Finally getting better.

Not counting my chickens or anything, but I've been free of back pain for exactly one week. The back pain which has over the past 18 months at times been so crippling that I haven't been able to function at all, and which has stopped me doing a lot of things I wanted to do/should be doing.

What made it better? Believe it or not, 10 minutes every day on my mini-stepper which seems to be great physiotherapy. And so far, it's working. It may not always work, but I'm enjoying it so far. It's also had a very positive effect on my mood too. Now I just need to shift these extra pounds - lost 1lb this week so heading in the right direction :)

The ups and downs of the numbers game

This week, it's been all about the numbers, and the ups and downs.

Quite appropriate in a way...a big chunk of my daily nine-to-five involves producing stats in various shapes and forms, and strangely enough I remain just a little fascinated by stats, even when the working day is over.

So....

This has been a record-breaking and totally amazing week over at EuropeCrazy, mainly thanks to a certain annual song contest :) so thank you all for visiting my blog during that time - and if you like what you saw, don't forget to call back regularly as you will be very welcome!

Now the bad news :(

I gained another pound this week, which is probably more of my holiday weight...oh well I need to work hard, no in fact I need to work much, much harder to lose all the weight I've gained over the last 4 weeks. After all, it's only 4 months till our next holiday. Destination unknown (at the moment).

Four pounds :(

Three weeks' break from Weight Watchers, five days in Italy. It was inevitable that there would be weight gain. And there was. Four pounds, to be precise.

But what the heck, it was fun while it lasted!!!

Tomorrow the fun ends....back on the diet, however I'm feeling confident that I'm going to succeed. Back to work tomorrow too....oh well.

R**** W******

For some people, it was the highlight of their year, whilst for others it was all too much - like that little scene-stealing flower girl above! (picture courtesy of www.mirror.co.uk)

I refer of course to the royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton which took place two days ago. I'm no royalist by any means, and my own view is that the British royal family are an unaffordable luxury, especially all the hangers-on. And why do royal weddings always take place during recessions, when, allegedly "Britain needs a feelgood factor"? When in fact they actually mean "Britain needs a smokescreen to make people forget about how s**t this country is".

Let's 'go compare'.....

1973: Tory government, recession, strikes, 3 day week, Princess Anne marries Captain Mark Phillips, ends in divorce.

1981: Tory government, recession, riots, mass unemployment, Prince Charles marries Lady Diana Spencer, ends in divorce.

1986: Tory government, massive gap between haves and have nots, Prince Andrew marries Sarah Ferguson, ends in divorce.

2011: Tory government, recession, mass unemployment, Prince William marries Kate Middleton....

Of course the best thing about it was getting an extra day off work, turning this into an extremely fab 4 day weekend. Again, despite my cynicism, I did tune in for curiosity value, to see "the dress" and the important parts of the ceremony. Kate was a stylish and graceful bride in a classic, timeless dress which was a million miles away from the bizarre creations of "Big Fat Gypsy Weddings" or indeed for that matter, Princess Diana's creased taffeta disaster from 30 years ago.

The most annoying thing for me about any royal wedding is the flag-waving lunacy, the street parties, and TV presenters knocking themselves out to see who can suck up to the royal family the most. It's the Last Night of The Proms gone mad, and the kind of "Britishness" which I just can't identify with, even though I'm a British citizen.

Despite my cynicism, I have to say that I wish the couple well and hope that they have a long and happy marriage which will weather the storm of life in the spotlight. The couple's relationship seems to be more 'real' and is built on a stronger foundation than some previous royal couplings, so maybe this one will work out and the fairytale wedding will have a happy ending.