Progress report

Mark the Magician (the personal trainer) had casually mentioned in my first session with him that a person should really be able to deadlift their own body weight without too much trouble. That was the same day that I squeaked and groaned as I tried to deadlift 25kg, and protested, "That's really quite heavy!"

He was gallant about it and didn't laugh at me until a week later.

Today, I was lifting 50kg. It was tough, but up it went, for 6 reps. Then I did pull ups - pull ups! - for 6 reps (I'll admit, they were assisted rather than my full body weight, but still). This whole process was repeated 5 times. I felt like Xena. Next time we do deadlifts, apparently we're gunning for the full body weight equivalent. It's exciting.

Now when I tense my glutes, there's actually a slight curve to my butt, and there is something firm underneath the winter stores. This is very exciting. It's been a long time since I had a butt worth mentioning.

The "C" word - Christmas

Today, I've been thinking about (I'm going to say it, I'm going to say the "C" word...) Christmas.

I reminded myself sternly that it's only August, and that sort of nonsense wouldn't be tolerated until at least 30th November, but my little brain wouldn't give in and occupy itself with anything more useful.

This Christmas is lining up to be the first one I will have ever spent away from my immediate family. I've spent a few years where I've only been with a few members of the clan, but generally it has been a home affair. Some years we join forces with another branch of the family, other years we keep it small. This year, I will be elsewhere (or so we hope, visas permitting...).

The reason it stuck in my mind so insistently was the realisation that I am poorly equipped for Christmas. My parents have been collecting Christmas decorations for decades, and have ample supplies of fairy lights, ancient tinsel, fibre optics, baubles and bells and whistles. Every year, the attic vomits forth a mountain of boxes of decorations, and we spend a couple of days decking the halls with boughs of holly - literally.

This year I have no holly (and no hall to deck, so never mind). No fairy lights. No baubles, no bells, no whistles. Not even a sad strand of tinsel. I am at square one for Christmas.

The good news is that we found a Christmas tree stand under the weeds in our back yard, so we at least have that.

Naturally, faced with a Christmas vacuum, I turned to the only place I could: Pinterest.

There is an abundance of ideas. Some are marvellous, some are... deranged? Some require such an investment in materials that you might as well buy ready-made decorations and save yourself the bother.

Most affordable seems to be home made salt dough ornaments, and they seem to be so simple that even I will find it hard to screw them up. I might even splash out on some cans of metallic spray paint. I'll need ribbon, too.

I also fancy some of the woven and folded paper decorations, although I disapprove entirely of any that use pages from books. Don't people know that books are sacred?? I've seen some very fancy colours being used, but being a traditional old fart, I will probably be using good old red, green and gold for my Christmas palette.

I really need to get out more.

Mexican rice and black beans - cheat food

Earlier on this week, I met up with my best friend for supper. We plumped for our favourite Mexican eatery, where I stuffed my face with fish tacos. On the side was a small pot of black beans and rice.

I've been craving black beans and rice ever since. No other beans would do. There must be something in the black beans that I need. This afternoon I cobbled together this cheat* meal in about four minutes flat. It was so good.



*Why is this a cheat meal? Because I used packaged rice, that's why. Uncle Ben's Mexican rice with lime, to be exact. Don't judge me!

Here's how it happened:

Half a packet of Mexican rice
Half a can of black beans, rinsed and drained.
2 tablespoons of water

All of these went into a covered pan over low heat to warm through, stirring occasionally.

In the meantime, I halved an avocado, added a pinch of salt and a squeeze of lime juice, and roughly mashed. I then quartered some cherry tomatoes.

Ta-da! The rice and beans were lovely and hot and mushy! Shoved it all into a bowl, and gorged myself silly.

In future, I resolve to make my own Mexican rice. But given that I was in a post-gym state of jelly-limbs and questionable stability, quick and easy was what I needed.

Enjoy!

The Battle - Farewell, Robin Williams

At 2am this morning, when I finally tore myself away from The West Wing and decided I should go to sleep, I saw the sad news that legendary actor, Robin Williams, had taken his own life.

Image from robin-williams.net

My generation was lucky to get to know him in our childhood as the Genie, as Mrs Doubtfire, and as a whole host of other benevolent and inspiring characters. We loved him - we still love him. He was a crazy uncle to us all. He was also, without doubt, one of the most talented actors we will ever know.

When I saw the headlines that he had committed suicide, I took a long, slow breath. It was sad news, indeed. I was not surprised. He had been open about his battle with depression for many years, and so many of the best comedians are blighted with the demons at the other end of the spectrum. Perhaps this is what makes them so good at being funny - they have so much practice at keeping the smile in place, at behaving as if everything is great, just fine, there is so much to laugh about... It becomes an effortless charade.

Sometimes, the smallest victory in depression is getting home and feeling as if you managed to fool everybody that day.

I think I put on a good show today. Nobody suspected how bad it is. I made everybody laugh. They all think I'm normal. Even better, they think I'm fun and outgoing and happy. Mission accomplished.

Some of the toughest moments are when you look at your successes, and you can see how good your life is, how many people around you love you and care about you, and you still sit slumped on the sofa, thinking to yourself, I don't want any of this any longer.

If there is anything to be learned from the battle of another man, it should be that there is not a scale of severity with depression. If you're not suicidal, that doesn't mean you are less worthy of help and support and treatment than somebody who is. If you have mastered the effortless charade, that doesn't mean that you are coping well. You don't have to be looking at the last option for what you're feeling to be recognised as serious. That 'waiting it out' isn't the answer. You don't have to accept the bad days, because it's not just a bad day when they happen over and over again.

Depression bites deep, and hard, and holds on. People who are lucky enough not to know this black dog don't realise that you can't just shake it off. They don't realise that we are all actors, giving the performance of our life, because we worry about the reaction of our friends and family if we admit that sometimes life is impossible, and we don't even know why.

Let's talk about the battle. Those of us fighting in it are brave, and strong; not weak, nor cowardly. To go out into the world every day, despite the growling and the darkness, is an act of courage and determination.

Let's talk about those people who march in to the darkness, seeking the light on the other side. Genie, you're free...

The to-do list

Well, gosh...

I always imagine that, at some point, I will be on the winning side of my to-do list. I'll eventually have fewer things to do than I have already done, and the end will be in sight. Occasionally I dream that I will have nothing left to do, and then I can mess about being creative and frivolous (and play Xbox).

On my brief trip out to Washington last month, I drew up a to-do list in the first day or so, and then spent the entire visit adding to it. A few things were crossed off, such as "buy Xbox", and generally I'm pleased with what I got done at the new house, but I left behind so many tasks that I felt I should have been able to conquer if I hadn't been wallowing in illness and misery on the couch.

Being ill in America is very crappy, and I do not recommend it.

I have come back to the UK for what I hope to be the last time before I get permission to be in the US for the foreseeable future. My to-do list here is growing by the day. I grapple most with the strange way that other people's to-do lists seem to end up being put on to mine, because I have "nothing else to do but wait around", as I was told this morning.

How glorious it is when your work is tangible, and you can show somebody what you've been doing all day, when they can see you physically toiling away on an object or a task with immediately measurable results. What a luxury it must be not to have to explain that you might appear to be freely available, but you are in fact masterminding a global operation. It just happens to involve a lot of sitting down.

All I can do at this point is get my glasses on, get my head down, and get on with what needs doing, and attempt to hold it all together without having a meltdown.

I think Cowboy is expecting a meltdown soon. He usually knows before I do...

The Juice Cleanse: an honest review

It's all the rage these days. All of the super-healthy, vegan, gluten-free, homemade-almond-milk-making, kale-eating cool kids are doing it. It sounds so seductive:

The juice cleanse.

So, considering that I had nothing better to do with myself except pack my suitcases and cardboard boxes for impending emigration, I decided to try one. I've been following Fruveju on Instagram for a while, after Ella of Deliciously Ella posted about their juices, so I plumped for their one day cleanse.

The cleanse consists of six juices of 500ml each. They come in various enticing colours and interesting sounding flavours.

Image from fruveju.com

So, I was pretty excited when they arrived at my house. I had ordered online, and a very polite email had been sent to me to confirm when they would be delivered. Customer service is so lovely. The package arrived on the day as promised, delivered by courier. The juices were packed in a small cool bag, with an ice pack. They were still mostly frozen, and I put them in the fridge in the bag to wait a couple of days to start.

The accompanying leaflet on how to make the most of the cleanse suggested adopting a vegan diet for a day or two before starting, and for a day or two afterwards. Well, I didn't have time for that. I had training with Mark the Magic PT on Saturday and I ate what I wanted.

Come Sunday morning, I was surprised to find the juices were still mostly frozen! The ice pack was still solid and cold, and the insulated bag had done a super job. I put them out on the kitchen counter to thaw out and decided to start the day with a cup of hot water and lemon, as suggested by the leaflet.

Juice One was ready by the time I'd showered and washed my hair and faffed about for a bit. It was one of the two green juices for the day.


Now, perhaps if I was more accustomed to drinking green vegetable juices or smoothies for breakfast, this might have been more palatable. As it was, I'm still learning to enjoy kale at the best of times, and I could really taste the kale and spinach. It was a little bit of a shock for first thing in the morning.

I also hadn't quite appreciated that 500ml is almost a pint. That's a lot of iron-y green juice to get through. I took the advice from the website about how to get through it if it isn't so delicious, and drank it through a straw. It took me a while to work through it, and I started to focus on the apple taste rather than the kale taste, and it improved.

Onward! How hard can this be? All of the aforementioned cool kids had claimed not to feel hungry while doing this, so I was feeling confident.

The second juice was rather delicious: watermelon and lime.


Very refreshing, very easy to drink. The only trouble was that I was starting to think about food...

I cracked open the third juice, another green juice. I became acutely aware of the metallic vegetable taste again. I struggled for a moment. Although my stomach was full of liquid, I didn't feel satisfied, and I was definitely hungry. I've never been one to starve myself for the sake of it, so I caved and ate a toasted bagel with houmous and lettuce. It was epic.

I continued to battle with the green juice. This was getting more difficult. I had three more juices to get through after this, and I was already sick of juice. I started to notice the slightly grainy texture. The juice is thin, but as it reached the back of my mouth, I could feel the small particles of vegetable on my tongue. It wasn't all that enjoyable.

The next juice was this "spicy lemonade".

At first, it didn't taste too bad: almost like honey with a mildly spicy finish. And by "at first", I mean the first three sips. After those, the sweetness was sickly, and the cayenne was kicking my arse. With every swallow, the pepper would irritate the back of my throat and make me cough. The grainy texture was even more noticeable.

I'll be honest. I barely got through a quarter of this one before I considered pouring it down the sink. It was unpleasant. I didn't want any more juice. I constantly needed a wee. I wanted macaroni cheese.

Out of sheer stubbornness, I cranked my way through the lemonade, but it took me two hours. I'd have taken another green juice over this one in a heartbeat. I was glad to see the end of it.

Fifth juice: the Royal Roots flavour.

I'm still learning to enjoy beetroot, and tend to only eat it in a very flavoursome soup that hides the earthiness of beetroot with tangy orange. The pineapple and apple added some sweetness, but the beets and carrots were overwhelming. The ginger wasn't enough to add any significant kick. The grainy texture was making me twitchy.

I was starting to feel very lethargic and a little bit nauseous. There was none of the fabulous energising that the cool kids had blogged about. I just felt bogged down. I was desperate for a big plate of wholesome, greasy American food.


Eventually, I made it to the final juice. It sounded so good.



Again, perhaps I need to be more accustomed to some of these things in order to appreciate them, but this flavour was sickly. As the sixth pint of liquid in the day, it was difficult to get it down. I was just bored of swallowing fluids. I craved solids. I was so very glad to see the end of it. I could have sworn off juice for life. How anybody makes it through three or five days of juice is beyond me.

Some of the philosophy behind these cleanses is that it's a good idea to let your digestive system "rest" and take a break from dealing with solids. Sounds admirable enough. Trouble is, my gut is pretty picky about a lot of things. It likes to have something to work on. It feels good to have a diet rich in insoluble fibre. At the risk of sharing too much information with you, readers, there is something intensely pleasurable about a good bowel movement - you know what I mean?

I now feel like I'm playing catch-up, trying to eat enough of the right stuff to give my gut something to wrestle with.

On the positive side, whilst I was craving grease and salt and carbs during the cleanse, the following day I had a very different craving on the palate. I wanted extremely clean food. I had a hankering for salads and beans and lentils, for some complex grains and for some good proteins. Whether that was just the mood I woke up in, or the result of the juice cleanse, I couldn't say.

Would I do it again? Not unless I made my own juices. It was an expensive luxury, and the whole day was a bit of an ordeal. I'd love to be a glamorous, raw-diet-eating, super-healthy blogger, but I'm not. I didn't feel energised, I was ravenous most of the day, and I was in a terrible mood by the end of it all. It was not worth it. Honestly.

The Last Hurrah

The end of my feeble, wasted, lazy existence is nigh.

On Monday morning, I slithered into my running lycras and went to meet Mark. Mark, a personal trainer, owns a little outfit in Oxford called StudioPT, and I have asked him to fix me.

I did my best to put him off working with me. "My fitness is terrible. I am a walking disaster. I am riddled with old injuries." He was undeterred, and unfortunately I had to show up at his private gym and feign enthusiasm.

The studio is well equipped, bright and airy, and has a banging soundtrack. After a quick sit down to discuss my situation, Mark put me through my paces as an assessment session.

He is tall, lean, and oozes power. He demonstrated each exercise with little to no effort, and corrected my wavering form as I tried not to shake too obviously in the press ups. This was nothing like my usual visits to the gym.

Mark is going to whip my butt into shape, starting tomorrow morning. He says he has a plan. I'm slightly terrified.

I'm preparing the best way I can think of, with one last rebellion - sitting on the sofa watching the Food Network, eating a bacon sandwich, and binging on cake.