Arse about face…

It’s been a week (or so..) of doing things differently..  back to the gym and finally attempting upper body exercises post wrist surgery – at the moment this involves using power-lifting hooks to take some of the strain off my still-recovering tendons for lat pulldowns.  Here’s what a hook looks like:

I’ve found that with those wrapped around my wrists (have to do both, otherwise you end up completely fecking lopsided trying to pull down the bar) I can now manage several sets of pulldowns.  I’m contemplating trying it on the rowing machine to see how that goes but have to say i’m a bit worried about the speed.. think there’s potential to yank the left wrist and undo some of the good work they did by scraping all the crap off my tendons and debrading (posh word for scraping crap off) the cartilage… we shall see.  The next test is chest press, but wearing my wrist brace.  I reckon as it has a metal support that won’t let my wrist bend too far backwards, or put too much strain on the joint, chest press could very soon be a possibility..

In any rate, whilst being bummed out about the exercises I currently can’t do, I cheered myself up with an old fave.. leg press.  100kg, four sets of ten.. for some reason just slamming heavy weight with my big ole thunder thighs always makes me feel better..

And I tried something else new too – there’s currently a trend sweeping the UK that’s changing the way women wash their hair.. Conditioner first.  Yeah I wasn’t buying it either.  But i’ve now washed the mop twice using the arse about face method – wet hair, slather with conditioner, leave for a few mins, shampoo twice… and so far this morning my hair is looking fuller than usual, lots of bounce, and although I was expecting dragging a brush through it to be a moment of trauma, it was actually fairly easy!

I’m aiming to make this a long term experiment – a couple of perky hair moments really isn’t naff all in the grand scheme of things.. so i’m gonna try it for a couple of weeks.  And then we’ll REALLY see if it works, or if it’s just a load of old roap. Or soap.

I’ll keep you posted… 🙂

Fat at Forty? Let’s not and say we didn’t..

So, here it is.  A new start, a new blog.. to cut a long story short, i’ve picked possibly the worst time of year to decide ‘ok, I need to lose a shit load of weight, and quickly.  My fortieth birthday is rapidly approaching, Christmas and NYE are literally around the corner, and I pick NOW to decide i’m going to go all hardcore.

It started with the picture of me taken for the works quarterly newsletter..

Gosh.  Don’t I just embody ‘jolly’.

I’m not feeling fucking jolly looking at that photo.  I wouldn’t even be able to use the ‘fat girl, nice hair’ line since a bunch of mine fell out thanks to my colitis meds..

At first, I was just plain horrified. Out came the photo editing software, but try as I might there was nothing to be done about my sizeable double chin. And that was probably the least icky bit of the photo.  As I stared at my chin, my chubby cheeks, my rounded shoulders and my bulging stomach I felt like sobbing.  WTF happened to the svelte 20-something year old I used to be? And that was it. Christmas or not, it was time to take account and sort my shit out..

Oh. And did I mention that it’s the office Christmas Party tonight? Cue me dodging all visible cameras / photos. I’d like to say i’ll be dodging the alcohol, but going on the way that photo has made me feel i’ll be drowning my sorrows for a large portion of the night.

Yes, i’m aware that alcohol has shit loads of calories.  Gimme a break.. One step at a time.  I’ve decided that my epic (insert ‘horrifically hard’) journey begins on Boxing Day. Yes, i’m stalling.  Yes, I know.

Stay tuned – epic willpower battles to follow…

EDIT:  I keep looking at the photo.  It keeps making me miserable.  Things must change..