I just had to humour him and let Dave give the sensible responses.

I think that's enough for you to be getting on with. I haven't been posting on here much lately. I seem to have a very high standard of topic I feel to be 'blogworthy' (which seems to include Secret Messages in France, Going to Manchester, or climbing a mountain in Wales), much higher than someone like Danny Wood, who posts every time he sneezes. No doubt it's a good read lol, no disrespect to the guy, I totally respect him. Read it now: www.dannysheffield.com

Did you all see the post before this one? The one about the Swedish guy called Mattias who found the secret message I left in France? If not, read it! If so, read it again ... and comment this time!