Ahhh

What a lovely night, great friends and conversation, and the food wasn't half bad either :-)

It was great to see A tonight, he was a total legend, coming over early to help me with the salad and veggies. I would have been in a total flap otherwise.

Wash the floors, Cinderella, do the dishes Cinderella

I am cooking dinner for 9 people on Monday. I've decided to do

• cider and mustard chicken,
• red pepper and courgette couscous
• green beans with garlic and proscuitto in balsamic vinegar
• roast butternut squash
• salad

with plums and greek yoghurt for afters. The best bit about it all is that it's all low-fat yet (hopefully) still tasty. The less fun bit about having people over to the flat is that I have to clean the place from top to bottom. I am not a naturally tidy person. I can live with mess, as long as it's my own. Hence there are clothes drying all over the living room, piles of magazines on the floor and random crap pretty much everywhere. So far I've cleaned the bathroom and kitchen, next job is to tidy up the living room and mop the floor. Luckily I'm going out tonight for a picnic and a film (Somerset House again for the premiere of "The Soloist.") so I've got a reward for all the cleaning.

It's not raining men

It finally started to rain tonight, which we really needed after two days of intense mugginess (is that a word?) I went to Reebok reps and used slightly heavier weights, which made it much more difficult. Also the instructor was a man who shouted at us A LOT. I did not enjoy that. I particularly didn't enjoy it when he picked on me to do press ups. Think I'll give him a miss in future, which is for his sake as well as mine really. I can't imagine he'd like having a 5kilo weight between the eyes.

It's been flipping ages since I had a date. Ridiculous really that I was pulling quite regularly when I was heavier yet now I'm losing weight I haven't had a sniff. Not quite sure what I can do about it. I have been going out a fair bit. Tomorrow night I'm going to a Gordon Ramsay restaurant for dinner (it's a special offer) with some friends from work.

Update: It is STILL raining heavily. Another hour or so and I expect to see an ark drifting past my window.

A different life

I feel slightly pole-axed tonight. Don't get me wrong, everything in my life is hunky-dory - work is fine, tied for first place in the pub quiz, a random guy at work commented on how much weight I'd lost, yada yada yada.

My mum left me a voicemail telling me that SR had been found dead. SR is a girl that I went to primary school with. I was friends with her from the age of about 9-11. She was a smart girl, she and I were by far the two brightest kids in the class. But when we went to high school we lost touch, though I was aware her life was going off the rails. I'd heard on the grapevine that she'd been hospitalised for anorexia in her twenties. And more recently I'd heard that she was drinking heavily. Poor, poor girl. Who could have ever forseen that things could have turned out so badly. I wonder what it was that made it so difficult for her to turn things around.

I'm going to try and appreciate all the good things in my life and all the people I love and who love me. Poor, poor SR.

Knackerdo

I am absolutely shattered. I was yawning my head off at work all day, so I gave up at 4.30 and came home, and since then have watched back to back Doctor Who episodes. Life is tough.

I went to see The Shawshank Redemption at the outdoor cinema with my team last night. We had a picnic beforehand, at which I over-ate. But I'm not too worried about it. I'll be back at the gym tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that...!

It'll be an early night tonight, after Ugly Betty on tv of course!

Start spreading the news

I've just spent a serious amount of money booking the New York trip. I ended up going for the Waldorf Astoria because it was only £150 more than the Affinia, and the latter hotel only had one double and a sofa bed, rather than 2 doubles. So the Family Gallus will be doing NYC Park Avenue styleeeeee! My parents are superchuffed.

I had a minor panic attack because my mum's passport expires less than 6 months after we leave the US, but according to the Department of Homeland Security and the US Embassy websites it's ok because the UK and the US have signed a waiver on that rule.

So all I need to do now is start saving my spending money! I'm sooooo excited. I've been to New York twice before and loved it both times. This time around I want to see the Statue of Liberty close up, and I want me and my parents to have cocktails in The Campbell Apartments,
http://www.hospitalityholdings.com/ which is next to Grand Central Station.

I went to an aerobics class at the gym this morning. It was my favourite so far - really dancey and fun and all the other women there weren't gym bunnies, just normal sized women (and one man, bless him.) Now I'm off to get ready for dinner at S and Ds.

I really shouldn't drink

It's a nightmare in so many ways - last night I sent inappropriate text messages, ate a greasy pizza for dinner and this morning I woke up with a hangover. I can usually stick to my pledges not to drink (I do it every January.) But this time I only lasted 6 days. Maybe it's because I'm changing so many other things in my life at the moment that it's proving more difficult. I'm going to the gym this afternoon to sweat the wine remnants out of my body.

The scales are reading 10st 6lbs at the moment, which is great. Some of the guys at work are runners and they've been trying to get me to sign up for the Grim challenge.
http://www.grimchallenge.co.uk/grim-original/info.php

I told them that contrary to popular opinion I am not in fact insane, and will NOT be taking part.