Monthly Archives: December 2015

Leftovers..? All Yours Sweetheart.

In the here & now, , , , ,

leftovers

Depending on what time I’ve hauled my sorry ass out of bed on Boxing Day in the past has largely dictated whether I’ve woken up thinking about leftovers, or smelling them. I think it’s fair to say that both my son and I are fully-paid-up card-carrying members of the leftover Christmas food fan club, in fact I might even go as far as to say that between us we’ve probably regarded it as the highlight of Boxing Day.

I can recall more occasions than I’m comfortable admitting to where we’ve pitted our wits against each other in the ‘who gets to the leftover pigs in blankets first’ race, and I’m here to tell you that the sound of the microwave being activated downstairs in the kitchen on Boxing Day morning has historically invoked the kind of reaction that alarm clock manufacturers the world over could only dream about. You see, whoever gets to the tupperware first is in charge of allocation…otherwise known as who gets what. And if that’s not you, damn straight you’d better get there and supervise, so you get your fair share.

So, when my son found out that he had to work on Boxing Day this year, as you might imagine, he was more than a little bit pissed off. To be fair, he wasn’t worried about working as such, I mean why would he…there’s no contractual obligation to work so it’s triple time thank you very much. But jockeying for space with the dollar signs in his eyes was the vision of coming home to pillaged tupperware containing a stringy bit of turkey and the odd unwanted sprout. He was worried that I’d eat Boxing Day whilst his back was turned.

As we were bidding our respective goodnights last night before heading for bed I casually threw it out there that I wasn’t eating any leftovers this year…his face was a picture. The sort of face, I imagine, that you might see on a lottery winner, as the implication of picking those numbers sinks in…well, something close anyway. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’ll definitely join in with the turkey, that’s fine…but the crunchy butter-rich sage and onion stuffing balls, the leftover roasties and the crisped up pigs in blankets are all his this year. Although it near kills me to say it, they were yesterday’s treat.

You probably don’t need me to tell you that the asshole in my mind has almost combusted himself into an early grave by jumping up and down trying to change my mind. They’re behind me in the fridge as we speak, and they flirt with me every time I open the fridge door. On a scale of 1-10 I want them to the tune of at least 15, but I’m thinking instead about that size 22 top that I pledged my allegiance to when I got back from Vegas…I remain determined to fit into it on 1st January.

I can’t have both. And one is more important than the other…so I picked that one. And whilst the chatter from the tupperware tubs is driving me bat-shit crazy, I’m happy with my choice.

Today, Boxing Day or not, is the start of a new dieting week. I’m remembering how I worked out a plan to see me through our trip to Dublin, and Christmas, and I’m way beyond proud that I managed to stick to it…I’ve had to dig deep, but I’ve done it and trust me when I say if I could bottle this feeling and sell it, I could retire on the proceeds. And you know what else..? I’m 3lbs down since my last check-in with the bitch in the bathroom.

Epic 🙂

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

My Big Fat Skinny Christmas

In the here & now, ,

santa

You know when my boy was little, like parents everywhere I used to get so giddy on Christmas Eve, and those few days over the Christmas period were precious. There’s nothing quite as magical as a little person who believes so completely in Santa Claus. I’m not saying I don’t enjoy Christmas now, of course I do but it’s different. Our family is small, just me and my son, and my mum…to be honest, apart from entertaining the Queen in our living room, Christmas day is just like a normal Sunday with a bit of tinsel thrown in for good measure.

I miss the build-up, you know? Writing letters to Santa, that really fizzy feeling on Christmas Eve…the little traditions we’d created as a family, like always saving sparklers from bonfire night so we could light up the sky to show Santa where we lived, and going to bed in new pyjamas on Christmas Eve. So many special memories. My all time favourite Christmas memory is from the year that my boy really got the Santa Claus thing for the first time, I think it was probably the Christmas before his third birthday and he was so excited.

Having bought and decorated the tree, I was doing that thing where you have a slight re-ordering of the baubles after the kids have gone to bed, since most of them were at three-year-old height and it was a bit sparse at the top. It seemed a bit wobbly, so I went out into the garden to find a really big rock to prop against the base, you know just to steady it a bit. It looked odd, so I wrapped it in Christmas paper…perfect. Except the next morning I found my boy, surrounded by torn bits of Christmas paper with big fat tears rolling down his cheeks, looking at the rock…but Mummy, I asked Santa for a train set…

So these days, it’s mainly about the Christmas dinner, and laughing a lot. My skinny strategy this time has been all about saving points so I could take my foot off a bit, just for today. I did a massive food shop yesterday even though I’m feeding just three of us but the one item conspicuous by it’s absence this year was the Christmas pudding…I didn’t buy one. And because I didn’t, there was no Baileys fresh cream or rum sauce either. I’m the only one who really likes it, and therefore the one who eats it…all of it. You don’t want any..? Oh ok, well it won’t go to waste…and it never did. It went to waist instead…mine!

Chocolates…again, I didn’t buy any of the ones that I usually stuff my face with, like after eight mints, matchmakers, black magic…there are chocolates but nothing that I would cross the road for you know?

I’d like to say that I exercised same restraint with the rest of Christmas lunch…hell no did I chuff! Give me a break, I’m not made of wood…those points I’ve saved up were royally spent on goose-fat laden roasties, pigs in blankets, bread sauce and stuffing. Hallelujah it was glorious. I shall be in a food coma until the middle of next week.

And I survived! I made it work for me, and I don’t feel like I missed out 🙂

I hope wherever you are and whatever Christmas has brought for you, that you’ve made some awesome memories with your special people. Both of mine are snoozing on the sofa right now and I’m just about to go walk off some of those pigs in blankets with the enthusiastic assistance of my furry friend here…lots of love to all of you, and I’ll see you on the other side 🙂

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

‘Twas The Night Before Christmas

Freeform thoughts, ,

stocking

Twas the night before Christmas, the cupboards were bare,

the food shop is looming, but why should I care?

I can’t eat the good stuff, the stuff that I crave,

‘cos I’ve promised the posse that I will behave 🙁

The Asshole is laughing, he’s biding his time,

he thinks he’ll persuade me to slip into crime.

I admit it, I’m sulking, my thoughts are not good,

as I think of the things I would eat if I could.

I want cheese balls and ice cream, pralines and cream,

pigs in their blankets, and stuffing supreme.

I’m madder than mad, that the size of my arse

means for this year, and next year my plate will be sparse.

My stocking is empty of chocolate and treats,

in light of the fact that I’m pounding the streets.

to remove all this blubber that covers my bum,

and break out the string bean that I shall become.

It SUCKS that on Christmas I have to be good,

but that’s what I promised to do, if I could.

And do it I will, have no fear of that!

(just forgive me for being a grumpy old twat.)

I’ll scowl at the chocolate, and snarl at the pud,

Stick to lean stuff and green stuff and do what I should.

And after it’s over I’ll grin like a fool

That the Asshole was beaten, and I’m still cool 🙂

Have an awesome Christmas everyone…to my occasional readers, my regular lurkers and all of you who join in the chatter on a daily basis, I couldn’t walk this path on my own so I’m sending lots of love to you all with grateful thanks for your glorious company xxx

holly

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

To Me, With Love From Me

In the here & now, , ,

willpower

I’ve been working from home today – I’m very lucky in that respect, when I have no face to face meetings in my diary the type of work I do means I can be just as productive sitting at the little desk in my kitchen as I am in the office. More so, sometimes – I am blessed with more than my fair share of curiosity and I’m very easily distracted. The minute a juicy conversation unfolds in our office my ears tune in of their own accord and drag me away from whatever I’m working on.

So anyway, I’ve just switched off, and I’ve had a much better day than I’d expected to have. When I came down into the kitchen this morning, I took one look at the table and immediately groaned…I might have even said a bad word under my breath. The first thing that greeted me were ten boxes of chocolate biscuits in a big stack, right next to my desk. Recalling times past, I immediately made the assumption that I’d be fighting all day with the asshole in my mind.

Do you want to know how much time I’ve spent resisting temptation..? None. Not a single minute of my day. I mean, I didn’t even really need to flex my willpower muscle you know? It’s like they weren’t even there. I’m more than a little bit baffled. I mean I know that technically they’re not mine, I’ve bought them for my mum to give to the lovely ladies who take such good care of her. But lets be honest, that’s never stopped me in the past.

For example, there have been times when I’ve gone through my boy’s Easter Egg stash like a swarm of locusts and then replaced them all before he noticed, and times when I’ve had to make a nifty detour go buy another Daim cake because I’ve vaporised the one in the fridge that I bought for ‘the family’ during a particularly traumatic episode of Grey’s Anatomy and I didn’t want to have to explain where it’d all gone.

My willpower is an elusive frankly quite strange and bloody annoying phenomenon. Some days it’s completely locked and loaded, and nothing’s getting through. It’s like the fun police you know?  Other days it lets me down big time and without warning by throwing open the door and letting every temptation through without a fight. Take yesterday for example. Epic fail on the willpower front, massive.

Don’t get me wrong, my food choices were all fine, my diet integrity is all intact. The same can’t be said however about resisting the urge to indulge in a little bit of leather love. I made a promise to myself about not buying any more handbags until I’d saved up enough for the new bathroom I am desperate to get installed. Six months I’ve held out with no impulse buys, SIX MONTHS! I fancied a quick mooch on my favourite re-sale site, you know just to have a look…yes, well that never ends well does it? I was still trying to kid myself I was window shopping as I completed checkout. Hello???

Still. If I’ve only got so much willpower to use up equally on all the areas of my life where I need to behave, I’d rather spend it resisting a hob-nob over a handbag any day…and it is Christmas after all. A little bit of birthday money went towards it, and you know what, I’ve been a good girl this year.

Happy Christmas to me, with love from me…I deserve it, right?

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

Who, Us?

Freeform thoughts,

robinA strange thing happened yesterday – it all started when I received an email from a very nice lady, saying how much she’d enjoyed reading the blog post on My Fifty Year Fitness Goal, and then asking my advice on a few health-related matters. Now, I can only speak for myself but that’s one of the reasons I love hanging out with you guys….I ask a question and you lot rally around with assorted answers, or one of you asks a question and either me or another one of the posse tries to find a nugget of wisdom to suit the occasion.

I almost flexed my fingers to consult Doctor Google and pass his encyclopaedic knowledge off as my own before throwing her questions out to you guys, but before I did, my thoughts turned to wondering what had led this lady to come knocking on our door for advice. I mean I know we have a few wise old owls in the posse, and between us we’ve been around the dieting block more than a few times but I don’t think any of us would class ourselves as experts in healthy living, right? We’re just all doing the best we can.

So, curiosity piqued, just call me Sherlock, after a bit of clicking left and right it turns out this lady was from a bona fide medical company, you know, with proper doctors and everything. They seem like a friendly bunch – I’ve put a link on my ‘interesting stuff’ page in case any of you need a band aid over the holidays – and they’re getting into the festive spirit by canvassing ideas from as many people as possible about how to stay healthy over the Christmas period so they can have a bit of fun on-line. And obviously our posse are right up there at the top of their list of folk to ask. *Puffs chest out with pride, of course we are, we KNOW stuff!*

How about I start us off..? My best piece of advice is don’t accidentally lick the tip of a 12v battery. I did that once – and before you ask no, I have absolutely no idea why – and straight up singed the hair inside my nose. For a split second I was literally battery powered and my nose didn’t stop stinging for three days. I suspect I still have a bald patch inside my left nostril, so best avoid that if you want to stay fit and healthy.

My second piece of advice is, if it looks slippy outside and you’ve just watched someone execute a triple salchow worthy of an Olympic score of 10 on their way to post a letter, don’t think that nipping over the road to the postbox with your own last minute Christmas cards will be incident free. I’m here to tell you it won’t be. And jumping up quickly before anyone sees you is by no means a guarantee that this time you’re going to stay on your feet for longer than the blink of an eye. I can vouch for that too.

So, posse…over to you. It’s time to gift-wrap those nuggets of wisdom and show the world what wise old beans we really are. Old family recipes which ward off lurgy? Tried and tested methods of shaking off aches and pains..? A strategy to lessen the impact of all those festive excesses, or best hangover cure known to man…whatever words of sage advice you might have to see our virtual compadres through a happy and healthy holiday season, wheel ’em out…the floor is yours 🙂

Like it..? Tell your friends!