I'm on a roll!

Wow, am I ever on a roll! Loss of 1.5kg this week and boy do I feel good. I’m so healthy I’m just about jumping out of my skin!!! Have had another really good week – still no alcohol – it’s now day 16 – reckon when I finally have a glass or two I’ll be off my face in no time! I’ve also tracked faithfully (and on points), managed to up the walking to SIX days – the dog thinks it’s fabulous, and drunk my 2 litres of water and on average had three cups of green tea each day. Hells bells that just over six tubs of margarine in two weeks. And you know what – it’s not that hard. I mean when you cut to the chase and leave out all the excuses and just do exactly what you’re supposed to – it happens! I guess I’m the master of bending the rules just a little here and there – thinking that won’t make much difference but if I’m honest and realistic I probably do that once or twice every day – only little things mind you – but that’s probably at least fourteen non conformances a week – work jargon creeping in here! And then I have the nerve to be all upset because I haven’t lost as much as I should have. Another interesting thing is how one success builds on another – when you’re not doing well it’s just so hard to get on top of things and think positive and following the plan is a struggle. But when you have a couple of good weeks you’re feeling so in control and focussed that it’s comparatively easy to make the right choices – because you just want your success to continue. My testing time will be at Easter – I’ve promised myself that on Easter weekend I’ll relent and enjoy a few wines. The challenge will be to just enjoy those few wines then climb back on to the big wagon again on Monday and continue doing what I’m doing now. Hopefully the fact that we have a wedding to go to in Noosa on 12th May will give me enough incentive to get straight back on plan again – I think I’ll set myself the challenge to be at my half way point by then. Got a real kick out of the side bar this week – my kilos to lose are into single figures! Otherwise it’s been a reasonably quiet week, which has been great after that recent hectic spell. Went to the beautician on Saturday – got the waxworks – and I was pretty overdue – underarms, legs, lip, Brazilian – probably lost half a kilo of fuzz! I also had a voucher for a one hour facial which Bloss had got me for Christmas. It was fantastic – came out of there just floating. And while I was gone Bloss - bless his little heart – had oiled the new deck. So it’s now only one more coat to go then we can get the proper furniture on it and organise the plants, pots etc. Have a great week everybody. Cheers!

Love these cool quizzes

Your Five Factor Personality Profile

Extroversion: You have high extroversion. You are outgoing and engaging, with both strangers and friends. You truly enjoy being with people and bring energy into any situation. Enthusiastic and fun, you're the first to say "let's go!" Conscientiousness: You have high conscientiousness. Intelligent and reliable, you tend to succeed in life. Most things in your life are organized and planned well. But you borderline on being a total perfectionist. Agreeableness: You have medium agreeableness. You're generally a friendly and trusting person. But you also have a healthy dose of cynicism. You get along well with others, as long as they play fair. Neuroticism: You have low neuroticism. You are very emotionally stable and mentally together. Only the greatest setbacks upset you, and you bounce back quickly. Overall, you are typically calm and relaxed - making others feel secure. Openness to experience: Your openness to new experiences is medium. You are generally broad minded when it come to new things. But if something crosses a moral line, there's no way you'll approve of it. You are suspicious of anything too wacky, though you do still consider creativity a virtue.

The Five Factor Personality Test

Feelin’ good

I’m on top of the world – loss of 1.6kg this week. I’ve stuck to my plan – no alcohol – even on the weekend and boy was that tough. I have this mindset that says on Friday I deserve a few drinks after a big week at work so when I went to the pub with some of the others after the training workshop I had to be so strong and just have a soda. It was the same on Saturday night when Bloss and I were having a nice quiet little dinner for two – however I resisted the temptation. I managed to get in four walking sessions this week – would really like to make it five and would dearly love to get back to the gym. There’s nothing like it for tightening up the wobbly bits! But right now I just don’t seem to have enough hours in the day. Points wise I have been under every day – not masses but just a couple up my sleeve – always useful in case everything turns pearshaped on the weekend! Had a bit of a laugh to myself when I entered my weight progress on the online WW chart this morning – I joined WW as an online member which gives me the tracker, points guide online, recipe builder, points calculator and weight tracker to name but a few and generally keeps me honest – especially since I’m paying for it. Anyway after I had entered my loss of 1.6kg (remembering what a shitty few weeks I’ve had previous to this) I got a message pop on my screen suggesting that maybe I was losing weight too fast! Sometimes you just can’t win! Mentioned in my last post that I was on to the green tea – still drinking about 3 or 4 cups a day – usually either the one with Mint or with Lemon. It’s really refreshing and a nice change from straight water. I don’t drink much coffee these days. I used to when I smoked (15 years ago) – the old cup of coffee and a fag – sometimes 14 or 15 of them! But these days it would be a huge day if I had 4 cups in a day and most days is one first thing in the morning and sometimes one at night. Anyway still having my heart starter in the morning but then having green tea at lunch, when I get home from work and after dinner at night. Been reading up on the properties – seems like it has some amazing benefits – lowers cholesterol (mine can be a bit wayward), reduces chances of several different types of cancer, lowers your chances of cavities and may even have weight reducing properties (not huge – studies show MAY burn up to 266 Kj per day so don’t got too excited) and also acts as a diuretic. Can confirm this last one –the combination of no alcohol which dehydrates you, drinking my usual amount of water (1.5 to 2 litres) and then my green tea has meant that my system has had a real work out – even having to get up several times in the night. It’s just like being pregnant again – a dim and distant memory! But I just grin and enjoy – think of it as weight disappearing down the S bend and at work every time I have to make my way down the hall to the other end of the building to visit the ‘conveniences’ I consider it another bit of Claytons exercise – the exercise you get when you’re not actually exercising! Otherwise it’s been a bit less hectic this week – and boy did I need that – had got that ‘stop the world I want to get off’ feeling, so it’s been nice to catch up on a few jobs at home. I think this weekend’s job will be to oil the new deck. Bloss oiled and stained the one pine beam on it last weekend but we didn’t attempt any more since we weren’t sure what Cyclone Larry was going to do – not that we were in the line of fire but we often get the accompanying rain. We’re still getting some gentle rain today which is great but really feeling for the residents of Innisfail, Mission Beach etc. Meanwhile we’re keeping a wary eye on Cyclone Wati which is currently heading towards Mackay (that’s getting a bit closer to us) and is forecasted to then head south parallel to the coast. I haven’t had the ‘pleasure’ of a cyclone since coming to Queensland 12 years ago and truth be told I think I can easily live without it but then you don’t always get a choice in these things! Have a busy night tonight – got to race home as the pest control man is coming – hopefully besides the usual cockroach spray he can do something about all the miniscule ants which have invaded us – they’re driving me bonkers. Then the kids are coming for tea (Son, D-I-L and the two darling boys) so that’s always a fun time. Hope you’re all having a good week – I’ve been lurking on lots of blogs and enjoying sharing all the good news and sympathised and in many cases empathised with those of you who are having a struggle. I’m gradually getting better at leaving comments – I guess I’m just a bit hesitant about commenting to a perfect stranger – think they might feel ‘what the hell does she know’ – but on the other hand I get a HUGE buzz when someone leaves me a comment – so I’m going to really try hard. Ciao!

As I expected

Check the side bar and you'll see that my predictions in my last post were deadly accurate. Nobody but myself to blame. However....since I posted on Monday I have been squeaky clean - no alcohol, managed to walk twice so far - sick yesterday so didn't manage and had to go and get some stuff in town on Wednesday so didn't have time then either. Planning to go tonight, and on the points front have been just under every day and feeling good - and in control. Think that's what really gets me down - I'm a bit of a control freak and I get so angry at myself when I lose control. Bought this months Slimming and Health Mag and have listened to the free CD (Think Slim by Mark Stephens) - some very interesting thoughts there - haven't tried the hypnosis section yet - saving that for the weekend. He recommends drinking green tea - suggests one of the flavoured ones to start with like mint, so I decided to give it a go. Got the mint and the citrus flavours - really nice, refreshing and Bloss has been drinking it too. It's credited with having all sorts of health properties so it certainly won't hurt and might do some good. Must away to work - big day today - a training team workshop of all trainers/training leaders across site. Could be very good - could be a whinge session but I think the facilitator will be good enough to ensure the former. Have a great weekend everyone, talk next week.

Severe talking to required - aka give myself an uppercut

Well I lost 400g this week - OK it's a loss but it's not what it could/should of been and even although I've been on holidays I just know inside myself that I'm arsing around - I weigh exactly the same as I did four weeks ago! I'm soo good weekdays at work - but lately I come home and I'm tired and I don't always walk then I decide a glass of wine on the deck with Bloss would be nice .. and it is but then I have another while I'm cooking tea, then of course one with tea and well ... might as well finish the bottle. Then comes the weekend - seem to be socialising a lot and of course I feel I deserve to let up on the weekend. Well that's fine but not if I'm letting up all week too! Positives are that I'm still doing a fair job of tracking daily. Ok - this is part two of this post - the weekend has come and gone and I'm not feeling good about weighing tomorrow and neither wonder! Had a real weekend of socialising - that dreaded alcohol again - it's bad enough but then the normal sense of restraint disappears so I have a couple of chocolates with coffee - don't normally have chocs in the house but our friends brought some nice little ones when they came for dinner and it's other things like a handful of pistachios or almonds with a glass of wine - you know the kind of thing. So last night I'm wide awake in the middle of the night - don't have hot flushes but do get the night sweats and if I'm honest - these are much more likely to occur after having a few drinks. Anyway I'm lying there telling myself what a dope I am - and that it's high time I stopped going two steps forward and one back. So then I think - it's time to get a bit of real structure into this or I'll be attending a friend's wedding in Noosa in May (one of my sort of milestones along the way) having not lost any weight. So then I thought - Ok what's the plan and what are the realistic steps. Right... it's that Lent time of year when people decide to go without things. So my promise to myself is - alcohol free until at least Easter weekend, try and walk at least four days out of seven and religiously track, the last bit is the easiest, the first two will require considerable effort. One month - 31 days following the above strategy and the challenge is to weigh at least 4 kgs less than tomorrow's weigh in.

Pink Cloud

Thanks to Sarah who mentioned this fun thing to do and linked to the site and to Slim Suzy whose site I found it on. Just cracks me up that alcohol is up there in the first line in just about the largest font - I'm sure there's a subliminal message there.

Tales of a Lost Sausage!

Alright we’ll get the bad bit over first – a gain of 0.9kg over the last two weeks. I wasn’t really bad but just a bit slack and I’m just not one of those people who can get away with it. Anyway got home late Saturday and got back on track on Sunday and trucking along nicely so far this week. The holiday was great but not without a few dramas. Normally we’d fly direct from Brisbane to Auckland and I’d booked our flights both from home to Brisbane and Brisbane/Auckland back in September. However just before Christmas the airline contacted me to reschedule the Brisbane/Auckland flight to an earlier time. Problem with that was that it didn’t allow us enough time to connect with our flight from home, so they had to book us on a flight via Sydney. Now on that day in at Sydney International, the central baggage conveyor broke down and a replacement part had to be flown in from overseas. So it became a logistical nightmare trying to move all that luggage. Yes you’ve guessed what’s coming – we get to Auckland at 10pm at night and along with about 50 other people on our flight have no luggage. So then it’s stand in a queue, describe your luggage, give your NZ address blah blah blah . We finally got out of there around midnight. Our poor friends had been patiently waiting for us. Trying to find out the next day what progress there had been on locating it was a real trial – on hold for anywhere between 40 minutes to an hour! We had planned to leave to go sailing with our friends on the Thursday lunchtime but delayed that by another day in the hope they’d get our stuff to us. By Friday we were no further forward and our holidays were slipping away so we shot down to the local “The Warehouse’ and bought the absolute basics – nothing too glam there! We were entitled to $100 each after 24 hours to cover emergency purchases. Anyway Bloss’s bag turned up that morning and they taxied it out to us early afternoon. But still no sign of mine. So off we went on the boat. Mine finally did turn up on the Saturday and they delivered it to our friends’ apartment. The airline would have delivered it anywhere we specified but with us being on the boat it was too much hassle to try to find a rendezvous spot. I wear a pretty ugly uniform to work – pants, shirt with reflective stripes and safety boots so holidays are an opportunity for me to wear ‘nice’ clothes albeit very casual ones. So all the feminine readers can probably relate to how it felt with only two pairs of ¾ bike pants, 3 polo shirts, 1 sarong and bathers which were a size 12 (all they had) when my top half requires a size 14 - the cleavage was incredible!! To make matters worse for the first time ever (and we travel a lot) I didn’t take any hand luggage. Because we were going on the boat I don’t use suitcases (they take up too much room) and I had bought a large ‘sausage’ type bag which had heaps of room in it so rather than take another bag with hand luggage I put everything in the sausage thinking – we’re only going to Auckland!!! So no moisturiser, medication, perfume, deodorant, hair product etc. etc. Lesson learnt – you better believe it!! Normally I’d carry all my toiletries, a change of undies and usually a spare top. Anyway I got over it – no sense in being miserable – it’s my holiday I’d be spoiling. Back to the holiday – once again we had absolutely peachy weather in NZ. We sailed to the Coromandel day 1, then next day headed round the other side to the Mercury Islands – a couple of nights there then over to Great Barrier for the next couple of nights then back to Waiheke then home. That was Thursday late afternoon and when we got back to the apartment my precious sausage was there. I think I wore about 3 different outfits in a day and a half just cos I could! We headed home Saturday morning – us to the International and our friends to the Domestic airport as they were flying down to Hawkes Bay for the Mission concert. We were quite excited about coming back home as the new deck was scheduled to be finished. It looks great – the famous lights have yet to be installed although the wiring is in place and our next task will be to oil all the timber. But it was Bloss’s birthday on Monday and our friends joined us for a baptismal beverage on it before heading to the pub for tea. Here are a couple of pictures of the famous deck - it's been a long long time in the planning stages but the end result is well worth the wait. Bloss has named it "The Corral" Hope everyone out there is having a good week - and I intend to have better things to report next week. Thanks folks for the lovely comments about my grandchildren and also for the nice one about my profile photo - I have to confess it is a couple of years old - taken at my son's wedding in November 2002 - so a bit over 3 years ago.