OMG! X-Factor is over, the weight loss is slow, and I must not mention the fact that I want Hodgson out of Liverpool!

X- Factor Winner Matt
with Dannii Minnogue

Well where do I start?!  Firstly recognising my sister friend Rita….no footie until the last paragraph (honest!) and to my friend TP….. she must realise that x factor and other tastes in music is subjective!  She is so funny and could not get over the fact that I was ecstatic that Matt Cardle won the X-Factor!  “oh he can’t sing she wailed” “he needs a wash” she goes. “And as for that One direction they can’t sing, and why do they refer to them as 1D” she asks?! I suggest she could have gotten a Guinness world record for the number and variety of faces that she pulled while she was ranting against Matt winning and other X- factor matters. I know this girl, she does not like pop, music or popular R&B so why oh why on earth would one watch a programme like X-factor??? Pray someone please tell me! Put me in the know, because for the life of me, I don’t get it! As for me I love it, I rave about it, I abuse it. I believe it’s stoked in conspiracy and favouritism…but at the end of the day…. It’s a programme that is good for cold winter sat evenings! And you can talk to someone a complete stranger about it!

So Miss TP, make a CD of your favourite music and let’s chat! Ha ha… Before I leave the subject of X- factor I must say that I thought Matt’s performance with Rihanna absolutely broke the thermometer. I loved it and yes call me sad, but I have watched it several times since! Definitely an iconic moment in this year’s show, for me at least.

As for the weight loss it’s going slowly, and whilst I have acknowledged several times before that I must be in this for the long haul this acknowledgment does not make putting on a lb and a ½ any easier to take. Why did this happen? Well am not going to throw the baby out with the pram, I have to be honest, I went out, I ate different food, drank wine and so on and so forth.  I did not have a sweet, and for this some would say that I am boring or indeed anal and what did I gain for this?  Oh yes 1and ½ lb! What concerns me about this is, is this a sign of things to come? Does this mean that I can never go out, please bear in mind that I did all my Tae Kwan Do sessions (4) this week and the dancing which I absolutely love! How do I fix this? What extra step can I take to increase the weight loss. It is clear that when I return from holiday that I am going to have to take these battles one by one and hopefully I will get on my way to looking like Naomi Campbell!( No smirking please!) Please note that I said look like not behave like! So bring on the battle of the food!  There were 9 people in class today and I was the only one who put on – imagine that.  Am I being punished because my preferred act won on X- factor, surely that should be cancelled out by the fact that my beloved Liverpool lost 3-1!

Hodgson..get out of Liverpool!

I have to say this, my friend Rita she hates or at the very least dislikes footie, so imagine the scene that as we drove home from our function on Saturday night I could only partially rant about this score line. It was like yeah. Whatever!  Anyhow I have to say that us losing 3-1 to Newcastle is just ridiculous. I accept that they (Newcastle) did not come to sell peanuts that they too wanted to win and indeed they did that in emphatic fashion! However, we were diabolical and the Hodgson seems to think that is ok. I mean does he not understand the nature of the opposition? Does he not get that this is The Premiership the best league in the world? If he did he would not go to a place like St James Park with the defensive attitude of 1 striker up front and then sit back and bang his weird looking head while Maxi Rodriguez did nothing for 78 minutes when we were 3-1 down. I mean bringing on Jivanovic at 78 minutes, how was that going to change the dire situation?  How was he supposed to make an impact?  Having just watched the Man U v Arsenal game it’s quite clear that Hodgson does not have a clue?  At 65 minutes, Arsenal were not getting very far, so what does Mr Wenger do? He substitutes two players and by jolly did they make a difference. OK they did not win, but the point is Arsene noted the issue and tried to address it, so at least an effort was made. I know that Rafa would have made changes then too. It’s clear that there is a purpose. Also this Hodgson bloke keeps going on about how Rafa left a bad team behind.  So how come then, that this Hodgson then does not play his purchases Cole & Co. Previously he made a very very bad mistake by sending Aquilani ( who is now having a whale of a time in Juventus and has no desire to return) away on loan!  I do not like this man; he needs to leave Liverpool with immediate effect!

Marching On, bribery, Corruption and the issue of stupid train companies

When all the saints, when all the saints when all the saints go marching on, I want to be in that number, oh when the saints go marching in!

Or in this case you could be saying When all the pounds, when all the pounds when all the pounds come falling off, I want to be in that number, oh when pounds come falling off!

Actually I only lost one pound, but I have to say that it felt like I had won a jackpot!  It can be hard to keep going on or marching on as the hymn says, when as I did last week, feel you have done everything right and you put on a half pound. I was very disappointed and to be honest I really felt like just letting go!  Some how though, I managed even when things really did conspire against me! I made a decision that I was going to knuckle down and I even made my darling hubby suffer more than one fish dinner in order to achieve my aims! 

Maxi

I also brought an end to my late to slimming world, put on weight just as my beloved Reds ended their second half goal draught with the a goal from Maxi Rodriguez making it 3-0  at 55 minutes. The wonderful Pepe Reina became the fastest Liverpool goalie to reach a 100 clean sheets.  And so I am hoping that Liverpool’s onward march to recovery will continue and as will the pounds drop off of me and yes I realise that we both have to strive, as there are always opponents to get in your way! The next opponent is more of an obstacle an that I have a couple of lunchtime meetings, and the next opponent for Liverpool is Newcastle at St James’s Park…we do not have a good away record this season, so let’s hope we can march past that obstacle.  

The difference between trying to achieve weight loss compared to other goals like winning the right to host the 2018 world cup is that you cannot cheat, I mean if I went down the chippie or curry house every lunch time, it should not come as a surprise if I were to put on weight and be less nearer my goal of looking like Naomi Campbell! (ha…no smirking please!) and the only person who would get hurt would be me, where as with the corrupt ways of FIFA, despite having one of the most viable bids, England still did not win the bid. What happened, was it bribery and corruption, or was it simply that Russia has never hosted before or does Sepp Blatter really have an altruistic reasoning?  Russia won and England lost. One set of people made the decisions and took the actions and other people got hurt! How interesting.  I won’t even bother with X- factor that needs a whole chapter of its own!

Annoying Train Company

One last note about overcoming obstacles, I have to travel to and from work on First Capital Connect and this can be such a challenge…really…. Take today for example; I left work in good time to get to the St Pancras to catch the 17: 22 train.  Alas when I got there, this train was not to be, indeed the one that should have come directly before was not coming either. This meant that from 17:10 until 17:39 there was no train when there should have been 4 trains!  I was not amused as this made me late for slimming world. It would have been easy just to go directly home rather than go to class…this side of my life is a real challenge all because the train company is rather poor, I call them stupid...

When Plans go Awry!

A good plan?

Generally I believe that most of us wake up and go about our business. We may have breakfast or we may not. We may grab a bite to eat at our desk or we we’ll do the whole one hour lunch thing. One must not forget about dinner which can vary hugely from one household to the next!  I don’t think there is usually a rhyme or reason as to why or how we do these things. (except those who may be a bit anal I suppose ha ha just joking!)

They usually have to fit around all the other important things in life:

Dropping your little darlings at school, Paying a bill, Going to work meetings etc that life is it not?

Having said that my colleague friend is very predictable about some of these things- you can set your clock by him no word of a lie! He would have no problem adapting to the ethic of slimming world which is planning, planning and planning.  Meaning you plan what you are going to eat. Making sure that it fits in with the important bits of your life.

So what do you do you do when your solid plans go awry? Do you allow it all to become “things fall apart” or do you scramble and make sure that you pick up all the pieces.

This week has been rather erratic, I had a good plan but it was sabotaged by events that were not within my control.  I got so hungry I was ready to eat my hand, I ended up with a Chinese; not what I would ordinarily have opted for especially in the middle of the week, but what’s a girl to do?  Sometimes the best laid plans go to pot, it’s what you do when this has happened that makes all the difference. For my syns I put on 1/2lb. I can’t say that this was due to my failing plan, but its irritating when you are looking to consolidate!  And now I am no nearer to being slimmer of the week! 

It was evident that Roy Hogdson had a plan when we went to white hart  lane this weekend; but that all went awry, in fact that really was things fall apart. Both Torres and Maxi missed glaring sitters, and we made a couple of defensive errors and bang, spurs punished us and beat us 2-1 from being 1-0 down.So they were able to scramble and pick themselves up when their plan was not working, but we couldn’t and there in lies the difference between those who are going to go on and win things. I think we were by far and large the better of the two teams, but chances missed do not win games, or indeed lose your weight. 

Diligence, indomitable spirit and other stories

A dictionary defines diligence as:

1. Earnest and persistent application to an undertaking; steady effort; assiduity.
2. Attentive care; heedfulness.

Now one of my aims, (as sad as some of you may consider that to be) is to be slimmer of the week at my slimming class. In order to achieve this you have to a) lose the most weight in the class and b) have lost weight the week before as well as staying to class.  One of my bug bears has been my inability these past few weeks to lose two weeks on the trot despite having followed the plan diligently.( wow! Aren’t I clever! Ha ha ) I mean I have lost 1 stone and 8.5lbs so far, with 2.5lbs lost this weigh in.  yippee… I honestly felt like breaking into dance there and then, and it has been the culmination of good week but also, my attention to the detail of the plan and how I tend to react. I have also developed very good planning skills!

The point I am really making is that this plan does work but it does require you to follow it, one needs to be persistent with it too.  I am also very happy that my beloved reds beat west ham 3-0 this Saturday, hooray!  How diligent were they or was it a flash in the pan?  In my mind Mr Hogdson would be conducting some due diligence of his own round about now, trying to understand what spurs are going to put us through next weekend, watching videos etc... well he should be doing something shouldn’t he?  I mean he needs to heed what their star players are going to be doing!!!

When you are constantly not achieving your goals, you begin to feel fed up and almost may wish to abandon the plan altogether. This is where indomitable spirit comes in.  This is to show courage when you and your principles are pitted against overwhelming odds. Although these words were not used in class today, we did talk about staying with it when it all seems to be going wrong, after all let’s face it, its easy to stick at it when its working isn’t it… you need strength and will power to stop from throwing it all away, because you have had a bad moment and your circumstances are challenging you, kids playing up, having to go to micky dees, domestic issues meaning you don’t get time to cook, there are lots of things that tend to go wrong. This principle is learnt at tae kwan doh and is one of the 5 tenets!

I have to talk about x-factor here..again… one of the other tenets of tae kwan do is integrity and it has now become glaringly clear that the judges (well except maybe Danni) do not have any of this quality, I mean did you listen to that Louis Walsh this week…he went on and on about how good paije was, how he has always supported him, and that they (him and cher) both did not deserve to be in the bottom two… did he put his money where his mouth is? Hell now he could have sent it to Deadlock and let the public decide but he decided to send paije home instead. I hated that and I was screaming at the TV, It was quite clear that they must have known the public vote although they go to copious lengths to deny that…somehow somehow its obvious that Cher, and Katy are their favourites and they will go to any lengths to keep her in..Meanwhile the Wagner fan machine goes on and on, and Mary obviously has all of Ireland voting for her. I can’t wait to see if this will fetter out or if this is the year when the joker will win?  That will be poetic justice against Simon et al for their lack of integrity don’t you think? 

The Devil’s Spawn, his food and his wicked ways

There are all sorts of people in this world that we live in. Some of them good, some of them bad and so on and so forth!  The ones that have caught my eye this week though are the saboteurs, the rumour mongers and the fraudulent show fixers! Right now in my opinion, these types of people are surely the spawn of the devil!

More Devil food!

The saboteurs, as you can imagine also come in all shapes and sizes. This week the one that showed up on my radar was my colleague.  I had returned to my desk late in the afternoon to find a small paper bag, originally hailing from starbucks awaiting me. It had a yellow stickie on it saying it was a present from said colleague. I opened the bag to find a muffin staring up at me, bold as brass it was, saying eat me, eat me…yeah right as if I would!  To be honest, this could have been seen as an act of kindness and in another era, that is how I would have taken it. However you have to see that right now, in this time this could not be so and therefore I was not likely to eat it. You see I am very vocal about my participation in the slimming world eating plan. In my work place anyone who sits within a two seat  radius f me will learn pretty quickly that I am actively following the plan with the aim of losing weight ( or as I generally refer to it, trying to look like Naomi Campbell), so why would you then offer me a muffin or indeed any other devil food for that matter, except you want derail me from my destination of goodness?!  Well needless to say it ended up in the bin and I am giving myself a big pat on the back ( I know, self praise is no praise!) for sticking to my guns. It can be done even in adversity, as I have  to mention that it I was hungry and people kept trying to tell me that it’s not as bad a cake or biscuits and that I should eat it, that it wont hurt etc..imagine that... they clearly do not understand.

He Said categorically that he's staying at LFC

As far as rumour mongers go, they are most certainly at the very least relatives of the devil! My chosen ones this week are the professionals, the press and people on the internet spreading falsehoods that Pepe Reina was going to leave Liverpool. It  went on and on like Ariston, to such an extent that the pepe himself had to come out and deny it. This is very annoying and I believe like the saboteurs they are only trying to undermine the confidence ( what little there is right now) of the fans and generally create a negative atmosphere.  Especially in times where your club is in a bit of a crisis/ transition, (call it what you like!), his is when your club really needs you behind them, to have patience etc you don’t want to be busy thinking that the people who could assist turn the club’s fortune around. 

Whilst I am talking about Liverpool FC, my beloved reds as I always like to call them,  I am now officially calling for them to break with the tradition and sack this Roy Hodgson, this is necessary for progress it has reached that point. He doesn’t get it. Liverpool is too too big for him, he does not understand that Liverpool languishing in the bottom half of the table is diabolical!  We played abysmally on Sunday and got beaten 2-0 by Stoke for our troubles , but compare this to Man utd who also played abysmally but came from 2-0 down to get a draw! It’s ridiculous and something has to be done other than blaming Rafa.  I am really sick and tired of that. Say what you like about him, under him we generally won our bread and butter games. I will keep saying it!

Devil's Spawn or is he the devil?

The event fixer that I am watching is the special child of the devil Mr Simon Cowell. I had to get this in about   X-Factor as it has become clear that it’s a farcical fix! Everything is manipulated to keep this Katie Weasel in the competition!   Last week they refused to let the judges go to deadlock as they knew that that miss weasel would have gone, this week they knew that Aiden had the lowest votes so they were happy to go to deadlock.  This is what they do and it’s a con at least, to those who think it’s a genuine competition.

Whilst some would say that the devil takes care of his own, in the end the truth will out and some people will ultimately be disgraced. Its all starting already… according to a red top paper, the Katie has already betrayed them, it makes sense as it also states that syco have paid lots and lots of money to buy her out of a contract. We will see if there is any truth in it.

This type of behaviour is not new it happens in ordinary work places up and down the country on a daily basis. This just seems extraordinary as its being played in the public eye and clearly does not have the same equal opportunity laws governing it. How interesting really..

Birthday parties, x-factor & winning ways

I have to be honest - it has been a tough couple of weeks!  It's been all go and not much come! I was just recovering from the jolly that was the MANSAG dinner dance up in Newcastle, then lo and behold it's time for a big family affair! How am I supposed to stick to a diet under these circumstances?! I have moaned a lot about giving up this and not eating that, I felt that I had stuck to it prior to this and for all my efforts I stayed the same! To be honest this was fine considering how things had been but then shock horror - I put on 4&1/2 lb! Boy was I  
sad! Yes sad! I could not even begin to imagine how I was gonna keep  it all under control  when I knew this party was coming up, after all, I won't be an ordinary spectator I 'll be right out of my  comfort zone  in terms of food anyhow. But somehow someway though; I managed to keep it together and omg! I lost all the pounds that I put on the week before!  Am still so excited and as a result I feel ready to face this thing head on! You would have been surprised at how much gusto I put into Tae Kwan Do tonight I was really spurred on!

 

I wonder though and I have to get this in how Treyc is really feeling,  I mean publicly she has been nothing but gracious  about her exit from X-Factor, unlike her fans who  are all calling for Cheryl and Simon's head on a plate! It's all been rather farcical with Cheryl refusing to vote and the other judges voting to send Treyc home even though Katie forgot her words and messed up her save me  song! I sincerely believe that Treyc will have the last laugh!  She did everything right but clearly this interim result was not expected! Just like this diet it's sometimes a shock when you think you have done it all correctly but instead you put on weight rather than losing! Those would not be considered to be winning ways!  

My beloved reds beating the champions 2-0 on the other hand is definitely winning ways! It happened mid week too  when Stevie G came on as a sub mid game  to save the day with a hat trick ensuring we beat Napoli 3-1 so with the latest win it's 4 out of 4 in all competitions  Good going  don't u think?  As for me  i am hoping I emulate them! Wanna lose four weeks in a row! That is my Xmas wish… 

Tantrums and more delusion.

It's Not fair!

Hmm, so much has happened  since last week and today I have to say that I threw the baby out of the pram, or out with the bath water, whichever one you prefer.  And I am not the only one.  It seems like Wayne Rooney may be having a mega tantrum for reasons best known to him and Alex Ferguson.  He must be well pissed having watched his team throw away a two nil lead! I talked about delusion last week, but whilst I believe I have relieved myself of my own delusion, I seemed to have passed it and some more to Roy Hodgson, who is the only person in the world who thinks that we played well and were unlucky not to have gotten anything from the game at Goodison Park.

Devil food

 So why my own tantrum, well after last week, with my addition of 1 pound for which I took responsibility, this week I stayed the same. I was and am still not amused. I did everything right,  I swapped it around, mixed it up and counted every single syn that I had, in fact to be honest, I did not have a lot of syns AND I did not have any healthy extras, i.e. no bread, no cereal no dried fruit or porridge.  So imagine my shock and horror when I got on the scales.  Therefore instead of remaining calm, and analysing what I had done, wrongly or otherwise, on the way to my zumba class, I stopped to buy petrol and I also purchased a grab bag of walkers crisp, Worcester sauce flavour and a wispa bar together with  lucozade sport and devoured the lot!

Psychologically this is the same as throwing away a 2-0 lead. After all, before I got to class and got weighed, I was happy and had a spring in my step.  I was confident that I was going to win on the scales and that I would be well on my way to losing the next ½ stone and nearer to fitting into my lovely trousers hanging without use in my wardrobe. Well blow me, I am no nearer, and I could not take heart from the fact that at least I had not put on. Oh no only a loss was gonna be good enough. That feeling of euphoria was short lived, and by doing what I did, I let the devil in and undid my good work!

static stars

I wonder how Gerrard, Torres and Cole feel, with all the ups and down of last week’s purchase malarkey. It was supposed to be the start of a new era, with new optimism. So imagine my shock, or in fact the collective shock of all other Liverpool supporters when we turned out a Goodison Park and played the way we did!  No passion, no control, half asleep and lost in a fixture that is historically significant to our club and that we have not lost for the last 5 years! We lost in spectacular fashion. I cannot even bring myself to put it down to the laws of averages.. we through away a golden opportunity to bring back the feel good factor.. ie we gave away a 2-0 lead!

X Factor, Politics and Dieting

What no footie I hear you scream! Is that relief or sadness?? Well what can I do, we are on an international break and the only premiership news of note is that Gillette and Hicks are going to the high court to stop Liverpool being sold to NESV! So you can check out the latest on that at LiverpoolFC website. 

I have a question - what do the X factor, politics and Dieting have in common?  How many of you have been following my favourite car wreck TV programme the x factor? It has not been out of the news this week; in fact it has been on the front page of most tabloids all last week and today! Why oh why I am screaming? Well the main reason is because Ms Cheryl Tweedy Cole decided to choose not one but two substandard wannabe pop stars over the mightily talented Gamu Nghengu. Check out any of the gossip / newspaper websites for full details.

The relevance point here is spin. Cheryl Cole in her desire to stay in the role of the national darling has tried very hard to defend her blatant favouritism, with statements such as ‘I stand by my decision’; ‘my hands are tied’ meanwhile the juggernaut that is the British Media went on and on like Ariston?  The fanatical desire for the news by the British public knows no ending….the more I think about it the more I am becoming convinced that they invented the whole twist /wild card malarkey to save a bit of face for the show.  Either way there is a lot of deluding and delusion going on here…secondary question- how come Danni was not queried about her choices, they were a bit suspect too weren't  they?

Sir Phillip Green 

In politics today the revered Sir Philip Green ( pictured) has said in his report on how the Government spends money that we are wasteful and that no one in Whitehall knows how much travel costs. I am sure that he thought he was being nice when he said that the civil servants were not to blame but that we did no use our economies of scale in our buying solutions. He went on to say that we did not have a particular agency that we used to book hotels, cars, train tickets etc.   I vehemently state that is not strictly true, at least in my department we do have an agency that we use for booking such resources. As for knowing the costs, as I said to my beloved hubby, even Bloody British rail do not know the cost of their tickets so how the hell does he expect some civil servant to know?  

I do believe that Sir Green was called in to give some backing to his maties Georgie Osborne and David Cameron, to ensure that people know they are not making public spending issues up and add a little credence to the cuts being demanded in so doing attempting to disguise   the fact that Messrs Cameron and Osborne are taking a typically Tory one dimensional approach to dealing with the issue of public spending.

Spin is a deflecting tool; in relation to dieting... it’s the little untruths we tell ourselves in trying to console ourselves when we have put on weight. It’s the non-acknowledgement of the extra slice of bread we had at breakfast, the cake we had on colleague John Smith’s birthday that we did not record. It all adds up and somehow we convince ourselves that if we do not acknowledge it then we never ate it and then we can be genuinely surprised when we have put on weight, as we have deluded ourselves into believing we have followed our diet plan to the letter.  I think it’s a natural response and its hard work to over come this.

As for me I have put on a pound this week, and funnily enough it was this type of delusion was on the top of the conversation in class  with a reminder that we have to count our syns and weigh our healthy extras. My struggles this week were the extra slice of bread here and there, the desire for sweet things, going hungry whilst out on my errands! I must not forget the wine! It’s keeping these things under control they are a real issue as they serve to undermine all the good effort one has already put in. 

Week ending 4th October cont'd

Well blow me for six! I lost one and a half pound this week and that took me to my stone and a half award.  I was so pleased, really I can't say how much... With this event I am even more determined not to let situations get in my way. I need to practice making good choices and to keep this up even when the going is tough.....

Week ending 4th October 2010: Analogies and Good Choices

Goal Scene...

I have to get this off my chest! Am so vexed at Liverpool, yes Liverpool, not my beloved reds as I generally refer to them!  They are there, languishing in the bottom three, losing at home to Blackpool was not part of the plan! And to add insult to injury Torres is injured again! Ok I like Blackpool but that is because I am a romantic! Anyhow well done to them and by all accounts they deserved the win. I will not be watching MOTD to see what happened; in fact I could easily say that my love of Liverpool has now turned me off match of the day… as I watch Chelsea and Man City take all the spoils week after week!  Looking on the forums, BBC 606, the LFC fan page on Facebook, the fans are full of vitriol. Imagine that…Sack the Manager they are calling for, the yanks out they say… they are all rubbish they scream…. But honestly is that reasonable? Is it reasonable for us to call for the manager’s head just because our team did not win?  

I joined slimming world a few months ago. The consultant is a very nice lady who explained everything and gave me the books I needed with all the information. The diet has been going swimmingly, but imagine if I went and started yelling abuse at her on the weeks that I put on weight rather than considering that perhaps it was I who did not follow the diet properly.  Would that be acceptable or reasonable?  I think not.  As far as I am concerned the blame for Liverpool loss today lies mostly at the feet of the players. .

Its similar to a story that I read in a popular women’s magazine, it told the story of two women, where one was resentful of the other. Getting down to the nitty gritty of it turns out the one of them had catapulted to the top of her career ladder and was revered across the industry. The other was stuck in a rut. The two started together, and the successful lady generally came in at 9am and left at 6 on the dot without exception. Compared to this other one who was often still at her desk late into the evening, sometimes as late as 10pm.  This lady was resentful of the successful one, as she felt that she did not work as hard as she did.  When it came down to it  however that this lady stuck in a rut  actually faffed around a lot during the day, tweeting, updating facebook,  and ended up having to stay at work longer in order to get her work done.  I found this story interesting because clearly the woman was deluded about her output and her work ethic was questionable. I can only imagine that her ability to make good choices and focus on the use of her time during the day was limited and/ or impeded. (Compared with dieting, managing or playing in a football team).  My slimming consultant sends us a text message every Friday to remind us to make good choices as in our choice of food and drink for the two best days of the week.  We all know how life is; sometimes it’s easier said than done.

I think it’s fair to say that the weekends are the hardest, you have to go and meet friends, you need to go to that party, or take little Johnny to his party these are all instances that impede on our ability to make good choices, indeed sometimes a whole situation can put paid to making a good choice at all. That is not the worst of it as when it comes to weigh in we are all so surprised when we have put on a pound or two or indeed over the moon if we have seemingly gotten away with it. It’s that thing called delusion again!

Char Grilled Crocker Fish

As for my week, it was a long one, marked by the trips to the hospital and errands that are not ordinarily part of ones repertoire, at least not on a daily basis. Did I make good choices, some of the time, not nearly as often as I should have. I am going to take a pat on the back for my good choice on Friday night whilst out with my old girl’s association. It was a Nigerian restaurant offering all my favourites, but instead I opted for the char grilled fish with Plantain.  I was not good enough not to eat the fried plantain though, but still it was a small but important win, so am proud of myself anyway. Will it translate into a weight loss? Until tomorrow folks…what I will try to do though is be honest with myself analysis when I do get the result. 

Fernando Torres top 20

Week ending 27th Sept 2010- cont'd

Well, I am really pleased, I lost 1/2 Lb. Its not much but its all in the right direction!  It's Tuesday now and still I am challenged!  Spent longer at the L&D than I envisaged and hunger was taking a grip. In the end I had half a bag of quavers...my beloved hubby then says 'oh you are not supposed to eat that!' Of course if I were following a standard diet, then that would  be oh so true, but in actuality, I can have those, (although I did throw half of them away) I just have to count it as part of my treats. I am allowed 5- 15 of those a day and half a pack of those was 4 and a 1/2! so hubby dearest, smoke that..much better than your snickers don't ya think??

What I have learnt so far in this journey that it's the situation we find ourselves in  that turn our desire or indeed need  for food/ fuel into a battle between good and evil. Sometimes good planning can offset this, but equally some situations arise quite unexpectedly and if its not possible that we can side step and still make good choices then we should not beat ourself up about it. I know I know...easier said than done!

Weekending 27th Sept 2010

Liverpool 2: Sunderland 2

I was reading the match report on the BBC , and I noted that the 606 debate was 'how was the 'pool's first goal allowed to stand?'.  Well my response to that is by the same reasoning that allowed the goal that was scored with the the aid of the beach ball was allowed to stand in the opposite fixture last season.   Do I sound bitter? Well may be so, but my point is that incidents such as these go around again and again  but it's always the people on the receiving end of the perceived injustice that will remember it!   This incident refers to the fact that Sunderland were deemed to have taken a free kick when Michael Turner kicked the ball back toward their goalie and Dirk Kuyt took advantage and scored for Liverpool!  Next time throw it!

If I am honest, I would have to say that this was a poor result from my beloved Reds, in particular on the back of being ousted from the Carling Cup by Northampton earlier in the week. ( not the same team though) but on balance I would say that we are not as bad as the pundits are saying but clearly no where near as good as our potential!

This brings me on to the subject of Luck, it appears to me that the whilst The FA, FIFA &Co dilly dally on the small matter of the use of technology to make key decisions in football the distribution of luck will have to rely on good old Lady Karma.  e.g last season there was a big raucous when Michael Owen scored the winning goal against Man City in the 6th Minute of stoppage time, when most of us felt that the whistle should have been blown...now fondly referred to as Fergie time...Darren Bent scored the equaliser  for Sunderland against Arsenal ( last week) in injury time and Mr Wenger was not amused... Is that luck? what is it?  We could be here citing many more examples.It was only when I saw the replay on MOTD that I accepted that the Torres's goal ruled out for off side was in fact offside. Technology would save a lot of heartbeats!

Last week, my gunner loving friend put out a vitriolic attack on my beloved Reds suggesting that Alex Fergie was correct to say that Torres was a cheat..somehow I have not heard from him, since his beloved Arsenal were beaten by West Brom!

Interesting Trivia...before this weekend, West Brom had not won at Arsenal since 1983 and funnily enough, Sunderland have still not won at Anfield since 1983. (Gary Linekar mentioned this  on MOTD)

Am writing this a bit prematurely this week, as have not been to my slimming world class yet. However I have had a mixed week!  At the start I came flying out of the starters box like Usain Bolt and kept sprinting and doing all nicely until Saturday! WHY oh WHY is the weekend so hard to follow a eating plan on. My hubby turning into Mr Hop along did not deter me, am trying to get the psychology behind not being able to keep to the plan or indeed be able to make good choices when one is outside of one's normal routine.  Yesterday I went to our old girl's association meeting in Bushey, it was a lively affair with lots of women screeching and all that and there was food- lots of it!  I tried to be sensible, a trait for which I was laughed at for by friends..imagine that..my friends that are the correct size for their frame.  I said to them, I want to be the correct size too..  I want to be able to buy nice jeans. I realised that people who can get nice jeans do not understand my desire....

Anyhow I digress..My sensible choice was beans with designer stew... well am yet to see how sensible that was. You would think that with Saturday over, Sunday would be easier..but hell no... I did not sleep well, as a result I did not get up on time, got lazy and my ability to make good choices for food slipped further and further away from me and I am beginning to realise that to lose weight and keep it off..is going to be hard work...

Will keep you posted on my weight loss if I make it to class this week. Watch out for my menu maker over coming soon!

VIDEO : Diving Nani Compilation

VIDEO : Diving Nani Compilation

This came from Twitter, could not resist sharing!

20th September: Gastrocnemius, Cheating and the 21st birthdays!

This has been a rather interesting week. I maintained, or in layman terms I stayed the same this week and to be honest I take that gratefully with all my heart!

As for the footie, my beloved reds were beaten by Manchester United at Old Trafford (3-2) and now they are languishing in 16^th! Imagine that it’s unheard of! However I am not going to dwell so much on the match but rather that I find it rather amusing that Fergie was not satisfied that the mancs took all the spoils but he had to accuse Torres of cheating – amazing! I did not get to watch the match this week, I was out at a tae Kwan do destruction seminar but from all the reports I have read, and indeed from my own hubby, I gather that the true reds were not as hopeless as everyone had written them off to be, this I believe to be at the heart of the issue Mr Alex Fergie had! He really thought the mancs were going to win 10-0! Instead he had to watch his darling little so and so squander a 2-0 nil lead by giving away needless penalties and free kicks! He probably thought oh no not at the hands of another Merseyside team! Lucky him then that they got away in the nick of time!

Well talking of cheating, when you are following a particular eating plan with the aim of losing weight the innocuous piece of cake or biscuit here and there seems harmless enough, but do it often enough the cheating goes against you and not the diet…Fergie in my books cries wolf too much and one day, an injustice will be committed against his boys and no-one will take any notice!

My personal cheating came in the form of being in a position to make proper considered choices about what I was going to eat.  Why am I making excuses? – It was my nephew’s 21^st Birthday on Friday... the celebration food was typically Nigerian and particularly oily- the plan was out of the window, what’s a girl to do? I could not take my own food now could I?  That would be just too anal.

As for the gastrocnemius that has no relevance on my attempt at losing weight except Mr Akiti tore his and we will be on the merry go round that will be trips to the hospital over the coming week…hopefully my routine will not be too busted!

Recipe of the week- 13th September 2010

Scotch Eggs

Ingredients:

6 hard boiled eggs

350-400g of lean Mince (I used pork, but u can use beef turkey)

2 slices of wholemeal bread from a 400g loaf (Makes 6)

Method

Put the mince into a bowl and season with garlic, black pepper, salt, thyme, curry and Worcester sauce. (Or whatever takes your fancy) and mix it together thoroughly.

Blitz the bread to form bread crumbs and set aside.

Beat one egg in a bowl.

Divide the mince into 6 portions. Roll each portion into a pattie and wrap one around each egg being careful not to rip the meat, but ensuring the egg is completely covered and that there are no gaps.  Dip each egg into the beaten egg, then into the breadcrumbs. Place  all six eggs onto a baking a tray and bake in a hot oven until the mince is cooked.  1 syn each.( for those of you in the slimming world know!)

This Week, ending 13th September 2010

A very interesting week indeed!  That is in both my struggle with the extra weight and in footie land!  It seems to have been the week of come backs!  My progress took a slight step backwards last week with the not so good result of putting on 1&1/2 pounds. I was so disappointed as I had followed the plan rigorously and as always recorded everything. I had a good little lament to the lady who sat next to me in class she seemed to think it was rather funny!  Anyhow I have looked through my sheets and it would seem as if I had not been eating enough fruit at least that seems to be the logical conclusion that I can draw. I have to link it to the fact that shock horror, England won two matches in a row, and in emphatic fashion and even the Rooney came good. I have to say that my effort proved worth it as this week I lost a whopping 4Lbs. I was so happy and imagine there were mini manicures at class, so I managed to get my nails painted as well.  Other comebacks included Everton, coming from 3 -1 down, to equalise 3-3 in the dying minutes of the match, and it would seem that even in the championship, it was going on as well as Leeds came from behind to beat Swansea 2-1 whilst, Burnley came from 3-1 down to beat Preston 4-3, making it a day of double woe in the Ferguson household.   When I switched over to watch the tennis, Aston villa were beating Stoke 1-0 so I could not have been surprised to see the final result was Stoke 2- Aston Villa 1! So there it goes, I only wish the same could be said for my beloved Reds!  I am still having faith and disagreeing wholeheartedly with the manky pundit who said that if Liverpool see 4^th they will feel like they have won the premiership!  Cheeky so and so….

Food, footy and a weighty issue!

I was listening to or rather reading the BBC news sports page regarding the Transfer window and all the wheeling and dealing that was going on.  The topsy turviness of it all reminded me of being on a diet. The ups an downs, the rumours, the hints, the truths and the outright lies.  In the end, when the window closes you can physically see the results, ie. Joe cole left Chelsea and went to Liverpool, just as Yossi benayoun left Liverpool and went to Chelsea.  This was the case in many clubs in many divisions in many countries all across Europe. 

So, how does this compare to dieting?  I  was thinking that  when a diet is successful where does all the fat go? How much of it si transferred into muscle and how much of it is used in fuel. Whilst the transfer market is conducted in Pounds, players and Euros, the diet is conducted in food, fuel, fat waste. Measured in terms of calories etc.  I think the logic applied here is straight forward and can be quite scientific. We all know by now that a mars bar has more calories than a stick of  celery; however the psyche is not  necessarily so scientific and can be a hindrance or a help in the battle of the bulge.  In this mode one can wake up in the morning and feel awfully ‘fat’ and the feeling can prevail for the whole day or indeed days, but quite often can dissipate just as quickly as the feeling arrived.  Some people always feel fat despite having anorexic body proportions. The point I am really aiming at is that fat is relative to the individual.   It varies by gender, culture, social groups etc and the impact of the feeling of fatness manifests in the society to such an extent that there is room for a multi-billion pound diet and fitness industry.

Myself, I often feel fat but I like to think that it does not affect my personality or indeed how I view myself.  I do worry about it in terms of my health though. I participate in martial arts. Tae kwan do to be precise, and I love it. I have obtained a black tag belt, this is the level that my instructor refers to as black belt in waiting or indeed sometimes virtual black belts. Needless to say the grading was very hard. I knew it was going to be hard, and I practiced a lot with my friends as often as I could. Indeed in the run up to the grading I went to the class 3 times a week, and in the two weeks immediately prior to the class I  did the class 4 times a week. I don’t need to tell you that I was absolutely shattered by the end of it.  In the end, I  got the belt and i suddenly thought that it would have been a lot easier if I was not carrying so much weight. In fact when that thought came in my head, I did really begin to feel fat. Funny then that not long after this I was st with a group of colleagues who all seemed to be doing one diet or another and in the end, I decided that I was going to make a concerted effort to lose weight, I was not however willing to starve in the process. I then enrolled in Slimming world for the 3^rd time. ( yes I had done it before quite successfully in fact). I had to think long and hard about my motives and what I wanted to achieve. I then decided that I wanted to drop at least 2 dress sizes.  3 would be better, but I did decide that I was going to take it slowly and realise that the world and indeed my world was not going to stop just because I was dieting.

It was with this in mind that I was able to adopt the edict that it was a lifestyle change rather than a diet.  Indeed that was to prove to be the challenge the ‘lifestyle change’,  changing the habits of a lifetime, those habits that are often routed in tradition and culture. They are often very comforting too, evoking comments such as ‘just like mummy made, yummy, to die for’ and so on and so forth.

So I have been on this plan now  since April and I have lost 1 stone and 4 pounds. Nearly a dress size. I am still highly motivated but its getting harder I have to be honest. And so I will soldier on, I must however spare a thought for my long suffering hubby ( not so suffering really) but will have to put up with my experimental cooking and my incessant search for the fat and sugar free versions of everyday comfort foods like cakes.   I must say though that I do make up for it to him in that I am a footie fan and lover of most sports except golf and horse racing. So am sure you can guess the contents of this blog – yep you guessed...food and footie.

My World Cup Experience

Nothing
gets me going from a sporting point of view than football. It’s exciting,
bastardised by money of course but exciting nonetheless.  And in football there is no competition
greater or indeed like the world cup. It’s the one that unites people and sets
them all alight at the same time.

To be
perfectly honest football is a sport that has grown on me, at least in the
granular sense anyway. Growing up I remember my brother sneaking downstairs to
watch Brazilian Soccer ( which I watched with him sometimes- and the endless
games of table soccer with the coke tops and biro lids)  and the various football matches throughout
the ages for one reason or the other with various people who happened to be in
my life at the time. (My love of Liverpool
started grudgingly in university- and cemented many years later).

This
world cup just gone is the first one in which I have watched nearly 95% of the
matches as avidly as I did.  Other world
tournaments that I watched stand out as follows:

1986- That
game with the hand of God…England
vs. Argentina.
1990 England vs. Cameroon, 1994 Nigeria
vs. Italy.
And I will start with this one, the Italians were seriously acting, diving left
right and centre. We were all screaming at them as one does (as if they can hear);
eventually mummy started yelling at the Nigerians for not diving…how
interesting. The Italians eventually won 2-1. As for England
vs. Argentina
– what could I say? Its all been said but the point is out of everything to do
with that world cup that is what I remember and indeed amongst my uni friends I
seemed to be the only supporting Argentina at the time, I cannot even remember
why except I must have been being a pain.  
At the time I could not understand why Maradona did what he did,
although his reasoning is very amusing. Worse Argentina went on to win that world
cup.   For me, I cannot talk about world
cups past without talking about the 1990 quarter final between England and Cameroon! There were at least a
dozen of us, if not more packed into my dad’s flat in Neasden. It was an
aggressive game. We all felt (without exception) that the ref was unduly biased
towards England.
Many fouls went unpunished and the floor of my dad’s flat got a battering of
its own when Roga Milla came on and did his thing. I can’t remember the score
line, but England
went through to the semi final and the dozen or so of us were left feeling down
trodden and pissed off to say the least. 
These are the moments that have added flavour to my interest in the
world cup and indeed football generally. 
As I write I also remember a world cup match between Brazil and England (2002 I think) where
Ronaldhino lobbed a ball from some yds right over the head of David Seaman.

All
very good and now we are in 2010 the year in which we had a new country join
the world’s elite!  The build up to this
world cup was fanatical as it ever could be. Personally I can remember being in
my kitchen when it was announced that South Africa would host the world
cup in 2010. I was so excited that I could picture myself right there with my
best peeps.  It did not even cross my
mind that I would not make it there that instead I would be watching it by
surreptitiously streaming it at work, in my iphone, rushing home from tae kwan
do to my front room to catch the action. 
I recall the expectations and numerous reports that South Africa
was not up to the task, there would be too much crime, the stadiums would not
be built etc. We had the reports about ticket fraud and sky high hotel prices –
but boy did South Africa
prove them all wrong. They so came out to play and showed them that you cannot
keep the good boys down. This was to prove a recurring theme.

Then
the year got nearer and then came the reeling out of glories past in particular
the never to be forgotten 1966 win for England.  One must not forget the wonderful build up
the squad announcement and the pre world cup friendlies. This was the
tournament that taught me about the 30 man down to 23 scenario. Anyhow so much
for that the squads were announced and all the media was alive to the sound of
selection: should they go or should they stay. 
My favourite medium has to be five live, they were all so funny on there
and of course the supporters were always adding their ten and ten pence. The
Tuesday that the England
squad was announced on supporter rang the radio and wailed and wailed how it
was so hard to be an England
supporter. It was quite funny; she clearly had a different view to Capello as
did many pundits.

How
many of you participated in the office sweepstake? I had Germany and even with the winnings of £35.00 id
never really supported them especially against Spain in the semi-final. I fully
expected and desired that Spain should win, just as I expected based on what I
had seen of Germany in previous matches ( e.g when they went down to 10 men
against Serbia and still looked like they were going to win) that they would
give Spain a run for their money! So shock horror when like Paraguay before them they did not come out to
play their own best game, but instead to stop Spain from playing theirs.  Just not good enough but Spain’s
abundant patience paid off! 1:0 Spain.

As I
said at the beginning this is the first time I watched over 90% of the
tournament. I was looking for excitement, adventure, unpredictability and
Romance.  My chosen teams in no
particular order were Spain,
Nigeria, Brazil and England.

Of
course Nigeria
disintegrated into an undisciplined mess, came last in their group and was
banned by President Jonathan Goodluck. (This ban was later retracted). As for England, those
of you who share with me on Facebook will know what I thought of them.  My chosen teams were picked off one by one
with the exception of Spain
who are now the champions. No adventure there, but this was provided in one
fell swoop by the disintegration of France after or leading to (depending on
your point of view) the suspension of Nicholas Anelka.  I and lots of others am sure, could not have
predicted that Italy would
have gone home without even making it through the group stages, that Brazil
would not make it past the quarter final and the only 1 African nation would
make it to the quarter finals.  The
Romance for me came in the shape of Ghana and Prince whatever his name
was with gyan in the quarter final. Who knew? 
None of their big guns were there in the squad. It was all just football
and the whole of Africa and some were behind
them. It was a fab game and in the 119^th minute PB found what was
looking like a fantastic last minute winner, make no mistake about it, it was
going in, but the cheating Surez had other ideas and double hand volleyed out!
OMG, a penalty in the dying seconds of the game…it was a sure banker! Alas! It
was not to be. Agyan kicked it too hard, too whatever…he missed..then it went
to penalties … I would like to say the rest is history, but kharma had to add
its own ten and ten pence and the Dutch showed them what happens when you don’t
come out to play,. (See that theme again).

Now
onto the final. I had hope and anticipation oh what a match it was going to be!
If it were food I would have been salivating at the thought of it.  I enjoyed the final in the end, but it was
not as exciting as it could have been. There were only a few minutes of end to
end stuff. Why?  Well in my opinion that
was because Holland did what every other team
before them who had played Spain
did.  They spent their energy trying to
stifle them!  However they were different
in that they had a plan, this plan included martial arts and general cynical
fouling. Don’t get wrong, Spain
handed out some fouls of their own and definitely took advantage of Holland’s poor behaviour.
It was in this match that I saw how patient Spain really was. They passed, and
passed and passed yet again. Eventually in the 116^th minute they got
their goal!  They were champions with a
familiar yet unfamiliar ring to them: they made history, they were new
champions, first final first win, they won despite losing their opening team
and the only other team apart from them to do the double of being European
champions then going on to win the World Cup was West Germany.  They are also the first Europeans to win on
non European soil.

Holland were bitter, the papers on
Monday were full of it. They blamed Howard Webb, referee, they blamed everyone
but themselves hmm. They remind me of child in the supermarket, whose mum has
said no to the packet of sweets and their response is to wail in a high pitched
voice. ”it’s not fair” as a parent my response to that would be that life is
not fair!

So in a
nutshell when all is said and done, what will I remember about this world cup?

·       
The
vuvezela

·       
The
disallowed England
goal, that was definitely a goal

·       
New Zealand scoring in the very last breath
of a match to equalise

·       
Suarez
who forgot accidentally on purpose forgot that he was playing football and not
volley ball

·       
Paul
the Octopus

·       
The
mad pundits

·       
The
sound of five live

·       
The
rushing home to watch the match

·       
Agyan’s
sobbing

·       
Frank
Lampard volleying himself in the air like a winch

·       
Diego
forlain

·       
Maradona

The
list above is not exhaustive, and it represents stuff I have not talked about
earlier in the body of this article.

Really
what I was trying to demonstrate is that its personal, what one sees, how you
interpret it or feel about it depends on many things that go to make up your
individuality. I loved this world cup, yet I know  of other football lovers who were indifferent
to it, thought it was not good enough, did not put on a good enough show of
high class football, lost interest just because their team did not do well or
were put off by the vuvuzela.

I loved
it, did I say that already? I will remember it for a good while.