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We dig, dig, dig, dig, dig dig dig....
Jul. 28th, 2012 09:34 pm... in a field the whole day through. Well, no, actually, a few hours proved to be quite enough, but I'll be doing a few more tomorrow. I've been at an archaeological dig in Norton, clearing greyish-brown soil off the top of brownish-grey soil so as to see the edge of a ditch with chalk walls. Tomorrow we'll be digging trenches across it, and may find out as a result whether it's Neolithic or Iron Age. The ground is very dry and very hard, and personally I suspect these Neolithic / Iron Age people had learnt to use concrete to line their ditches.
The technical details are on the dig's blog, and the writer must have spent every moment typing after he got home to get them up that fast!
http://nortoncommarch.wordpress.com/
In health terms, this is partly an attempt to get me out in the open air and doing something reasonably active, and partly a test of where my limits are now. Can I, for instance, do mildly strenuous work at ground level, given a suitable seat? Yes, it seems I can, though I'm glad I didn't have to actually kneel. Can I lift a bucket full of spoil? Yes, before lunch - by half-way through the afternoon, no. Stamina? This was the problem, It was a long walk to get there, and then hard work in hot sun. I got to the point of "bit dizzy, stand up, take a breather, shovel spoil into bucket, get back to it", then "dizzy, stand up, get water and energy bar, get back to it" and ended up with "get dizzy, stand up, don't quite fall over, stay dizzy". At that point they told me to stop. I'd normally carry on through "stand up, fall over, get up again" up to "stand up, fall over, don't get up again", but they didn't like the idea.
Tomorrow, my current plan is to get there at the start (don't ask), but not to continue after lunch. If I can manage it, that's a bonus, but there's no point in being silly about this.
The technical details are on the dig's blog, and the writer must have spent every moment typing after he got home to get them up that fast!
http://nortoncommarch.wordpress.com/
In health terms, this is partly an attempt to get me out in the open air and doing something reasonably active, and partly a test of where my limits are now. Can I, for instance, do mildly strenuous work at ground level, given a suitable seat? Yes, it seems I can, though I'm glad I didn't have to actually kneel. Can I lift a bucket full of spoil? Yes, before lunch - by half-way through the afternoon, no. Stamina? This was the problem, It was a long walk to get there, and then hard work in hot sun. I got to the point of "bit dizzy, stand up, take a breather, shovel spoil into bucket, get back to it", then "dizzy, stand up, get water and energy bar, get back to it" and ended up with "get dizzy, stand up, don't quite fall over, stay dizzy". At that point they told me to stop. I'd normally carry on through "stand up, fall over, get up again" up to "stand up, fall over, don't get up again", but they didn't like the idea.
Tomorrow, my current plan is to get there at the start (don't ask), but not to continue after lunch. If I can manage it, that's a bonus, but there's no point in being silly about this.