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iDiet[a weight loss story]
*kathrynoh at nemesis dot com dot au* |
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::28.5.07:: I got the job! I now have 4-6 weeks of living in clover! Woohoo! The temp agency people weren't happy though and when they told my supervisor at my temp job, she came over and kicked me out! I said I'd finish up the day but she was like - "NO, go. NOW!' So I said, 'Fine, just sign my timesheet.' It's like dude, I'm only doing data entry, it's not like there's a steep learning curve. The only bad thing about the new job is the 30-40 min drive each way but since my gym suspension at Fitness First ends on Wednesday, I figure I can go to the gym on the way home. I'm also planning some before-work runs even though it will kill me. And, yes I know that isn't a long commute for most people but I'm used to walking to work (which actually takes about 45 minutes but it's multi-tasking). Driving to work shits me because it requires concentration and focus.
Congratulations!! FFS, you're a temp. They wouldn't hesitate to flick you the instant your services are no longer required. With the labour shortage out there it's time for temps to get their own back!
By Congratulations! So funny that they behave like that- glad you are getting away from them.
By Well done babe! Stuff the temp job, you don't owe them anything. You'll get used to the travel I reckon. I've had to and running in the morning is so cool. Both temperature wise and fun. I have to get up at 5-5.30am to run/walk/yoga but it's worth it and you warm up within 5 mins of brisk walking anyway. With travel, I am always too buggered to exercise after work so it's a good idea to try and get it out of the way in the morning. A great way to start the day and your metabolism :-)
Congratulations on getting the job Kathryn.
By
Congratulations on the new job!
Congrats, knew it would happen. What a pratt that supervisor was. As CKK says, you're a temp, you're doing a temporary service, the reason most people choose this sort of job is so they can pick and choose.
Good for you Kathryn. With a bit of luck it might lead to more and its one more reference which is good. Woo hoo for clover is all I can say! Congratulations on your new job!! yay! but i am still in shock that you did an 11km run! fark!
By
Congratulations on the job kathryn. CONGRATULATIONS!!! :) Congrats on the job Kathryn - that is great!
By Fabulous news on the job front Kathryn even if you do have to travel a bit :)
By
::27.5.07:: Lousy Run I went out for my 11 km run yesterday. I so didn't feel like it and started off walking, thinking I'll run soon, I'll run soon. The plan was to run to Royal Park station then back to Princes Park for a lap then home. I hate running the section between Royal Park station and Princes Park with a vengeance - it's got some nasty hills - and was almost tempted to do an extra lap of Princes Park instead but figure avoiding hills is cheating and, if I want to do the City to Surf this year, I need to run hills. I felt miserable the whole time. I didn't want to run, my sports bra was chafing, I was too cold then too hot. The whole run, I was a complete sooky la la. Then, on my lap around Princes Park, my knee started hurting a lot. I had those two voices - the tough one saying: 'stop whinging and keep running' and the other one saying 'stop running now.' I tried stretching and resting but it still hurt. I think the tough voice is a good one to listen to when it comes to sooky fits but not for injuries and pains. I walked the last 4 kms and even that hurt. I'd have caught a tram home except that would have meant going into the city and back out again. Luckily now I'm stiff and sore but it's the regular, good soreness not injury soreness so I'm glad common sense won the day. I think the knee soreness come from having tight quads from the bike riding. My right quad felt tight as tight in the shower afterwards. I gave it a good, hard rub (that sounds vaguely dirty) and it's fine now. When I got home, I made my sister a big, birthday brunch of banana pancakes. Yum. I also made her a special birthday dinner of pot pie because I'm a legendary sister of much niceness. They have had this yummy sounding pie on the specials board at our fave cafe so I decided to to make my own version. It's just vegies in cheese sauce with a pastry top. It even works out quite low in calories the way I made it. I was going to do more running today, but think I'll rest the legs and maybe just go to the gym and do some upper body work. I've got a stupid 'take home' test to do for class on copyright *yawn* so must get it done... boring, stupid copyright. You are not a sooky la la- you are sensible. You are indeed a great sister!
By That "pot pie" sounds delish! Might even give it a go... another way to get veges into the little shit named Griffin! Hope your legs are feeling tip top now. Kathryn, we all have runs like that, I had one last week - they are horrible. It is indeed wise to ignore the "tough voice" when real pain is involved, but why do us runners find it so hard to do? Well done though on taking it easy when the pain struck.
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It is so hard to pull the pin on a run isn't it!! Had to do it myself on Saturday :(
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Hi there. You don't know me but I've been lurking on your blog for a while. Love your work! I wish my sister would make me breakfast and dinner for my birthday. Then again if she did that then I would be expected to do the same for her and I don't like cooking at all.
::25.5.07:: Dilemma I've been offered a job pending reference checks. It's a good job, 4-6 weeks with excellent pay and lovely offices. A fair hike out of the city which means driving and therefore no incidental exercise, but I can work around that with gym workouts and such. The sticking pointing is the 'pending references' part of it. My supervisor from last job has, as they say on 24, gone dark. I rang him just the other day because my temp agency, after sending me out on a week's assignment, decided they should do a referee check. He was happy to give me a reference and his phone was working just fine. Now he's out of contact! Argggh. My plan B reference has left his job so I called plan C. He's on leave until Tuesday! Oh noes. Oh, did I mention they want me to start on Monday or Tuesday... mmmm. Well Tuesday now. It's a worry. To make it harder, my old supervisor only works part time so is hard to contact except by mobile. The plan of attack now is to ring the switchboard on Monday and try to track him down. Failing that, I'll see if I can get someone else there to give me a reference. The other thorny issue is that I've agreed to do 2 weeks temp work starting Monday. Oh noes! Now to put things in perspective, the new job is 2-3 times longer and pays 150% more than the temp work so it's no contest but if I have to pull out of the assignment, I reckon the temp agency will take me off their books. Again, in the grand scheme of things, no biggie. There are so many temp agencies out there. But I hate letting people down with a passion. Still big bucks are big bucks. On to sunny things - since my legs felt ordinary, I skipped my long run today. I'll make it up tomorrow. Instead I went for a bike ride. Yah! I went along the Merri Creek trail, thinking it's really flat. It's not good when being confidence-lacking bike rider to suddenly realise you have on one side of you a massive drop down to a rocky creek bed! But I did okay. The score so far: Bike rides: 2 Bike accidents: 0 Woohoo! I did adventurous things too like riding on the flat without the brakes on and riding down little hills instead of walking. Some of the hills I walked down but then again, I walk down them when I'm running cos they are so steep. Oh yeah, and went I see a pothole, instead of thinking 'yikes, I'm going to crash!', I think 'yikes, this will kill my butt!' Kathy: I was going to say my bike doesn't have gears but maybe it does. There are some lever things near the handlebars. Are they gears? Stop laughing. My last bike was my purple Malvern Star when I was 10. I'm still trying to deal with handlebar brakes instead of pedal ones. Is it wrong that I can run faster than I ride? Oh well better to be slow than have a broken collarbone. Today I checked out the website for the Great Victorian Bike. Yeah, I know I've only actually ridden my bike twice but it's not until November. I can train a lot before then and it's a nice week's holiday. I'd like to do it if I can get my friends (and champion tent-putter-uppers) to come with me. I'd love to do the Great Victorian Bike Ride too! Congrats on the job offer, hope the referees show up! Hope the "Bike Accidents" side of that scoreline stays at zero too!
By
I think the temp agency will understand that you have to take the offer of the permanent position over a two week temp assignment. I have been in this situation before and they are usually quite good about things.
Okay, officially a dork!! For some reason i had in my head that this was a permanent position. All previous comment seems a bit silly now, although I still think the agency will understand.
Wish I could give you a reference. I would say "two thumbs up". HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Hope the reference thing works out OK. 4-6 weeks sounds good.
Oh the referee thing - such a pain it can be. Hope that works out - sounds like a good opportunity!
LOL kathryn. I think they might be gears!
Pirates I overdid it yesterday - damn you complimentary popcorn. Short movie review = meh! Longer review - good but far, far too long. It's not even Pirates 3, it's Pirates 2 part b... they could have edited 2 & 3 down to one decent 2 hour movie instead of having over 6 hours of too much filler and boring shit. Seriously, what do people want? They want action and fights and Johnny Depp with his shirt off. Not people sailing around talking about shit. And Kiera Knightly bugs me. You could happily skip the first hour and not miss much. I'm so tired. I had to get up at the crack of dawn to go to a job interview. I went yesterday and they postponed it. To be fair, they had called me and I hadn't checked my phone so they couldn't do much more than that. I'm all interviewed out at the moment and have temp work for the next 2 weeks anyway so if I don't get one of these jobs, it can wait. I'd planned a long run today but my leg is sore so I'm not sure about it. I might have a nap and see how I feel later. You have just devestated me. :( We definitely like the idea of more Johnny with his shirt off....yummo!!
By
Bugger.
By I felt the same way about Pirates 2 (meh). Maybe I'll wait until 3 comes out on DVD. About the only thing I wanted to see was Keith Richards as Johnny's father. Kierra should eat more. I wish I was as skinny as Kierra 'cause then I wouldn't have to be on a constant diet. I would eat EVERYTHING until I got fat. Geez that would be good
::24.5.07:: Ouch Bike riding uses very different muscles to running... ouch, ouch... even different muscles to spin class ... ouch, ouch, ouch! Hey, has anyone else seen those "Free Paris" tee-shirts? I saw a girl wearing one the other day and nearly wet myself. Apparently the whole Free Paris campaign is based on it being wrong to lock her up because she adds beauty and style to the world so some such nonsense. Oh yeah, my life was beautified and styled after watching One Night in Paris! I'm just waiting for the Simple Life/Prison Break crossover reality show, in which Nicky Hilton gets the prison plans tattoed on her body and tries to break Paris out. Pity we have a whole generation of 14 year olds trying to look like Miss Skanky-Pants. Let's hope she does the time, if only to teach the younger generation that no matter how rich you are you must be held responsible for your actions.
Ditto Debstar on the Paris comment - that girl is a complete waste of space.
Ah but your bum will become so pert and shapely!!
Congrats on being brave and collecting your bike. Have fun with it! Haha...butt sore hey!? Paris...no comment.
Nicky Hilton's body wouldn't be big enough to put a tattoo on would it? hehe I can think of another four-letter "F" word that I would use to replace the word "Free" in "Free Paris", but it might get misinterpreted. It would mean "lock her up and throw away the key".
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::23.5.07:: Town Bike I finally picked up my bike!!!! Woohoo! I have wheels. I've been a bit of a chicken about it because I planned to do it before my friend's went overseas so I thought I could con them into riding with me, but shit happened and they've gone. I've been a total sooky la la about picking it up and riding the 6 km home alone, but then I realised if they get back and I haven't picked it up, they'd give me so much shit. I walked over - 6 km, got the bike and my friend's dad (who's been conned into building them a new laundry while they are in Paris, nice work there) pumped up the tyres. I got on then got off, feeling really insecure. The thought of wheeling it down to the train station and catching the train home was sooooo tempting, then I told myself if I couldn't ride the bike home, I couldn't have a bike. I wheeled it a ways, they live in an area with lots of trucks... then got on the bike path and rode a tiny bit, then got off and wheeled it over the big overpass. I did a mix of riding and wheeling between Flemington Rd and Royal Park - it's very hilly. I thought I'd struggle with the uphills but ended up being fine, it's the downhills that scare me. Just to get this straight, I even freak in spin class unless I have a lot of resistance on the bikes so if you translate that to situation where speed = falls = broken bones, you can imagine my girlie wimpiness. Once I got to Princes Park, it was all very flat and easy. Except for stopping. I think the bike seat is too high cos I couldn't put my foot on the ground without getting insanely painful cramps in the arches of my feet and sometimes my calves plus the real danger of being anally raped by the bike seat. Any hints on bike adjustments? I was wonky and scared and had the breaks on most of the time but I made it home in one piece even when the stupid skank stopped wheeling her pram in the middle of the bike path and walked in front of me to check on her kid - like she couldn't get off the path and do that. Must buy a bell cos it didn't work. My plan is to ride every day so I get good at it, well confident anyway.
When you ride, does that (Beatles??) song "Riding along on my pushbike honey, when I noticed you" come to mind?
By Oooh how excitment!!! i agree with CKK's thingy re seat height, took me ages to find a comfy position but it was pretty much as her dad said! As a novice bike rider, I feel entirely comfortable commenting about your insecure feelings on the bike. I've only been riding a month or so and my confidence has been growing daily. OK - so I'm still not ready to ride on the road, but I'm MUCH more confident on the footpath! My trip home is virtually downhill, and at first I was riding the brakes all the time. Gradually I eased off and only yesterday I noticed that I didn't brake on one particular section where I had been braking. My speed is still incredibly poor compared to someone like ajh who got up to 70km/h recently. (That's just silly.) But I try very hard to average about 15km/h. I am still uncomfortable over about 25km/h. When the wind rushes past my face so fast that I need to squint, I know I am in danger-territory. I haven't got the wobbles up yet, except going really, really slowly uphill. Sometimes it's just easier to get off! Good luck - we could have a competition to see who is the first to be brave enough to ride on a road!!!!! (I still get off and walk my bike to cross a road just like a little school kid!!) I agree with the leg slightly bent theory- your spin bike set up would be the same too I think. Happy riding- hope you have a mud guard and a jacket!
By
WHOOT! The girl has some wheels and will be hooning around town!!
I had a very bad image when I read the title!!
I'm learning to ride at the moment too, so I understand exactly what you mean when you say you are insecure. I'm getting off the bike when I have to cross a road, sticking to bike paths and generally wimping out on hills. As for riding the brakes - what would we do without them? Does your bike have gears? I am totally bamboozled by the gears. I have found one I like and I'm sticking to it!
The others are right about how to set your saddle height. You may not be able to reach the ground while sitting on the saddle with it set up right, but you knees will thank you for it.
Things One interview down, one to go today. I wore my new skirt so that rocks - it's worth having interviews if it means wearing my skirt. I wanted to wear a white cotton shirt with it but, as I've said before, I don't own an iron. I figure it's better not to wear a shirt if it's not ironed so I wore a long sleeved tee-shirt which doesn't look all that corporate but what can you do? Words can't express my excitement at the moment. I've been talking and thinking and plotting for a while about doing the half marathon at the Melbourne Marathon this year and now the new course is up. Suddenly, in my head, it's gone from something I'm thinking about doing to something I'm going to do - I can do this. I love that the new course starts in Richmond instead of down halfway to Frankston - it means more bed time for me beforehand. And I love that it finishes with a lap of the G. There is a cut off time - 80 minutes I think for the first 11 kms. I freaked when I first read that then worked out the pace/km and compared it to my Run for the Kids time and it's actually slower than that so I don't think I'll have a problem. The plan is to stick to the program and not slack off with spazzy demotivation days... but to not get overzealous either. I think I went a bit crazy before R4tK - doing my planned training plus fitting in running days with friends, and that's how injuries happen. I've got heaps of time so a sensible, consistent effort will pay off. I realised on my run yesterday that my legs are faster than my fingers - because I can run to 'I Wanna Be Sedated' by the Ramones but I can't keep up with it when I play it in Guitar Hero! Makes sense I guess since your leg muscles are bigger and stronger than your finger muscles but you'd think years of typing would pay off. And, a final woohoo - we got tickets for Pirates 3 for tomorrow. It's not gold class because it's Hoyts so it's the Director's Suite. They have some crazy system with La Premiere and Director's Suite. Apparently La Premiere you get special seats in the regular cinema whereas DS is a separate cinema - same cost though. I can't figure why you'd pay extra to be in the regular cinema. The whole point of paying more is to get away from all those annoying people with their uncontrolled kids. Director's Suite is licensed too so you have to be over 18 to get in. Woohoo, no kids. Anita was worried about Andrew getting in until I reminded her he's 20 years old - she was thinking he's still a baby! Congrats on the HM commitment. Should be a fantastic day (unfortunately one for which I will be out of the country).
Oh, I wish you had a camera so we could see this damn new skirt! Knowing your taste, I bet it's hot :-)
::22.5.07:: Run Today I planned a 5 km run - my training program has "easy" runs and "relaxed" runs. What the hell is the difference? Anyway, still lacking motivating but I forced myself out the door. I got halfway through my run and realised I was making good time so pushed myself and ended up with non-race pb of 31.30 mins for my 5 km run. My pb from Queen of the Lake last year was 30:36 so only a minutes difference and, considering all the wait times at traffic lights and cross streets I had today, I'm pretty darn impressed with myself. Other than that, I've set up 3 job interviews and 2 weeks of temp work today. That's mighty productive. And many opportunities to wear the new $90 skirt (I picked it up off layby yesterday). Now I have to get my sister fired up and ready - we're going to get gold class tix for Pirates of the Carribean for her birthday this week, if we can still get them. Well done on the training pB, don't you love those? I cheat though and stop the watch when i am waiting at the lights and stuff.
Way to go Kathryn....excellent work there girl!
By Good run Kathryn, certainly sounds faster than the race PB accounting for the traffic lights etc. I usually stop my Polar when I'm stopped too - the worst thing is when you forget to restart it though - should have bought a Garmin - doh!
By
What's your program for? Did you know the melb (half)marathon ends with a LAP OF THE MCG??? you wanna do it or what?
::21.5.07:: Weigh In - 76.9 Kgs Woohoo, that weight's going in the right direction. Lately I've been visited by my old friend, laziness. I'd planned to do a 10 km run on Friday - my long run for the week. Well on Friday I decided to reschedule it for Saturday. Saturday I rescheduled for Sunday. Yesterday I sat around thinking up excuses for not doing it. I didn't want to run, I wanted to curl up in front of the heater with my knitting and my coffee. It's so hard to get motivated when the weather's so cold. In the end, I put on my running gear. It's so much harder to NOT go running when you are dressed for it. Still took a lot to get me out the door but I decided I do a 5 km run around the block and then keep going. my usual around the block run and keep going. I worked out the time I needed to run based on my pace and ran for that time. I'd like to say that running somewhere new and unexplored revitalised my running but that would be lies. When I leave my house and run my usual run, the streets are all bitumen. I didn't realise that heading north, they are all concrete. Concrete is much harder on the legs and knees than bitumen. Curse you, City of Darebin and your need to concrete! When I got home, I tracked it on MapMyRun (my new fave toy) and it ended up being over 11 km - go me. Well done for getting out there. Did you take the time to indulge yourself in feelings of self-righteousness?
Great going on the 11km run :)
By
Well done on the run and damn that interviewer to hell and back. Karma will come back to bite him on the arse don't you worry about that! Awesome ... 11 kms ! You are a machine. I am mainly a concrete runner too, I think I need to find something softer for some of my runs, but the only option locally is running around and around a footy oval which doesn't sound too great - but may need to to save the knees and shins.
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Hi Kathrynoh,
By Congrats on making it to 11km, so much for your original 10km goal - right? Great job.
By Go you!
Yay with your run!!
You would love Vancouver Kath - it's full of runners and super cool running shops!!
By
I like it when the weight is a-going! Laziness is an old friend of mine too LOL but we gotta just do it hey. I thought about the cold this morning for a second at 5.45am but then thought stuff it, I'll warm up in less than 5 mins. I actually like walking in winter and think I'll enjoy running in winter now too. I couldn't imagine running in summer with how much I heat up now?? Something still yet to experience.
::19.5.07:: Woolly Issues I had back to back job interviews. The first one was a shocker. The interviewer told me that I don't sell myself well and come across as lacking confidence. That might be true since I've had a lousy track record with interviews lately but he was a total douchebag about it. He asked me about my skills in different areas and I told him what I'd done in various jobs and the skills I had - what else are you supposed to do? He then went through my resume and asked me how I'd gotten my past few jobs - if I'd known someone at the company - implying that's the only way I'd get a job! Arsehole. The second one went really well though so screw him. Since I was in the city and had some extra cash, I went for a look around the shops. I got a cardi at Cotton On reduced to $10. I'd thought it was $15 so that made me very happy. I also got some fingerless gloves with pull over bits to make them into mittens. They are extremely cool and I'm wearing them now. My sister thinks I should have got her to knit me some though since she's knitting gloves atm. She seems to knit everything for hands and arms while I'm more focused on the feet. After that, I went to Portmans. I've wanted to try on one of those high waisted skirts with the braces type bits at the top for a while. Since my most problem area is between my boobs and legs, I figured they'd either look really good or really shite, but I'd never know without trying it. So I waited an age for a free fitting room and tried it. It looked fantastic. I was looking in the mirror thinking - damn my legs look good... yeah they look really good... mmm better have one more look at my legs before I get changed... sometimes I'm unspeakably vain. The thing is, the skirt cost $90. I'm not working, I have nowhere to wear that skirt. On the other hand, I've not wanted to fork out cash for a suit so have been wearing a suit I borrowed off my sister to interviews. It's a good suit but it's just not me. For starters, it's got pants. I hate wearing pants. I don't look my best in pants. Then I thought maybe the reason I have nowhere to wear a $90 skirt is because I don't own a $90 skirt. If I had a $90 skirt then $90 skirt wearing opportunities would open themselves up to me. Maybe I would be confident and able to sell myself if I had a $90 skirt. So I put it on layby and I'll pick it up next week. When I got home, I checked my bank balance and had more money than I thought so rather than saving it for the $90 skirt, I went to Rosanna to check out a wool shop. It was such a lovely shop. Everything was so totally organised, unlike places like Spotlight where the knitting stuff is a total mess. And the wool shop lady was lovely and helpful and happy to answer all kinds of questions. I spent far too much money but got some magical sock wool that knits into a pattern so you look like you did clever stuff and some red and black sock wool to make my sister ladybug socks - I'm making everyone in my family socks for Christmas. When I made my first sock, I used 8 ply wool. Now I'm using proper sock-making 4 ply and it's insanely slow to knit, plus I started off wrong and had to undo a heap of rows! All up, it's been a woolly day.
What a complete tosser the first interviewer was. That's just so unnecessary. Glad you had a better second experience. Interviews are never fun are they.
Well Spotlight sucks...they are the most disorganised arseholes in the universe. And Portmans prices REALLY suck. BUT, if the $90 skirt looks fantastic on you,then you should definitely buy it. Instead of being angry about the first interview, be thankful for the honesty. An interview that leaves you thinking that you'll be hired and turns into nothing does nothing for you (the immediate upturn in mood is countered by the worse feelings when it doesn't happen). Now you know something you need to work on which could help you land the job you really want.
By That guy was definitely on a power trip. There are way too many people who feed off other's insecurities and if pisses me off.
what a powertripping f*ckwit! honestly. how horribly rude. can i kick him?
::14.5.07:: Weigh In 77.8 kgs I'm back to posting my weekly weight because it keeps me honest. I'm down from last week, woohoo! Although my weight was doing weird stuff last week, it's a kg down from the week before too. I did some checking last night and knitting burns 40 calories an hour more than just sitting in front of the telly. If I knit for 10 hours a week then I've burnt enough to eat a Choc Top. That rules. Last night I finished my sock. It's pretty damn awesome - if I had a camera, I'd post a pic - but it's too big for me. I decided instead of knitting a pair of too big socks, I'll keep this one as a test sock and start on a new, smaller pair. Then I'm going to make these. Also in the to-do pile is a hat with ears, more slippers and I'm awfully tempted to try a short sleeved, angora cardi. Btw if anyone wants some knitted slippers, I'm your girl. Just leave me a comment or send an email and for a few bucks to cover wool and postage, I'll knit you up some spiffy slippers. wow- you are a knitting weight loss machine! Is the knitting the secret to the weight loss because I need to find myself some knitting needles- though I need mum to do the first row for me!
By
Excellent, get me some knitting needles!
By OMG those socks are the coolest ever :)
Right, thats it!! I am off to find that beanie I started 2 years ago and finish it off, lol!
By
oooh pick me pick me!! I want some slippers puhlease! :) I find knitting takes just a smidgen too much coordination for me. However I like crochet - I've made a couple of beanies (soooo easy) so the sock/slipper thing could be an extension of that I guess. I like the idea of crocheting in front of the TV AND burning calories. Plus it keeps my hands busy so I can't pop food into my mouth with quite so much ease. Now it's getting colder I might pick up the needle again.
OK first of all you MUST promise me that you're going to wear the tulip socks WITH your sandals, secondly I would like to wait and get in the queue for the hat with ears, 'thankyouverymuch'
LOVE the socks! I think writing stuff on your blog definitely helps keep you honest. OO OO OOO!!!! I was only just saying how I badly need some warm socks! I would Love love LOVE a pair, and will pay your named knitting fee. How exciting!!! My email is on my page if you need it :)
Respectfully, you might want to wash and dry that too-big sock a few times, just to make sure it really IS too big. (I'm a big believer in the You Never Know principle.)
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Oh, wow! You really have caught the knitting bug. Great about the calorie burning too! I am a fan of knitting but I only ever manage scarves :)
Oh yes! Please knit me some slippers. I'll even send you fun yarn to do them with. I've lost nearly 55 kgs and my old slippers just don't fit :/
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::12.5.07:: Socks I started knitting my first ever pair of socks last night. I've only got the foot and toes to go. I've done the hard bits like working out how to knit round instead of flat and doing the heel. At first I was freaking out, looking at this pattern with all the weird abbreviations and things so I rang my mum because she's the knitting expert and her words of wisdom were - you know how to knit plain and purl, everything else is just a variation on that. So I started following the pattern, taking it one step at a time and it worked, it made sense and I got something that looks very sock-like. I started thinking how weight loss is a lot like knitting. You start out with this master plan that freaks you out. It looks like such a mammoth, un-doable plan. But, while you have to keep the big picture in sight, you just have to keep plodding on. Sometimes it feels like drudgery and you might never finish but you just have to push yourself through it, other times it's easy and magical and you seem to make a helluva lot of progress. Your methods might be different from someone else's but if it does the job then it doesn't matter one bit. You just have to take it stitch by stitch - a regular, consistent effort. Each step linked to the last and prepares for the next. If you make mistakes, it doesn't matter. Nothing's unfixable. The thing isn't to be perfect but to keep on trying. In the end, you'll end up with something you're done on your own that is pretty damn amazing and you just gotta hope it doesn't sag in the wrong places.
Adrienne is knitting little jumpers at the moment for a charity that sends them to Africa for AIDS babies. I was complaining the other day about snacking too much and she gave me the same advice you did the other day, about taking up knitting - still I don't think it's for me!
By
Another sock knitter. Yay! Well done! Lovely words of wisdom Kathryn, and what a great little pep talk for all of us at the moment, thanks for sharing :) What a great metaphor!
You absolutely CRACK me up!! great post... just emailed a link to a friend who is struggling at the moment... thanks!!
By
Nice analogy, Kathryn - I've never knitted socks, but I've done bootees a-plenty, and the principle has to be the same. Just follow the pattern, one stitch at a time and it all comes together.
Great analogy. The other thing is that just as there are different ways of holding your needles etc. there are also different weight loss methods.
By
I really want to do some knitting! Kathyrn just what I needed to read after dropping a few sticthes this weekend. Had me giggling away just the right pep talk. I love your writing, great read.
By You are profound - that's a really great analogy! Thanks :)
I can't believe this, I was wasting time cruising around blogland and there are a whole lot of people who just blog about knitting. amazing! Like everyone else I think that's such a great analogy Kathryn! Thanks for sharing that one with us.
::10.5.07:: Oops! I went for a run today and felt like I spent half of it screwing around with my iPod. It does this damn annoying thing where even though it's charged, it comes up with a flat battery warning and shuts itself down. Normally if I turn it off then on again a few times it rights itself but the other day it started dead until my sister worked her iPod magic. It's getting worse and I know it's just a matter of time before it dies completely. This afternoon I had to do some stuff with Andrew and he wanted to go to JB Hifi to get a new iPod. He got his when they first come out so it's heaps ancient now. We were looking at them and the Shuffles were so appealing, although scarily small. I looked at them and some other mp3 players and the salesman offered us a good deal so I got one. I haven't had the funds to impulse shop for months now and I never buy things unless I absolutely have to so it feels wrong to spend $100 on an iPod but I'm sure it will feel oh so right when I can run without my music stopping mid-track. Plus it's pink and shiny. Mine does exactly the same, stupid thing! Can your sister work her magic from afar? :) Funny you should talk about ipods. Yesterday the batteries died 1/2 way through a workout and today my earphones broke. There's always something going wrong with my MP3 player.
Hey Kathryn I love my big ipod and never have any problems with it, but the shuffle that I use for running is hopeless. I can never get it to work or load stuff up. Or worse still it pretends that it is charged and loaded and then ISN'T. I love my little silver iPod shuffle. It is so easy to run with, just clip it on and away you go.
By
Ooooh pink and shiny! Money well spent I say. A girl must have music! Hey hey the little pink one! That's the one I've asked for, for my birthday!! Hubby got the standard ol' silver but then the damn thing was so small that he lost it. It must have fallen into a crack somewhere. So he got a new one - silver again. I have to wait and see if the first one turns up before we can get my pretty pink one. The birthday is the cut off date. You definitely don't have to worry about justifying running accessories- I am sure you have earned it. How is the running going? Any runs coming up ? Run2G?
By You gotta have your music with you when you run! I can't go for a walk without my mp3 player. It's so boring otherwise.
::9.5.07:: Helmet My stupid weight has gone down to 77.7 kgs now. How wack is that? I mentioned a while back that my friend had given me his old bike. I've been waiting until I could afford to buy the accessories - helmet, lock, etc - before picking it up. So yesterday I went up to K-Mart to get them. Because I've got an abnormally small head, I had to get a children's helmet! That's good in the way that I could get a pink one with flowers and butterflies on it but I'm worried the strap isn't long enough. It feels uncomfortable but maybe that's just because I'm not used to wearing a strap under my chin. I also got a lock and was tempted by other accessories like handlebar streamers and pretty baskets but decided to stick to the basics. I also got more wool and some pretty pjs - they have bees on them and come with a tee-shirt as well as the tops and bottoms. I love the tee-shirt so much that I think I'll wear it as day wear for a while. I made another pair of slippers last night - I'm a slipper knitting machine! So now I just have to organise picking up my bike then I can start riding.
Woo hoo for riding! You'll have such a good time! You're lucky to have a dinky little head - I'd love to have one of those cute helmets :(
hehehehe I can just imagine you riding around with a pink helmet with flowers. Now if only there was a way you could poke a hole in it for your ponytail, wouldn't that be good.
We are living in some kind of freaky parallel universe you and I. What's going on?? I have the reverse problem - my head is too big that I have trouble getting helmets, caps etc to fit. Yay to nearly joining the world of cycling!
By How cool to be getting a bike. I hate helmets but we gotta wear them. Love the sound of those slippers, especially for winter!
::8.5.07:: Crazy Weight I got on the scales yesterday and was up to 79.5 kgs. That totally freaked me out. So this morning I tried again - 78.1 kgs! Don't you love that womanly time! Still it's made me realise I've been totally unfocused lately. Far too many treats and goodies. That's stopping right now. Yesterday Andrew gave me my mother's day present. Yeah it was a week early but he's working all next weekend so I won't see him. I got season 5 of 24 and Fraggle Rock on dvd. Woohoo! I've watched most of the 24 dvd already, like an insane amount yesterday. We started watching then suddenly it was 3.00 am! How did that happen? I'm powerhousing through my knitting but getting mighty sick of this scarf. Scarves are boring. The other night I decided to knit slippers. I started just demonstrating to my sister how to knit with multiple balls of wool and then kept going with them. They are so fast to knit and so much more fun. I'm sending them to Mum as part of her Mother's Day present and have some funky ideas for some to make for myself - maybe all in green then decorated with crochet daisies like a garden. omg! I LOVE Fraggle Rock!!! Where did he get it from??
Red is my favourite! My friend's mum has all the soft toys and I have asked her to leave them to me, how morbid. "Down at Fraggle Rock, grab a fraggle by the c*ck. Swing it 'round your head, now the fraggle's daed" - remember that??!
By Woo hoo!!! At last someone I know who knits and might be able to help me when I get stuck ;)
By
I love Fraggle Rock - Fraggle rock ROCKS!! hehe I love Fraggle Rock too!! Yep and I've gotta stop the treats of late too. It kinda got out of control and I'm up 3kgs. Blimey!
::5.5.07:: Weekend Woohoo - it's the weekend. When you aren't working, you don't have weekends, just days where there are more people around. What a week - I've seen a million envelopes and stuffed them all. My hands are a mess of paper cuts. I'm going back on Monday, they have a few things that need finishing off. Hopefully the cuts will have healed by then. I learned something about myself this week. I've always mocked the way my stars say I'm a pedantic Virgo. As if. Yet working with a group of other temps this week, I've almost gone insane because they do things wrong. I don't care how mundane the task, there is a right way to do things. Yesterday afternoon we had to work on a huge mail out in pairs and two of the women had some system going that was moronically slow and plodding. One of the other girls and I finished all our work and wanted to help them but they wanted to do it on their own. That's all well and good but it was almost 5 o'clock and I had plans for after work. Then at the end of the day, we all handed over our timesheets to get them signed and faxed off and one of the guys realised he still had to download the form from the net and fill it. I say if you care that little about being paid, then go without. This was at 5 after 5 and I'd put down 5.00 as my finishing time! I don't work unpaid overtime because of someone else's incompetence so I went to the loos and changed into my running gear. After work, I met up with Simon and we went for a run. We'd planned to trial the Run to the G route but ended up skipping the bits around Flinders St and Fed Square. Still did about 8 km but I had to walk heaps of it because there are no freakin' public toilets around the G! Today I'm going to the market then plan to do a heap of cooking. Tomorrow we're going over to get all our stories that Andrew's downloaded for us - Supernatural, Heroes, Grey's Anatomy... I think that's it. Then we're going to loll around watching them all. Oh and when I said The Godfather was an awful long movie I meant it was loooonng not awful. I've got a big crush on the young Al Pacino at the moment. We also watched Dog Day Afternoon this week. What a fantastic movie. I've never seen it before. It's very funny in places yet such a sad story. Go rent it. Airlie - I think I've posted my chicken soup recipe before but I can't find it. It's dead easy. You just need some good quality chicken soup then add heaps of garlic and ginger, onion, thinly sliced carrot, bok choy or spinach, capsicum and some chili if you want. If you want to be more authentic, you could add a little Vietnamese fish sauce but I don't. Then chuck in some noodles, hokkien are good. When it's ready, add some thinly sliced chicken breast and a handful of chopped coriander (oh yeah, you can also add the coriander roots and stems to the soup). But the other night, I got mine from a Vietnamese place in Richmond. I know exactly where you are coming from. When I used to be the PA at an accountants I would never accept help from anyone because they never do it the right way. It doesn't matter how little or insignificant the task, it has to be done correctly. I think there is a name for it - control freak!! LOL Ouch to paper cuts, they are the pitts! Hope you have a wonderful weekend.... sounds as though the myotherapy is helping and your hip is recovering well. Yay! I loved Dog Day Afternoon... when I saw it in 1977. Must get hold of a DVD. Ooooowwww, paper cuts! If you want the technical story, it's because there is quite a bit of acid in paper, and also because there are tiny wood fibres left in the cuts... I don't like cooking much. Pity you couldn't just deliver your soup to me. That would be nice. People with an inefficient system of doing anything bug me too- maybe I am a virgo after all- I have been hiding behind my messy desk and denying it all along.
By
Which place do you get your soup from? My favourite place is Pho Dzung. (208 Victoria St) Bwahaha...I'm a pedantic Virgo too but I try to keep it secret LOL. Shame people still notice ;-)
::3.5.07:: Work... hard This working thing is dead hard. It doesn't help that I had a whole heap of stuff to do last night and didn't get done until 10.30 then had to have dinner (Vietnamese soup, the perfect comfort dinner for the overtired) then tonight decided to watch The Godfather. I'd never seen it before, it's an awful long movie. The work itself isn't taxing. It's kinda mundane but I can wear my ipod. I've got another week's work at the same place at the end of May so that's a bonus. We have lots of slow periods so our supervisor tells us to go surf the net but I don't like checking blogs and things when I'm in a room full of people. I took in all my stuff to do boxing today but didn't have the energy to go to the class. It wasn't so much the class itself but the thought of showering and changing afterwards, oh and being around people. But I walked to and from work - around 8-9 km all up - so I figure that's enough. I'll do the same tomorrow then Friday I'm going for a run. Must sleep ... more work tomorrow... Yes, make sure you get plenty of sleep. I agree about checking blogs and things with others around, I don't like it either.
By do you make your own vietnamese soup? no chance for a recipe?
By Oi! Writer! Is the Godfather an awful, long movie, or an awfully long movie? :P
By
Yum, Vietnamese soup!
By
I loved the Godfather but then I'm into all that mafia stuff. I grew up with Balkan mafia undertones LOL.
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stats:current weight: start weight: total loss: goal weight:
measurements:boobs: 100 cm waist: 81 cm hips: 109 cm thighs: 50 cm
Weekly Goal Lifestyle Changing Challenge-A-RamaWeek 1 - Drink more water Week 2 - Cut out sugary treats *
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