Ten items or less

Would one of these items be a moose, perhaps?

Found this today: the supermarket shoppers of Kongsvinger in Norway got a bit more than they bargained for....check out http://www.nrk.no/nyheter/distrikt/hedmark_og_oppland/1.7208584 for video evidence!!

Bastille Day Boules Tournament

OK I know it's not Bastille Day yet (2 days to go!) but one of our little annual rituals is the Bastille Day Boules Tournament, an indoor event in which faithful travelling companion and myself compete to see who's best at mini-boules. As you do. We usually hold this event on or near 14th July every year, so tonight it was time for this year's contest!

It's been going on for a few years now but I can't remember ever mentioning it on the blog, so I thought it was about time too. For the past year I've been the reigning champion which has meant lots of gloating etc etc but my reign sadly came to an end tonight :( oh well same time next year eh!!

Musical accompaniment for this evening: Johnny Hallyday's "Sang Pour Sang" CD, which still sounds excellent even after 10 years in our respective record collections.

On the up.

In just under two hours the World Cup final will be starting: Holland v Spain, soundtracked by an orchestra of vuvuzelas....I'm going to miss vuvuzelas. Everyone hates them, but I actually quite like them. That seems to be the story of my life: I get on well with some people that others hate, I like music that others hate, and I like vuvuzelas. Probably because they appeal to my juvenile sense of humour: listening to a football match is like a whole stadium of people all breaking wind at once. Just as well it's not smell-o-vision.

Since the World Cup started, I've been parked in front of the TV most nights watching football, gorging on nibbles, and getting so fat that I'll soon be a prime candidate for a Channel 5 shock-doc. This also coincided with a period of extreme chronic back pain which meant I couldn't exercise, and a period of extreme stress which I decided to address by...comfort eating.

So now that the World Cup is over, there are no more excuses. Tomorrow the new regime starts, and this time I mean it!! Exercise, careful eating and staying focused - that's the plan.

I'm also quite excited by my return to full-time blogging next week :)

Same old, but that's ok

Weight stayed the same this week, didn't lose but didn't gain either.

Quite happy with that, after the three lunches and the comfort eating binge.

Back in the zone next week....

The summer of limited blogging, disappointing football and hating my hair

July already. Recent weeks have been very nice, weather-wise, you could almost call it a summer. And it even feels more like summer when you get the chance to get out of town and get down to the seaside, as I did yesterday (along with faithful travelling companion of course).



I've rediscovered Sunshimmer by Rimmel lately, which is a joy for someone like me who could very easily get mistaken for a milk bottle in an identity parade, and is the ideal short-term solution to avoiding fake tan disasters.

Putting EuropeCrazy (the blog) on hold for a few weeks (all things being well, it's back on 19th July) has allowed me to concentrate on some stuff at home - mainly decluttering, nothing too exciting - as well as the daily ritual of watching the World Cup, which has been one massive anti-climax so far. Although having said that, we've missed the football over the last couple of nights....normal service resumes tomorrow. And then it will be time for my favourite sporting event of the year: Le Tour, which begins on Saturday.

Happy summer things aside, I'm going through a lot of stress right now. (I'll give you a clue: in the work/life balance, it's not the life bit) On the one hand, I'm trying to get fit to deal better with it all, on the other hand I have completely crashed into a phase of comfort eating. You can't win :( But I am still very thankful that I have a job at all, in this current climate. And in spite of everything, I do like my job, and I work beside lots of lovely people too.

The thing I really hate at the moment is my hair. You can tell I'm not any happier with it since it was cut a few weeks ago. As time goes on it's beginning to resemble a bad footballer's mullet. *Stands in front of mirror and recites 'it will grow back.....it will grow back...."*

Result!

Week 2 of my 12 week fitness plan has come and gone, and incredibly I lost 2lbs this week. I say 'incredibly' as I didn't put so much hard work into it as last week, but I've still been good and resisted a lot of temptation.

Next week won't be so easy as between now and next Friday there will be three lunches, so I'll need to up the exercise quota. Getting there slowly: the power-crawl to work is on its way to becoming a power-walk again. Also my back injury is easing off a bit, which is good.

(almost) the longest day

Technically I shouldn't really be here, as EuropeCrazy and the Ramblings are "on a break" as they say, but what the heck...

Weather: it's been nice and dry and warm of late. That's all very well, but it means that we are treated to the sight of sunburnt men with bellies the likes of which were last seen in a labour ward.

Weight: I can't really speak about anyone's weight at the moment. The fact remains that I've gained half a stone and become significantly fatter since falling off the wagon at the end of March. So I started another '12 week plan' last week and have lost 1lb so far after a week's hard work and good behaviour.

Travel: the summer holiday 2010 discussions haven't started yet, but will start soon. At the moment I don't know where we'll end up!

Footie: The World Cup's been on for just over a week and I'm still waiting for it to come to life, as it's all been pretty uninspiring so far IMHO. There's been more attention paid to the aural torment of the vuvuzelas, which says a lot about the quality of the football on the pitch. Even the big guns are too inconsistent. And even the eye candy is disappointing :( Still hoping that Argentina win it.

But the worst thing of all = talentless morons masquerading as TV pundits. For everything of course, there's a Facebook group...http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=56636721228

Hacked off...

...my hair, that is. Yes, lots of my lovely long hair is gone after this morning's trip to the salon...got 3"" off the length, and there are now lots of choppy layers.

Maybe a bit too short for now, but it will grow out and that's when I become really happy with it.
Now off out again for retail therapy. The sun is shining, the weather is warm.....summer is here again (ok we've had three days of it, which is usually as much as we can expect)

EDIT 4.35 PM: Matalan was pretty rewarding, although one of these days I'll actually try on a sun-dress which is more flattering than all the ones around at the moment which make me look even fatter than I am already :(

That nice work-related thing

Which I can't really go into detail about, suffice to say that I was rewarded by the big bosses for a big piece of work which I did last year. I attended the presentation yesterday, at which I didn't know till then that I would have to give a little description of this work, to all the other recipients. Unfortunately brain and mouth were in separate universes yesterday and I was completely unprepared, so in "Come Dine With Me" style I'm only going to give myself about 4 out of 10 for this one :(

Still that doesn't matter - what does matter is that it's nice to get the recognition and be rewarded for your efforts.

Food, fitness and finding the way back

Off to our favourite local Indian restaurant tonight with faithful travelling companion. Both of us have not been looking after ourselves of late, and our fitness levels have dropped and our waistlines expanded :( anyway tonight was another descent down the slippery slope.

The good thing though is that tomorrow is a new day and it's a fresh start. Lately of course I've been laid low with some rather horrible back pain which has completely affected my ability to exercise at any level, but the last time this happened I actually found that the exercise helped, so hopefully it'll be the same this time. I've been a bit below par mentally, physically and emotionally over the last couple of weeks, so need to give myself a shake. Haven't even had the enthusiasm or the time to blog so much - I will catch up though :)

Anyway...summer came back again today after a week of relatively cool temperatures and horrible torrential rain yesterday, so it's an extra incentive to get back on track to get into those summer clothes!

Tapas

Off to the big city on Saturday for lunch and retail therapy with faithful travelling companion. Lunch meant tapas at La Tasca. Just realised that we have been going there for the past 9 years (gosh I feel old...!) anyway I haven't mentioned this on the blog before now so I thought it was about time I mentioned it. We are well and truly La Tasca addicts. The ambience is second to none, and for that hour or two you are transported from the dreary British clouds and rain to the Spanish sunshine, where the party vibe never ends. And why not? I thought I'd post a picture of La Tasca's Patatas Bravas, in my never-ending attempt to get into Blogs of Note (ha ha)

Weight-watching, Spring/Summer 2010: Week 1

It's all good :))

I lost 1 lb after just 5 days of careful eating, drinking water, eating fruit and abstaining from eating rubbish.

So well done me :D anyway it's been pretty difficult of late to get into a dieting/exercise regime due to my sore back/coccyx problem, so I suppose I did alright on my first week of my latest 12-week plan. 11 weeks to go....

Damage limitation twenty-ten

Feeling a bit irritable and argumentative tonight for some reason, I think it may be the stifling heat (yes you heard right) at EuropeCrazy HQ which has worn me down since my return from (cooler) Bratislava. Unfortunately all my horrible sinus problems have returned too :(

And if that's not enough, I stepped on the scales and discovered the full horror of the last eight weeks "Binge for Britain" which followed hot on the heels of "Slim For Sweden". Basically I spent eight weeks off the rails, and now I have to start paying. In sweat :(

So it was off to the garden for another instalment of damage limitation, 2010 style - I wouldn't call it gardening as it doesn't really deserve that term. Hopefully I've shifted an ounce or two today?? I'm not too worried though as I'm setting another realistic and achievable target to aim for - my summer holiday in mid-September, the planning and booking of which will be left to the last possible minute in case the ash cloud makes a comeback.

Anyway despite all of the above it was a good day today, and one particularly nice work-related thing happened, which gave me a much-needed boost.

Back.

Yes I made it to Bratislava.

And now I'm home. And feeling very, very, very tired today even though it wasn't really a tiring holiday.

As usual, there will be a review over at EuropeCrazy, but probably not until this time next week as it's Eurovision week and my attention will be elsewhere, I guess.

Back to work tomorrow :( but it's only a four day week so it shouldn't be too painful.

When will it all end?

Volcanic ash from Iceland is (allegedly) back, there's a risk of airports/British airspace (allegedly) closing over the next 3-4 days.

I'm going on holiday to Bratislava (allegedly) this coming Monday, this of course after the rescheduling of my previous holiday (two weeks ago) due to the threat of volcanic ash. So at the moment I am seriously p****d off at the realistic threat of a possible, proper cancellation. My sympathies are with everyone else who's been through the whole mess.

Being totally philosophical though, it's only a holiday, not a matter of life or death or anything. And at least I got over to Sweden a few weeks ago, for the holiday that really mattered :)))

Bank holiday weekend

Being a creature of habit, tonight would normally be the night before I head off to some European city for a short spring break with faithful travelling companion. Only this year it's not, therefore I can chill out and enjoy the long weekend instead.

After an uncharacteristic burst of energy earlier today, which went on some long-overdue housework stuff, I'm now back into lazy Sunday mode and the best part is, I don't have the "Sunday night feeling".

To whoever invented bank holiday weekends, I say, 'thank you'. Now if we only had some decent weather to go with it, instead of the never-ending clouds and rain we have to put up with :(

Three blogs and a Twitter

Being the mother of three blogs continues to be a challenge. The first-born continues to be barely maintained, which continues to cause me some grief; the middle child continues to be favoured and will be for the foreseeable future; and I'm just using the youngest to vent, and write about rubbish :)

Anyway, 2 May 2010 is my first Twitterversary = one year ago I joined Twitter, at 3.29 pm to be precise. At which time I was unwinding from pre-Düsseldorf preparations and watching the world snooker. So we come full circle. Back then it was red wine, iTunes, snacking, listening to Salem, blogging and tweeting. Nothing changes.

If I'm honest I don't tweet anywhere near my full potential, and just tend to use it for random nonsense and my endless quest for world domination for Salem. Which is a valid enough reason, I guess.

What will transpire over the tweeting-year ahead? Who knows? That's what makes it all so wonderful.

The World Cup....of crisps :D

The launch of a new series of crisp flavours by Walkers (the "Walkers Flavour Cup") is not good news for anyone trying to shift a few pounds, but as I'm going through a 'phase' at the moment when all my good work has completely gone to waste, I just had to try them in the interests of blog research :)

If you remember, Walkers previously tried this kind of new flavour thing a while back (which I also blogged about on here). Looking back, the flavours were all pretty vile really and none of them caught on. At least the new batch are much more agreeable, the ones I've tasted anyway, although some of them are hard to distinguish from each other. I may be a non beef eater but I do like beefy crisps though, so the Argentinian and English flavours are probably doing it for me.

But being EuropeCrazy after all, I'm also partial to a bit of German Sausage - "ooh er missus!!"

Haven't plucked up the courage to try Aussie BBQ Kangaroo yet though :)))

Bigger.

I finally plucked up the courage to weigh myself after four weeks of off-the-rails eating-rubbish-for-Britain.

Three pounds on. It doesn't sound that much, but I've ballooned.

In the immortal words of those philosophers The Divine Comedy, "it's hard to get by, when your a*se is the size of a small countreeeeeeee".

Mine is the size of Outer Mongolia :( diet starts again next Tuesday...

Saturday.

Which meant some long-overdue retail therapy in the big city, with faithful travelling companion. (And I wondered....why do you run out of all your cosmetics/toiletries at the same time??)

Nice Italian lunch, very agreeable vegetarian lasagne :) however on the down side, one of our favourite branches of Caffe Nero is closing. Really sad about this as it was one of the few coffee shops you could be guaranteed a seat in....maybe that's why it's closing I guess??

Tonight just chilled out with a mixture of "Who Dares Wins" and my weekly revisiting of "Phoenix Nights" - now onto series 2. Classic stuff.

And finally, all hail Morrisons Cheese & Onion Potato Skins, for they are truly wonderful ;)

Bratislava bound!!

Yes we are going to Bratislava in three and a bit weeks :))

Holiday Update!

I'm no longer going away on 3rd May and have decided to change my spring-break week to w/c 17th May, thus avoiding post-volcanic chaos for a little while....

Feeling quite happy today

You can tell how thrilling my life is at the moment, when I actually get excited about moving to a bigger desk at work! First day in the new (old) office and I just loved everything about it. Sitting right beside the window, with the blinds open - which is just perfect conditions for a long-time SAD sufferer :) and yes, that big desk is an ergonomic, spacious joy,with no more risk of smashing your knee to pieces every time you swivel round (unlike the last desk!!)

The work may not have changed, but after day 1, the verdict is: it's good to be home.

Volcanic ash cloud continues to spread :(

After last week's eruption in Iceland, the volcanic ash cloud continues to spread across Europe with no sign of abating : http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8627720.stm

With the closure of airspace all over Europe, and the uncertainty of when things will be back to normal, we decided not to book our spring break (due to depart two weeks from tomorrow) until we know what's happening.

Watch this space...

Needless to say the havoc created by the closure of airspace all over Europe has caused tempers to rise, and of course it has also created an unlikely internet celebrity - the "I Hate Iceland" guy from Edinburgh Airport :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34mHZgP9vkc

A significant day tomorrow

Some things which will make tomorrow just slightly more significant than the usual Friday...

At work, it's our section's last day in our current office within the building....for we are moving to another office along the corridor, which takes us full circle as we're going back into what was our original room when we moved into our current premises 11 years ago. I am the only original member left from that "class of 1999" and in a way it feels like going back home again...fingers crossed it will all go smoothly.

16th April is also a very special date for me and faithful travelling companion: it's the anniversary of when he asked me out for the first time. I won't tell you how long ago it was :) but of course this marked the beginning of a long, happy and very successful (if highly unconventional!) relationship which continues to this day.

However, there will be no fancy celebratory dinners tomorrow night because we've got work to do. Booking a spring break to be precise: we've reached our decision, just a couple of little things to clarify and hopefully it should be done and dusted tomorrow night!

Got a new obsession...!

I know I'm probably about 3 years behind everyone else but last night I finally discovered Google Street View. Within about 5 minutes I was obsessed with it. Now my mum's obsessed with it too - we can't wait for our next "virtual tour".

Sunshine! (Part 2)

Two dry, sunny days in a row. We're definitely not used to it :)

Unfortunately this was enough to bring out all the summer-fashion-casualties whom I witnessed whilst out shopping at lunchtime. It was enough to make me bring up my lentil soup, and bearing in mind that I wasn't feeling too great again today, then that wouldn't have taken much!

Not really much to report otherwise...I'm still having a bit of a job adjusting back into reality after my Swedish trip. Reality pretty much sucks actually, it's boring me right now, and I can't be bothered with it. I treasure my nightly escape into blog-land....

Sunshine!

I'd forgotten what a blue sky or sunshine actually looked like after all these months of snow and rain! Yes the sun is shining, the sky is blue and I've been overwhelmed to turn my blog from withered brown to bright green as a celebration of spring. But, like the weather, it's subject to change. I'd actually been experimenting with new, non-Blogger-supplied templates today but it was all too complicated so it was back to something I felt more comfortable with.

It's been a nice weekend and the good news is that it's set to continue.

Holiday-planning is still ongoing, and there should be an announcement by the end of the coming week. The previous front-runner has now been overtaken by another front-runner!

Got lots of other things to do this week so there will be minimal blogging.

See ya!

Woo-freakin'-hoo.

So there's gonna be a general election in 4 weeks time. Which is a good cue to switch off every news programme on TV for the next 4 weeks. Because after just one day's coverage I feel as if I've been beaten senseless by political pundits who would win a gold medal if speculation was ever to become an Olympic sport.

Yet despite my increasing political apathy I have always voted since I was 18 years old, never missed a single election, even those boring council polls where about only 15 people turn up to vote (yes, I was one of that 15, my mum was yet another). So once again I will do my duty, and even if none of them reflect my political views any more, I will still cast my vote regardless :)

Still in search of va-va-voom.

It would appear that my 'get up and go' has 'got up and gone', and it's taking a while for me to get back to feeling ok again - I'm still tired and sleepy, lacking in energy, and completely uninspired by yet another day of torrential rain and high winds.

My mum's still not feeling well either at the moment and that's getting me down too :(

Anyway I managed to summon up enough energy today to do the annual alphabeticising of my CD collection. Which apparently is one of the danger signs of being an obsessive-compulsive control freak. Hmm. Yes I'll admit to being a control freak, which can be my downfall at times. But obsessive-compulsive....nope. I haven't reached that stage yet: I'm far too messy :)

Zzzzzzz....

There is this contrast going on at the moment: the previous post covered my state of mind, this one covers my current state of health.

So here I am, the night before the Easter holiday long-weekend. I'm lucky enough to be off work tomorrow and Monday. I should be feeling full of beans but quite frankly I'm not. Like everyone around me, I fell victim to that viral-infection-thingy-with-no-name at the beginning of last week (severe headaches/high temperatures/persistent cough), thankfully I didn't get the version with the added sickness, which my mum got.

Anyway I recovered in time for Sweden, however since coming back I seem to have been hit with a post-viral bout of fatigue and a general flatness and my face isn't chalk white anymore, it's grey :(

All of this has not been helped by three days of weather misery: torrential rain, snow, sleet and unrelenting cold. However I'm not going to let it get me down and am planning lots of nice retail therapy tomorrow and Saturday, along with copious amounts of blogging, red wine and nibbles over the weekend.

Have a happy Easter y'all !!!!

Trying to re-adjust to reality, but failing miserably

Sorry but can I just stay in my little bubble of happiness for a while yet? I am still on this incredible euphoric high after last weekend, and would be quite happy to feel this way forever. Life is just an irritating little intrusion at the moment and I can't really be bothered with the mundane stuff. Like work, and housework, and...stuff.

Would be very happy to devote my life to flying back and forward to Sweden and taking in every Salem Al Fakir concert ever. I can dream can't I..... :))

Ra ra ah-ah-ah, roma, ah-ah-ah...

Sorry, just listening to "Bad Romance", I am obsessed by that song and I've now got it as a calendar-reminder on my phone too....

Anyway I digress. This will be my last random-ramble before going to Sweden tomorrow. I'm planning to update Planet Salem from an internet cafe while I'm there though (fingers crossed) and will be back here either on Sunday night or definitely at some point on Monday.

See you all soon....

I gotta feeling...

That Friday night's gonna be a good good night!

I'm flying over to Gothenburg on Thursday, going to Salem Al Fakir's concert on Friday, can't wait, too excited to put it into words :) anyway it will be good to be back in Sweden again - record shops, meatballs, Swedish cider-tasting.....it's all good.

Now all I have to do is recover from whatever is wrong with me, it's not really a cold or a flu but it's been pretty horrible today although feeling a wee bit better tonight....anyway I've taken enough Strepsils and Co-codamol for one day, so I'm off to bed in a few minutes. "1000 Miles" by H.E.A.T. is playing on Rix FM at the moment so I'll listen to that first, it always reminds me of m Gothenburg trip from 11 months ago :)

Bad timing :(

Feeling pretty unwell today, nasty cough has developed over the last 12 hours into a general feeling of yuckiness, which I could do without so near to my holiday.

At work just now....hoping today goes in quickly and I'll get some rest tonight.

And as if that wasn't enough I had a freaky fall at home last night. Result = two cut knees and a badly bruised foot :(

Bullseye!

I hit my mini-target weight today! I'd set myself this little goal to reach the same weight I was when I went over to Sweden last year, so needless to say I'm chuffed to bits today :)

Can you be calm and hyper at once?

That's how I feel at the minute, with 10 days to go. I haven't really got my control-freak tendency into gear yet, so it's probably time I got into list-making mode and decide what clothes, make-up etc that I'm taking to Gothenburg with me.

The other dilemma: black nail polish or fake French manicured nails? Black is winning at the moment.

Really want to wear the new boots to Gothenburg too, but will have to break them in beforehand.

Having a nice relaxing night, still got all those Sanctuary spa goodies left over from Christmas so I've been treating myself to a nice little pampering session :)

But on the other hand I'm extremely hyper now, as my holiday's getting closer...I've also been on best diet-and-exercise behaviour today, which is more than can be said for the weekend...!

Retail therapy!!!

Other things happened on Saturday 13.03.10 too....

I didn't realise it would be so difficult getting my hands on a bag for my big 17" widescreen laptop, but happily I found one at last - an affordable one too, even better.

Which left me more cash to splash on a nice new flowery-patterned long top (short dress?) and I finally tracked down those elusive black quilted patent leather boots which I've dreamed of owning for so long.. if you want to see what they look like, check out http://www.quizclothing.co.uk/footwear/2205009818.html

Who ate all the pies?

Inevitably the good run had to end: I gained 1 lb this week, which has ever so slightly jeopardised my grand plan to reach my mini-target.

But never fear! There's always next week. When it will be time for

DRASTIC MEASURES!! (well, a bit more effort anyway)

Some thoughts from today

It started off very badly with a recurring household repair/emergency resulting in me having to take a day off work, but at least I tried to make the best of my sitting-around-waiting time by continuing to learn new wonderful things about my new(ish) phone, and continuing to catch up with my Winter Olympics backlog (only a week of it still to watch - that's the worst of living in a different time zone)

And still in gadgets-ville, some good news: last weekend I made the decision to buy a new computer - a laptop - replacing my trusty but now failing desktop dinosaur (born 2001, and soon to depart 2010). After much deliberation and comparing which resulted in my eyes almost popping out my head last night, the decision was made to go for a state of the art futureproof model - which presumably means that it won't become obsolete until, ooh, at least April 2010.

Anyway it's due to arrive tomorrow!

So I probably won't be around too much in the next few days as I'll be bonding with the new arrival, installing programs, getting my internet up and running and the like...between now and Friday I'll probably do most of my blogging and tweeting from work.

Same old

...which is actually quite good. My weight stayed the same this week, which is kind of inexplicable considering I had a week off my efforts to lose weight, and which weren't helped any by a couple of things: going out for a lovely three course dinner on Tuesday night with faithful travellling companion before an equally lovely theatre show, and working late a couple of nights therefore I didn't fit the post-work exercise session in.

Four weeks till Sweden, and normal service will be resumed on Monday with water, walking, Weight Watchers soup, more exercise, and discipline, discipline, discipline.

Off tomorrow for some retail therapy, which should provide some more motivation ha ha :)

Stress, sick computers and Swedish stuff

That kind of sums up my life at the minute.

There are not enough hours in the day: I am, officially, stressed out.

Then there is the small matter of my old geriatric home computer not working properly. The internet is hanging by a thread but a combination of haywire-drivers and a load of little problems all turning into one big problem means only one thing...a reformat could be on the cards. On the plus side, at least I've backed up everything on the external drive - but on the down side it means I'll lose all my updated programs and (sob) iTunes which will need reinstalled.

Bit of deja vu now: as with almost the same time last year, my firstborn blog EuropeCrazy is running on a very limited service at the moment as everything is being concentrated on Planet Salem for the foreseeable future (well, the next 4-5 weeks in any case). Normal service will be resumed at some point, I've got a big backlog of old posts which I'm going to publish at some point, I just don't know when.

And I've now got an Olympics backlog to watch!

Bear with me ;)

Weight-watching update

Another Friday, another weigh-in...and another pound off. Yay!!!!

My "Slim for Sweden" campaign is really getting results now and heading in the right direction as I get closer to my mini-target with five weeks to go. Just one thing though: why is it that the weight still doesn't fall off the bits you want it to, and vice versa? Still, I'm very happy today :))

At least we're spared....

...the annual ludicrous ritual of overpriced bouquets of flowers being delivered to the workplace to very insecure people so that they can boast that they are loved "this much" and you, well, aren't. Little do they know how pathetic it all is :) If Valentine's Day has to exist at all, then Sunday is probably the best day for it I guess.

The unconventional nature of my long-term relationship means that I won't actually see faithful travelling companion today, but we did exchange cards, our one concession to commercialism.

Friday

Seeing a lot less of me: six and a half inches less in the last six weeks to be precise. Weight loss is nice, but this is even nicer. After feeling totally rubbish yesterday (which I can only attribute to Wednesday night's meal, sad to say, as there are no other explanations), I felt good today. And I was off work. And I went to the big city with faithful travelling companion, who annually commemorates his birthday with a few days off work. Nice. Which explains why I'm not hanging out with him tonight, and therefore blogging instead.

Think I may be having a midlife crisis, as my skirts are getting shorter, although still dignified enough not to look completely mutton/lamb ridiculous. (I think)

What if you win, wouldn't it be weird? OK I know this is not the place for it, but I keep reliving last week's Melodifestivalen over and over again, in a Groundhog Day-style repeat. I had a dream last night that you-know-who won Melodifestivalen, and several weeks down the line there are millions of people all over the world watching him destroy the opposition at Eurovision, and in one fell swoop, the job is done, and all my campaigning since 2007 is justified. Voila! The arrival of, potentially, a worldwide star. It can be done.

Tomorrow? Got a free day. Not shopping, not hanging out anywhere with anyone. Will make effort to do some worthwhile stuff at home. But Winter Olympics in Vancouver starting, so may put life on hold for the foreseeable future. Still hate curling though.

We're gonna party like it's your birthday

Well, maybe not quite, but a night out at our favourite local Indian restaurant was a more than agreeable way to spend the evening with faithful travelling companion, to celebrate his birthday today.

Which was rather lovely. What probably won't be lovely for my work colleagues tomorrow will be the lingering aroma of garlic, leaking from every pore of my body :)

Red sky at night / The joy of blogging

It was probably one of those occasions when I should have taken a photo on my all-singing all-dancing new phone, but instead I was too busy rushing down the road on my way home from work. It's a joy to be coming home in daylight (well, almost dusk) instead of darkness. Anyway I looked up at the sky and I was captivated for a moment by the clouds, which looked like grey waves lapping against the shore, and there was a little red border around each one. And no before you ask, I haven't been on the sherry trifles, but sometimes the strangest little freaks of nature just stop you in your tracks and that's what happened early this evening.

Busy but happy times at the moment. I know that blogging is only a hobby and probably shouldn't mean too much in the grand scheme of things, but it has opened up a whole exciting world for me and brought me a lot of happiness. The last week has particularly been wonderful and incredibly surreal: due to Salem's appearance in Melodifestivalen, this resulted in record visiting figures to Planet Salem since Saturday. It's delightful when you realise that other people are reading a blog which you initially started for your own interest - whether it's one person or a thousand. It's not an ego thing, but the joy of realising that other people like the same things that you do, and you're not really alone in your interest after all. Life, once again, is good.

The diet's about to take a hammering this week though, thanks to the double-whammy of faithful travelling companion's birthday tomorrow (and the resulting dinner at our fave local Indian eaterie) and then I'm taking a day off work on Friday and hanging out with him in the big city. Which of course means lunch.

It's only a minor blip though: I'm now into an exercise routine and also walking to and from work again!

So what's been happening in the life thing then???

Sunday: sickness bug. Not good, day ruined :(

Monday: training. Not delivering it this time, but on the receiving end. Very productive.

Tuesday-Friday: Catch-up / major work stress :(

Friday: Weight loss: 1 lb (add to previous week's 2 lb weight loss: it's all going well)

Saturday: Housework / wallpapering / Melodifestivalen = taking relentless happiness to a whole new level and the realisation that this blogging thing truly changes your life after all :)))

In it for the long haul

In "The Virtual Revolution", a documentary about the history of the internet screened on BBC2 in Saturday night, it was claimed that 90% of all the new blogs created since 2002 are now dormant.

I think that's quite sad really, although understandable in a way. It's a very time-consuming hobby(although ultimately rewarding, well for me anyway) but I think it's something you should stick with, life permitting.

Now all I need is the spare time to keep them all going :)

Well this has just been one exciting week!

Got the training out of the way, which went well.

Then it was on to the real serious stuff - booking my trip to Gothenburg in 8 weeks time to go over and see Salem in concert. There were a couple of snags/hitches to begin with, but everything went well and I've now got flights, hotel and concert tickets booked!

Ironically, this happened on the same day as the announcement of Salem's new album being released so Wednesday was such an exciting day!!

After weeks of reckless gorging I've decided to lose a bit of weight and have been good this week. Result this morning = 2 lbs lost. Which may not be much for some people but that's major for me.

And I'm getting my (very long) hair cut tomorrow.

Good times :)))

It's not that it's easy, we just make it look that way

Been feeling a bit more tense than usual of late. Among other things, the time has come again for me to tutor another training course tomorrow and my stomach feels as if it's tied in triple-knots at the thought of standing up and delivering a course to a large group of people, only a couple of whom I know. The hardest thing about all this for me is the time-management aspect, trying to fit it in with what is a very stressful time workwise at the moment. Oh and the other tough bit is slotting all the course content into reasonable timeslots over the two days. It may look easy but there's a lot of work goes into it to make the event run smoothly.

My heightened state of agitation has had an impact on my relationships with my closest loved ones: I wouldn't want to hang out with me at the moment, I'm even getting on my own nerves. Got some other potentially stressful stuff over the next week and then things should hopefully be easing off a little.

Stuff worth looking forward to: the Planet Salem Gothenburg 2010 Adventure.

Only eight weeks to go!! Planning is underway but it's already hit a slight snag which I really hope can be resolved as I want to get everything booked before this week is over. And if it all works out I'll be so excited that I'll probably burst. Which would probably save me having to crash-diet :)

All decluttered out.

OK so there wasn't much relaxing after all as I spent the best part of the day continuing to declutter my bedroom. I suppose you'd still describe it as cluttered, but only with furniture and my sprawling CD collection. There is not a magazine, a mess of USB cables, a takeaway menu or a piece of unopened junk mail in sight. I'm tired now, but very happy; it's been a productive day.

Not so happy that I'm back at work tomorrow though :( still it's not long till the weekend :)

Blue Monday? What Blue Monday?

Apparently some psychologist came up with this formula that today, the third Monday in January, is the most depressing day of the year, when the realisation kicks in that you can't pay all those Christmas bills, you can't keep your new year resolutions, the weather is rubbish, the nights are still dark etc etc.

The one thing about throwing yourself into home improvements is that you forget all of the above for a while! Today was a very good day. Day off work for new blinds being fitted on our new windows so everything is nice and clean and new and lovely. Now that's done I could put my room back together, although as Operation "Declutter EuropeCrazy HQ" continues, I ended up spending the evening throwing more stuff out.

Extremely tiring day though, so off to sleep shortly! Even better is that tomorrow is another day off work, so will probably do a bit less housework and a bit more relaxing. Zzzzzzzz......

Snow = gone.

Yep, it's all gone. Finally. After almost five weeks.

Lots of rain came during the night on Friday and finally washed the snow and the three-inch-thick ice away, which deserves a great big woo-hoo!!

It's still very cold though, so my big red waterproof Trespass jacket will no doubt see much more action before the winter is out.

More to follow ....!

Touchy!

It's not been all bad news over the last few days though, as I've got me a new phone, one of those state of the art today, obsolete tomorrow, touch-screen phones. Which is surprisingly easy to use, (even with my index finger all plastered up following a horrible accident at home last Friday) and it might even help me to text quicker. Being the world's slowest texter, that's a tall order :)

Anyway it's got 'widgets' and a decent camera and I've even got some music on it, even if it's only five songs just now, all by the same person. Yes, that one.

Which brings me to a conversation earlier tonight with the eternally technophobic faithful travelling companion:

Me: "I've got a tune from a certain Swedish musical genius as my ringtone."

Him: "Basshunter!"

The return of...pavements!

The last 48 hours have just brought more personal lows (and extreme lows in some cases), leading me to believe that the beginning of 2010 reminds me more of 2007 (yes that bad) anyway I'm looking on the brighter side today.

Pavements are back! Yes finally after four weeks of snow, the pavements have begun to re-emerge. I'd forgotten what they looked like, and indeed forgot how to walk on them - got so used to walking that funny way you do on snow and ice.

The world's most insignificant Christmas lights are still up and still lit in my town. Have they not heard of Twelfth Night? No wonder we get so much bad luck :)

Windows 2010 / Frozen Britain / Buffering / Phone....

Taking a bit of "chill out" time which in these temperatures takes on a new meaning!

I'm not referring to some new operating system, but actually to the new windows at EuropeCrazy HQ which are very nice and functional and ...new, but there is so much else to be done, involving continued upheaval over the space of the coming week which means normality and blogging and stuff is on hold yet again.

FROZEN BRITAIN! yells the headline scrolling across the screen of all our news channels. As this country is totally rubbish and can't get anything right, we're therefore subject to salt shortages. (I wonder what the implications are for chip shops across the UK???? What will you have with your vinegar??) Anyway there's a grit shortage, cars are skidding and crashing, people are falling and fracturing limbs, and we've been looking out at the same snow/ice which has refused to shift since about mid-December. Still, it could be so much worse. You could live in a part of Russia which is -40 degrees. Wonder how they cope? Better than us, I should imagine.

What's been annoying me today? Constant buffering on YouTube, and not being able to watch the Norsk Melodi Grand Prix because I don't have this super-duper-fast internet connection.

On the plus side, I got my new touch screen phone on Friday, which is going to take me about 5 years to actually learn how it works, ha ha.

And one more thing: woolly hats with pom-poms totally rule.

Festive season = officially over.

Today we took the Christmas tree and decorations down, so I suppose that signals the end of the festive season then. Took my false nails off too, which also usually signals the end of the festive season. Typing will now get easier, which is a total relief when you make your living as a typist ha ha!!

Although it is still very "Christmassy" outside as we had yet another day of snow and there is no sign of it going away either....

The forthcoming window replacement has given us a good reason to de-clutter and clear out the house. This has been hectic but strangely therapeutic: I should do this more often rather than putting off until tomorrow what can be done next week. :)

A brief farewell....

As with my other two blogs I decided to post my new year greetings tonight. I just want to wish everyone a happy new year and all the best for 2010.

I'm taking a break for a couple of weeks as something has come up at home (nothing bad, just a sudden home-improvement thing which came out of the blue, we were expecting it but just not this early!) and it will require a lot of upheaval over the next week or so, therefore I'll be very busy and won't have time to blog until Monday 11th January, when I should be back in blog-land if things all go to plan.

In the meantime.....HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

We got chills, they're multiplying

ITV News tonight: "The wintry weather is back".

Ummm......excuse me, for some of us it hasn't been away! Freezing/below freezing temperatures and snow which refuses to melt is now the norm for us. This has resulted in the realisation that none of our winter fashion boots are actually up to the job of coping with this weather, so that's led to an acute shortage of wellies as people rush to the shops to snap up some very colourful patterned boots which would otherwise remain on shoe shop shelves from one festival season to another.

Let's go back, way back, into the mists of time. When such things as gritter lorries existed, and you had things like grit salt bins. Back in the day they used to clear the pavements so that we pedestrians could actually walk on them; now every day is like an audition for "Dancing on Ice" - although most of us are more Todd Carty than Torvill and Dean :))))

Sales success.

My first outing to the 2009 post-Christmas sales today, and it was very successful too - new skirt, knitwear, handbag, jewellery, bath stuff and the long-awaited skinny jeans. Now you know that I'd previously bought a pair in the summer sales but they were too small for me when I bought them. This time I wasn't making that mistake and made sure I bought a pair which were a good fit to begin with.

Thank goodness for shops that do petite ranges: it's not always easy finding jeans when you're only a 29" leg. And another thing....why do jeans manufacturers assume that if you're a size 16 then you must be about 5ft 10" tall????

Anyway I got my new jeans, so rant over. Good old Dorothy Perkins.

I'll have to wait till next week to head off to the big city for part 2 of my sales adventures: in the meantime it's back to work tomorrow, aah the joys of living in a town with no decent shops :(

And it's very, very, very, very cold tonight, there is no sign of the week-old snow melting and the pavements are so icy now that only Torvill and Dean would be able to negotiate them!!

That happy post-Christmas feeling.

I hope you all had a great Christmas and that it was everything you wished for.

I had a very enjoyable time, no change to the usual Christmas routine but that's the way we like it! Got lots of lovely presents and also lots of money to buy some more goodies in the sales!!

We are still surrounded by snow: it's been so cold that last week's snow hasn't melted, and there are little daily top-ups of new snow too. The temperature tonight is forecast to drop to -5 degrees which is pretty cold for this country but that's nothing compared to other parts of the world which are much worse, and they just get on with it.

I haven't been out for a few days but will finally venture out tomorrow - wrapped up in my fabulous new cosy scarf which I got for Christmas - to check out the sales, which as usual will probably be rubbish and I'll moan relentlessly that there's nothing in the clothes shops but size 8s and 10s which they haven't been able to shift for months - however they may yet surprise me :)))

Sweden in the snow

http://www.webbkameror.se/ is an absolutely brilliant website, packed with webcam views of towns and cities all over Sweden. Here's some pictures which I found tonight, of Malmö, Skövde and Norrköping respectively:

It's not only the goose who's getting fat :)))

The downside to ditching Christmas party nights, apart from denying myself the opportunity to get all glammed up, is the lack of motivation to slim down to fit into a flashy party frock. Oh well.

Over the last few weeks there's been no motivation at all, combined with those two colds which floored me, which means that my waist has completely vanished and I'll need to send out a search party. Now it's Christmas holiday week which has completely opened the floodgates: spare tyres all over the place, spots (which I'm not usually prone to) and the realisation that I'll need to buy a pair of skinny jeans which actually fit, rather than those ones I bought a few months ago which were too tight when I bought them - you get the idea, "I'll slim into them" but you never do. Bad idea.

But do you know something? The diet can wait. It's Christmas!!

Walking in a winter wonderland

Well not exactly, I didn't go out today and decided just to stay in, do some tidying up and watch the snow falling outside.

Yes we have had snow for six consecutive days now and the prospect of a white Christmas is a very real possibility. It's also very cold at the moment. Brrr!

The snow may be nice to look at, but it can also cause havoc and disruption, which is spreading across the continent at the moment : http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8425805.stm

...IT'S CHRISTMAS!!!!!

• Only 5 shopping days left. Do shopping malls really need to open till midnight? Why are people so disorganised? It's not as if Christmas has just appeared by surprise. We know it's happening, like, every year.


• As previously mentioned in 2008, my hometown has recycled the world's most insignificant Christmas lights for another underwhelming season. You know that your town's Christmas lights are seriously rubbish when neighbouring villages have better lights than your apology for a "town".


• Yet again I passed on the whole party night/Secret Santa/Christmas lunch thing and didn't feel like I missed out on anything. (Certainly didn't miss out on copious amounts of Quality Street scoffed with a couple of my colleagues whilst we covered in the office yesterday when everyone else was away for Christmas lunch.....!)


• This week I got some very lovely Christmas presents from my boss and friends at work and truly appreciate their warmth and friendship (and extremely good taste) - it's great to be part of such a lovely group of people and it's a pleasure to spend every working day with them. Here's my lovely big Yankee Candle set which already has pride of place in my living room:

• Mum and I had our annual trip to the panto today which was fab and funny and maximum entertainment. Oh yes it was!!!! That's one Christmas tradition which we always enjoy.


• Tomorrow = wrapping presents and then putting them all under the tree. So I probably won't really be around blogland till later tomorrow....


• One more thing - I'm now on holiday! Finished work yesterday and won't be back at my desk till Tuesday 29th!!!!!! Hoping to have a reasonably chilled out week.

And so, ladies and gentlemen, that concludes the Christmas shopping for 2009.

Yes they think it's all over....it is now.

Today I took some time out of work to go and do the last 'loose ends' of my Christmas shopping for this year. As usual, I've gone into control freak mode but it's been all very relaxing so far and the one thing I refuse to do is panic, unlike some people I could mention!!

In other news, I'm still feeling slightly under the weather, although finally getting better.

Being a Libran, 'indecisive' is of course my middle name, but once I bring myself to a decision it is set in stone and no going back. Last night I made a decision: I'm going to get a new mobile phone at the start of next year. One of those nice touch-screen ones, which do everything from taking good quality pictures and playing mp3s to possibly making the tea (well you never know.....).

As a tortoise would probably beat me in a texting competition, I wonder if a touch-screen phone would make me text any faster???? (Ummm.....probably not)

That 'why I haven't posted here' post

Basically I've not been feeling very well over the past two weeks. A few weeks ago I caught a really nasty cold which took me three weeks to recover from, then I caught the very same cold again almost two weeks ago. Because I've got sinus trouble, all my colds then develop into horrible sinus infections which go on for another week, where you feel sick all the time as if your body is full of green poisonous goo. Sorry to be so graphic, but that's the best description I can think of.

Happily I finally feel today as if I'm on the mend, but now my mum's got a very nasty throat infection and she's lost her voice. She's been looking after me over the past week, but now it's role reversal time again and I'm going into carer mode again.

I won't be posting much this week apart from the 2009-50 chart on EuropeCrazy and the live concert updates on Planet Salem, so maybe I might fit a couple of posts in here along the way. Counting down the days till I finish up at work for pre-Christmas leave: only 9½ working days to go. Yippppeeeee!

(sniff)

So what, I hear you ask (or maybe not), am I doing online on a Friday night when this is usually spent in the company of faithful travelling companion?

Two reasons: 1) FTC is not here tonight, he is over in Dublin staying with friends.
2) I'm not in Dublin, but here at EuropeCrazy HQ with paracetamol, Strepsils, hankies stuffed up my nose....yep, I have the cold. Again. So much for my fitness regime and daily multivitamin intake blah blah blah. Haven't even got over the last one and here we are again. I've had this cold since Tuesday. Wednesday was probably the worst day then it seemed to be going but now it came back with a vengeance this afternoon; am now feeling thoroughly miserable so am going to be a bit responsible (for a change) and get to bed early.

Normal blog service to be resumed (fingers crossed) soon....

Umbrella, ella, ella, eh, eh, eh

When is this rain going to stop???!!!!

Happy days, in the real and virtual worlds

Haven't posted on here recently, not just because I'm busy with the other two blogs but mainly because it's been a very tense time of late - the last few months (and particularly the last few weeks) had brought a period of new uncertainty over my mum's health, and it's been a stressful and unsettled time. Today however, she got the all-clear. To say that we are both happy and relieved is probably an understatement, and it's just the best feeling in the world to know that she can now relax and go back to getting on with enjoying life.

Back in the virtual world of blog-land, it has also been an amazing week, thanks to some news from Sweden two days ago, which has been well documented at EuropeCrazy and Planet Salem. The Melodifestivalen announcement was particularly amazing as it was the moment when my two blog-worlds collided!!

Yes, once again, life is good :))))

Twenty years later...

If we need any proof that we're getting older and time is flying by faster than ever, then it's been brought into very sharp focus for me over the last few days as I've been watching various TV shows, video clips and radio shows reminiscing about the fall of the Berlin Wall. Today the 20th anniversary of the opening of the East German border is being commemorated, and I know this sounds like an old cliche but it feels so recent and fresh in the memory.

I was very interested to read recently that although 20 years have passed since the barriers were broken down and the subsequent reunification of the 'two Germanys', there is still a vast difference between the standard of living in the east and west sides of the country. A business has grown up around the idea of 'Ostalgie' - nostalgia for some aspects of the old East German way of life - not the surveillance by the Stasi, but anything from food brands to Trabant cars to TV shows.

It may seem like a retro-chic trend, but for those who have not been dealt a good hand by the arrival of capitalism, unemployment and seeing their country being wiped off the European map, you may begin to understand why there's a genuine nostalgia for what they remember as the positive aspects of day-to-day life in their 'old country' - full employment and community spirit to name two.

20 years ago today. I think about people who are just reaching, say, their 20th birthday. They have grown up in a world where Europe wasn't divided by the 'iron curtain', no Berlin Wall, no German Democratic Republic, no Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia, no Soviet Union....it will all feel like distant history for them. A city divided by a wall? A continent divided by opposing ideologies? Seems unthinkable now, but the post-war/'Cold War' period of history should never be forgotten, and that we should always learn lessons from history. There may be no physical 'walls' now,or 'Iron Curtains', but the walls of nationalism and extremism are being built higher and higher across our continent. They're the walls that need to be knocked down, before it's too late.

07.11.09. That would be Sir Cliff then, singing Mistletoe and Wine.

It's here.

Just the other day I happened to mention that there hadn't been any Christmas songs on, during any recent bouts of retail therapy. Good.

Until today that is. I decided to head off to the big city on my own, as today was a bit of a research trip - checking out what's on offer a) to buy for Christmas presents and b) to suggest to Santa what I might like....anyway it was a bit of a marathon which took its toll, so I'll be having an early night and not blogging into 2am or thereabouts. It was a pretty successful and productive day: the Christmas shopping has officially begun.

Now I love Christmas, so don't think that you have a bah-humbug thing going on here, but I think there should be an embargo on Christmas songs being played in shops until, say, the beginning of December at least. At this time of the year I feel really sorry for those who work in the retail trade, being subjected to the same old musical classics/turkeys (delete where appropriate) year after year.

Anyway I went into BHS and was greeted by..."Christmas time, mistletoe and wine" and my heart immediately sank. That's it started now, there is no escape until 25.12.2009. There's a lot to be said for iPods.

Talking of which, I called mine into action on the bus home, as I had the world's loudest man sitting behind me, yelling into his mobile phone for the most part of the journey. The best part was that brief few moments of silence when he lost the signal..... :)))))

Yes the bath is full of seaweed, don't panic

I seem to be enjoying some little luxuries these days and why not? I've already developed an obsession with Yankee Candle wax tarts, which are highly fragranced blobs of wax which you put in the top of an oil burner, heat below with a tealight candle, the wax melts and your living space is suddenly filled with your aroma of choice. My favourites at the moment are too many to mention but I particularly love Cranberry Chutney. Home Sweet Home smells like cinnamon balls, if you remember them, Frosted Pumpkin smells like gingerbread, and tonight I'm trying out Black Cherry which also appeals to me as I love fruity/citrus smells.

Another thing I've recently got into: Lush bath ballistics, which are a very luxurious essential oil-filled alternative to bubble bath. However I probably won't buy the Big Blue again, purely for the fact that it's got seaweed through it, and leaves the bath in one great big seaweedy mess. At least Avobath and Blackberry are less messy. (I quite fancy some of their special edition Christmas range though, so watch this space) By the way, the Lush website tells us that it's only 53 sleeps to Christmas. A reassuring thought ....!

Something to look forward to!

My dream of making it back to Sweden to see Salem play live again next March has just got that little bit closer, as it looks as if there will be flights to and from Gothenburg from one of my local airports after all :)

I know it's tempting fate, mentioning and thinking about it so early when there could still be some obstacles in the way, but I want to make it happen the same way I did earlier this year.

And why not? Life's too short, and every day something happens to remind me of that, so I'm just going to do all the things I want to do, while I'm reasonably young and fit enough :)))

Five months to go till another dream comes true...... :)))))))))

Dare I say triumphant?

So another Tuesday meant another of my presentations at the weekly admin staff development sessions...only this time it was with a difference as I was attending a) for the full day and b) with my own admin group, so I had mixed feelings as on the one hand I was playing to the 'home team' where the subject matter would have much more relevance than in previous weeks - on the other hand I felt more pressure for the same reason.

As it turned out it all went very well and was received even more positively than I'd expected or hoped for. Being someone who's terrified by the thought of public speaking, it's been an amazing learning process and my confidence has grown over the weeks. Rating myself X Factor-style, the first couple of weeks I'd probably have put myself in the bottom two and voted myself off, but this is now the 5th one and on this performance I'm definitely through to next week's show (OK I'm not doing next week, but you get the idea).

It was an enjoyable day and I'm glad it went well. Now back to reality (work) tomorrow and trying to balance an ever increasing workload....

BST 2009, RIP / Clearout time! / Croak croak / 3lbs off

So British Summer Time is officially over. The clocks went back last night, it's 6pm and it's dark outside. If like me you suffer from 'SAD' syndrome, with a depression heightened by a lack of natural daylight, the period between the end of October and the end of March can be terrible at times. Having said that I managed to get through the whole of last winter without too many episodes of it, and am hoping for the same this year. Just need to keep myself occupied - won't have any problem with that as there is always lots to do!

Like one outstanding job which took all day today and couldn't wait any longer: the wardrobe/drawers clearout, to make room for my new autumn/winter clothes. There is now a very large pile of clothes in the corner of my bedroom which will be going off to the charity shops and hopefully their next owner will enjoy wearing them as much as I did.

The blogging is also very good therapy: there's always lots to write about at this time of year so it also takes my mind off the winter blues.

I have one horrible leftover from last week's cold-from-hell: can't stop coughing and my voice regularly breaks into a croak. My poor mum, whose list of health problems just seems to be getting longer and longer, now also has the very same cold too. As if she's not got enough to worry about :(

Good news: lost 3lbs last week. After quitting Weight Watchers I'm now on what I call the 'Frank Sinatra Plan' - I'm doing it 'My Way' (!) and not following any particular diet this time. As I wasn't well enough to exercise I just watched what I was eating and drank lots of water. Loving fruit at the moment, particularly raspberries which are just my most favourite fruit and as my dieting chums say that they are a particular 'fat burner'. There's quite a bit to burn so they will have their work cut out :)))) At least now I'm feeling better so I'm going to start exercising again this week.

Rotten cold, day 7....but there may be blogging ahead

I need the "Big Brother" voiceover for this one: "Day 7 in the 'rotten cold' house".

It finally got too much to take and I was sent home sick from work yesterday, as I reached the point where I couldn't function any more.

The rest of my day and night consisted of paracetamol, throat lozenges, and lots of sleep and rest. Anyway I'm feeling a lot better today, at least the extreme headaches and the sneezing have gone although I'm still coughing, breathless, choked up and am as white as a sheet, even paler than my usual complexion if that's possible. At least I'm well enough now to blog, so I'd better get on with it....

Rotten cold, day 5.

I thought it had gone away but it came back last night with a vengeance, the non-stop sneezing started (which I hadn't had in the beginning).

Hoped to do lots of blog posts this week but they'll just have to wait till I'm better :)

a) Cold; b) Does public speaking ever get any easier?

Right so anyway I'm now in the early stages of a rotten cold, my throat feels raw, (there aren't enough Strepsils in the world to soothe it) my ears are sore, the top half of my body aches and I generally feel like ****.

I would hazard a guess that faithful travelling companion, in his infinite generosity, probably passed it on to me at the weekend - he had a very similar cold at the beginning of last week. Although I'm trying not to name and shame and blame at this point, as there are millions of horrible little viruses floating around in the air at any given time.

And as if that's not bad enough, it's Tuesday tomorrow which of course is presentation-day, tomorrow will be the 4th one out of the 6 I have to do, next one is in two weeks at my own team's development day and the final one is in mid-November I think, then comes the massive sigh of relief :)

I'm my own biggest critic and I still don't feel satisfied with my performance. I know what I want to say and I'm glad I've got my notes to refer to, but standing up in a room and talking to a group of your peers doesn't get any less scary as the weeks go on. Suppose it will be better this week though, was in a bit of a panic last week about other stuff which thankfully sorted itself out.

Apart from all that, life is good, but I've been enjoying the good life a bit too much lately, cue the disappearance of the waistline and the unwanted return of the double chin. Must really get back into the fitness-thing after I feel better!

Birthday.

It was my birthday today, and I had a rather nice day too in spite of being at work....of course the gang made it very special even though I tried not to mention the fact that it was my birthday :)))

Anyway I got lots of nice things and then tonight I was hanging out with faithful travelling companion for birthday celebration part 1; birthday celebration part 2 follows this Friday as we'll be going out to our favourite local Indian restaurant for the now-traditional birthday dinner.

Yes I really enjoyed today!! And even though I might be getting older, it doesn't mean I have to grow up, does it???

Last day of my holiday.

Been back from Turkey for almost a week and my blogging output has been minimal to say the least. No it's not bloggers-block this time, just been caught up in my latest little project, getting my music collection in order, cataloguing and putting it all into a nice big database. Being the obsessive list-making computer geek that I am, this should come as no surprise ha ha.

Anyway the last week has flown by, with its mix of retail therapy, leisurely lunches and work, rest and play. I'm trying not to feel that sense of impending doom about the end of my summer holiday fortnight, but the fact remains that it is the last day of my holiday and yes I'm feeling fed up about that.

But I need to go back to work tomorrow so I can earn more money to save up for the next holiday!! Also consoling myself a little that it's only a four day week and it won't be long till the weekend. At which time the annual autumn EuropeCrazy HQ house-painting bonanza will begin again: this seems to be a little tradition which I introduced for the following reasons:
a) to keep the post-holiday/dark night blues at bay;
b) to freshen up the house in time for Christmas (yes it's not long now, and I've had my first sighting of cards, gift bags and big chocolate boxes in the shops. It's only a matter of time till Poundland gets the Christmas CD on)

Oh, and there is also the small matter of my birthday this Wednesday. Trying to stay upbeat about this as I don't look or act my age, which is only a number blah blah blah. :O

Two sleeps to go.

We're off to Turkey on Monday for our summer holiday. I can't believe where the time has gone, as it feels as if we're just back from our last one (Dusseldorf in May).

I'm looking forward to this one with a mix of excitement and slight trepidation. Being the seasoned city-breakers that we are, we don't traditionally do "package holidays" as that kind of thing isn't really our scene, so this is a big change and we're well out of our comfort zone here.

I know you're supposed to relax on holiday but if I'm being honest, I don't really do relaxation! However, recent weeks could only be described as manic and stressful, so for once I'm looking forward to going on a holiday where the pace will be slowed right down.

We love discovering new cultures so this should be another big change. I know a lot of people who have been to Turkey, past and present, and they have all loved it. So we head off with open minds, and fingers crossed that the heavy rain stops and the temperature doesn't go too far above 30 degrees.

The only problem now is trying to make room in my rather small suitcase for all the souvenirs I'm going to buy over there...... :)

Proof that diets don't work.

Since I gave up dieting about 4 or so weeks ago, I haven't been near a set of scales, but I've lost inches and got thinner. So my clothes fit me better, which makes me happier.

Result.

Need to learn how to paddle a canoe

Where I live we have had torrential rain virtually every day since the middle of July. Have decided that if this goes on I may have to travel to work not on foot or by bus, but by boat.

Today was better.

Work was busy but bearable.
The torrential rain even went off for a while.
Out for dinner with faithful travelling companion to our favourite local Cantonese restaurant, and rather wonderful it was too.
I'm off to put some tunes on my iPod now and then watch a bit of "Wallander" before bedtime.

Nighty night. :)

Purple boots!!!

I might have mentioned before on this or another one of my blogs, that my favourite colour is purple. Which is quite fortunate this year as many of the shops are full of various purple items this late summer/autumn season (my favourite time of year for clothes, actually). I'm now building up my purple wardrobe and the latest addition today is a rather fab pair of purple boots which I bought during my lunch break.

They might just go nice with those skinny jeans which I bought the other week. Yes, skinny jeans (!) I may just be having a midlife crisis as I'm more a bootcut kind of girl, but having lost quite a bit of weight over the last few months I thought I'd reward myself with something I'd never even have considered before. The only problem being that I'm not quite at the stage where they're fitting comfortably, but it's heading in the right direction.

Seagull-sized butterflies

So tomorrow morning is the first of my six presentations to a training group. This is a little follow up to the training course which I wrote and ran back in April, so now I have to do this little speech about the training course, on six occasions to different training groups between now and the end of November.

It shouldn't be too bad now I've finally written a little script for the thing. I've still got butterflies (the size of seagulls ha ha) in my stomach, which isn't helped by the fact that I have an upset stomach tonight anyway :( Still I'm feeling much better than I was during the last couple of weeks, and am now getting over the quadruple-whammy of chronic fatigue, recurring knee trouble, a mild depression and that old favourite "circumstances beyond my control".

Still haven't decided when to bring EuropeCrazy back. Maybe next week, but it's now looking more like 31.08.09 at the very latest. (And of course this week I'm too busy watching the World Athletics to be doing much else!)

Off to bed soon - need to get the beauty sleep for tomorrow :)

The other end of the week

I must say that I am very very happy to be ending the week with two less things worrying me than what I started the week with. Both of them are work-related, one is the end of a task and the other is a presentation which, it turns out, I've been needlessly worrying about for the last couple of weeks when in fact it should be short, sweet and straightforward.

And now it's the weekend :)))))))

I felt like treating myself to some Yankee Candle stuff today, so I'm home with a few different new aromas to fragrance EuropeCrazy HQ, starting with Island Spa, which has a nice lemon sherbet-y vibe going on. It's burning as I type this and there's something wonderfully fruity and summery about it, quite appropriate for such a lovely bright sunny night. We haven't had much of them for the last 3 or so weeks, so we'll enjoy it while we can :)

More to follow....

Weight-watching update: groundhog day

Stayed the same again this week, that's about the umpteenth week in a row....anyway now that I seem to have hit the dreaded 'plateau' I've decided to shift the focus from weight loss to toning up in time for my holiday in five-and-a-bit weeks' time, so it will be exercise all the way from now on. The only problem is that my recurring knee problems are back, so one must be very careful.

How do I feel today?

Unfortunately between the last blog post and this one, there was a further stint in the dark tunnel, which should probably account for the lack of posts across my three blogs over the past 7 days.

I've been in a little depression lately, most of it due to the following, some of which are beyond my control:

• work stress;
• something work-related which I have to do over the next 3/4 months which I can't get out of and am quite frankly dreading;
• the most important one - feeling frustrated that I can't do anything about my mum's continuing poor health.

It's been a really tough time over the past couple of weeks and I don't really want to go into detail about it, but I'm trying to pick myself up again. There was some good news today as I finally booked my summer holiday, and I'll have to go a post over at EuropeCrazy about that too.

I'm not really promising anything about the extent of my blogging over the next 6 weeks, as whenever I promise posts I never deliver (e.g. the Eurovision 2009 review: maybe I should post it 6 months after the event!) but I'm planning another blog-break-week starting 31.08.09 where I'll totally take a break from posting. Am going to do this every couple of months just to keep things fresh.

I'm hoping that things should pick up on EuropeCrazy during the autumn.

It's been quite a busy year at Planet Salem, but I think that little blog will be taking a break for at least a couple of months after the middle of August - as the man himself will also be taking a well-earned rest with only a couple of gigs here and there. That's unless there's more news to report?

I still enjoy blogging though, so don't worry I won't be going anywhere :)

Retail therapy

If all else fails...!

Happily, I'm coming back out of that dark tunnel which I seemed to spend most of the past week and a half travelling through. It wasn't all bad though: I had a good meal at a local Indian restaurant which I hadn't been to before, although it still hasn't dethroned my favourite local Indian restaurant; and despite a long-weekend binge and aforementioned Indian meal I managed not to gain weight this week, staying the same, which is pretty positive, considering....oh and now I'm back on stepping terms with the mini stepper and can do 700 steps in one session.

Today, in my continuing quest to try some new things this summer, faithful travelling companion and myself visited a new-ish shopping mall which we hadn't visited before. It is sales time of course, which is ok if you're a size 8. So needless to say I didn't pick up any bargains, but was lucky enough to get a very nice summery dress in H & M which has been earmarked for the forthcoming summer holiday. (Which hasn't been booked yet, are we living life on the edge or what!!).

To be continued...!

Can I have 'me' back please?

Did you ever get that feeling that someone or something had sneaked in during the night whilst you were asleep and removed your brain/ability to think straight/ability to feel good/ability to cope with everything life throws at you, etc etc?

That's been my week. I can't put my finger on it, but it's like some external forces pushing buttons, pushing and pulling me in all directions and I feel like I'm going to explode. It'll pass of course, it always does....but I've gone from this carefree happy person firing on all cylinders to someone who's even struggling to fire up the one.

During my teenage years I borrowed a book about biorhythms from my local library. It described how three cycles - physical, emotional, and intellectual, control your ability to function in these areas, and are worked out according to your date of birth. As usual, there's more info at Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biorhythm

I never thought anymore about this until a couple of years back, when thanks to the internet I decided to investigate it all once more. I have the odd glance at my horoscope from time to time, but I don't really go too deeply into astrological matters (Libra btw: apparently I'm compatible with Aquarius - aha! faithful travelling companion! - and my objective is to seek fairness and balance in all things. Yep.)

However, I do check my biorhythm chart every couple of weeks and find it spookily accurate. I use http://sitefoundry.com/biorhythms/ to calculate my chart and unsurprisingly this week, all three cycles are appropriately on a downward slide, although intellectually there should be an improvement in the next week or so. Which may or may not make for better blog posts :))

The biggest swines of all

Forgive me for going all conspiracy-theorist on here tonight, but I just wondered if it was now the media's sole function not to spread news, but only to spread panic. Yes, swine flu is here, there, everywhere (as it has been for the last couple of months) and it is inevitable that it's only a matter of time before I get it, you get it, your husband/wife/children/workmates/neighbours/friends get it. We are aware of the risks, the dangers, we know how to wash our hands and we know how to 'catch it, bin it, kill it' and stop infections spreading. We know, and we try our best, but the fact remains that it's....inevitable.

The NHS in this country is trying to do something about it, even if it's probably too little and too late, but in any case it's probably fighting a losing battle as long as night after night, the TV news bulletins gleefully report the imminent rise of the pandemic. It's as if they are willing us all to catch it, for they are the biggest swines of all.

Scare tactics. It's all about putting the panic into the pandemic, and like every other drama of the last 10 years - the 'war on terror'/SARS/bird flu, I'm sure there are others too numerous to remember - 'they', whoever 'they' may be, are using scare tactics and panic to keep us in a permanent state of anxiety. To increase viewing figures, to sell newspapers, for someone to make money out of it.

I just switch off now. And then go and wash my hands. And catch it, bin it, kill it. Hopefully.

Unwinding and upgrading

Having two days off work purely for relaxation purposes...and enjoying every minute.

Currently celebrating the fact that I have successfully downloaded Internet Explorer 8. The last time I tried to upgrade my Internet Explorer, I completely lost the internet altogether :(

Also still coming to terms with the fact that it now takes me about 20 minutes from switching on the computer to getting everything to work, thanks to upgrading my anti-virus a few weeks ago.

But anyway everything is working, and that's the main thing :)

Charity begins at home?

So when did it become so hard to try and do a good deed? As part of the ongoing 'let's treat EuropeCrazy HQ to some new furniture' exercise, we decided to donate some of our old furniture away to charity. ('Old' as in years, but in very good condition nonetheless).

We live in very strange times: once upon a time charity organisations were happy to accept furniture donations. Now it seems all they want to do is sell them in a shop. Just like any other business. And if your furniture even falls slightly short of their often unreasonably high standards then they don't want it. I think that's pretty sad, as there are many people out there much less fortunate through circumstances beyond their control, but who are missing out on any donations which are being sold in a shop instead.

All's well that ends well though - we managed to find a good old fashioned charity organisation which happily accepted our donation.

Sunday, but not as we know it

Two significant things about today.


1. The normal Sunday practice of making home-made carrot and coriander soup for the Monday and Tuesday lunch was abandoned. As 'creature of habit' is my middle name, I think my workmates might all keel over in shock when I bring in a new flavour of home-made soup, i.e. butternut squash, red pepper and onion soup, adapted from a recipe on the WeightWatchers website. With copious amounts of dried chives on top. Voila!




It looks and smells rather nice I must admit, but it doesn't have to look good, it has to taste good too. Think it will though. I actually made so much of it that it will do me for three days so that should be enough time to get used to it!!

EDIT 06.07.09, 12.14 pm: Yum.........oh yes. I like it. Most tasty.

2. My chilled-out Sunday afternoon surfing was abandoned for a bout of extreme de-cluttering in my bedroom, which resembled less of a bedroom and more of a home for unwanted plastic bags full of magazines, brochures and other paper-type things etc which I should really have binned many moons ago. I also got rid of a few cassette tapes, from the pre-download days when you taped the top 40 off the radio (!) anyway no point in keeping them as they've all been transferred to CD. It was a very therapeutic exercise, although in these days of fortnightly rubbish collections you now have to pace your de-cluttering from one fortnight to another, as there's still a week to go till the bins are emptied....

:(

Gained 1lb this week.
Well, you just can't diet in this weather can you?

Computer-free Thursday (not)

As part of my get-my-life-in-order time management strategy (ha ha) I had decided during my blog-break that I'd take one night a week out of any kind of contact with a computer - no internet/email/typing/scanning...nothing at all. So I came up with computer-free Thursday and it's been working for the last couple of weeks. But obviously not tonight.

I need something to take my mind off this heat, I guess....thankfully it won't be high-20s tomorrow, the forecast is for good old rain and 20 degrees.

I hate the rain but this time I think I might just run outside and dance in it :))))

Good heat gone bad

Wasn't June amazing? It's always one of my favourite months of the year, and this time it finally delivered on the good weather front for the first time in years.

However there's a point when this hot weather crosses the line, and we reached that point today when even the people who love the heat were suffering. Today, 1st July was the day when the good heat went bad.

EDIT 02.07.09: It's not any better today. Already on the verge of passing out. Today temperatures of 29 degrees are forecast :(