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Healthy Living/MFC/ 19/10/10
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Message 1.Â
Posted by boo decker (U10848648) on Monday, 18th October 2010
Hello everyone. I'm opening up for the first time so forgive me if I miss something out!
Welcome to a new week of making informed choices! A new week of healthy thoughts and actions regarding food, drink and exercise. This is an open and welcoming thread, you are welcome to lurk and make contributions once you feel ready. Its lovely in here, we are a supportive bunch and I have gained such a lot from my involvement, especially the knowledge that I am not alone!
Our one GOLDEN rule is that we don't fess up to our actual weights, measures and sizes. The reason for this is that somebody's starting weight could be a far distant goal for another, and we want to keep all happy. We do rejoice with each other over loss of weight or inches - we can cope with both metric and imperial weights. At times we also commiserate when there isn't a loss, or there is a gain. Some of us are at our target and want support to remain there while some of us are still on that journey.
There are 3 sister threads to this one (and here it all goes wrong as my link posting skills are non existent!)
There is the cyber gym here Where helpful information and advice can be found about exercise.
There is the Cook Book Thread with lots of lovely recipes and tons of helpful information here:
And there is the Rota thread here where we can volunteer to open up. I did and it wasn't scary, honest! That's here:
A new week is a time to strengthen our resolve, to re visit our choices.....
Have a good week everyone and KOKO! -
Message 2
Posted by boo decker (U10848648) on Monday, 18th October 2010
Now bumping this one back over the other one! Then I'm off to haul my poorly carcass to bed, I've gottanuther code on the way and feel very sick! OH is about to polish off the stew from yesterday and I don't want any even though it was delish!
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Message 3
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Monday, 18th October 2010
Mon, 18 Oct 2010 19:06 GMT, in reply to booandpingasmum in message 1
Looks like an excellent opening post with all links working fine, b&psmum!
So... your lesson for today is: stop assuming that it will be rubbish just because it's you wot done it!
A very light supper tonight - a handful of lovely fresh walnut halves with a smidgin of Dunsyre Blue cheese and a little bit of raw onion on each... mmm!
Lunch was huge - four small slices of toast, each with a good slice of my homemade kitchen-destroying meatloaf on it, topped with pickle!
Breakfast was a Napple.
Early-bed nibbles will be tinned figs. Admittedly in syrup, but still far far less bad than the desired slab of Dairy Milk. Desire is not always justifiable, as lovers have found in most great literary plots throughout history... sometimes it is better to sublimate one's desire by finding alternative paths... like tinned figs!
Two large DEDs today but otoh the cat did start waking me at 5am by clawing my face (she does this to wake me if she gets hungry early) and I did my first academic writing since April. And there hadn't been DEDs since, er, ages. Not sure!!
KOKO one and all - we're the Three Musketeers round here really, aren't we? All for one and one for all!
laura -
Message 4
Posted by LostInML (U13646691) on Monday, 18th October 2010
Well done, Boo, and thanks for opening!
Sigh. Still working at 8.30 p.m., trying to find resources for PSHE. You know, the lesson I had to cover which would not require any planning. H'mm.
Still, it keeps me from the fridge! -
Message 5
Posted by boo decker (U10848648) on Monday, 18th October 2010
Lost, I should be working but I'm not!
I have been off today with a poorly Pinga and now I feel rubbish too. She's fine, all happy and boingy until she went to bed.
I should be preparing a maths lesson and working out what Literacy we need to teach but I have CBA syndrome and I am going to bed! -
Message 6
Posted by Fire-Pig - proud to wave the protest banner (U12231213) on Monday, 18th October 2010
Boo - get to bed and don't even think about going in to work tomorrow! It was an excellent opening post, and as laura says you CAN do links, so you are not useless!
Lost, I know about those lessons that don't need any preparation, when I started teaching in Brunei I was asked to teach some English language classes. Me - I was bottom of the form (literally!) at English. They said it would be easy as I was British therefore .... It nearly drove me to the depths, I couldn't do it at all. Fortunately it was only for a term, then I had all Maths to teach and was so happy! I treasured the comment of one of the senior girls, I had them for AS maths just after an English class and she queried my carrying an English textbook, so I explained, her comment - "What a waste!"
Laura, there is only one thing wrong with your analogy of the Three Musketeers - there are more than three of us! (well you would expect your resident Mathematician to work that out wouldn't you?!)
Today I spent some money on myself, I bought a dinky little teapot, Portmeirion Botanic garden. It is just the one cup size and I will use it for my redbush tea or my sleepy time tea, just for me. It is very rare for me to spend money like that on myself, but I did it! (I was paid £10 for a comissioned card recently so that helped!) You lot are helping me to think of myself rather than others all the time.
May we all make good choices this week
F-P -
Message 7
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Monday, 18th October 2010
Mon, 18 Oct 2010 20:06 GMT, in reply to Fire-Pig in message 6
just for me. It is very rare for me to spend money like that on myself, but I did it!Â
[laura breaks into wild frenzied celebratory dancing with much wild whooping of cheerful variety]
[laura looks round hopefully - who'll be next to break their chains and consider themselves for once?] -
Message 8
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Monday, 18th October 2010
What a brilliant start to another week ... thanks very much Boo :0)
All well here at Birdy Towers ... -
Message 9
Posted by archingmad (U8292055) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Let us know how you will be proceeding with the poorly knee, Birdy.
Sister has arrived from Geneva with fresh supplies of chocolate. Oh dear. -
Message 10
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Break the chocolate into bits and pop it in the freezer and when you want some get out some and put it on a lovely dish and enjoy it ..... you know this makes sense :0))
I had to lie still for 15 minutes in a big machine today and have my knee zapped ... you can imagine that as soon as you are told not to move you want to! As soon as the result of the MRI scan is back (a week or so) they will ring me and give me an appointment with the consultant. It is so much better than it was, but just refuses to get completely better.
But, tis bed time ...I've taken a Piriton and at last am feeling ready to lie down, so "I'll catch you tomorrow" (as my friend says!)
Take care of yourself :0) -
Message 11
Posted by LostInML (U13646691) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
I gave up too, Boo, and went to bed... on the grounds that sleep refreshes us and gives us new strength for the day! I'm finding that PSHE is one those 'woolly' subjects where you have to find your own resources and make it up as you go along. That's all very well, but it does take time!
Ö÷²¥´óÐã-made minestrone soup for lunch today! -
Message 12
Posted by puzzler76 (U3733897) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Morning all, thanks for the lovely opening b&p's mum.
A remarkable maintain for me this week. An unexpected evening at the pub with my husband and an unplanned pub Sunday lunch, so I suppose I would probably have been otherwise on track for a loss.
As alcohol has played rather too large a part in my husbands life recently, we have decided together to stop buying the stuff when that which we have is all gone. I've only been having a drink or two of an evening at the weekend myself, if I've even bothered, so I don't think it will be too difficult for me but OH has been drinking rather more, and nearly every night, so it will be interesting to see how he copes, and what effect it has on his appetite/weight/shape. -
Message 13
Posted by Fire-Pig - proud to wave the protest banner (U12231213) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Birdy, I have every sympathy for you with your knee. last night when going to bed I tripped and landed on my right knee, the pain kept me awake most of the night* - but I KNOW what caused it and expect it to subside in a day or two. YP was upstairs in a flash to see what had happened, and was very caring, OH hadn't heard a thing!
Well done on maintaining, Puzzler and I hope Mr Puzzler copes with the reduced alcohol consumption - are you rationing it until it goes or drinking as normal then cold turkey?
Lost, I hope the PHSE lessons sort themselves out during your sleep, that sometimes happened to me! (Not PHSE but General Studies and others outside my expertise)
KOKO one and all
F-P
*I had been hoping for a good night's sleep after taking a Piriton and my tea from my beautiful little pot! -
Message 14
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Fire Pig I really really really hope your knee gets better quickly ... sleeping on your side with a pillow between your knees can be a comfort.
Puzzler after losing the last few weeks I think a maintain was almost to be anticipated anyhow ... :0)
I also took a Piriton last night as I had been to a neighbour meeting and so my brain was doing wheelies ... and as it is a subject which plays on OH's mind too, and he hadn't slept very well the night before, he had one too! DD1 arrived with her dog at 8.30am and we were both still fast asleep!
Lost, and Fire Pig ... our DD2 is doing her PGCE and has done the Starter for three lessons so far (just doing the intro and then a teacher helps carry the lesson forward) and this week is having to plan a whole lesson. The one thing she says is how long it is taking her! Also, just as she is about to go into the department/classroom to begin her throat goes tight and she finds it difficult to speak in her normal voice. (They've had a lecture on using their voices). She has 'performed' all her life so is fairly confident this will pass with experience, but she sounded fairly wobbly when I spoke to her a couple of evenings ago.
I have two daughters, one quietly confident, and this one noisily unconfident!! The quietly confident one was promoted from an angel in the nativity play at playschool to a "quietly confident Virgin Mary" the next year, and this noisy one stayed an angel!!!! -
Message 15
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
I've just had a giggle at this picture ... under it the photographer says "Climb a tree it gets you closer to heaven" but it is a spindly little tree and I reckon I'd have that lower branch off in no time ... and as there are bullrushes nearby presumably it is growing in a wet boggy ditch area presumably I'd end up with a wet butt .... not my idea of heaven!!
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Message 16
Posted by maria_sedgegrass (U2267184) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Just whizzing by with a quick comment to bookmark the thread, as I have a million things to do today and I haven't started yet (help!).
Pleased to see a weight loss at WW last night. Helped considerably by very considerate youngest daughter who fed us wisely, but deliciously, when we visited at the weekend.
Was enjoying the "psychobabble" in the last thread as I'm constantly trying to analyse my relationship with food - where it comes from; how I can deal with it. Also, why I waste so much time fiddling about on the computer when I should be shopping for food and tidying the house for guests...
Healing thoughts to painful knees - KOKO one and all.
xx -
Message 17
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Well done Maria ....
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Message 18
Posted by archingmad (U8292055) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
why I waste so much time fiddling about on the computer when I should be shopping for food and tidying the houseÂ
Hear bliddy hear -
Message 19
Posted by anagramladysin (U14258840) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Popping in to say hello after a long time away. How nice to see you all here!
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Message 20
Posted by LostInML (U13646691) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Archi, fiddling about on the computer is /far/ preferable to shopping and cooking!
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Message 21
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Tuesday, 19th October 2010
Lovely to see you toooo Ana :0)
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Message 22
Posted by bridgete (U14638807) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Someone prefers something to shopping and cooking? I'm impressed!
Hello everyone. I'm not weighing in this week because it's my monthly Swell Up with Water week. And quite frankly I've done a lot of shopping, cooking - and eating what I've shopped for and cooked. So I think I'd be at a standstill even if it wasn't that time of the month.
Will read everyone else's soon.
xx -
Message 23
Posted by GuzziNut (U6364582) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
most things are preferable to shopping IMO
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Message 24
Posted by Fire-Pig - proud to wave the protest banner (U12231213) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Another here who doesn't enjoy shopping! Perhaps that is why I am currently wearing jeans with a leather belt so that they stay up rather than go out to buy new smaller jeans!
Just back from another chat with my GP. I wish I knew more about the border between stress and depression. I don't think I am suffering depression but I know I was suffering stress. I am getting more assertive about not working overtime etc. I am feeling a lot less tired, but still not sleeping well.
I am getting better at making choices about food and have sorted some of my nibble temptations!
Ana, lovely to see you - I think of you each night as I rub my Sleepy Time Moisturiser in.
Birdy, lesson planning is an art, quite different from teaching! Your DD will presumably have to show her plans to a tutor so she will want to cross all the ts and dot the is (how can I show that means all of the letter i?) When she is actually teaching things do not always go to plan ..... you have to be able to think on you feet and adjust. I am sure her voice will cope better when she can relax more, IME she will relax more when she feels more confident about what she is teaching. For me I was far more relaxed teaching Maths than trying to teach English.
My knee is better now, yesterday It wasn't good and I didn't do a walk - the heavens had opened too so I wasn't very tempted. I must get some waterproof overtrousers so that I am not sitting in wet trousers all afternoon.
KOKO one and all, and make as many good choices as you can.
F-P -
Message 25
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Wed, 20 Oct 2010 11:47 GMT, in reply to Fire-Pig in message 24
Groggy coldy laura today.... felt peculiar yesterday when going to Waitrose to get supper, and on return found that I had bought my Being Ill kit - soured cream for a very onion-y dip, salt and vinegar crisps for said dip (and which flavour I never eat when feeling well - must be the salt?), tons of oranges, small cylinder of Bentinck's chocolates filled with a chilli-orange cream (again, never when well, the chilli must warm me perhaps?) and a steak and huge bunch of watercress.
Funny how our bodies instruct us at times.
KOKO all - me, I'm more like croak-croak...!
laura
p.s. re stress and depression - and anxiety too... I suspect they are used separately rather than lumping all into "depression" because the physical effects are different, since different mechanisms are called in to play.
Stress can be good, bad or neutral. It is still stress whether you are trying to get yourself out of a well you've fallen down, deal with a difficult colleague's moods, or preparing for your wedding. It produces stress hormones which are still not fully understood. They are things you;ll have heard of such as adrenaline, as well as cortisone and others. One effect you may have come across is "fight or flight", and you may recall incidents of near-miss traffic collisions, or walking past scary group of lads, etc., when you have felt extra-alert, very aware of how poised you are to defend yourself or sprint... that goes on at a less-noticed level in all stressful situations. One study of forensic scientists in training found a correlation between the amounts of certain stress hormones in saliva tests and the marks obtained in the trainees' tests - it appears the best forensic scientists are really rising to a challenge, being excited literally by the situation, on red alert, noticing everything, not relaxed about their role...
Anxiety is related - it is a form of stress, and can involve those chemicals, but is nearly always a negative situation. It often links to a feeling, accurate or not, that one has no control over the outcome. A helplessness, having to just wait and find out what happens. This can be tackled with good success rates by some forms of "training" your mental processes. A phrase I like is "washing machine mind" when you go over and over and over something and nothing changes, no matter how many times you mentally replay what is going on, because you cannot influence the events to come, only how you respond to the situation. The thoughts go round and round and round... this is very often one of the problems in stress-related insomnia and can be reduced by methods such as CBT or hypnosis which train you to break the cycles. Al-Anon works successfully with some of these forms of anxiety.
Depression is a nebulous term, often mis-used in our society. Medically, clinical depression is something about one-third of adults have at some point, and is usually divided into endogenous depression and exogenous depression. That just means depression coming from inside (endogenous) and coming from outside (exogenous). If you lose your job, your house burns down and your partner leaves you, the normal response will be to feel depression - that's exogenous depression and although at the time it is every bit as appalling as endogenous, it will ease with time as the situation eases. Endogenous depression can feel far more hopeless because it just hits without any apparent cause - in fact, it is an imbalance in hormones in the brain, which introduce feelings of bleak depression - just the same way that an imbalance of the hormone insulin will produce certain symptoms in a diabetic person. That's why, in both endo- and exo- depression, anti-depressants can help, because, just as a diabetic injects insulin, taking an anti-dep can help balance out the imbalance. However, just as some diabetes can be controlled without insulin injections, so can some depression (ALWAYS essential to check with GP, as we aren't trained to identify which is which!). Diet and lifestyle can really help, as I know Birdy in particular has familiarity with.
So you can indeed be suffering stress without being depressed, and anti-deps may not help particularly if you aren't depressed! A sedative med could help, though, at a very low dose, taken evenly throughout the day. Certain foods have a mild sedative effect, which is why we have centuries of milky drinks at bedtime, and herbal preparations with valerian, hops, lettuce, etc.
Exercise is a very effective stress-reducer, at all levels, so daily walks in the open air are really practical.
Support from the rest of your household, colleagues, friends and family are very useful - sometimes stress is increased by keeping the causes secret. Opening up can help reduce the stress.
A lot of the alternative/ complementary remedies are very good with stress and anxiety - massage, for example. If you don't want or can't find/ afford massage, you can usefully learn to do things like massaging your own feet at bedtime which has a fair anecdotal rate of success in reducing stress.
hth! -
Message 26
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Bridget ... a maintain isn't to be sniffed at especially under the circumstances ... so much better than a rise ... so well done you :0)
Fire-Pig .. I'm so glad your knee is recovered and that you are feeling able to protect yourself from more and more overtime.
Thank you for your thoughts on being a novice teacher ... you are right, she is able to run her lesson plan past her mentor/tutor and is confident that any tweaking recommended will be given in a way to boost her confidence. She is teaching a subject which is dear to her heart, and which she is confident of as it is who she is. She says she can't fault the help and support she is getting and is enjoying the company of the other teachers in her department. But basically she's on a roller coaster ... and doesn't know which way is up sometimes! She isn't getting home til late some evenings as she is helping at the school... it is raising her profile with the students though so a good thing I feel. I can't say much more without giving away too much ....
Laura ... helpful as always :0)) -
Message 27
Posted by Fire-Pig - proud to wave the protest banner (U12231213) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Laura, for someone feeling peely wally that post was quite something. I'm printing it out so that I can cogitate!
I am getting support at work but less so from OH. He is a bit of a hypochondriac and nobody can be worse off than himself. This was most apparent two years ago when we went on a Christmas market trip and I fell between train and platform at Cologne, severe bruising from knee to toe. HE was the one who couldn't walk for some reason which I have now forgotten! YP was with us and wasn't amused!
F-P -
Message 28
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Humph Fire Pig :0)
On the falling between the train and platform ... I once nursed a woman who had done that and the train drew away and completely smashed her pelvis to bits, so if you want to be grateful for small mercies, be glad you didn't hurt yourself really really really badly.
:0) -
Message 29
Posted by Sister Primrose of the Red Tinsel Flag (U5405579) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Hello again,
Wandering in to say that I'm not getting weighed this week. I had a nice evening out last week and it was our 19th anniversary over the weekend. Net result is that although the food choices I made were not as bad as they could have been, they weren't as good either and I don't want a set back when I know the cause and it won't be recurring for another year...
PP -
Message 30
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
I don't see a problem there Primrose ... so long as you enjoyed yourself :0)) Happy 19th :0)
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Message 31
Posted by Fire-Pig - proud to wave the protest banner (U12231213) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
Birdy, I know that fall could have been a whole lot worse. I was helped up by a dish of a young man in uniform! He had obviously done it before and had me leaning back into him as he pulled me up.
I have had a wasted evening at a meeting I felt I ought to go to, it was worse than I had expected, at least there were no refreshments served ---- however there was a block of chocolate on the dining table when I got home. I only took one row of squares, before MFC I'd have taken the lot!
Tomorrow I'm out for an official lunch, I will try to make healthy choices - if there are choices to be made. I still find it hard to leave food on a plate when I know I have had enough.
KOKO one and all
F-P -
Message 32
Posted by Sister Primrose of the Red Tinsel Flag (U5405579) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
I also have a bad habit at picking at food on my plate after I'm full, and it's much worse when I'm trapped by the plate by social circumstance. Could you take some salt with you and surreptitiously sprinkle enough on to make it unpalatable when you've had the amount you've decided is enough? That way, even if there's a delay in the food being removed you might find it easier to resist?
Well done on the chocolate by the way.
PP -
Message 33
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
What a good plan Fire Pig :0) I remember someone mentioning that they squirted washing up liquid over food that they put in the bin or they would be tempted to retrieve it!!!
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Message 34
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Wednesday, 20th October 2010
.... apologies ... it was Primrose who suggested the salt.
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Message 35
Posted by LostInML (U13646691) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
I sympathise with those who find it difficult to leave food even when they're full... I like the salt idea. It's unobtrusive and effective (providing you don't love salt!)
Interesting thoughts re stress, anxiety and depression. I'm still pondering them. -
Message 36
Posted by Isabel Archer (U13716168) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
Dear all
please may I creep back in this thread after along absence - due to summer holidays, a busy family life and simple overwork.
Laura, your categorisation of the three conditions was really interesting and well-informed as always.
Food wise, I've plateaued for some months now at about 16-18 lbs weightloss. I would really like to get the total loss down to 1.5 stones and stop there but my body (or my willpower) just seems to play tricks on me. Every time, I creep down a bit, it always creeps back up again. However, my eating habits are so much better than they were so I guess that is a partial triumph. -
Message 37
Posted by Westsussexbird or Birdy aka Westie (U6316532) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
Isobel, your space on the bench has been dusted off ready and waiting for you :0))
You're more than half way there ... two thirds ... and hopefully the fact that you have managed to keep a maintain going in the interim will stand you in good stead for losing the last bit.
:0) -
Message 38
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
Thu, 21 Oct 2010 16:04 GMT, in reply to Isabel Archer in message 36
It's just the luck of having a medical library to hand for the last twenty years and the nosiness to ask exactly the questions you've all asked, that's all!
Isabel, I have found plateau-ing is part of making healthier changes. I know others have too. Last week, I think it was, a number of useful suggestions were made to help kick-start losses once more - change in food types, meal frequency, double-checking portion sizes which tend to creep up, and changes to exercise all have helped people, so it *is* possible (she types on a year-long 3-inch waist-loss, but yearning to get back to the 6.5-inch waistloss of 14 months ago!)
I've made healthier choices today. Melon and ham for lunch, and about to have toast and pork pate for early supper before going off to teach.
That batch of homemade meatloaf has been a real exercise in how little I think at times. It was supposed to be cheaper than buying Prince Charlie's stuff, but in the making I smashed a beloved mixing-bowl and torched the food processor; then it turned out to taste utterly bland unless smothered in pickle (possibly because I actually forgot to stop cooking it at 7pm, and Mum turned it off at 11pm just as the last of the water steamed out of the bain-marie it was steaming in at Gas Mark 4, so it was very dry...). Finally, with the cold I've had most of this week, I forgot to put it in the freezer so now it's had to be binned as a health hazard...
NOT cheaper!! I need to add an ingredient, along with the meat, sausagemeat, herbs, spices and so on - I need to add BRAINS to the list: my own, use of!!
KOKO all, and hope your brains are working!
laura -
Message 39
Posted by LostInML (U13646691) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
Well, I certainly wouldn't want your brains to be an ingredient /in/ the meatloaf, Laura! Somehow I've never fancied /eating/ brains. I had my first painful lesson in only knowing selected words when I went to France aged 13 and ordered in a restaurant what I /assumed/ would either be roast lamb or lamb chops (what else could it be?!) only to be served lambs' brains... Have to say that was an effective aid to losing weight!
Not sure how I'm doing this week. The cold weather here has made me feel hungrier and more deprived. I've eaten more at night than is good for me. On the plus side, the exercise has continued. How it all balances out, I'm not sure. -
Message 40
Posted by Miftrefs Laura in Lothian bufily ftitching (U2587870) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
Thu, 21 Oct 2010 16:25 GMT, in reply to LostInML in message 39
Lost, that was exactly how I discovered my Very Favourite Meal whilst in France - "gesiers" wasn't in my little pocket dictionary nor in the waiter's limited English, so after ascertaining it wasn't a mushroom or a fish, I tried it - in a salad - and it was DELICIOUS... only later did I look it up online and find it was gizzard, part of the throat arrangement of large birds... but it is still delicious!
Here's my homemade effort, back home, courtesy of Ell Kaye who had a jar of them and had no intention ever of finding out if she liked them and kindly posted them to me!
Mmmm.....!
laura -
Message 41
Posted by LostInML (U13646691) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
I always use my story to show the kids in school a) that I don't know everything, b) that you can learn from your mistakes (believe me, I /never/ forgot that word!) and c) it's worth not assuming you know something just because you know one of the words in a sentence!
I have always tended to play safe when ordering food abroad after that!! -
Message 42
Posted by Fire-Pig - proud to wave the protest banner (U12231213) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
I made healthy choices at my lunch but didn't enjoy them as much as my fellow diners enjoyed theirs! I managed not to eat everything, well it wasn't very tasty! I also resisted pud, although the majority were having it. So altogether I feel rather pleased with myself.
It does seem rather silly that I have to leave the house at 9.30 and return at 18.00 to go to a lunch, but on the whole it was worth it.
Lost love your story of the menu. When I was a VSO teaching in Northern Ghana I went on a half term trip to Ouagadougou in Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) which was French speaking. Every time we chose something described as ....'Farci' there was a mistake on the bill! We decided this was a new meaning to the word, obviously farcical!
Isabel, life is what it is, there is no compulsion in MFC, we all use it differently what suits us at the time. Nobody takes a register, it is here when it is needed in a person's life. Great that you are with us this week.
Still not sleeping well, I'm yawning my head off now but will it turn into sleep tonight? Who knows?
KOKO one and all
F-P -
Message 43
Posted by anagramladysin (U14258840) on Thursday, 21st October 2010
Hey Fire-Pig
Am an old Africa hand myself.
Just to say, don't beat yourself up about not sleeping.
Lie there and re-run the memories, or dream good dreams.
Wake easy, feel refreshed, enjoy the day.
love
xx ana -
Message 44
Posted by LostInML (U13646691) on Friday, 22nd October 2010
Fire-Pig, maybe they decided that whatever they were stuffing into the food deserved and justified a price hike!
1/2lb loss this week. Excruciatingly slow progress, but losses have to be better than gains. I'm looking forward to working from home next week, even if there is another alarming pile of paperwork to tackle! -
Message 45
Posted by Fire-Pig - proud to wave the protest banner (U12231213) on Friday, 22nd October 2010
Ana, I am trying hard not to beat myself up about not sleeping. I have moved on, I am not lying awake worrying now. I KNOW I have certain things under control and others are beyond my control and I am learning to accept that. The trouble is that I am not getting up very refreshed.
Lost, love your theory of the price hikes! I was lucky on that trip, as I then spoke French fairly fluently the others had paid part of my trip (they were all contract teachers and earned far more than me) so that I would be their interpreter.
I had a lovely text from EP yesterday. 'Next time we talk, remind me to tell you about Desmond Tutu and the intolerant lesbians ............ ............ ........... .......
(2 separate stories)
F-P -
Message 46
Posted by maria_sedgegrass (U2267184) on Friday, 22nd October 2010
Oh F-P I really wanted that to be one story!
Was thinking of you last night when I couldn't get to sleep. Came downstairs and did crosswords and sudoku and drank "tranquilitea". Feel rubbish this morning, but heyho I'm going to get out in the fresh air. -
Message 47
Posted by Kishtu (U14091165) on Friday, 22nd October 2010
All righty, help needed.
I am a v. lucky lass, I have a happy, healthy, loving 3 month old Small and a happy, healthy, ditto Hairy Bloke who cooks my breakfast and dinner every day.
This leaves me with lunch. Now I am back to my pre-Small weight but because I'm a bit OCD (in other words quite neurotic about spending so much time sat on my bum feeding the Small and what it might be doing to my circulatory system) I would like to drop a bit more... limited to what exercise I can do, and limited to what healthy choices I can make for lunch.
Hairy Bloke comes home for lunch every day and works very hard in a manual job (a lot of which is in a yard outside) so salad isn't really fair to him... it's just we seem to have soup or cheese on toast or pasties a lot these days ;-(
Hayulp, as Penelope Pitstop would say? -
Message 48
Posted by GuzziNut (U6364582) on Friday, 22nd October 2010
oh the perils of a French menu! (or any menu you dont understand really). When interrailing, I managed to order what I thought was a big salad and then country style sausages...
I was served salad, all well and good, but with slices of large intestine and of course the sausages were the ones made with pieces of small intestine as a filling.
I now know all the obscure french and german words for small pieces of pig and the name of those sausages is engraved upon my mind
hope everyone has a good weekend -
Message 49
Posted by GuzziNut (U6364582) on Friday, 22nd October 2010
well, I think soup is good IMO, Medhuil because you can have as much or as little as you like and it fills up hairy and indeed non-hairy blokes. Or those of us who work outside and get starving in general
So if he wants another bowlful he can and you can always serve small pasta shapes separately for him too (A sda, if you can get to one, make some wholewheat small shapes (penne and shells I think) for kids, s*d that, we love them).
We tend to live on variations on the bean, lentil and veg soups theme, during the colder months (from various parts of the world, Turkish breadfast soup, harira, various italian ones, indian ones, more middle eastern ones etc), made by the vat so there are leftovers for lunches -
Message 50
Posted by FlufflesB (U14188870) on Friday, 22nd October 2010
Hello All
Coming back in from the wilderness Suddenly got back on track last weekend. I looked at my burdgeoning (sp?) belly pushing over my belt as I sat on the sofa feeling miserable. Still feel miserable but had a good conversation with myself about my future health if I continued the weight gain.
Remarkable! Portions hugely reduced, nice food eaten, no vino and walking around 2 miles a day (which I had been doing since getting a pooch). Eating will not solve what ails me so perhaps I have taken a small step towards separating food and emotions at the moment.
Laura, great post re stress, anxiety and depression. The interchangeability of the words is one of my bugbears. Your tale of the pate rang a lot of bells. I just do not bother anymore despite having youthful ambitions of being an earthmother, good at all such things. Numerous disasters in the kitchen rid me of all such ambitions.
Re menus, my sis was struggling for the word for butter in Spanish so decided that as French and Spanish has many similarities, she would try a variation of 'buerre'. Result - hysterical waiter who told the whole place about the tourist who asked for a donkey with her toast.
FB
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