Sawatdee

I'm back after an amazing couple of weeks in Thailand. I totally fell in love with the country and I really don't want to be back at work at all. At least the sun is shining for my return, even if it is about 20 degrees colder than I'd gotten used to.

We spent 4 nights in Bangkok at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel which was stunning, followed by 9 nights in Phuket at the Indigo Pearl Resort. I feel totally refreshed, sick of Thai food and beer and ready to get back to some healthy living.

patpong night market

the view from our hotel in Bangkok

from lebua

Nia Yang Beach Phuket

boat trip to Phi Phi

Phi Phi Islands

I had 2 realisations whilst we were away:

1) Work has been killing me. I've not been able to switch off, I've been working at least 12 hour days and for what? I don't earn enough money to kill myself over a job and if my boss is not working these crazy hours, why should I? So it stops now. I do what I can and that's it.

2) I am fatter than I am happy with. I am ok with being fat, but I am not ok with being this fat so I want to lose a couple of stone. I also need to get back to the gym and regain my fitness.

So, the plan of action:

1) Eat healthily again, cut out the random carbs, the excess alcohol, the fatty foods and possibly join a class to keep me on the straight and narrow. I am never going to be thin and I don't want to be, but I do want to be less fat.

2) Get back to the gym, I've 2 PT sessions left then I need to go it alone. If I'm no longer working crazy hours then there is no excuse for me to miss the gym.

Sounds simple, huh?

I need to get back to blogging more regularly to keep me on the straight and narrow, so expect more of my ramblings in the near future :)

AWOL

I've been MIA for a while. Life has been utterly mental of late. Work is driving me crazy and I've spent the last 4 weekends in various parts of the country so this is the first actual Saturday morning I've woken up in my own bed for a while.

So, what is new Chez Linzerello? Not much really. I've managed to drop about 7 pounds over the course of the last few weeks by cutting down my carb intake, but I can't say I've been overly focused on it. This is probably stress related as I'm working on average, 12 hour days, and also at weekends. This does not make for a happy Linz.

Exercise has been more sporadic than planned, my chest has been really bad which means I'm now on 3 different inhalers and a course of steroids. Given I'm the worlds worst hypochondriac, this is not ideal. Anyway, I'm feeling a lot better now so hopefully I can get back into regular gym workouts instead of the once a week PT sessions which absolutely kill me.

So, instead of rabbiting on about what I've been doing, I'll leave you with a selection of photos from my last 4 weekends....

Pennyhill Park - utterly fabulous!

The Latymer

Girlie weekend in Manchester...

Jack Spratt Burger

The Place hotel

Devon via Stonehenge and Somerset.

The Lanes Hotel

Hull to visit friends

 Bar snacks - amazing pork pies at Ye Olde Black Boy

Larkins

Actually, reviewing those photos has made me realise I must've been eating a hell of a lot of carbs before if I think I've cut down!

So, this weekend see's me working this morning and then my parents are arriving. No chance of a weekend of doing nothing for me. Sigh.

I might have to try and sneak in a cheeky afternoon snooze, we've woken up to yet more snow (seriously?? BST starts this weekend, sort it out UK) so my motivation to anything other than sit on the sofa is zilch.

Back to work for me now then I'll attempt to catch up on blogs, my social media has taken a battering due to work and we can't be having that.

The wanderer returns with a plan, kind of.

Urgh, I've been away from this little space for a while, again. This is clearly not the best sign....

So, what's been happening Chez Linz? Well, I've been ill (you hear me, another cold leading to another bad chest and therefore no gym for over a week), I've been working crazy hours and I've been spending my weekends rushing about all over the place. 2 weeks ago we drove up to Liverpool to visit friends and then last weekend, my parents came to stay so we spent the weekend entertaining them. We did get to see this however, something we've been missing for a long while in the UK... a beautiful weekend.

So in summary, life has not been very relaxing.

This weekend will rectify all of that. We've spent the last of our wedding fund on 3 nights at the amazing Pennyhill Park hotel and we plan to do as little as possible other than relax in the spa and eat some lovely food. It's Matt's birthday on Monday, so I'm treating him to a meal at the 2 Michelin starred Latymer on Saturday night.

And then, we need to get down to business. It's 7 or so weeks until we fly to Thailand and I really need to lose at least a stone before that. I'm fatter than I've probably ever been (I'm not weighing myself) and I don't expect Thailand will be overly good for the waistline. So as of Monday, I commit to the following:

• Gym at least 3 times a week - no more excuses (unless on death bed again)
• No snacks unless it's fruit. 
• Drink more water than alcohol (seriously, cherry and apple cider is like crack to me at the moment)
• Limited Carbs (kind of like the Harcombe diet, but not as rigid) 

I need to try and do the above with the following already in the diary between now and 15th April when we go away:

• Weekend away with Matt & his birthday
• Dinner with some of the girls
• Dinner out with Matt (Groupon voucher due to expire)
• Dinner at a friends house with some of the other girls
• Weekend with yet more of the girls in Manchester
• Weekend visiting Matt's friends in Tavistock
• Weekend visiting my friends in Hull
• Lunch at the Square rescheduled from January
• Lunch with friends at various houses x 2
• Friends visiting from Scotland

I don't make life easy, do I? Maybe I need to get rid of some friends.... :) 

So wish me luck! This is me today, expect a slimmer version next week.... 

The sitcom of Mr. & Mrs. Jones

Since my last update, I have remained on my healthy eating and limited alcohol, I've even upped the exercise somewhat which has lead to much moaning about aching and the most ridiculous pulled muscles known to man.

We had a pretty lovely weekend, which in true Mr Linzerello style, we managed to turn into a total sit com. I've married an absolute clown :)

Lunch at Le Manoir was pretty special, we managed 6 courses, plus matching wines and therefore ended up in a slightly inebriated state by mid afternoon.

Top - Cornish Mackerel with apple, ginger honey and soy * Soft-fried hen’s egg, watercress purée and Jabugo ham, toasted hazelnuts 
Bottom - Quail, Butternut Squash, red wine and cinnamon * Flavours of Citrus

Unpictured - Spiced Cauliflower velouté with curry oil for starter and a cheese plate with figs... 

We'd booked ourselves into a local B&B, which was essentially the spare room of a woman's house in a lovely 17th Century Thatched cottage. This was the middle of the countryside, and being the ridiculous town's people we are, we really weren't prepared for the remnants of the snow, the muddy fields, the lack of street lighting or the vast number of dogs also sharing our property.

We decided on a trip to the local pub after we'd had lunch in the next village to the B&B. This saw us traipsing through mud in completely inadequate footwear (suede pixie boots anyone?) with a broken torch (which we'd borrowed) to guide us home. After several glasses of wine and several pints, my husband then deemed the various barking dogs (who'd been nothing but friendly earlier on) far too dangerous for us to enter the property.  We sat in the car for a while, we argued in the rain, we discussed at length the possibility we'd be savaged by these killer animals, before eventually deciding we'd have to brave it knowing our landlady was out in Oxford for the evening and unlikely to return any time soon (plus we'd both run out of battery on our phones - genius).

These killer dogs - aka Labradors, completely ignored us upon our entry into the cottage. I've never known such nonchalant animals. Lesson learnt, my husband's judgement is not to be trusted when he's encountered alcohol and we are not cut out for a life in the countryside.

In other news, I've been diagnosed with Adult Onset Asthma and am now on a steroid inhaler twice a day for the next 3 weeks. I find this fairly ridiculous, but according to the Doctor, asthma can be triggered as a result of a virus, and given I've had every virus known to man over the past 4 months, I guess it doesn't seem too far fetched. Let's hope this sorts me out, I've also a preventer inhaler which I'm to take before I go to the gym, so let's see if that stops the feeling of an elephant standing on my chest when I try to run!

Also the health front, this week saw me lose 7 pounds overnight thanks to a delightful vomiting and diarrhoea bug which we picked up from one of my friends nursery dwelling children. I'm going to start visiting anyone with a child, wearing one of those face masks and douse myself liberally in anti-bacterial gel before and after entry to their homes.

So, I've lost weight, despite a 6 course meal and lots of alcohol - clearly germs are the answer.

This weekend should be fairly good too, lunch with the girls tomorrow and a couple of trips to the gym. It's all about balance people.

A lady who lunches...

It's been 2 weeks since I last posted, and I haven't succumbed to any illnesses since then. This is a new record! I'm hopeful that my new healthy living (with the odd lapse) is having the desired effect.

My eating, on  the whole, is pretty exemplary, lots of fresh vegetables, some fruit, less fat, no snacks and a load of water. I'm still making it to the gym for PT, but other than that, movement has been quite limited. The snow over the weekend didn't help much as our gym was closed and we live on the top of a hill, so the cars were going nowhere.

We did go for a fairly decent, snowy, walk on Saturday, but ruined that with a boozy lunch. Swings and roundabouts, I guess. That cauliflower cheese, heaven!

In case you're wondering......
Ashampstead venison haunch, butternut tart, duxelle of seasonal mushroom, herb crumbed salsify, smoked butternut purée, game jus, crisps
Hampshire beef fillet, potato cube, winter veg, confit shallots, crispy pancetta, garlic chive purée, green peppercorn sauce
Cauliflower cheese, blue cheese crust


The scales are not moving in any direction. I'm kind of ok with this, although a little bit disappointed that being healthy doesn't necessarily mean losing weight, despite eating well, I'm clearly still eating too much.

So, I'm going to start tracking calories, just to get an idea of where I am going wrong. This might need to be put on hold this weekend as we're off to Le Manoir on Friday for lunch which was a wedding gift from my best friends. They've also paid for £100 worth of wine, which I suspect is one bottle, but still.... We're staying over in a little B&B nearby, I did have a vague thought we could treat ourselves to Le Manoir, but we'd need to sell the flat to afford it, so that seemed a little extreme.

Saturday we've a belated Burns night dinner with friends, which I suspect will involve more alcohol and obviously food.

It seems, that as per usual, my social life is not conducive to being thinner... I just need to remember, for now, that is not my aim. I'd like to go at least a month without catching a lurgy. What is the likelihood of that??

True flu baby I love you....

So that little cold I blogged about last Wednesday, it decided to become full blow flu. Happy days. It completely floored me so I ended up spending from Wednesday lunch time - Saturday in bed. I can't tell you the last time I felt quite so pathetic.

It meant we had to reschedule my Christmas present to Matt. I'd booked for us to go for lunch at The Square on Saturday which we were really looking forward to, but given I could barely leave bed and anything I ate had no taste, it seemed a pointless exercise. Boooooo.

Anyway, being bloody ill again has definitely given me (more) food for thought though. My immune system is obviously completely screwed, so I've been very kind to myself these past 5 days. Lots of vitamin rich foods (I'm like a green grocers inside at the moment), lots of water and plenty of rest. I had PT penciled in for tonight, but I've cancelled it until Saturday so as not to put any stress on my already stressed body.

Thankfully I'm feeling a lot healthier today, but given that seems to last about a week at most at the moment, I don't want to count any chickens.

I weighed myself last week also, and it was slightly less than anticipated. Still far more than I am happy with, but not such a shock to the system really. I'm hoping that reintroducing my healthy living regime will see me drop back to my happy weight (which is about 3 stone less than currently, but still fat) without too much trauma. That could be wishful thinking of course.

So, watch this space. Here's hoping I remain healthy until at least the end of January....

Happy New Year

Happy New Year y'all, I hope you all had much fun over the festive period. My Christmas and New Year were lovely, but it's back to work today and the start of a new year, time to finally take control and sort myself out.

2012 was a brilliant year for me in many ways, I married my favourite boy, had a lovely time in Italy with friends and family, got promoted at work, traveled a lot, spent a lot of time with my favourite people and generally enjoyed life.

However, towards the end of the year (post wedding) I let things slip. Work stress got the better of me, I stopped eating well, I became a lot lazier and I suffered in no particular order from this little lot:

• food poisoning
• 2 colds
• 1 bout of flu
• Norivirus
• Chest infection
• Mild pneumonia (particularly fun)
• and now I have yet another cold... 

So enough already. Before this point I have rarely been ill, I've always had a fairly robust immune system, but clearly something has gone wrong and I can only put it down to this vicious circle I've gotten into. Stress = boozing = little sleep = no exercise + convenience food = illness = stress.... 

It stops now. I am determined to get healthy again this year. I've started back on a healthy eating plan - I'm not planning to start following any 'diet' plan, I just need to concentrate on upping the fresh fruit and vegetables for now and cutting down the crap. Limiting the soft drinks and getting more water down me. This is not about losing weight for now, I need to drop a couple of stone to get back to a weight I a comfortable with, but for now, I need to concentrate on getting healthy.

I'm also committing to working out at least 3 times a week. I missed PT for the whole of December due to illness, so once this current dose of cold does one, I'm going to do at least 2 sessions of PT a week and one other gym session on my own. I'm cutting back on the boozing too - the aim is to drink only at weekends and as little as possible during January. 

Hopefully once I start following the basics, I'll start being able to avoid picking up every flipping germ that passes me.

So, here's to a happy and healthy new year! I've already lots planned for 2013, so I need to make sure I'm fighting fit to enjoy it all.