Chipboard Papdi

A couple of days ago I nipped into Tesco on my way home from work for a copy of Heat magazine. The magazine section is located right next to the doors and the tills, so this should have been a quick in-and-out exercise, over in less than a minute. However, I was a bit hungry (stupid time to enter a supermarket, just before tea – guaranteed hunger shopping of crappy ‘food’ items!) and my rumbling stomach pulled me inexorably down into the deepest, darkest, depths of the aisles in search of crud – er, food.

Wandering down one of the aisles I came across an Asian foods section. They had some weird stuff in there. And I don’t mean weird in terms of the food so much as weird in terms of the packaging. There were huge tin barrels of cooking oil, tubs of rice the size of a small child, enormous sacks of flour… blimey, buy in bulk or what!

Anyway, a five-year supply of vegetable oil couldn’t tempt me, but I did end up coming out of Tesco with a whole bagful of strange foodstuffs to try. There was a box of sticky baklava, the remains of which I shared out at work once I had pigged a few pieces myself, there was a packet of spiced nuts which topped my energy up before going to the gym on Wednesday… and yesterday I opened a box of – hmm – well, the box said it was something called Soan Papdi, and the pictures on the box looked like little cakes with pistachio nuts arranged prettily on top – but I swear I’ve bought a box of chipboard pieces! It looks like chipboard, it tastes like chipboard, albeit a somewhat sugary variety, and there’s even things in it that look like squashed insects. (I just hope these are the pistachios!)

I’ve bought the chipboard papdi into work today, but I’m just wondering whether anyone will ever speak to me again if I hand it round…?

Huff, Puff, Grunt

Gym day today. Me and Charles joined our local gym just before we went on holiday and, now that we are back, every Wednesday night is gym night. Today was our first ‘proper’ session. (We can’t really count the one before we went to Spain, as that was my first gym session in years, and Charles’ first in a while, so it was a somewhat half-hearted effort, curtailed by the fact that I needed to get home to watch Katie and Peter on ITV2!).

Anyway, today I decided I was going to really give it some welly! Charles sat there on the bike and did his stuff, barely appearing out of breath as he calmly got on with his normal routine, but I threw myself into it, gripping the bike handles tightly so that I could whizz the pedals round at a million revs per second without falling off my seat, huff-puffing and sweating, upping the level and speed every 5 minutes; then onto the rowing machine, which I had never used before and which Charles showed me how to use, whoosh whoosh whoosh; then thudding the running machine into submission for a good half hour, stomp stomp stomp; and also some press-ups and some stomach and back exercises in the middle of all that. Phroo! Sweaty! (I used Charles’ towel to mop my red, shiny face at one point… ewk, that was a mistake... it was horribly soggy with man-sweat!)

Remembering back a few years to when I was truly fit, how I got that way was a combination of two things: 1) always being late for college lectures and having to pedal my bike like billio to get there on time, finally flinging myself through the door in a sweating, gasping heap to collapse on the nearest empty chair (I bet everyone loved sitting next to me in lectures!) – and, 2) being so competitive that I could never allow another cyclist to overtake me, even lycra-clad athletic types on their shiny racing bikes. My short, girly legs would pump the pedals of my little mountain bike so fast that they almost went invisible, refusing to be beaten, having to overtake each person back, no matter how out of breath I got, no matter how much my legs hurt! Anyway, the net result of all that pushing myself to my limits on a several-times-daily basis was rock hard muscles and a superfit body. I want to be like that again! Not sure I can achieve it without setting up camp in the gym, mind you, but once a week is something and so I’m bloody well going to push myself while I’m there!

I must say, I do like having Charles’ company at the gym. He’s very good at making us get out and do stuff (if running/gym was left up to me I think I’d quickly find excuses not to go, I’m such a lazy moo!) and I’m always glad we've made the effort once I’m into an exercise session. It’s nice, too, having him come up and offer me water, or just having a bit of a chat between machines. And because he’s more of a gym bod than me, it’s useful to be able to ask him how to use the equipment, or what exercise I should do for a particular muscle group. He definitely makes exercise sessions more fun! Everyone should take a Charles to the gym!

I Think I Need a Dishwasher

I hate washing dishes.

I can be something of a cleaning obsessive. I give my flat a major spring clean maybe once a month, manically hoovering, dusting, scrubbing, bleaching and cupboard-sorting until there is not a speck of dust to be seen, not a tin or bottle left facing the wrong way, not a piece of rubbish left unchucked…

And I like neatness to the point where every item and piece of furniture has to be arranged at precise right angles to each other, and precise distances from each other, and books have to be placed on their shelves in descending order of size, and I will notice if someone moves an ornament or a book even a millimetre out of place…

And, whilst my ‘to do’ pile is really more of a ‘still not done yet’ pile, and can occasionally grow into something rock climbers would be proud to scale, it is confined to one corner of the bedroom, behind the TV, where it can easily not be noticed…

So I think I would consider myself a pretty clean and tidy person.

So why is it then that I hate washing dishes to such an extent that they will sit in the kitchen for weeks, gathering pretty-coloured moulds and strange smells, piling higher and ever higher, and yet still I can’t face washing even one fork to eat my tea with? Occasionally I will even go out and buy paper plates and plastic cutlery just so I can avoid dirtying any dishes for a week or two, and have a nice clean kitchen. I even get a weird kind of thrill from throwing a dirty paper plate or plastic fork into the bin, as though I have somehow cheated the universe out of forcing its nasty, dirty dishes on me!

Alas today I can smell my dishes. From the hallway! I think I’d really better go and wash them!

Letter From the Queen

A couple of weeks ago my friend William held a birthday party for the Queen. We all dressed up in our best frocks and tiaras and waistcoats, and ate lots, and sang God Save the Queen (thanks to a judiciously printed songsheet, as I'm darned if I know the words!). The Queen wasn't present, obviously - I'm sure she had bigger and better places to spend her birthday than in William's kitchen - and I didn't think she had any clue whatsoever that us insignificant subjects even existed, let alone that we were birthdaying on her behalf.

Silly me! William thinks bigger than that! He wrote a letter to the Queen telling her about our party - and he's only gone and received a reply from Buckingham Palace! It's on royally headed paper and is signed by one of the Queen's Ladies in Waiting! Woo hoo!

That's What Girls Like

Charles is a darling.

I woke up at 5.30 this morning, head full of sniffles, and nostrils full of those evil, twanging pixies, so I was very tired all day. On top of that, work was quite stressful... I'm preparing for two weeks off so there's lots to do to make sure things run smoothly when I'm not here, plus Boss Number 1 kept throwing unexpected work my way. I wanted to throw it back at her and shriek, "Nooo! Do it your flipping self!" But unfortunately I have my pay packet to think about so had to content myself with the merest little whine of an "Oh dear!" as I took it from her.

In between all this I was trying to chase up on hotels for our holiday, and none of the hotels had replied to any of my emails from yesterday. It was very frustrating. In spite of being in work so early this morning I stayed two hours late tonight trying to find decent hotels that had rooms available, emailing them, and chasing up on unanswered emails. And trying to do all this in Spanish!

Charles rang me at 5.30 to see how we were getting on with arrangements, and I swear he could hear my head throbbing through the phone! Anyway, he has taken over finding the remaining hotels for us, bless him. He'll get such a big snog when I next see him!

(Yes, that's what girls like! (in joke!) )

Hayfever - grooh

Every year in March I get a hayfever phase which lasts until May or June. Last year it wasn't too bad... at the very first sign of the sniffles I bought a big bottle of Beconase and faithfully snorted it up my nostrils morning and night for a couple of months. During that time I barely had to blow my nose at all. I could even kid myself that I was 'cured' of hayfever!

I was doing the same this year, although I did keep forgetting some of my evening sniffs so I have been a little more snotty than previously. Then at the weekend Doctor Charles was watching me sniff my bottle. "Don't use that stuff, it'll get on your brain!" he said. Whilst I'm not sure that this is physiologically possible, it does hurt my head if I sniff the stuff in too enthusiastically. So I stopped. For just 24 hours.

Now I have one of the worst bouts of hayfever I can ever remember. My head is throbbing, my eyes are puffy with tiredness... there's an evil little pixie up my nose and he's twanging elastic bands against the inside of my nostrils... and I sound like a defective steam train - "Sniff, choo, choo, sniff, choo, choo!"

I'm going back to the Beconase!

Run Until You Drop

Another run around Richmond Park today. I wasn't in the mood (well I never am, lazy moo!) but Charles dragged me out, and I'm glad he did. It was sunny and fine, a perfect day for being out in the park.

After last weekend's complaints that Charles hadn't pushed himself enough, which had been followed by him taking himself out for a run without me last Wednesday (can't have that, he'll be getting fitter than me if I'm not careful!) I decided that today he was going to darned well push himself. So I wouldn't let us have any breaks, we would stop for only a few seconds at a time, and then we had to keep running. And running. We even took a longer route around the park today which was nice as we discovered a sheltered area with good picnic potential and a big lake.

Without the stops in our running I really got into my stride and could have run on and on I think. In a converse way it became easier and easier the longer we ran (or maybe I'm just odd!). In the end though I felt a bit guilty at pushing us on, as Charles suddenly had an asthma attack and we had to stop, properly! Oops! Lucky he had his inhaler with him or I'd have had to chuck him over my shoulder to run us both home quick smart!

We decided to make use of our stop to have a stretching session, with Charles pulling and pushing my arms into contorted positions. As he was standing behind me, pulling me into a stretch, he said, "You're looking smaller today." (Another way of saying "Hey, your fat arse is shrinking!") It's a good thing though!

Anyway, I think Charles did feel that he pushed himself this week. And I think, too, that he might have changed his opinion of me as being a weak and feeble girlie who can't keep up with the boys!

I beat Charles! Ha!

(Now we'll just have to see if I can beat him on a day when he doesn't get struck down with an asthma attack!!)

Hairy biker

I was watching The Avengers whilst I ate my tea last night. Emma Peel is a crap spy – when she shoots someone she closes her eyes as she pulls the trigger!

Does anyone else find Dave from The Hairy Bikers’ Cookbook strangely attractive? I squawked out loud when someone draped a big cobra around his head and he said nervously, “I’ve only come to cook meatballs!”

I am Monica

I am so damn organised!

I have been working out a rough plan for our Spanish holiday. When I say ‘rough’ I mean I have researched every possible town, village and area of natural beauty within 200km of Malaga (which is where we are flying out to), I have looked up in my Lonely Planet guide all the nice things to do in each place, double and triple checked this information against several websites to make sure nothing was missed out, looked up photos on the internet to make sure every place is as beautiful as it is supposed to be, worked out a circular route that fits in most of the nice bits (an anticlockwise route and a clockwise route, which are slightly different!), decided which places we should stay the night in (both clockwise and anti-clockwise), looked up opening times and addresses of every tourist site in every town we pass through… typed all this information up neatly (with bold and italic for emphasis), printed it out and put it safely in a folder in the order in which it will be needed on holiday.

Last night I was watching Friends, the episode where Monica organises Pheobe’s wedding – and, oh my god, I am Monica! The only thing I am lacking is her headset! I wonder if Charles would like the “super-organised sex at 2300 hours” that Chandler was listed for??!

Got Any Spare Change?

The mortgage rates are set to go up again soon. Bloody hell, I’m barely surviving now – that will just kill me! The only reason I’ve kept my head above water over the last few months is because Charles has gradually been paying me back the money he borrowed for the deposit on his flat. I get the last bit this week, which will immediately be swallowed up by our Spanish holiday.

And then I’m pretty much not going to eat ever again!!