New beginning? Maybe, but each year is a continuation of the last.  food wise the first four days are full of  it - lunch at my parents today, tomorrow I'm entertaining, Saturday I have a party, Sunday my work lunch, after that who knows?  Exercise?  Would like to start some kind of regime working but I'm scared cause back and knees hurt. As for going to see someone who can guide me, I've been to these ppl and nothing really worked for me except for dishing out money.  Only thing which seems to help is acupuncture and chinese cupping and I will miss that terribly when I leave.

But there's no hiding from it - I need to lose weight.  A guy who used to be here, Javier, lost heaps - like 200 lbs or something and now he has only 30 lbs left and he's finding it difficult.  Spoke to him yesterday on msn. Was Awesome.  He looks so great and he was one of these really obese people - he's a TBL story and lost much more than a lot of the contestants on the show - what's more he did it without the support and network of the show and he went from barely being able to move to running 30-40 miles a week. In fact one of his targets is to try to contain his running to 15 miles a week because he is running so much , he's feeling the wear and tear in his knees!!! Ain't that something?  He says that lately he is losing 5 lbs and gaining 3lbs which still sees him -2lbs each time. I'll take that over my losing 1lb gaining 4lbs any time of the day.

I need to lose weight and I need to be pro-active about it.

Happy new Year everybody. May it bring you joy and peace.

my extrapounds homepage it gives me phrases like - shelley/tatumsmom/GCQMon has lost 1kg. I assume it does that when one of my online friends posts a loss. Did it say 'janedoe gained 3kg' earlier this week when I posted the gain? I was wondering. 

I am so tired and it's still 7:30am.  Yesterday I was out all day - I left in the morning  and came back in the evening. I hate it when I do not touch home during the day at some time.  Today I have to go to my acupuncture thing in the morning and I need to go to my flat to wash up yesterday's dishes cause I had ppl for lunch and did not have time to clean up before rushing to work.  Then at 1 pm I will meet a friend of mine, soon to be a colleague in Luxembourg, who should have come to lunch yesterday but did not come (I'm having her portion for lunch today) and at 3:30 I have work til 6:30. At 7:30 I'm meeting my dear friend Rita for a dinner between two - probably last time we'll meet on our own before I leave.  I have been so busy like this (yesterday I had 6 hours of work) that on New Year's Eve so far I have no plans and I'm not that inclined to fill it up with anything.  At least today is the last day of work with computer invigilation.  It's not that I don't like meeting friends, I love it in fact but too many things in one day tire me out. Next weekend is also going to be very hectic but then the week after it should slow down a bit - this weekend will see me hosting a dinner for 8 on Friday, have a party on Saturday and work lunch also in honour of my leaving on Sunday. 

Have a great day everyone.

not great at all - today I weighed in at 79.4kg which is horrendous for me - very close to my record of 84kg when I came back from Australia and everyone went - OH MY GOD , WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!!!!

Most people take stock of the year that haspassed and whether they set out to reach their 12-month goals.  I started the year weighing 76kg wanting to be 69kg and I'm finishing it at nearly 80kg.  Throughout the year I have gone down and up but it has been a year characterised by bouts of ill-health which have let me very wary of exercise as I seem to get something when I start moving a bit. My physical condition is much worse than when I started and whereas I started the year with one knee hurting now both hurt and my back is lousy.  My health has really taken a big permanent hit this year.  That saddens me most of all as I feel I am unable to exercise cause even stretching was being followed by bad health and I'm so tight.  I wanted to have long nails and I had them until a month ago but now I have bitten them again.  I have fallen in love with the wrong man but  I'm not depressed about that - at least I fell in love which at one point I thought would never  happen again - seems the heart is not ice cold and there's hope.   Professionally I've done well though I did not dig in as much as I wanted in my mortgage.  It does feel I have lost some control over my life as if it has really slipped away from me and I cannot get it back although I cannot say I'm trying very hard - even the will power and the trying hard is elusive.

I will start my new job in Luxembourg in 2.5 weeks.  It's a new beginning and I want it to work for me on a professional and personal basis. I want to get my life control back.  I want to be 70kg and have long nails and I want to fall in love with the right man.  I want my health to at least not get worse and start exercising again. I want to run a marathon but that is something I will never do.  Most of the time I do not thing about my health in that I know I cannot run but I'm not in a wheelchair or limping, right?  The fact that it could be worse does make me thankful that I wake up in the morning, put my feet on teh ground an dmake my way in the world one step after another.  But I so wish I could run and run and run and at times it gets to me and I guess I'm going through that right now. The wish to go and play a game of tennis, volleyball or squash and then to just run and run and jog until you feel you cannot possibly run anymore but you still push on.  I want to feel the elation of the achievement of having run an incredible hour and feeling like dying out of the effort. I want to go on the treadmill and push myself to the limit and sweat like a pig.  I want to swim 2.5km which was my record.  And feel fit and feel I'm athlete again.

This is a selfish post. I don't regret 2008. A lot of good things happened to me as well. I got this job, the man I fell in love with is the wrong man but nevertheless, he is a wonderful man who made me feel loved and appreciated and never lied to me.  I have been abroad for 4 times and while financially I'm worse than broke, 2008 has set me for what should be a much better 2009.  At a time when ppl are facing financial gloom, my situation will actually improve bar great mishaps. 

I just wish I could grab my life back from wherever it has slipped off to.

Yesterday I managed my 8 glasses of milk - did take 5 small chocolates to the amount of 165 cals.  No buttered bread - sandwiches do not count - and before I slept I went for 50 situps.  I did 2 sets of 25 and then as I went to bed the most painful cramps in my stomach hit... I could barely move and had to concentrate on breathing!!!  It lasted a few minutes - am I so out of it? Or did  I do them too fast cause I really wanted to do something before I sleep so that I had at least something to report if not the planned 100?  I will try today again and do them more slowly - try to stagger them through the day. 

Christmas eve - will do 2 hours work with my friend on my diploma, afternoon not sure might go buy a pair of boots I really need or if my brother needs me I'll go help out preparing for tomorrow lunch.  We are meeting at my brother's and my sister-in-law woke up sick yesterday.  Poor thing. Not a great thing to have happen to you when you are having 15 ppl for lunch and 5 kids.  All presents wrapped up and under the tree although one of the presents coming from Germany will not make it here on time. :( It will have to be an after Christmas present. will try to do midnight mass this evening but I'm not sure I'll last.

Enjoy the day and while enjoying the festivities and not being a party pooper, we try to not go overboard with the eating.

I did not reach all my goals but at least I started!  I did not drink 8 glasses of water - only 4 but that's 4 more than usual. Today I'll do 8.  I did not do 100 situps - I didn't do anything at all.  But I managed not to eat chocolate and said no to buttered bread.  So I guess that is about 62.5%.  Not bad, but I have to do better. I did not bite my nails.  With biting nails it's like a hobby. I know this will sound disgusting but I enjoy biting my nails.  It's like eating chocolate. the good thing is that I can stop and I can let them grow when I want to so I'm letting them grow again.

Today it's a pretty busy day which is great cause I get to eat less. I have an acupuncture session this morning, then I need to see a friend.  Then I have 5.5hrs work , invigilating computer exams.  I shouldn't be doing this work these holidays since this year I'm not teaching at all but they were shortstaffed and so asked me to come in.  The great thing about it is that since I will be working abroad next year and the pay for these hours will come in next year, they will practically be tax free. 

Good luck with your goals everyone and let's not lose sight of our real objectives.

dinner at my flat on Monday.  All things I tried were new things so I was very happy things went well. Healthy stuff? Not really but not that bad I think either. Not much to say - I think I'm eating in a way not to gain and not to lose.  Things very hectic right now.  Have a great day.

cannot stop eating - really. Have gone up to 77kg and I think it is just waiting to give me a shock to 79kg really soon.  I just can't find the will power - also no exercise. The no exercise bit is both due to laziness and also because i'm scared if I start doing something, even stretching, I'll have a health relapse.  So far, I'm not too bad so I don't want to rock the boat too much. But I'm fat in that I remember until 5 years ago when I used to play volleyball, my fat weight was 72kg and now I would kill to get to 72kg. 

Have not been in here for a while - I had a great time in Holland. London was not as great as we had hoped for since nephew was a bit sick and we did not get to see as much as we wanted. But we did manage to go to the Fulham vs Manchester City game and to do the Emirates Stadium tour - both fantastic experiences.  The EMirates Stadium is just incredible.  I will definitly try to see more matches in the future and also visit other incredible stadiums.  And we did some great shopping stopped only by airline weight limitations. The EUro to Sterling rate is really to our advantage and even if it wasn't, things are so much cheaper there my Christmas shopping is nearly ready at half the price.  Still expensive, I love to buy the right gift for the person - I really put in the effort. I also bought a laptop which I'll be taking up with me to Luxembourg - I needed that like the air I'm breathing. I saved around 250€ on that alone!!! 

So now it's a definite countdown to Luxembourg - feeling a bit sad about what I'm leaving behind to be honest - I'm off within a month exactly as I leave on the 15th January. 

Will try to make more of an effort but so many functions right now. And I have to cook for friends this evening. I'm cooking dishes I have not tried  yet so I'm a bit apprehensive. Hope it turns out well.