I was about to write a moany blog about how I had finished all the chocolate buttons and fingers of fudge in Clackmannanshire and moved on to Crunchies and Cadbury's fruit and nut (which I have) while Ailsa keeps writing perky blogs about what lovely runs she's been on (which she has). Motivation keeps failing to raise its head for me. Despite nice-ish weather last night I put together half an Ikea chest instead of running.
But! I remembered that I had done some form of exercise after all - I went surfing on Sunday. Yep, first one since the crap session at Lunan on our hot tub long weekend in Angus back in January. It was a welcome hour's remarkably sunny interlude in a day otherwise spent hunting for lost keys of various types, (a tale with which I will not bore you, other than to say it was frustrating and climaxed in me shouting at a neighbour's child until he returned the roof-rack straps he had nicked from under my very nose! Tch, the youth of today...)
Back to the surf. It was at Pease Bay and it was good - long intervals and not too ginormous. Hard to get out due to complete lack of upper body fitness and I only caught one wave but it was just good to be bobbing up and down on the water again. Al pulled the muscle in his back he always pulls when surfing and I pulled my wrist as I always do when surfing - it was almost nostalgic after all those running injuries had made me forget the many other ways there are to crock myself. Al won though, by dropping a board on his head back in Leith while putting it away in the shed and getting a perfect fin-stick injury in the exact middle of his forehead - whilst dressed in full motorbike gear. For some reason he was not impressed by my observation that he should have kept the helmet on.
Tuesday 24 June 2008
Thursday 19 June 2008
Where all my money goes
Today all my money was supposed to go on curtains, but instead it has gone on something even less exciting: contact lenses and glasses. Every two or three years I walk into an optician and spend half a month's wages on being able to see. Surely this isn't fair? Do deaf people have to pay for hearing aids? I suspect, like glasses, you can get the horrible cheap ones on the NHS if you're poor enough but have to shell out for anything half way decent.
Luckily my optician has cottoned on to the massive rip off that is eye care in the UK and set up a scheme where you pay £3 a month and get 20% off contacts, glasses and that contact lens bit of the sight test not covered for free (non-Scottish readers, note that regular eye tests are free up here! Yes, free I tell you! Not that you'd know from listening to the BBC). So I signed up for that and claimed my £13 from the NHS for being really, really blind. They don't give me an extra £13 for last year though, even though I didn't buy any lenses in 2007.
Even with all the discounts it still came to £400. Most of that, as always, was on the lenses to go in the glasses. I chose a plastic option that was slightly cheaper but they might be too thick, in which case I'll have to have glass for an extra £50. I could have got loads of curtains for that.
Afterwards, I took that black dress back to TKs and swapped it for a log basket. I may have to wear the log basket if I keep spending money on boring things. But at least I can accessorise it with beautiful glasses.*
I haven't done any exercise since the last blog, and have eaten vast amounts of chocolate buttons and fingers of fudge. I'm in Edinburgh tonight though, and once I'd thrown everything visibly mouldy out of Al's fridge there was only a pitta bread and some organic vegetable soup left, so I ate that and felt a bit healthier. I think it's time to get back to my usual summer eating of veggies and salad. Unfortunately, despite its many other fine attributes, the cottage is absolutely freezing in even the warmest weather, which doesn't encourage me to eat lettuce and the like.
Fi and Ailsa are coming for dinner tomorrow though and I'm quite excited about the dessert (which I have already made and left in the freezer - I hope it turns out ok) and a starter recipe I found for sweet potato, mozzarella and parma ham stacks. It will also be a chance for Dougal to meet his cousins Baffie and Bridie, who will probably at best ignore him.
*I have to admit they are nice glasses, with a hint of sexy secretary about them.
Luckily my optician has cottoned on to the massive rip off that is eye care in the UK and set up a scheme where you pay £3 a month and get 20% off contacts, glasses and that contact lens bit of the sight test not covered for free (non-Scottish readers, note that regular eye tests are free up here! Yes, free I tell you! Not that you'd know from listening to the BBC). So I signed up for that and claimed my £13 from the NHS for being really, really blind. They don't give me an extra £13 for last year though, even though I didn't buy any lenses in 2007.
Even with all the discounts it still came to £400. Most of that, as always, was on the lenses to go in the glasses. I chose a plastic option that was slightly cheaper but they might be too thick, in which case I'll have to have glass for an extra £50. I could have got loads of curtains for that.
Afterwards, I took that black dress back to TKs and swapped it for a log basket. I may have to wear the log basket if I keep spending money on boring things. But at least I can accessorise it with beautiful glasses.*
I haven't done any exercise since the last blog, and have eaten vast amounts of chocolate buttons and fingers of fudge. I'm in Edinburgh tonight though, and once I'd thrown everything visibly mouldy out of Al's fridge there was only a pitta bread and some organic vegetable soup left, so I ate that and felt a bit healthier. I think it's time to get back to my usual summer eating of veggies and salad. Unfortunately, despite its many other fine attributes, the cottage is absolutely freezing in even the warmest weather, which doesn't encourage me to eat lettuce and the like.
Fi and Ailsa are coming for dinner tomorrow though and I'm quite excited about the dessert (which I have already made and left in the freezer - I hope it turns out ok) and a starter recipe I found for sweet potato, mozzarella and parma ham stacks. It will also be a chance for Dougal to meet his cousins Baffie and Bridie, who will probably at best ignore him.
*I have to admit they are nice glasses, with a hint of sexy secretary about them.
Friday 13 June 2008
Summer break
Had an easy couple of weeks, dug a bit of garden, swung in the hammock with Dougal (nee Diesel), took Dougal for walks and met lots of new people and dogs. Al is astounded by the amount of female attention he gets when walking Dougal in town. He is just so cute! Dougal, that is. Well obviously Al is cute too. But not in the way that women run and and squeal and ask me if they can stroke him very often.
Anyway, the pooch and I had a hilarious walk down the Water of Leith where we met a rather boring man with a black lab; a friendly guy with another working cocker called Fergus (again, the dog, not the man); a scary looking, thick-necked but in fact quite friendly woman with a massive, thick-necked, but actually quite friendly rottweiler and a snooty thin woman with a saluki who looked down her nose and hurried past. Maybe it is true what they say about people being like their dogs. Callum and Dougal certainly hit it off. I think five months in dogs age must be about 11 for a human - they had a great weekend playing in the garden, building a den and a swing. Al banned the computer for the weekend though, and by Sunday Cal had had enough of the great outdoors and wanted his computer games back again. He is still a bit of a city boy.
Had a training course near York for three days this week, and it was pretty full on with the gorgeous sunny days spent closeted in a room with closed curtains looking at powerpoint presentations and doing emergency planning exercises. On the last day a BBC manager was invited to speak to us and spent an hour talking about how BBC local radio is the best place to get an emergency message out. When I pointed out that in Scotland we had to work with commercial radio because the BBC treats Scotland as one region and people in Glasgow don't care if Angus is flooded, she just said, 'Well, yes it obviously different in Scotland.'
I feel the Scottish chip on my shoulder growing with each trip to England these days. I like to think I started out prejudice-free and hope my feelings are based on experience rather than me having picked up a general Scottish malaise. I do hate the attitude that blames England for all of Scotland's woes: I think it's inaccurate and excuses apathy. But I've seen Scotland treated as an afterthought at best on all sorts of training courses and the like and it's getting irksome. The BBC has just promised to up its regional content in the news, anyway, so let's see if that helps remind people that it exists.
I'm feeling very relaxed about it all now, since I had the great foresight to book two days off and continue my journey south from York to see the parents in Sussex. Jenny is also here having just started work in Burgess Hill, and I awoke on Thursday morning to hear her snoring five minutes before she had to catch her 7am bus, so had to wake her up. She missed the bus but made the train thanks to a lift from mum...she moves to a room in Brighton tomorrow, which I hope will suit her.
Spent yesterday reading (feel like I haven't had time to read for ages) and shopping. Bought a very bling handbag for Sam, who I'm meeting briefly before my flight tomorrow for a birthday brunch. Also a back dress for myself, but I think I might take it back as it's a bit big. I have an opticians appointment in Edinburgh next week that I can combine with a trip to TK Maxx in Meadowbank. Today I was indulged in a belated birthday present of pedicure and back massage. My first ever pedicure! It was perfectly timed for my post-marathon feet, which the lovely lady did not even wince at, and we picked a dark red polish to cover the black nails!
Went for a run round the rhododendron-infested grounds of the conference centre one night before dinner on my course, and another round Broadbridge Heath and Warnham this morning. Just half an hour each and about three miles, which was just what I needed. It felt a bit sweaty in the humid weather but not particularly hard. Maybe I'll aim for an October half marathon. Or maybe I'll just keep going for shorter runs when I feel like it.
Anyway, the pooch and I had a hilarious walk down the Water of Leith where we met a rather boring man with a black lab; a friendly guy with another working cocker called Fergus (again, the dog, not the man); a scary looking, thick-necked but in fact quite friendly woman with a massive, thick-necked, but actually quite friendly rottweiler and a snooty thin woman with a saluki who looked down her nose and hurried past. Maybe it is true what they say about people being like their dogs. Callum and Dougal certainly hit it off. I think five months in dogs age must be about 11 for a human - they had a great weekend playing in the garden, building a den and a swing. Al banned the computer for the weekend though, and by Sunday Cal had had enough of the great outdoors and wanted his computer games back again. He is still a bit of a city boy.
Had a training course near York for three days this week, and it was pretty full on with the gorgeous sunny days spent closeted in a room with closed curtains looking at powerpoint presentations and doing emergency planning exercises. On the last day a BBC manager was invited to speak to us and spent an hour talking about how BBC local radio is the best place to get an emergency message out. When I pointed out that in Scotland we had to work with commercial radio because the BBC treats Scotland as one region and people in Glasgow don't care if Angus is flooded, she just said, 'Well, yes it obviously different in Scotland.'
I feel the Scottish chip on my shoulder growing with each trip to England these days. I like to think I started out prejudice-free and hope my feelings are based on experience rather than me having picked up a general Scottish malaise. I do hate the attitude that blames England for all of Scotland's woes: I think it's inaccurate and excuses apathy. But I've seen Scotland treated as an afterthought at best on all sorts of training courses and the like and it's getting irksome. The BBC has just promised to up its regional content in the news, anyway, so let's see if that helps remind people that it exists.
I'm feeling very relaxed about it all now, since I had the great foresight to book two days off and continue my journey south from York to see the parents in Sussex. Jenny is also here having just started work in Burgess Hill, and I awoke on Thursday morning to hear her snoring five minutes before she had to catch her 7am bus, so had to wake her up. She missed the bus but made the train thanks to a lift from mum...she moves to a room in Brighton tomorrow, which I hope will suit her.
Spent yesterday reading (feel like I haven't had time to read for ages) and shopping. Bought a very bling handbag for Sam, who I'm meeting briefly before my flight tomorrow for a birthday brunch. Also a back dress for myself, but I think I might take it back as it's a bit big. I have an opticians appointment in Edinburgh next week that I can combine with a trip to TK Maxx in Meadowbank. Today I was indulged in a belated birthday present of pedicure and back massage. My first ever pedicure! It was perfectly timed for my post-marathon feet, which the lovely lady did not even wince at, and we picked a dark red polish to cover the black nails!
Went for a run round the rhododendron-infested grounds of the conference centre one night before dinner on my course, and another round Broadbridge Heath and Warnham this morning. Just half an hour each and about three miles, which was just what I needed. It felt a bit sweaty in the humid weather but not particularly hard. Maybe I'll aim for an October half marathon. Or maybe I'll just keep going for shorter runs when I feel like it.
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