Dilemma

Life is somewhat busy at the moment.

I’m trying not to bang on too much about the wedding. It would be only too easy for this blog to slip into “Our wedding, our reception, our music, our orders of service, my dress, my hair – oh, I’m sure you want to hear every detail about how it’s such hard work getting married…” Which would be:

a) boring
b) not really true as to the hard work
c) not like me, really.

So: it’s not THAT much hard work. There are things I’m worrying about, such as my dress (last seen in several pieces and unfortunately transparent in places it shouldn’t have been) but it would be a lie to say it’s haunting my every waking hour. It does take up a bit of time, though, and it’ll no doubt increase as the day gets nearer.

There’s also the house-hunt. We don’t have particularly big ideas – one spare bedroom to put the computers in is about the height of our ambitions – but we want to be able to get into town fairly easily from wherever we are (the D. B. wants to cycle to work, for one thing). So we’ve been spending most Sundays looking at houses and flats, and our lunch-hours going to arrange mortgages and things. All of which takes a bit of concentration.

And unfortunately the D. B. is not entirely out of his bout of depression. It was great having his brother here, and we did lots of things, including climbing Arthur’s Seat. And on Sunday at teatime, my sister suddenly walked in. She’d decided to visit from Sheffield, where she’s studying, and wanted to surprise us. She succeeded. (She's making a bit of a habit of it.) So it was very jolly having everyone together. Alas, once his brother went down south again, the D. B. had a bit of a relapse. There’s a bit of a tendency for this to happen either before or after a keenly anticipated event.

If there was only some tangible reason for the depression, we could do something about it. As it is, however, all I can do is cuddle him a lot, make soothing noises and hope things will get better soon. Which it will, and indeed I think (and hope) it’s starting to. But it’s a bit wearing for both of us. Every so often it gets a bit much, which it did for me on Tuesday – I ended up crying into his shoulder in the street, which is never a good idea.

I stayed home from choir yesterday evening (I had a headache) and it was really nice to have a bit of time unplanned. I didn’t lie around all evening – we did some weddingy things and the D. B. recorded some minidisks – but there wasn’t a timetable.

Obviously it would be good to have more unplanned time together. Really good.

What it boils down to is this – Mum thinks I ought to spend less time at the gym. And maybe I should.

I don’t feel as though I spend hours and hours working out. What I normally do is this:

20+ minutes running, 5 minute walk to cool down.

Either
12 (or as near as possible) Gravitron pull-ups
12 seated crunches on Abdominal machine
3 sets of 12 benchpresses
3 sets of 12 kneeling rows with dumbbell
3 sets of 12 tricep extensions with dumbbell
3 sets of 12 back tricep curls (if time – sometimes I do these instead of the tricep extensions)
3 sets of 12 bicep curls

Or
12 Gravitron pull-ups (I really don’t know why I always do these, but they’re quick)
3 sets of 12 deadlifts
3 sets of 12 squats (or as near as possible)
12 seated leg extensions
3 sets of 12 calf raises

Then
20 minutes on elliptical crosstrainer.

In a perfect world, this would take about an hour and a half overall, and I’d be home by 7.30. But it isn’t a perfect world. Sometimes I stay at work a bit later. Sometimes the place is very busy, and you have to wait around to use the weight platforms or the squat cage or the benches. This means the free weights might take 45 minutes, or longer (they used to take an hour before I split it into upper-body and leg days). Then there’s some time needed for changing before and after, and drinking water (especially after running). Then I have to wait for a bus to get home, which usually means walking for about 10 minutes to a more-frequented bus stop (and then it takes at least 20 minutes to get home from there). Sometimes I don’t get home until after 9.30. And I can see that this leaves the D. B. on his own for an awfully long time. Being sad.

In theory, I’d like to do all of this three times a week. It’s not as though the weight is exactly dropping off me. In practice, I frequently only make it there on Monday and Thursday, and if we’re doing something strenuous on Saturday (such as climbing Arthur’s Seat) I’ll consider that a workout. But I’m also out for a couple of hours on Tuesday at a class, which I have to do, and then I go to choir on Wednesday. It seems like overcommitment and yet I don’t feel I’m doing that much.

I’d hoped the D. B. might join the gym too, and then we’d be together although not at home. But he’s decided he’d rather just run on the road for free. That’s fine, if it suits him. I’d also sort of hoped he might join the choir, but he doesn’t fancy it. Again, that’s OK. But it does seem that we really should be spending more time together. We love each other and we have to be apart 8 hours a day, 5 days a week as it is.

Am I being selfish? Do I do too many things? The class ends next month, and the choir ends in April, but that doesn’t solve the problem at the moment. We have discussed other possibilities, such as buying some dumbbells, and replacing the upper-body day with doing the exercises at home and going for a run. However, we’ve singularly failed to buy any dumbbells (or even investigate what they’d cost) and although the D. B. runs in all weathers, frankly the treadmill looks pretty tempting at this time of year. Also – and this sounds a bit odd, I know – I’d rather not do my exercises with people I know around me. I’d feel silly. I’ve got used to doing them in a specialised environment where people aren’t going to talk to me or say “That doesn’t look like much fun” or the phone’s going to ring. And at that rate, I’d be paying full whack to go to the gym maybe just once a week. Is it worth it?

Another suggestion of Mum’s (just this morning) was that I move to another gym. There is one nearer to our house, but it’s one of a chain. I’d have thought they were unlikely to have as good a free weights section as the gym I’m at presently – if any. And they’re probably much more expensive. I’m paid up until (I think) July at my current gym, and it cost me £100 for a year. Which I know is a brilliant rate, and I like my gym, even if it is a bit crowded right now. Shauna’s gym, which isn’t particularly fancy, charges her £47 a month. And would I still go as regularly, if I was coming home first and then having to get myself together to leave the house again? Wouldn’t the temptation be to stay in more often?

I don’t know. I don’t want to sound like a Cassandra. Maybe this will all sort itself out in summer, when I’ll be doing less, there won’t be as many students making the gym busy, and the weather will be nice enough to go running outside (maybe). But it isn’t summer, it’s February, and I don’t know what I should do NOW. I’d really welcome any suggestions, even if they’re saying “Yes, I think you’re being selfish and you should drop some activities or shut up about it.”

So let me know what you think…

At the end of the tunnel there's a glimmer of light...

...which is to say that both the D. B. and I are feeling a lot better today. Thanks for your comments, people. I went off to the gym and had a storming workout, burning (according to the readouts on the cardio machines anyway) 550 kcal, which must have helped a bit. Then the D. B. came and picked me up – I would normally get the bus, so that was total luxury. And I went home and had some wholesome broth.

Today has been much cheerier and perfectly healthy, so far. Breakfast was oatmeal, lunch was a wrap from Marks and Spencer's healthy range (I didn't keep the wrapper, but it was the only veggie one - lemon vegetables, I think.) I don't know what tea will be, but the D. B.'s making it so it will be healthy.

His brother is visiting for the weekend, and this lunchtime they bought the suit he'll wear to get married in! So at least one of us won't be standing in the church wearing jeans and a T-shirt...

We're all going to the cinema tonight to see A Cock and Bull Story. Have a good weekend!

Considering

what a stressful week it has been so far, I’m not doing too badly. Or so I have to tell myself.

This is now the second week of Renee’s challenge. The first week went well: I ran on Monday and Saturday and went for a walk on Tuesday and Friday.

(Normally I’d run on Thursday, but instead I went to a Lush party organised by Pisica who I know through LiveJournal. It was strange meeting people I’ve had online conversations with, but never seen before, especially as various people recognised me and the D. B. from our running photos. Although I was shy and awkward at first – why am I so much less articulate in person? – I had fun, and acquired quite a stash of highly scented goodies.)

I was also pretty saintly food-wise. I ate lots of fruit and avoided sugary stuff. I didn’t lose the pound I was supposed to for the challenge, but I wasn’t stressing about it as I knew my period was coming up, so I probably had a bit of water on board.

This week? Not so good.

Life is rather busy at the moment. Well, it always is, but particularly so. There’s the wedding, of course, and my attempts to sort out what I’m doing next year (which has its own set of problems, which I’m reluctant to talk about here in case I jinx things). Then the D. B. and I are also making our first tentative steps towards buying a place of our own, which involves much brain-racking over finances, and spending large chunks of weekend driving around Edinburgh looking at various flats and houses. Since it’s our first time, we’re working everything out from scratch. And last weekend, the D. B. had to go down south to attend a memorial service, and came back in a depression, which he’s still in.

The D. B. has suffered from depression for years – since he was 12. It isn’t necessarily caused by external events, although it gets worse when he’s under stress or doesn’t have enough to occupy him (as you’ll gather, it can be a delicate business ensuring a happy medium there). He’s been remarkably OK for several months now, but this week work is somewhat stressful, and it’s got to the point where he really doesn’t want to go in in the morning (though he does go). In the evenings, he’s exhausted and going to bed very early. It could be a lot worse – I’ve seen it a lot worse – but it’s awful to see him so sad and not be able to make it better.

I was trying not to dive straight into the nearest biscuit tin over this, because overdosing on sugar is not actually going to improve the situation in any way. My resolve held out until lunchtime today, when my better judgment was shouted down. Some rubbish has been eaten. By me. Now I have a bit of a headache and my mouth tastes sickly, which is what happens if you eat junk after abstaining for a while, and you’d think after experiencing this effect once you wouldn’t do it again, but there we are. (I was even slightly repulsed while I was eating it.)

I’m drawing a line under this. It is not helpful and it doesn’t make me feel better and it doesn't make the D. B. feel better and it’s a totally stupid way to behave and I knew that while I was doing it. OK.

So. I said I would journal my food and I didn’t do it (or rather, I started doing it and didn’t post it). I’ll start again, on paper at least, tomorrow. I’ll go to the gym tonight, as planned, and burn off some of the glucose sloshing about my system. I had a very good exercise day on Monday, and I’m still on track to complete Week 2 of the challenge. And if the boy and I are sad, well, that happens sometimes. It will get better. We have to hold to that.

Time to get tough

Looking back over my running times, it has to be admitted: going by the numbers alone, I'm actually getting slower. Yes, slower. I did the Race for Life in 35 minutes something, the JogScotland 5K in 36:50 , and the Great Winter Run in 37:18.

I know there are mitigating factors - the JogScotland run was a very humid day, and the Arthur's Seat run was the steepest. And the slowest times for both of these were over an hour. But still. Over six months, I was hoping for some improvement.

There might be some consolation if the numbers on the scale had moved substantially during that time - I might not be faster, but look at all the fat I've burned off! But they haven't. While I'm sure I have built some muscle, things need to start happening faster. I didn't gain over Christmas, but neither did I lose, and I've started to notice myself going back to bad habits - in particular, eating food because it's available.

When I look at the last few months, I'm a bit discouraged by the little progress I've made. If I'd lost as much as PastaQueen, for example, I'd be under 140 pounds. If I'd lost as much as YP I'd be 150. I know, I know, comparisons are odious.

Why am I being so half-hearted about this, especially as regards diet? Partly, I suppose, it's because I don't have quite such an impetus to change any more. I'm back, or nearly, at the size I was for most of my teenage years. I can wear size 14 dresses and tops, if not jeans. I might not be breaking the sound barrier, but I'm fit enough to walk a few miles or climb a hill without wanting to die (which I certainly couldn't do as a teenager). Things are relatively comfortable.

And yet. I still hate the sight of my thighs in the changing room mirror. I still wouldn't wear a sleeveless top on its own in public. I'd like to go swimming for once without dreading the walk from changing room to pool.

It's easy to scorn the resolutionaries who join gyms in their droves in January. Mine is full of them. On the other hand, they are making a change, not just jogging along in the same rut. Inspired by these ladies, I've decided to do something too.

First of all, this challenge. It's not a huge change to my routine, and to begin with at least will only mean taking one extra 25-minute walk per week. That sounds do-able.

Secondly, I'm going to start journalling my food again. Why I didn't keep doing this, when I had a permanent loss the week I did it, I don't know. But I have ten weeks until W-Day. That should be long enough to make some difference, surely?

I'm back!

Ever since I’d signed us up for the Edinburgh Great Winter Run around Arthur’s Seat, I’d been having visions of the two of us slogging through rain, hail, gale-force winds or all three. Although it doesn’t get super-cold in Edinburgh even in the winter, it would be a bit optimistic to _expect_ nice weather on the fourteenth of January.

I was also a little apprehensive about my levels of fitness. The gym was closed for almost two weeks over the Christmas period, and although I’d been back twice before the run, I hadn’t been too impressed with my performance. On the Monday I’d actually had a touch of asthma for the first time in months, and since in the past it’s often been brought on by cold air, I was beginning to wonder whether running outside in January was such a good idea. The D. B. is a lot fitter than me, and usually goes running after dark, braving the cold without any problems, but had only had time for a couple of runs to get back into it since his cast came off.

He was also a little unclear as to the distance he usually runs. His normal route takes 20 minutes, and given that he runs much faster than I do, I didn’t think he’d have too much trouble with the 5K, although we’d been warned that the first half of the course contained a long uphill section.

Despite all that angst, it was a beautiful day after all – sunny and mild (well, for January). My brother gave us a lift to Dynamic Earth, which is the white structure you can see behind us in the photo, and I was relieved to see lots of obvious runners converging on the complex. It’s always reassuring to know that if you’ve got the day wrong, so have lots of others… We followed the tide of humanity up the steps, then discovered there was no way down and had to retrace our path.



After that inauspicious beginning, we found the starting area for the race already quite busy. The area was divided up into projected finishing times, which I hadn’t seen before. We decided we were probably “30-40 minutes” (the D. B. was determined to run at my pace) and settled down to wait. The warm-up was already in progress, but we couldn’t see the leader from where we were so contented ourselves with jumping up and down a bit and doing as much stretching as the crowd would allow.

Suddenly I was hailed from behind (I must have a recognisable pigtail). It was the Proper Runner from work who gave me a lift to the Race for Life back in July. She maintained that she hadn’t done much training over Christmas and wouldn’t be whizzing round (but she got away from us when we started and we haven’t seen her since!)

The clock started and we were away… only to grind to a halt a few metres later with the pressure of the crowd. By the time we got to the start line, however, things had opened up a little more, and we set off along a good, even path in the sunshine. At this point, we were running on the flat. The D. B was jogging along easily – obviously this part was not challenging him too much – and even I was able to talk a little (we agreed that mid-January was perhaps a little early for the guy with the mike to be talking about “spring sunshine”). It seemed like no time before we reached the 1K mark, and I was quite encouraged that I’d got that far without really feeling it.

Soon, though, the path began to climb. And kept right on climbing. The views were fantastic – I’ve lived in Edinburgh all my life, but I still love looking out over the city from Arthur’s Seat. However, the feeling in my legs was not fantastic at all. Apparently it was a mistake to do quite such an energetic leg workout on Thursday – I hadn’t done any squats since before Christmas, and I’d reckoned I ought to get back into it… Wrong. I had to slow to a walk. My leg muscles were just too tight to run uphill, and I didn’t want to injure myself – certainly not at this early stage.

By way of encouragement, the race organisers had planted signs by the path with their ‘Top 5 Songs for Running Uphill’ (number five was ‘Running up that hill’ by Kate Bush). The D. B. was doing a kind of slow-motion jog so that I could keep up with him. “You’re doing really well. Run to that next sign?” I had a go, but didn’t quite make it.

Over the next two kilometres, I ran when I could (on the less steep bits) but to be honest, most of it was walking. Fast walking, mind you – I was warm, and no doubt crimson in the face – but walking. The D. B. (who was actually cold!) stuck with me nobly and was very encouraging. By this point, most of the field were going about the same speed as us, and as he pointed out, we weren’t exactly falling back. And, well, it was a nice day for a walk.

The turning point came at Dunsapie Loch – we knew this was the highest point of the route. The path is fairly flat here, and I was able to run again. We passed the 3K marker at around this point, and the song suggestions switched to “Running Downhill”. The first one was ‘Moving on Up’ by M People, which would have done as well, we felt, for running uphill.

“Can you think of any songs for running downhill, though?”
“Don’t know. ‘Down Down’ by Status Quo – that’s got to be one of them.” (It was.)
“Hasn’t anyone written a song called ‘Downhill all the way’?”

We didn’t come up with much. On the other hand, the route was now quite appreciably downhill, and running had become easy. Once we’d rounded the western curve of the hill, we could see almost all the way to the finish line, and I began to entertain hopes of being able to run the rest of the way. We could see a few finishers making their way back along the sides of the route already.

I wish running was always like this.

The route flattened out slightly before the 5K marker and the last song (‘Don’t Stop Me Now’). There were still about 300 metres to go, and I would have liked to walk, but I was NOT going to run 2K without stopping and then finish at a walk. I told the D. B. to run on ahead, but he didn’t, and in the end we crossed the line together, hand in hand.

Well, we’re engaged, we’re allowed to be soppy.

Then we just had to collect our free water, disengage our running chips from the socks to which they had become intimately velcro’d, and go and get our goody bags and T-shirts (I took mine out of the packet to check the size, and instantly dropped it in the mud. That was bright.)



As you can see, I was still a little purple in the face at this point.

“Can I go back to bed now?” the D. B. asked as we made our way back up Holyrood Gait to go and meet my brother, who was giving us a lift back.

_________________________________________________

In the end, our times were within a second of each other (mine was one second faster – the D. B. must have adopted a ladies-first policy). He’s talking about running the route by himself sometime to find out how long it actually takes him, though. My time was 37:18, which is about the same as the last 5K I did, which wasn’t nearly so hilly. So perhaps my form hasn’t declined as much as I feared, although I’d very much like to actually _run_ the next one.

I’ll be back with a roundup of other news later in the week – I hope. I’ve been trying not to go on too much about the wedding here, but the D. B. and I have been quite busy with various preparations this month, which has cut into my messing-around-on-the-internet time somewhat. But I hope I never go so long without updating again…

_________________________________________________

For a while now, I've been a little tired of my template. I want a different colour, and I want something less off-the-peg. On the other hand, I know nothing about designing websites, so actually doing much about this is a little difficult.

In the name of totally accurate research, I did a little quiz to see what colour my new design should be - and got this:

Your Blog Should Be Green

Your blog is smart and thoughtful - not a lot of fluff.You enjoy a good discussion, especially if it involves picking apart ideas.However, you tend to get easily annoyed by any thoughtless comments in your blog.

What color should your blog or journal be?

Well, that's me telt. Fortunately, I don't recall anyone ever being nasty in the comments!

Placeholder

Roundup, part two - genius, chocolate, scaphoids

While I was staying with the D. B. my eating was not of the healthiest (hard when you’re staying as a guest, and harder still when you go out for dinner twice on the strength of the D. B not only having graduated with Distinction, but having won the faculty prize for the best project! Yes, I’m a little bit proud of him). And it didn’t improve all that much when we came back. I only made it to the gym once that week, and for some reason, was eating chocolate as if it were going out of fashion. The D. B. and I were both, I think, suffering a little from post-holiday blues, and he’s been having a slight depressive episode all week. Alas. I hope he will be feeling better soon – you just have to give it time, and give him lots of support meanwhile.

We did manage to get to his work night out, which was fun, but didn’t help the diet either. When I eventually weighed myself, I was up a pound, and I wouldn’t really have been able to argue if it’d been more. Well, it’s all a learning experience…

This week, I’ve been to the gym twice, although it is now going to be closed for Christmas on all the days I’m not working, and only open until five on the days I am. Which means I won’t get back there until the fifth of January. Of course, it’s perfectly reasonable that the gym staff want some time off too, but I will have to make good use of my free time and Actually, You Know, Go For A Run Or Something. Or I’ll make a very poor showing when I do my 5K in January. I am, however, down a pound again.

My department lunch was on Tuesday, and while I was not going to worry too much about calories, I don’t think I did too badly. It was a nice restaurant, and while I don’t suppose the food was too healthy, the portions were a reasonable size. Oh, and it was yummy. Mmmmm, crème brulée. Very civilised. We were walking back to work afterwards when I was grabbed around the neck by a maniac, otherwise known as my sister, just off the train home from uni. My bro was also skulking off to the side a bit, pretending not to know us. I love my siblings, but perhaps they could choose not to give me a heart attack in front of all my colleagues next time?

But it’s lovely to have her back. In fact, over the course of the next few days, all of my family have been wonderful, and we’ve needed them to be.

The D. B. and I were meant to be meeting after work on Tuesday and going for a drink with some of my colleagues. He’d been working late and I’d been at a work function, but he was going to cycle along and meet me. I came out of work to find him waiting for me, but in a bit of a state. He’d fallen off his bike while turning on slippery, damp cobbles, and landed on his wrist (and his shoulder and hip, although he didn’t realise until later – he’s rather bruised). After a moment, it had felt OK, but as he biked along to meet me it got more and more painful.

Needless to say, we didn’t make it to the pub but went straight home. The D. B. is not a great one for making a fuss (sometime I’ll tell you about the time he had meningitis…) but it was obvious he was in a lot of pain, so Mum and I took him to A&E – a longish trip, as it’s on the other side of town. Rarely have I been more grateful for parents with cars.

If you must injure yourself, Tuesday is the day to pick, because there was hardly anyone in there. He was dealt with pretty quickly (the D. B. didn’t even manage to finish his chapter of Harry Potter while we were waiting), x-rayed and splinted up. The x-ray wasn’t conclusive, so my brother, who is a medical student and had been taking a keen ("Can I see the x-rays? Cool,")and not unsympathetic interest in the whole thing, took him to the fracture clinic yesterday. They decided he probably has a scaphoid fracture, so he’ll be in a plaster cast for about two weeks. Which is a bit of a bummer. It could have been a lot worse, but people? Please don’t you fall on any cobbles.

Roundup, part one - mortarboards and progress photos

Tons and tons of stuff has happened since my last entry, much of it concerning the D. B. We went back to his home town for the graduation and stayed with his parents, who have been missing him. His dad and I went to the graduation on Friday.

The D. B and I met at university, and then proceeded to take postgraduate degrees at another, different university, and not at the same time as one another. However, for complicated reasons (one day I may write about them, but don’t hold your breath) I graduated in absentia, so I never got to dress up in the big robes and have my picture taken. (We’d already done that when we graduated from our first degrees, so it was not a huge deal.)

For fun, and because my mum quite fancies having a complete set of photos, I decided to hire robes and get my photo taken with the boy. Which we did, holding fake plastic diplomas and making last-minute decisions as to whether the hats should be on or off.

I didn’t really think through what would happen after that, because I then had to walk around robed for the rest of the morning. When we got to the Great Hall, I had to explain three times that no, I wasn’t supposed to sit at the front with the graduands because despite the robe and silly mortarboard under my arm, I wasn’t graduating today. The first two stewards merely gave me a “Well, it takes all sorts” kind of look, but the third said “So you’re just wearing that for fun?” in the sort of tone of voice usually associated with “Didn’t it hurt when they pierced your nipple?”

As I’ve said before, I have no idea what I look like and usually feel that some daft-looking stranger has taken my place in photos. I have no progress photos on this site mostly because with the measly amount of weight I’ve lost, I’m hard put to tell the difference between thin pics and fat pics. (Also I’m mostly hiding behind someone else.) When I look at the photos of my previous graduation, though, I really do look quite chubby-faced, so it’ll be interesting – and possibly discouraging – when the new ones turn up to see if there is any visible difference. Obviously the gown will be hiding my body, but the skirt I wore to graduate the first time is now loose on me, so I know I’m thinner in general.

Zoom zoom zoom

Just a quickie - I am going down south for the weekend to watch the Very Clever D. B. graduate, and probably won't be able to update while I'm there.

I went back to the gym on Monday, and had a good workout, which (I hope) means that the cold I was incubating was to blame for the rotten one I had last week. However, despite the lack of exercise, I lost about 2 pounds, bringing me to my lowest ever weight (just over 183) and breaking the plateau I spend most of my time on. So I'm happy, although I wonder whether the mere act of recording what I eat causes me to eat less, even though I'm not trying to or aware that I'm doing so. Either that, or having a cold burns a lot of calories.

And I forgot to record the piece of carrot cake the D. B. bought me on Thursday. Even more mysterious.

Anyway, I'll probably get plenty of walking in over the weekend, as the D. B. and I will be doing some Christmas shopping. Have a great weekend!

The Cheese of Doom

I take it all back. Obviously I do eat cheese every single day, or at least I did this week. I'm trying not to make excuses: it's been an unusually social week, and maybe not the most representative one to have chosen. However, maybe no week is normal. This week I'll be going down south to watch the D. B. graduate, so it won't be "normal" either. I suppose that you have to take going out with friends (and so on) into account, because nonstandard days will come up, and you have to allow for them.

Seven comments! That's got to be a record (I'm not counting my responses). I keep meaning to say that I love getting comments, so thanks to all the people who leave them and if you're reading this now, do give me a wave.

I'm now feeling a lot better, and am heading back to the gym after a week off.

Boring foody bit:

Thursday

Breakfast: Rice crispies (there! I surprised you! Only because we’d run out of oats) with 1 tbsp flaxseeds, 4 tbsp muesli, about 200ml skimmed milk. Herbal tea.

Lunch: egg mayonnaise on white roll. (I was aware this wasn’t the healthiest, but I was in a hurry.) Apple. Nonfat latte from Starblend*.

More herbal tea. Chocolate coin (just 1) from the Christmas Elf**.

Buffet at pub quiz†: half egg sandwich on white bread (not very nice). Four small pieces of vegetable quiche (about an inch square). 1 gin and tonic, Diet C0ke. When I got home, cup of tea, plate of boiled peas.

Friday

Breakfast: Rice crispies with 1 tbsp flaxseeds, 4 tbsp muesli, about 200ml skimmed milk.

Lunch: sandwich (2 slices wholegrain bread, 40g cheddar, 2tsp Flora) and apple.

Tea – vegetable soup. I forget the main course. I didn’t write this down, because I thought I would remember, and I am stupid. Tesco’s apricot lowfat yoghurt.

Later: pineapple lowfat yoghurt. Half a pack of fresh pineapple. I must have had a serious pineapple deficiency that day.

Saturday

Breakfast: Oats (Mum had been to Tesco) with 1 tbsp flaxseeds, 4 tbsp muesli, about 200ml skimmed milk

Lunch: vegetable soup. Toasted cheese (about 40g cheese, 1 slice wholegrain bread) and apple. A small piece of chocolate from the Christmas Elf, and about five jelly beans (from the D. B.)

Tea. Well now. The D. B and I went to dinner at the house of some friends, who are French. All that can honestly be said for this meal was that I didn’t totally overeat. We had “raclette”, which is basically potatoes, meat or vegetables with melted cheese poured over them. You melt the cheese at the table, a bit like fondue. I stuck to the vegetables, obviously, and had some salad, but I did eat something like 100-150 grams of melted cheese. It was absolutely delicious and was followed by little chocolate things.

Sunday

Breakfast: Oats with 1 tbsp flaxseeds, 4 tbsp muesli, about 200ml skimmed milk

Lunch: vegetable soup. Roll with about 35g cheese. Apple. Small packet of chocolate from Christmas Elf (about 75 calories). Crunch cream biscuit (also about 70ish calories).
Tea: vegetable soup. 1 cup butterbean/onion/mushroom stew. About 2 cups of salad containing mixed leaves, carrots, grated beetroot, yellow pepper, snap peas, cucumber, cherry tomatoes. 2 potato croquettes (tsk tsk). ½ piece sponge cake filled with raspberries and whipped cream, small scoop ice cream. Coffee. Several cups of herbal tea later in evening.

*Obscure reference to book called The Telling by Ursula Le Guin.
** OK. It's like this. We have an elf who comes to our house and leaves us a little treat, every day of Advent. Yes, I know, we're very lucky. He's kindly leaving me only very small amounts of chocolate as he doesn't want to put temptation in my way...
† We won!

Snuffle

The cold continues. I had a day off from choir, though not from work, which may have been silly. Oh well, I'm not exactly dying. I think the gym may have to wait until I'm less germy and can breathe properly, though. And sleep. I really should be in bed now!

I've only been doing this food diary for three days, and already it's become apparent that there's almost no variation in what I eat until the evening. No cinnamon toast, though, RG! (I used to eat a lot of toast at college, because it was about the only hot food we could have in our rooms. It was a bad habit. I still have difficulty eating just one piece, so mostly avoid it.)

Today (Wednesday's) food:

Breakfast: oatmeal with 1 tbsp flaxseeds, 4 tbsp muesli, about 200ml skimmed milk (Boring, you say? Me?)
Coffee with skimmed milk.

Lunch: sandwich (2 slices wholegrain bread, about 60g cheddar, 2tsp Flora) and apple. (That sounds familiar too.)

Tea: veggie burger, peas, cabbage. Two cups of herbal tea. Ginger crunch cream biscuit. Remarkably small apple.

Sniff

At the weekend, the D. B. had a stinking cold, with sore throat, sneezing and blocked sinuses.

On Monday, I went to the gym as usual, where I did the worst workout I can remember, particularly the weights. It's not that normally my routine goes like clockwork: I'm still learning all the movements, so I tend to go slowly and carefully so I don't get sloppy and risk injury. But this was not good. Last Thursday, I was given some pointers regarding my deadlift form by a guy I've often seen in the free weights gym, usually acting as a trainer to a girl who I think rows for the University, which leads me to suspect he knows what he's talking about (I've also seen him lift, and he's very strong). It sounded sensible, and when I tried what he was showing me with light weights, it did feel more effective. Trouble is, I couldn't seem to make it work yesterday, and nor could I revert to the way I was doing it before – apparently I've forgotten how! Then my squats were rubbish too, mostly because the backs of my thighs felt "tight" and I couldn't get more than halfway down, which didn't feel like I was doing anything. I did my usual upper-body routine (bench press, tricep extensions, rows, dumbbell curls) but it took me longer than usual and the rhythm just wasn't there. I ended up very tired and frustrated.

Today, I have a sore throat, runny nose and blocked sinuses (though I'm not sneezing quite as dramatically as the boy was. He is now better). I'm hoping this is the explanation for the feeble workout.

I'm going to be journalling my food for the next week, to try to get some data on my average calories per day. so here we go. I probably won't keep this up longterm, as it will be boring.

Monday
Breakfast: oatmeal with 1 tbsp flaxseeds, 4 tbsp muesli, about 200ml skimmed milk. Coffee with skimmed milk.
Lunch: sandwich (2 slices wholegrain bread, about 60g cheddar, 2tsp Flora) and apple.
Cup of hot chocolate with skimmed milk (I was cold!).
Snack: 50g cheese, can of Diet C0ke.
Tea: about 1 cup macaroni cheese, 4tbsp ratatouille, 50g broccoli.

Tuesday
Breakfast as Monday (I have this every day, as I can't think in the morning). Cup of tea, skimmed milk.
Lunch: half egg sandwich, half cheese. About 175ml fresh orange juice. Small banana. 1 mini flapjack, one mini chocolate roll (this was a work buffet, and I think I was doing pretty well for me.)
Coffee with skimmed milk. Mince pie (last day of handwriting class - party), 50ml orange juice.
Tea: 1 cup cooked tagliatelle, 1 egg scrambled with 1tsp Flora and a mushroom, 15g cheese, 50g sprouts and sweetcorn. 1 cup fennel tea. 1 piece of shortbread.

I think today was quite high, calorie-wise, because of the unusual lunch and the mince pie, but we'll see. I will work out the calories on FitDay later, but wanted to get this down before I forget it.

Now I'm taking my cold to bed. Night night.

Where was I ? Oh, that's right... Barcelona!

Things I've Been Doing Which Explain If Not Excuse Lack Of Posting:

Working.
Gymming.
Wandering round town in the cold with the D. B. at lunchtime.
Playing with LiveJournal. (New toys are a bad idea.)
Going to my handwriting class.
Going out to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.
Going out with some friends for a drink (look! A social life!)
Trying to organise wedding invitations.
Watching Bleak House and Lost (and you probably don't know how unusual it is for me to watch more than one series at a time, or you'd be more surprised)
Reading Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell and enjoying it really rather a lot. I'm sorry it's finished.

Thanks for all the encouraging comments! Eating has been going a lot better, despite its being very cold here, and I'm happy with my diet for the past week. I have been wondering, however, if I ought to get a bit more scientific about what I'm doing. The other day I worked out my basic metabolic rate, which was 1638.7. This is (if I've understood it right) the number of calories I'd need to maintain my weight if I didn't do any activity at all.

This seemed quite a high number. Then you need to decide what your activity level is, and multiply the BMR by the corresponding number, which is 1.55 for moderate sporting activity 3 to 5 days a week. I ended up with over 2500 calories to maintain, and about 2000 to lose weight, which sounds like an awful lot.

I tried again with "light activity" (1-3 days per week) and got 2253 to maintain weight, 1753 to lose. Again, I can't believe I eat that much.

Perhaps I should try to journal what I eat for a week, and see. This isn't the kind of thing I'm good at, not being particularly methodical, but I am sick of this plateau. I feel that I'm doing all the right things, exercise-wise, and not losing.

Otherwise I'm quite cheerful. One month to Christmas! When the decorations go up really early, I'm as cynical as anyone about it, but now I'm beginning to get in the mood. I love Christmas. We actually had snow this morning, which is almost unheard of, this early in the year. The way the flakes fall, that slow drift downwards - it's just magical. (Probably I'd feel differently if I had to drive in it, or if we had snow more often.)

This week sees the passing of Lose the Buddha, the second blog I ever read (the first was Pound!), one of the best blogs out there and one I'll always have fond memories of, as it helped me through some gloomy times. Undoubtedly I wouldn't have embarked on blogging if not for Erin, and she is the only possible reason that I imagine I'd like to do a triathlon at some point, as well as introducing me to the term "boy howdy" . I'm sorry LTB is going, but understand Erin's reasons for calling it a day - and I'm very glad that her regular blog will be continuing at www.ejshea.com.

Oh, and if you can spot the connection between the title and anything else in this post, I'll be highly impressed.

Crisps and chocolate. Not both at once

What has been up with my eating this week?

While I don’t follow a strict diet (because, well, I’m not very good at it, which is probably also why I rarely write about food), I have some rules I try to follow. These are, roughly speaking:

1. Ideally, no snacks between meals.
2. If you must have a snack in the evening, have a bit of lowfat cheese, or fruit, rather than a biscuit or a piece of toast. (If you are not hungry for fruit… you’re probably, well, not hungry.)
3. Do not eat something just because it’s there.
4. One helping of anything is enough (with the exception of vegetables).

Mostly, what I eat is fairly healthy. I’m a vegetarian, so I have to be slightly careful about the ratio of protein to carbohydrate, and the amount of cheese I consume, but I don’t normally eat any fast food or even many ready meals. And although I don’t cut out treats completely, some of my eating habits have changed for the better. A few weeks ago, I was in a coffee shop and thought “I’m going to the gym and I won’t have dinner until later; I could have a cake now.” But when I looked at them, I just didn’t really want any. This would not have happened a year ago.

Since the D. B. moved up, we’ve both been bringing a sandwich from home, rather than buying one at lunchtime. Lunch used to be my Achilles heel, in that I would sometimes find my eyes were bigger than my stomach, so to speak. If I was really hungry, I’d buy something extra as well as a sandwich and fruit, eat it all too quickly, and then realise I was overfull. (This is a good reason to sit down and eat slowly.)

There wasn’t a good reason why I didn’t bring in my lunch before – mostly I just didn’t remember to. But it does save money (which, as we know, the D. B. is keen on) and if I don’t go into food shops, I’m not tempted by other things. Or at least that’s the theory.

Since Monday, the no-snacking principle has gone completely out of the window.

The worst case of this was undoubtedly yesterday, when there was a function at work in the late afternoon. Had it been at lunchtime, I’d probably have been OK. But as it was, I ate quite a few crisps and things, more or less because they were there, and free. As a result I felt dehydrated (probably the unaccustomed salt) and wasn’t really hungry for tea.

I’d feel better if I knew why I’m doing this. Nothing is wrong; I’m not under particular stress. I will let myself off for Wednesday (piece of pizza, Galaxy ice cream) in that I was grabbing something I could eat fast between work and going out to the Neil Gaiman booksigning, and given that I was going to be standing up for an unknown period, I wanted to have eaten something. But the rest of it? I think I’ve just lost concentration somehow.

Today there have been biscuits (free) and chocolate. Well, there we are. What I need to do now is focus, remember why I’m doing this, and remember that food is fuel. Sugar is not good fuel, and it won’t make me feel better for eating it.

Finally: I don’t know how this works, and I'm sure it's totally unscientific, but it’s weirdly accurate.

kicking_k took the free ColorQuiz.com personality test! "Her need to feel more causative and to have a wide..." Click here to read the rest of the results.

Eerie silence

It’s been a full kind of week, although, alas, we didn't do anything much for Hallowe'en. I had a yen to dress up, but nowhere to go to (maybe we'll organise a party ourselves next year). But I’ve been to the gym twice (and will go again on Saturday), I had my palaeography class on Tuesday night, and choir started up again on Wednesday. Funny how one can have what feels like a very quiet life, and simultaneously not have a free evening in which to write a blog entry.

This has also been made more difficult because my computer, which used to be quite well-behaved, has recently become slow and crash-prone. I think it doesn’t like its updated virus protection and anti-spyware program. Anyway, it takes ages to boot up, so you can’t just nip online for a quick browse and post. Luckily for me, I have a handy computer expert in the D. B., who had brought a new processor unit up with him with the idea of rebuilding the whole thing anyway and doing a clean reinstall. So that’s one thing we’ll be doing tomorrow.

It’s funny – I’m still in the process of adapting to life as one half of a couple. Although I live with my family, like them, and do a lot of stuff with them, I don’t necessarily dash home at the end of the day to be with them. I don’t have that feeling of conflicting desires when I’m off doing something on my own. For the past couple of years, the D. B. and I have either been visiting each other (so obviously, we spent all our time together) or a long way apart, so I’d sort of forgotten what it was like. I like singing, reading, doing my crafty things, and going to the gym, and I don’t want to do less of them, but it’s still such a novelty to have the D. B. around on a daily basis (and he’s so lovely) that I want to spend all my time with him too.

I did manage to find time to update the sidebar links here, which I’ve been meaning to do for ages. And I’ve finally succumbed to temptation, and made an online place to talk about books. I keep being tempted to post rambling accounts of what I’ve been reading here, and while that’s OK once in a while, it’s not really what this blog is for. I had a livejournal which was sitting empty, so it’s now become my book blog. If you’re interested you can find me at www.livejournal.com/users/kicking_k, or click on the link at the side. I’ll be doing the TIME reading list and reading my usual SF and fantasy as light relief.

Yesterday I had the best workout for ages. By the end, every muscle felt well-used, and I think the level of effort was about right. It hadn’t started out too propitiously: the cardio room was very busy. Usually I go on the treadmill for 20 minutes, then do weights, then use the elliptical cross-trainer for another 15 or 20 minutes. There wasn’t a single treadmill or cross-trainer unoccupied, which I’ve never seen since the renovations – there are a lot of machines. The StairMaster was the only thing available; I’ve never used it before, but nothing ventured…

I think I shall rename it the MoonWalker. It feels a bit like walking on a trampoline, or a giant squishy marshmallow, except that it’s easier to balance upright. The longer you stand still, the deeper your feet sink, so if you go slower you have to take bigger steps. I did the “fat-burning” interval course (well, it sounds good) for fifteen minutes and although I didn’t have to stop, it was hard work. I think it burned about the same number of calories as the equivalent run (about 150) but it was tiring in a completely different way. The hardest thing of all was pushing with my whole foot, rather than going up on my toes as if I was actually trying to climb up a step.

Weights went very well, although I had a long wait to use the Olympic platform and squat cage. I’ll be happy when they get round to building a third platform. I added a bit of weight to my deadlifts and squats. Last time I did squats, they made me feel sort of head-rushy and nauseous (they were at the end of the workout – the cage was busy then too) and I ended up skipping my second cardio, on grounds of not wanting to throw up. I know some people see throwing up as a sign that you’re working really hard, but I can’t help feeling it’s the body saying “You are not up to this.”

This time, although I was being cautious, the squats were fine. It’s actually easier to balance the bar if there’s some weight on the ends (we’re talking a measly 5kg here – don’t want to go mad, do we?) and also easier to keep my heels on the floor.

It’s the upper-body stuff which is a real challenge. I’m doing bench presses, dumbbell rows and hammer curls, and although I’m not using much weight yet, it’s always quite a challenge not to involve my back towards the end of a set. On the other hand, self-correcting is easy because it feels instantly wrong if the back is anything but neutral.

And finally, abandoning any pretence at a structure for this post:

In the gym a few days ago, I was getting changed next to a girl who was ready, waiting for her friend. She was tall, pretty and graceful-looking – I would like legs like hers in my next life, please – and since she was discussing philosophy animatedly with her friend, she clearly wasn’t dim either. Generally enviable. I was vaguely thinking, as you do, that here was a person who was far more together than me, who didn’t look as though she was stumbling through life in a shambolic and amateur manner like me, and sort-of wishing I could be like that.

Then I noticed she had her shorts on inside out.

(Yes, I did consider mentioning this to her, but she noticed before I had thought of a tactful way to do it. However, that made my evening.)

Stick it out

I meant to post at the weekend, but I’ve been pretty busy, because THE D. B. MOVED UP HERE YESTERDAY!

I’m a little bit happy.

No, that’s not really an excuse for not posting on Friday or Saturday, but since he’s moved into my parents’ house, we had to move all my brother’s stuff out of the room he’ll be sleeping in. Which took a while. Also, I had to blitz my own room as it was, to put it mildly, total chaos, and if the D. B. had seen it that way, I wouldn’t have entirely blamed him if he’d had second thoughts about the whole marriage thing.

However. We got it all done, and he arrived at lunchtime on Sunday, and spent the rest of the day cooing at each other in a revoltingly soppy manner, and trying to get his new laptop to connect to our wireless network. And it’s been the first day of his new job today.

What with all of this, I have not been to the gym since Thursday. This is the first skipped session in quite a while, and it does worry me slightly. I’ve never had the D. B. around full-time while I’ve been doing this. Will I keep it up? Or will I want to dash home to his arms rather than going for my session? He has made the odd noise about joining my gym, but I don’t know how serious that was; he’s not keen on spending large sums of money on himself. (Yes, I know this is meant to be a virtue.) It’s up to him, but I really hope he does join, because otherwise – there’s no denying it – I will feel guilty for going.

But Thursday. On Thursday I had a dental check-up, and my free-weights induction.

Of the two, the dentist’s was vastly more scary in the event. (Only because I’m a wimp – my teeth are fine.) The free-weights, which I’ve been dreading and putting off for months, was fun. There were supposed to be three of us, but I was the only one that turned up, so I got one-on-one attention. The instructor was the same guy who gave me my Nautilus induction, way back when I was scared of those machines too (I should just rename this blog I’m A Total Coward and be done with it, shouldn’t I?) My gym has the most helpful instructors. They are all really nice, and this guy is no exception. He actually remembered me from eight months ago.

We started out on the Olympic platforms, and the instructor told me how to do a deadlift.

Now, I have been trying to make my mind up to try free weights for a long time. Months. And my primary source of motivation has always been Krista’s extremely full, thorough and funny site (go and explore – there's TONS more than I've linked to). So I’d looked at the “Dork to Diva” pages many times, trying to educate myself a bit.

And it’s all paid off. “That’s a perfect deadlift” said the instructor as I sank down the first time, concentrating on not rounding my back, and on keeping my heels still and shoulders over toes. (Of course I told him I’d been reading up – and where). Unfortunately, I did have a slight case of beginner’s luck – as my muscles got tired, proper balance became more difficult, and I don’t think I ever managed quite as well again!

I was expecting the squat to be more difficult, also – and it was. But I have practised it unweighted, and so it didn’t feel nearly as weird as if the movement had been completely new to me. Apparently both of these exercises are “all about sticking your bum out”, and I have a natural talent there. Anyone who saw me in ballet class as a small child would have no doubt of that…

But I think I can master both of these, and that the dumbbell exercises I want to do won’t be an impossible challenge either. I will still be using at least some of the machines, because apart from anything else, I’m just using practise weights for the deadlift and the unweighted bar for the squat and chest press, until I feel the form is right. That will still be a bit of a workout for a while, judging by the way my muscles felt on Friday… but it was a good sort of hurt.

And on a closing note, go and read this post. So much of what YP says is what I thought and felt for years, but could never express nearly so well...

Backwards & sdrawroF

Post-workout yesterday, I showered, washed my hair, and stood combing it out in front of the big mirror in the changing room. Without thinking I tossed it back over my shoulders, and in the mirror saw a T-shirtless girl sitting on the bench behind flinch backwards.

I’d sprayed her with now-cold water off the ends of my hair. Very clean cold water, but still… Note to self: do not shake wet self like dog. You are a human; use a towel.

It could have been worse. Back in the days when I used to play football, my pigtail was a bit of an offensive weapon on rainy days, as it’s over a foot long and, when soaking wet, very heavy. Fair’s fair, though: it smacked me in the face as I turned about as often as it smacked anyone else.

The changing rooms at the gym were redone recently, and although they are much more salubrious than they were before, there are rather a lot of mirrors, set at angles to one another. I could live without this. I don’t mind seeing my reflection from the front, but catching sight of my rear as I’m walking to the showers… not so good. How is it that a person always looks so much wider from behind? Blast you, mirrors! I know I have a big bottom: do you have to rub it in?

There’s also the optical illusion produced by one set of mirrors, which are set not quite at right-angles to one another. This gives the illusion that your body is half as wide again. Also that you have one and a half heads, mind you, but even so it’s not encouraging.

And I could do with encouraging at the moment. The numbers on the scale are not going anywhere. Or rather they are, but only up half a pound, down half a pound, and up again. Yes, this has happened before – twice – and then I’ve suddenly and mysteriously lost five pounds at once and gone back to zigzagging, just at a lower number. But it’s driving me barmy. I’m not doing any less exercise; probably more, in fact, and I don’t feel that food has been particularly bad (well, except on Sunday when my grandparents took us out for lunch). I could cut calories a bit further, but am worried about messing with my metabolism, and there is no point in losing quickly only to find I can’t sustain it.

On the other hand, I’ve finally booked a free-weights induction. On Thursday. Although I’ve really enjoyed doing the Nautilus machines, and will probably keep on with some of them, I think I’ve gone as far as I’m likely to go with many of them. I record my progress in a notebook, and mostly have been working at the same level for weeks without much prospect of improvement. I can see that you can’t go on adding weight forever, so it’s probably time to learn something different.

Normal service resumes

This morning I woke up at 8.30. Grrrr.

I am not pleased with myself.

What's worse, for some reason part of my brain thinks I have a license to be unhealthy today, and has led me to consume a vanilla-and-honey yoghurt smoothie and some chocolate which I really didn't need and wasn't hungry for. It's not even emotional eating; it's brain-turned-off eating.

I'm posting to draw a line under this, because it is silly, and stops NOW.

OK.

Il pleut sur la ville

Maybe it’s silly, but I always feel reluctant to do a sad post. In a way, writing a post that said “I’m really down today” might make it official, whereas if I don’t write it down, I hope I’ll be able to move on quicker and get to the stage where, when I think back to it later, I’ll wonder what all that was about and tick myself off for being a drama queen.

So: I’m feeling better now. This could be something to do with having had enough sleep the past couple of nights. For several nights in a row I had been still awake at three (or later) in the morning, which is Not Good. The next day, all is gloom. I can’t concentrate, my head hurts, I turn into a grumpy cynic and am convinced nobody likes me. (I have been a bit lonely recently, but it is entirely my own fault.)

Ever since the nights started to draw in and the mornings began to get darker, I’ve had difficulty getting out of bed. Not that I’m ever a morning person, but it just seems less painful in summer, particularly as the temperature difference between bed and room isn’t so great. (Not that my bedroom is particularly cold, but it feels cold by comparison with bed.) How on earth do people who work out in the mornings do it?

I try not to be a night owl. The world is not set up for the nocturnal, and it’s a pity to waste daylight. And what with work, I’ve been tired in the evenings, so shouldn’t have had any trouble getting to sleep – except that it doesn’t work like that. But having slept through my alarm on various occasions last week, and on Monday, this couldn’t go on.

On Monday night I took extreme measures. That is to say, I took a hot-water bottle and a cup of hot milk to bed with me, before midnight for once. Such a rock’n’roll lifestyle I have. Once there, I read a couple of chapters of Dorothy L. Sayers – I’ve read all her books so often now that they are infinitely soothing – and actually managed to have the light off in about 20 minutes. Wow.

Same measures last night, with the result that I woke up at seven BEFORE THE ALARM. And I felt fine. This doesn’t happen. As a result, I had time to have porridge and a cup of coffee and was in work by 8.15. Tell me I can keep this up…

Another disadvantage to not getting enough sleep is that I tend to make poor food choices to perk myself up – drink too much coffee, and eat more than I really need to. If you never wake up properly, you’re sluggish and therefore cold, too.

So eating has not been miraculously healthy recently. In particular, last night’s tea was a bit of a carb-and-saturated-fat-fest: pasta parcels, cheese sauce, Müllerice (reduced-fat Müllerice, but still). And broccoli, but I don’t think that exactly counteracts the rest of it.

The gym, on the other hand, has been fine. I seem to be well in the routine of 20 minutes on the treadmill (intervals), Nautilus, 20 minutes on the cross-trainer, three days a week. Three sessions I can do, but various people I know who are losing much faster than me do five, and now I’m worried I should be doing that. But I don’t really think I can, unless I learn to get myself up earlier in the morning (see above).

Now that I’ve got used to it, I like the cross-trainer better than the stationary bike. Music is evidently the key – once I get in the rhythm, I can just dance along (well, provided it isn’t some annoying rap track with a slow beat. Or “Beautiful”. Why, remind me, did I not just change the channel or pull my headphones out of the socket? That never occurred to me at the time).

Most of my weights on the machines have reached a plateau now, where I can do 12 with a bit of effort, but can’t do the next level up. The exception is the leg press machine, which is still moving. I’ve got to 275 pounds on that now, which seems utterly ridiculous. But cool. I don’t know what a sensible target is on that, though. Apparently if you’re doing squats, your own bodyweight is a good target, and leg presses are only half as difficult… which would suggest you should be aiming to leg press twice your bodyweight? That doesn’t sound very likely.

Logically enough, the machines I’m making least progress on use the muscles I have most trouble with – the thighs and upper arms. I know that there are muscles in my thighs under the squish, but my upper arms seem to be doing nothing despite assiduous bicep and tricep work. I actually seem to have more muscle in my forearms – is this normal?

My calves are rock-hard these days from all the leg work, which is nice, but also discouraging. Because one thing I’d really like is to be able to wear knee-high (or at least three-quarter) boots. Flat riding-style boots. I’ve wanted some of those since I can remember, and I could never find any that fit because my calves are just too chunky. There are wide-leg ones available, but there's not so much choice of style (and yes, I may have a slight issue there. I want normal legs...)

So now the calves appear to be solid muscle and although they look better, they’re still chunky. Other bits of me have slimmed down – my ankles have, my waist certainly has. But there may be nowhere for my calves to go. “Maybe you should do fewer leg presses,” my sister suggests, and yes, there is a certain logic to that. But nooo… I don’t want to. Muscle burns fat, right? So if I lose muscle, I’ll lose fat more slowly, and I don’t want to do that, because it isn’t exactly evaporating at the moment.

There may be no answer to this one.

I still haven’t booked a free-weights induction.

I saw Serenity at the weekend, without knowing a thing about it except that Beth recommended it, and it was fantastic. Crouching Zombies, Hidden Star Wars. I could geek on for ages, but I won't unless someone posts a comment about it. G'wan.

It is extremely wet in Edinburgh, but I’m quite cheerful.

I'm going to go and buy some flaxseed now.

"Strange how potent cheap music is..."

First things first – James Blunt.

Thanks for all your comments, people. It’s such a relief to find that I’m not the only inappropriate weeper, and that it’s not just me who thinks the song is a bit lame. Which it is. Crying at Great Art would be just about acceptable.

I was amused to see this letter in the Metro (our local free newspaper) a few days after the gym incident:

"My sister Annie is convinced James Blunt wrote the song You're Beautiful about her and that I was the 'other man' she was with when she smiled at him (on the Glasgow Underground). Thus I'm held responsible for ruining her chances of going out with a pop star and also for causing him to get depressed. If Mister Blunt is reading this then he should take heart. My sister is single and if he hangs around the Citrus club at the weekend then he should catch up with her..."

So there's hope for him yet.

I had a really nice weekend with the D. B.: I got to see his project and it seems very impressive to me. I went down on the Friday and his hand-in was Monday, so he did still have some work to do, but it was great just being with him. Somehow I never remember quite how lovely he is when we’re apart. I still think he’s lovely, but when we’re together it hits me afresh, and it’s a wonderful surprise.

Shock, horror – I made the tea on Sunday! You might have gathered that I’m not exactly the most domestic person you’ve ever met. As I live at home, usually the evening meal is made by the time I get home and rather shamefully, I hadn’t cooked a meal I was expecting anyone else to eat for months. (I do make my own tea from time to time, but I have low standards of edibility. If it’s reasonably nutritious, it’ll do.) But he was working, so I offered to make the tea and we had cheese soufflé, which rose, with new potatoes, carrots and broccoli, and then fruit salad.

I know that’s not the most difficult meal ever cooked. But I’ve been stressing slightly for months over the necessity of cooking once we are married, and I’m actually feeling much better about it now. It had just been such a long time since I had done it. As it happens, the D. B. is a much better cook than I am, but it isn’t really fair to expect him to do all the work!

On Monday he handed his project in. We stayed in town after that, celebrated with the other people from the course and then went off for a meal together. This was not the healthiest day I have ever spent. Chips featured heavily, while vegetables were pretty well absent. On the other hand, the weekend had contained quite a lot of walking, so I didn’t feel under-exercised.

The week after that was… a bit odd. I had made up my mind to audition for a musical theatre group that I’ve been involved with in the past. Last year, I didn’t get in to the show, but did some costume stuff for them so was still around. Various people had said to me that it was a shame I hadn’t got in, and that I should try out again, because they’d had an unusually high turnout. (“It’s not you, it’s me…”) The audition was on Thursday, so I spent the days before psyching myself up and humming the song to myself.

Well, I didn’t get in again. Probably I shouldn’t have tried out again, but I am incapable of bearing a grudge, and had persuaded myself that not auditioning was just cutting off my nose to spite my face. I’m not the greatest singer in the world, but I didn’t feel it had gone that badly. Maybe the others were all brilliant, who knows?

The people doing the auditioning were totally different this year, so it was without prejudice, and I don’t really blame anyone, but… well… I still wish I had got in. I love being in a show – the atmosphere of everyone working together, also the social life. This is partly selfish. It would be true to say I don’t have much of a social life at the moment. Post-university I seem to have fallen out of the loop, partly because many of my friends now live elsewhere, and the one uni friend who did live here has just moved away.

I could still go to some of the drama socials, but I don’t want to seem like a desperate hanger-on… is that pathetic?

In order to cheer myself up, I’ve been having a book orgy:

Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman
Thud! by Terry Pratchett
A Tale of Time City by Diana Wynne Jones
Four Ways to Forgiveness by Ursula Le Guin
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
Minor Arcana by Diana Wynne Jones
Stories of the Supernatural by John Buchan
Huntingtower by John Buchan
Castle Gay by John Buchan
True Tales of American Life edited by Neil Auster
Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Now you know why I haven’t had time to write a blog entry for ages. Now that I write it down, I’m quite impressed by this list, especially since I also disposed of the newspaper most days, two copies of the New Scientist and a few other magazines that were lying around, and read Minor Arcana twice in that time. I mean, I’m a speed-reading book addict, but still.

In fact, I read Anansi Boys much too fast (in one sitting), and will have to read it again, more slowly. I’m beginning to feel that, much as I enjoy reading Neil Gaiman’s online journal, it sets up a very high expectation for his new stuff. Given that I’ve been vicariously present during much of the creation of Anansi Boys, I would have been really disappointed if it hadn’t lived up to my expectations, given that I’ve been waiting for it for all this time (the same was true of MirrorMask). So I almost didn’t want to start reading it, in case it wasn’t as good as I hoped. Whereas with Thud!, also new out last weekend, I knew it was coming only just before, and therefore didn’t have such a pitch of anxiety about it, even though I like Terry Pratchett a lot and would also be disappointed if he wrote a substandard book.

It’s all right though, because both books are good, although I notice that Thud! continues the trend I’ve seen in recent City Watch books to move further from “comic fantasy” to “quite serious book, with funny bits.” The tipping point for me was Night Watch, which isn’t really a comic novel, doesn’t contain much fantasy (well, there’s some time travel and a very brief zombie, but that’s it) and might well be my favourite Discworld book.

Anansi Boys, on the other hand, is definitely a comic novel, and contains some wonderful observational writing, although I will have to read it again before I’m certain where it lies on my personal Neil Novel Ranking (which currently has American Gods at the top – where it’ll probably stick – followed by Good Omens, Stardust, Coraline and Neverwhere).

I have been going to the gym (Four Ways to Forgiveness, Minor Arcana and Huntingtower were all partly read while on the crosstrainer) but if there’s a conflict between having time to exercise and having time to blog about it, exercising wins. It’s all been going fine, I think. I do wish the new cardio suite was cooler, though. The extra heat makes a surprising amount of difference – running is considerably more difficult. I’ve been trying to challenge myself, but am not making progress as fast as I’d hoped (and certainly not as fast as the Born Again Gym Bunny, who started running about the same time as me, I think, and has worked up to 10K. Why can’t I do that? Maybe because I don’t go every day).

Eating has been… OK, but I need to be a bit more vigilant, I think. More fruit, fewer carbs. After the Weekend of the Chips I got my period immediately, which confused things rather, but I think I gained a pound and then lost it again. So I was still at my lowest weight when I last checked, but it’s my lowest from 3 weeks ago. Which is not exactly progress.

On the other hand, I had a little milestone a few days ago. You know how I’ve been complaining that my jeans are too baggy? They’ve now reached the stage where they really don’t do anything for me – just hang there looking shapeless. I was vaguely wondering whether the time had now come to try some new ones on when it occurred to me that I have a pair of slightly smaller ones. I don’t know if there was a time when I physically couldn’t get into these – there may have been, but I stopped wearing them because they looked too tight.

Now they don’t. They look fine – in fact, I think they’re looser than when I bought them, which is a distinctly odd thought as I definitely had those at university. So I’ve presumably undone the damage that I did from taking very little exercise in my final year, which means I’m thinner than I’ve been for four years. I'm still trying to get my head around that...