What You Missed This Week

With a new(ish) year, comes a new weekend blogs series from HuffPost UK. After a few years of wrapping up the week's news and politics in my Sunday blog, this year I'll be bringing you a plethora of links to the stories that didn't make the front pages. One of the joys of my job is reading, clicking and watching literally hundreds of features and videos each week, which sadly hasn't made me nearly as good at pub quizzes as it should, but does mean I'm great at recommending obscure websites, blogs and all manner of other publications.

With a new(ish) year, comes a new weekend blogs series from HuffPost UK.

After a few years of wrapping up the week's news and politics in my Sunday blog, this year I'll be bringing you a plethora of links to the stories that didn't make the front pages.

One of the joys of my job is reading, clicking and watching literally hundreds of features and videos each week, which sadly hasn't made me nearly as good at pub quizzes as it should, but does mean I'm great at recommending obscure websites, blogs and all manner of other publications.

And now, instead of just sharing all the recommendations with my Twitter followers and editors around the office, I'll be wrapping them all together to provide you with a mix of the serious, the funny and hopefully the unexpected each week.

If you've got suggestions of stories or quirky videos you've spotted around the web, please email them through to HuffPostUK@huffingtonpost.com with the subject line 'WYMTW' and I'll aim to include as many as I can.

Appropriately then, let's kick things off with a story one of our readers shared with us last week, which no matter how much dieting/detoxing/exercising you're doing this January, is guaranteed to make you feel like a couch potato.

Featured on ABC News' blogs site, it's an article about Janette Murray-Wakelin and Alan Murray, who despite both being in their sixties, managed to run an entire marathon PER DAY during 2013.

The 9,776.75 miles they ran during the year have helped raise money for a number of charities, and by the sounds of things seriously depleted banana supplies Down Under - the pair are passionate raw foodies and ran most of their marathons powered on fruit smoothies and raw juices.

If the January trend for self-improvement is upon us, so too are all the hopeless romantics determined to make 2014 the year they find true love. I assume that's the case anyway, given the numerous links to dating blogs that my friends are all sharing online at the moment.

On HuffPost US, there was Mark Radcliffe with 16 Things Your Boyfriend Should Be Telling You, while over on Elite Dating, Ricardo Martinez wrote A Gentleman's Take On Why Women Should Never Settle For Less Than They Deserve.

Not a single man I've sent these links to has appreciated them, mind you, but softer-centred women might well do.

For tech geeks of both genders, this week was all about CES, where the assembled, Google Glass-wearing crowds swap tips on the next big innovations in tech. There are lots which sound frankly marvellous and then there's lots that sound frankly ridiculous. Our tech editor, Michael, rounds those up right here.

The soundtrack to my 2014 so far has been a mix of Birdy and Lorde, which made this hilarious parody of Lorde's Royals a must-listen. If you're in your thirties, you'll find it funny. If you're any younger, quite possibly not.

For those who've pledged to make 2014 the year they find true work/life balance, the story this week that German 'superminister' Sigmar Gabriel will be taking Wednesday afternoons off each week to spend time with his two-year-old daughter could provide some inspiration. His decision certainly chimes with our Third Metric mission.

As a general rule, this blog will be all about the new, but given Leigh Clark's 'The Degeneration of Facebook in 10 Statuses' this week became the most popular blog we've ever had on the UK site, I can't resist sharing it one last time. If you haven't yet read it, or liked it!, please do.

Finally, I leave you with one of the most moving HuffPost blogs we've ever hosted. Garreth MacNamee, a journalist for the Irish Daily Mirror, writes with eloquence about his battle with depression in 'It's Okay Not To Be Okay'. It's a brave and eye-opening article that I hope you'll take the time to read it.

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