Changing man

As you may be able to tell, quite a few things are changing for me at the minute.

The veg bowl is now overflowing in the kitchen. That's not weird granted. The odd thing is that it gets eaten during the week. We no longer stare at the aubergine, it's actually used in meals other than a Thai green curry.  The potato is rarely destined for my chip-esque oven bakes. Mash is now our potatoey treat for the week.

The weight is staying off. I'm lighter than I have been in ages.

I've been on a bike for the first time in a good twenty years. OK I haven't been on a ride (yet) but on the plus side I have avoided being a crumpled, crying mess of a man (so far).

And this blog. It has really been the first diary-style thing that I've maintained. I remember having a copy of the Roald Dahl Diary in one of my last few years of primary school. I always wanted to keep a diary but the young Doney's diary entries were dull. They were not the witty entries that TV showed me children of ten should be writing.

Granted, those TV children can still string a sentence better than I can but, let's face it, they're fictional and I have the upper hand in the realms of reality.

So thanks all. I'm not giving this up I'm just having a short break from my normal ramblings tonight to say thanks for reading this. It's keeping me focused and motivated.

This year is one of change. I'm getting married. I'm turning 30. I'm taming the bike-shaped beast that has haunted me for the majority of my life.

Schmaltz over. Tomorrow, I'm hoping to get back on the bike.

Weight to go

Along with exercise, the key to losing weight has to be what we eat.
As statements go, that must go info the stating the bloomin' obvious section.

Please forgive my GCSE F grade intro but there was a time when I really didn't get that idea.

At school and college I was somewhat bigger than I am now. I was about 16st plus and clocked in at about 5ft9.

Granted it helped on the rugby field (former tight-head prop speaking here) but it just wasn't good for me.

To be frank, I ate a lot of crap food. Granted that crap food tasted fairly good, and it's amazing how bad food does that, but I think the key is I ate a lot of it.

Packets and packets of crisps, pies, pasties, bags of sweet treats - I could go on for ages. Especially when I started work in the newsroom, I ate a lot.

Drink may have also played a part. I had a lot of match practice at the noble art. What can I say? I love a drink.

So what changed?

I can remember bending down to pick up a skittle (the pin and not the sweet) at my local and losing my breath doing it. I caught myself losing my breath doing the smallest exercise.

That single action sparked shock in my head.

So I hit reverse on my diet. Out went the grease and in came the fruit, black coffee and low fat versions of everything.

Since then I've flipped and flopped between fads and foods. Thanks to the WTB I'm really enjoying the healthy foods and veg plays a big part in my diet. Save cauliflower and sprouts. They still belong in the wrong column. And beetroot.

I love food. I love trying new foods. I love watching cooking shows. I now love to cook. It's just now everything is in moderation.

Striking the balance has been hard. It's not always right, but I am getting there.

And relax

Tomorrow is my day off. Tomorrow I will be doing housework.
For anyone who works a weekend, this is the normality you face. Whatever you can't do on a Saturday or Sunday is carried over to the week.
For me it's ironing, cooking and... well something else.

The worst thing for me will be staying away from any temptation. For temptation, read 'The Pub.'
To say I'm a huge fan of the midweek drink would be somewhat underselling my devotion to what is one of the few things that still feels naughty.

There's something wonderful about sitting in a boozer, while others are at work, and supping a drink while pouring over a paper. You get this particularly cheeky feeling. Well, I do anyway.

You still get some shocked reactions when you say you're off to the pub in the middle of the day.
At one stage I'd have to explain to people: "Look, I'm just going for the one. I'm not going to be there all day. I'll pop out, have a pint or a whisky, read the paper and come home to continue my dedication to the housework."

I no longer have to do that, mainly because I got legless on one occasion and people know I'd be in big trouble if I did it again.


So, I have cut down on my habit. But with the wedding on our minds I don't think I can justify it at all. Oh on special occasions I'm sure I'll head out of an afternoon, but for now the pub is closed in my brain. Well, on weekday afternoons anyway. For now.

As we're off the diet now we've got open season on what we eat. Because we can use more than a few pots and pans, our kitchen looks like a toddler has gone on a slight sugar-fuelled rampage. There are dirty saucepans everywhere. Knives I didn't know we owned have appeared. The peeler is filled with all sorts of funk. And that's just from today's effort.

For the record I cooked salmon with herbs and lemon, with steamed veg and a small portion of mashed potato. Having gone through last week, mashed potato seems to be a novelty.

We did sort of fall off the wagon last night. I know, I know, first day off and I'm already going bananas. Stick with me though.
We had small glass of rose wine and a single Hershey's Chocolate Kiss (under 200kcal for both if you're interested). Everything in moderation.

Plus, now I've had some wine, I won't think of the pub tomorrow.

Yeah, right.

High steaks

Meat day. Well, what can I say? Did it live up to my hopes? Was it everything I've been dreaming of?

Predictably, yes and no.

Steak for breakfast was mega. Seriously. It was tasty. It looked lovely. It. Was. Mega.
That amount of beef really set me up for the the day. I can honestly say it was the first day I didn't get hunger pangs.
My stomach has been making some wonderful noises this week. Growling like a hungry dog one minute, gurgling like a plughole another.
Have you noticed your stomach always makes noises when it's deadly quiet? It has to be the most mischievous part of the body.

The breakfast also made the house smell spectacular. When I was growing up, the smell of a roast beef coming from the rayburn was, perhaps, one of the greatest things about the weekend.
We'd come home from church, sit round the table and tuck in to the meat, roasted potatoes, yorkshire and suet pudding and other bits.
Today's smell may not have reached that height, but it was a solid substitute.

We mixed the steak with the soup at tea. This made the soup more meat than veg.

I'm not complaining.

As usual, I did miss something about my normal diet. Today, drinks. I can only drink coffee, herbal tea and water at the mo. I would have loved a whisky today. Or an ale. Or a cider. Or a red wine. Even a can of Coke Zero would have been a wonderful, celebrated thing.

I went shopping for the week ahead and the fruit bowl is bulging with a host of colourful treats.  I've also made a low-fat chilli, stocked up on grapefruit juice and bought an obscene amount of spinach. So it looks like the wind is here to stay...

Two days left of this plan. We've both lost weight and feeling positive about the wedding weight-loss scheme.

Tomorrow, we're on the home stretch. Chicken! More meat!

Diet goes bananas

Steak! I can barely contain my excitement that tomorrow morning's breakfast will basically consist of a slab of meat.

That's right. I'm having steak for breakfast. Surely this is the dream for every carnivore? 

I've got quite a loving relationship with beef. When I was growing up, my birthday meal request was always a roast beef dinner (followed by milk jelly).

When I turned18 I ate a 32oz steak, with chips and onion rings (and side salad, but not really counting that), at my local in Cornwall. I can honestly say I didn't break a sweat... until I finished, when the meat sweats hit

I love beef.

But... There's always a 'but' in these situations...

To get to the steak, I've drunk about a litre of skimmed milk,  eaten five bananas and had two portions of the cabbage soup. FIVE bananas.  

As I've mentioned, I love fruit but the bananas have taken it out of me. Both the WTB and I felt quite lethargic today and I'm putting it down to that.

When you look at it, the diet is quite barmy. Yes, I know it's a fad diet and only for a short time, but some of the combinations have been quite off.

Tonight, apart from removing the Christmas decorations, we're also discussing what we should eat next week. We will be left to our own devices again. The diet is making us examine what we're eating on a daily basis.

However, I wouldn't mind if we left bananas off the menu for a while. 

A year should do it.

Trumpet trousers

No matter what your age, breaking wind is funny.
Childish? Yes.
Embarrassing? Occasionally.
Funny? Always.

We boys seem to have the obsession over it because, I think, it not only has a funny sound but also a funny smell. We're simple creatures.

I'm sorry to go on about 'it' again, but when you're on this diet, it's the one thing that always comes up.

So yes, I'm at 'that' stage of the cabbage soup. The stage where you're right in the middle of the eating plan. When, like me, you've eaten four apples, peppers, cucumber and four grapes as your snacks,  the only badge of honour you have that you're on the diet is the occasional whizz-bang.
And yet... I've not noticed a huge increase in this activity. I'm sure there's more obstacles to come but so far? Not bad. Either that or I'm just naturally gassy.

Avoiding other foods is still proving a challenge. One of my colleagues brought in a homemade cake today. It looked and sounded stunning. Only more coffee and pints of water solved the hunger pang.

The exercise aspect of the healthier life still needs to be tackled. WTB loves zumba but the idea of me joining in fills the whole town with dread. I'm a keen walker but I know that's not enough. Bike riding isn't an option (at the moment) so it may mean I need to go back to the gym.

While tomorrow brings milk back and introduces bananas, I know that in my head I can't wait for steak day.

Green machine

I don't hate vegetables, really I don't, It's just I've never had the best relationship with them. 

I've never understood how people can chomp down on a raw carrot or look forward to eating celery. Both of those, in my opinion are best served in stout, traditional dishes. Pies for example. Or stews. Or, in fact the cabbage soup which has become the focus of my life this week.

I just don't think I'd only eat veg throughout the day*.

Today was always going to be tricky for me. No fruit. Still no meat. No dairy. No bread. Just veg.

Breakfast consisted of cucumber and peppers with black coffee. Dinner? Well the soup, of course, and some more cucumber and peppers.  Tea had a spark of variety. Baked potato. some more of the soup and steamed spinach, courgette and broccoli.

So far, so healthy.

The food itself has been fine. But we're in a tricky period, I'm sure all of us would agree. The flotsam and jetsam of festive good still lingers in our kitchen cupboards. I know that if I open one cupboard I will find about 12 Kinder Eggs. Temptation has never been closer. Especially when the editor brings in bag after bag of Christmas food for the newsroom to eat. It's all very kind but it's taking some will power to avoid the treats. Thank goodness I still have coffee! Huzzah!

I also think I'm starting to experience the one familiar problem the diet has. Gas. Guffs. Farts. Trumps. Parps. I've got a sneaking suspicion the cheese will be cut quite a lot this evening. I can only hope they hit their peak before work tomorrow.

Tomorrow I can bring fruit back in. I'll be hitting the apples from early morning.

*Apart from potatoes. I mean you can have chips, waffles, fondant, mash, baked, fried...

Cold feet

So I'm sitting in the office today, looking out across the Malvern Hills, trying to crack a headline about a new morgue (seriously) and it suddenly dawns on me that my feet are freezing.
They're blocks of ice; they were at the stage where you're not quite sure if they're damp or slightly cold. Now, I'm usually quite cold while sitting at my desk. The window lets in a bit of a breeze. Indeed, with the strong winds hitting Cheltenham today, the office kitchen window was whistling like a kettle on a rayburn for a good few hours, but my feet are rarely cold.
So what did I blame for this weird happening? The bloomin' cabbage soup.
Of course, it's nothing to do with that. I know it's cold in my head as my rugby-hit knees are aching. But my heart is blaming the soup.
The soup is actually quite tasty. The WTB put a fair kick of cayenne pepper in, turning it from boring and bland to spicy and seriously tasty. I could eat it even if I wasn't on a diet. But, as the WTB so accurately put, it just needs chicken and a bread roll.

Today's condition has been eating fruit. I can eat as much as I like. Bliss. Apples, apples and more apples for me. I will never get bored with that beautiful fruit, wonderful tasting thing, creator of cider. Tomorrow though it's veg only. Balls.