What's news ?

I don't actually have a whole heap of news since last posting - life is too hectic but not really much to say !!!

I did lose another 0.5 this week taking my total loss since 5 Jan 09 to 7.1 - gotta be happy with that.

My walking has taken a back seat this week - much to my horror. I REALLY miss not walking each day but sometimes it is just too hard to try to fit it in.

Saturday I spent a lot of time studying for two exams on Sunday - my own fault for not having picked up a book prior to the day before the exams !!!! The good thing was I passed both of them so was very happy about that. Can't remember what happened on Monday except that when Al got in from work we landed up talking until about 2am when I finally said "Can you please keep quiet I have to go to sleep".
Tuesday night I got home from lectures about 9.30 - totally knackered from so little sleep the night before - and HAD to make banana bread because the bananas were just about ready to walk out the door by themselves they were that frot !!! Wednesday night I had my massage swop but after that I had to go and do the shopping and when I got home - just after 9pm again - I made a cheesecake for the dinner we are having tomorrow night for some friends of ours.

Tonight I am home - am just about to have some dinner and then I am going to have a shower and sit and watch Grey's and do some knitting - if Al is lucky I may even still be awake when he gets home from work !!!

Work is a bit of a nightmare - I KNOW I said I would never work the hours that I used to work at the hospital and, while they aren't that bad, I am doing about 50 hr weeks - the upside to that is, as a contractor, I get paid for all 50 odd hours that I work - SO, it does make it worthwhile for me to put in the time especially as we got into a bit of a financial pickle when I didn't work for nearly 4 months. This whole week I have felt like a real dunce at work - not because the work is rocket science but because I don't know the stupid council processes which are supposed to happen (of course none of them are written down either). This afternoon the one guy, who has been really good about helping me where he can, said "Thanks so much for all that you have done today (we had a big deadline to meet by COB today) - we would never have made it if you weren't here" - so that was good. I said to him "So I don't need to go and sit in the road with a witches hat on my head ?" and he just laughed and said no I didn't need to - earlier on in the week when I was really battling I had said to him that I thought I would be more productive for the council if I went and sat in the road with a witches hat on my head and at least I would stop traffic from going where it shouldn't go !!!! Anyway, I felt a little better when I left this evening to go to lectures - the fact that I woke up at about 3.30 and didn't go back to sleep worrying about whether I would make the deadline or not was besides the point !!!! The countdown to the end of my contract has begun - he laughed when I told him that today because he has been working for the council for about 30 odd years !!!!!

OK - it is now 9.45 and I am off to have some dinner, a shower and then some time in front of the Tv with my knitting.

Take care everyone and until next time - go safely !

Thought for the day : How many a man (or woman)has thrown up his hands at a time when a little more effort, a little more patience, would have achieved success ?

A funny thing ....

happened tonight. I had decided that I was going to walk after seeing my client and having dinner (I decided that at the beginning of the week). While I was chatting to my client before she left, I remembered the second 1500 flyers which had arrived that hadn't been delivered yet, so decided that I would kill two birds with one stone and deliver while I walked (it does slow me down a little but that's OK).

I left home at about 8.40pm - I don't think any of my South African friends read this but they would not believe that I can go walking around my neighbourhood at that time of the night and still be safe - that amused me for a while !!!

Now, the thing with delivering at night is - it isn't that easy to actually see where the post box is - especially when there is dodgy street lighting (blast the council for not replacing blown light bulbs in the street lights !!!). Then, when I am lucky enough to find the post box, the next trick is trying to see if there is a No Junk Mail sticker on it - again, not that easy when there is no light as my eyesight is shot at the best of times. Then if I manage to decipher that there isn't a No Junk Mail sticker - I have to work out do I lift the lid, drop it in or push open the flap to the post box it get the flyer in there. Of course this can only happen after I have bumbled my way along the grass verge - nearly twisting my ankle in the pesky holes that seem to abound at night time (I am sure they aren't there when I walk that way during the day). In the meantime I have managed to trip over uneven pavements and driveway edges all the while looking to see if I can see an elusive post box ! Some people are very accomodating and have sensor lights - the only trouble is that I nearly died of fright every time one of the bloody lights switched on. And, because there are dog lovers amongst my readers (yes, I know you are reading Kathy !!!), I won't mention what I thought of the dogs who barked and scared the cr*p out of me as I walked up their driveway !!!!!

All in all - about 140 people will take my flyer out their post box tomorrow and read about what I have to offer - maybe someone will phone to book an appointment or maybe they will tuck the flyer away and think about phoning at another time when they have more disposable income or more time on their hands. But, as long as I am out there telling people about what I have to offer, I have done what I can for now to promote my business.

This is a little philosophical but while I was walking I was thinking about how my weight loss journey has been a little like delivering the flyers at night - there have been things along the way which have tripped me up but I have had to just keep going - doing the best that I can. And, there have been those moments, like walking up the driveway and have the sensor lights turn on, where the light has turned on for me and I have realised that something I was or wasn't doing, was or wasn't helping me in my weight loss e.g. last year when I was at lectures, I very rarely ate dinner when I got home - I may have eaten a box of biscuits or a packet of chips or picked up some chips and a milkshake on the way home but I can think of maybe a hand full of occasions when I sat down and ate a meal. This year I have realised that if I don't eat a meal when I get home, I am not doing myself any favours and that hard work that I put in the rest of the day in terms of what I am eating and the exercise I am getting, is just going to waste because by not eating any dinner, I am just messing my body around and it won't like me for doing that.

Maybe I should continue to deliver flyers at night - maybe I will do some more thinking and come up with some amazing theories on things I didn't know I knew !!!

Have a great day everyone and take care !

Thought for the day: A good way to repay a kindness is to pass it on.

How to cope ?

OK - this is my problem right now (and for the next 4 months) - not only am I working full time (which I am totally happy about) - but I also work part time two or three evenings a week at Coles, study two nights a week and all day Sunday for my diploma, am busy setting up a business called The Body and Feet Retreat, work casual hours at a local day spa and need to find time to exercise and keep myself healthy - oh yes, I forgot about being a wife, mother, daughter, lover, chief cook and bottle washer, laundress and home cleaner. I am going to have to make sure that I am super, super organised otherwise it is all going to fall down around me like a pack of cards.

I can always give up the casual hours but there aren't that many of them and I do feel sorry for the owners of the spa - I can only do those on a Saturday. I have two big exams on Sunday and need to get some serious studying done this week - not sure when, but sometime.

Tonight I was going to come home from work, go for a walk and then come home and study. Well, a huge storm hit the Gold Coast and I drove home (an hour later than normal because we had a last minute rush job that had to be done) in the pouring rain - only to find when I got home that we had no electricity. So, the pork roast which we were going to have last night and couldn't (because we got home from cycling and exercising on the council gym equipment too late and would have been eating at 9pm) didn't get cooked tonight because of the rain. No problem, I had made a curry in the slow cooker last night we can have that - not so fast, when we decided on that plan for dinner, the electricity hadn't been taken out - so when the electricity went off, we landed up with pizza for dinner. Not my first choice but given the circumstances of pouring rain, no electricity and us fiddle faddling around wondering how long it would be before it came on again - pizza was the best course of action. Plus Al had to get to work.

I have accepted that sometimes you have to just do the best you can in the circumstances and tonight was one of those circumstances !!!!

Now I am off to log my weekly weigh in (I think I am down from last week but can't remember what I was last week !!!) and then I am going to hit the books for a couple of hours.

Take care everyone and have a great day ! I hope that Victoria is getting some of this rain as well.

Thought for the day : Life is a drawing board, sketch your own scenes.

All things come ...

to those who wait. The only problem is knowing you long you have to wait for the thing to come !!!!

Well today it came for me - a job offer that is !!!!! I went for an interview this morning and they rang to offer me the job this afternoon - WOOOHOOOOOOOOO !!! Now the money is not flash but hey, not flash money is better than no money.

I am so excited - since I got home from signing all the paperwork I have been saying to Al - guess what, I'm going to work tomorrow. And then again 30 mins later - am sure he was happy to go to work tonight just so he didn't have to listen to me say it anymore !!!!

The role has a fancy title - Directorate Management Accountant - but really it is just a budget controller position for 7 departments and the director. It sounds like it is quite busy as it is a one person role i.e. I am responsible for all 8 budgets, variance analysis, new budgets and budget revisions but it should be good.

It is only a 4 month contract but hey, who knows what will happen in four months and this employer is probably one of the largest on the coast and so there is a good possibility that it may turn into a permanent role down the track. Will wait to see what happens with it but for now I am just so relieved that I will be generating income on a regular basis.

Weight wise I was down another 0.6 this week taking my total weight loss since 5th January 09 to 6kg - am very happy with that and hopefully will be able to organise my lunch and snacks so that I don't start to undo the hard work I have put in so far this year.

Kaitlin told me today that they are looking to have their formal at the Q1 building (thank goodness on the 2nd floor - I wouldn't have been able to go if it was on the top floor where they often hold functions) and I so don't want to embarrass her by being overweight and not having something nice to wear when we go to the before drinks.

OK - better get going - have heaps to sort out as I need to get all my lecture notes together as well as I will be going to lectures straight from work (that just sounds so cool to my ears tonight !!!!) - I am sure in a few months time I will be saying "Gosh it would be nice to have a break" - but until then I am going to enjoy every morning of having to get up and go to work !

Have a fantastic day everyone !!!

Thought for the day : Happiness is in the heart, not in the circumstances.

Thanks but no thanks ...

was the e-mail that I got yesterday advising that I had been short listed for a role I applied for and then the current encumbent withdrew their resignation - bugger !!! Or maybe that is just that company's way of saying thanks but no thanks without hurting your feelings !!!!

I have updated my CV recently - one of my clients worked in a employment agency and as an HR manager and she helped me to revamp it which was great. Lately there haven't even been any jobs that I can apply for - I haven't done company tax and a lot of positions going at the moment require that skill so it is just a case of being patient until something good comes along.

I need to call the employment agent re a job with a marketing company as I am sure that they must have decided who is on a short list for the client by now - I applied last Saturday !!!!

My latest flyers arrived yesterday so I have been doing the delivery rounds again. It was funny because I had been uhmming and aahing about whether to order more flyers because of the cost involved but I know that if I don't advetise, new clients are that much harder to come by. In the end we decided to bite the bullet and order 1500 flyers - there was a special if you spent over $50 you got free delivery in 9 days. This would normally cost me in the region of $80 for a 21 day delivery time so it was a really good deal. Ordered them and they should have arrived on Thursday according to when they were despatched. No flyers Thursday, no flyers Friday - so Friday night I e-mailed them asking them if they could please track where my parcel was. I received a reply from them the next day advising that they were sending a repeat order to me and if mine arrived in the meantime to accept the second order with their compliments !!!! So, at the end of the week I should receive another 1500 flyers - bugger - that is a lot of walking but boy is that a good deal - 3000 flyers for the price of 1500 !!!!! YAY - something in our favour !!!!!

My eating continues to be good - not much else it can be when there is a lack of funds !!! I have tried two new recipes this week so that was good. My walking is still happening every day although I do have a rest day during the week where I don't actually go out for a walk but try to walk around a shopping centre for a while so that I can make my steps for the day without pushing myself too hard. This week saw a loss of 0.9 taking my total loss since 05.01.09 to 5.4kg. I can definitely notice a difference although I haven't measured myself at all since putting all this weight on - only another 20kgs to go !!!!!! This morning after spin class I was waiting for the lift to the car park and the lift doors were mirrors and that was when I really noticed how much I had lost - my hips are not as big as they used to be which is just great !

Well I am off to have a shower and then get K from school before coming home and heading off to lectures. You are right Mary, it makes such a difference studying with people who actually want to study - nothing like when I did my degree (even though I was a mature age student then !!!) - the class was made up of kids straight out of school who were told they had to go and do something and they just messed around in every class - soooooooooo annoying !!!

Take care everyone and have a great week !

Thought for the day : You never know what happiness a simple act of kindness will bring about.