Ouch

If anyone ever hears me saying I am going to the gym for heavens sake stop me.

Having gone to the gym a few sundays ago and being energised by the exercise I was more than a little shocked to have such a negative reaction to my latest visit.

Having sat on my bed chatting I found that when I tried to walk it was absolute agony, I could hardly put any weight on my feet. How could this be when my workout had been minimal.

After a little perserverance walking became easier. Having changed my bedding I settled down to watch a dvd. I was totally relaxed until once again I tried to walk around. It felt as though both my ankles had been crushed.

I went to bed worrying about how my legs would be in the morning. But luckily when I woke my legs were fine.

I am not sure why I had such a bad time as having only been to the gym once in recent months I tried not to over do it and go mad. All I did was 10 minutes on treadmill (5 minutes walking at a steady brisk walk followed by 30 seconds of fast walking then one minute of steady walking repeated for 5 minutes). Then onto the static bike 4 minutes of steady cycling followed by 6 minutes of 10 seconds fast and 20 seconds steady cycling. On another day I would have done double that without these problems.

I can only think it has something to do with a glitch at the start of my session on the treadmill. I tried to program in my weight so that I could monitor calories burnt off. Instead I was programming in the speed. Of course this was faster than I could comfortably manage so I quickly adjusted the speed.
I have sent Romeo a message telling him that it is all his fault. If he was here I wouldn't need to spend my sunday afternoons at the gym as I can think of a much better way to exercise on a sunday afternoon.

Aliens have landed and I have the proof

I was only being flippant the other day when I said that my body had been taken over by aliens.

Now though I know it is true
I must have been abducted by aliens and returned but not quite back to my normal self.
If you don't believe me let me tell you the evidence I have and believe me theres plenty of evidence.

First there was the Romeo drama, his hurtful text that had me crying (out of character for me)
I could so easily have given up on him at this point but I am too stuborn, I feel that this may have even made me love him even more than before........don't you tut

That was just the start of the strange character changes. I have never been one to cry but I certainly did on Thursday evening and Friday morning, but I feel stronger now than before.

Then today there was more evidence that I have been taken over by some kind of alien being.
I woke up this morning with a headache, (last week was the first time I have gone a whole weekend headache less for ages) I took some tablets and went back to sleep, when I woke again the headache was gone. Normally they last most of the day.

Not impressed yet?

There is more.................

I collected all the books that were stacked in various corners of my bedroom and took them downstairs to fill the book shelf I emptied two years ago when I was taking everything I could find to sell at a bootsale held every sunday in the grounds of a localish secondary school just to raise money for food and petrol. Those were the really bleak days after my divorce. ( I have come a long way in the last two years but still have a long way to go before I can say I have got there).

This afternoon I did my usual mid afternoon dash to Asda to buy food for the next few days, I never buy for a week as my boys (gannets all) would eat it all and I would still have to buy more. I treated myself to bean shoots, thai sauce and other fresh ingredients that I never buy. The wok will be working over time this week. (if this isn't evidence that I have been taken over by some strange being then I don't know what is).

After Asda I stopped off at mother's and without even sitting down I grabbed her car keys and took her car for a much needed spin, it had been sat on her drive way for over 3 weeks. When I got back there was a cup of tea waiting for me. We chatted for a while and I brought down two baskets of dirty laundry for her. I didn't stay too long with mum as I wanted to get to the gym.

Yes thats right the gym. Every week I tell myself I will go to the gym and every week I have a reason not to go, headache or too busy or too tired. So I am really pleased with myself for going. I told myself I would do 20 minutes on the bike I don't want to go mad on my first visit for months. Ha what was I thinking, 15 mins on the cross trainer followed by 15 minutes on the bike later I set off home. See I told you I have been taken over by a strange being.

Arriving home I carry all of the shopping inside in one go (normally I would have taken two trips). By now it is raining hard again and I am in my cut off rousers and vest top. Having taken the shopping in I return to my car to put it away, knowing there is a car parked in my space I am planning to park in the space where DC's car is most days. But in those few minutes someone has parked there. So I parked on the other side of the road to my normal spot outside PB's house. As I got out of my car I ran across the road waving to PB and her b/f who had just got into his car, that must have been a shock to her seing me run for the first time in the 11 years she has known me. I even ran all the way up the footpath to my garden path and upto my door. I never runand if I do its only a few steps. Do you need more evidence than that I ask?

You do oh ok then, instead of collapsing in my normal heap to recover my exertions, I set about a mountain of washing up then cleaned my kitchen!!

Now I might be the goddess of flirting, I might be a funny old bean, but one thing I am not and never have been and I doubt I ever will be, is a domestic goddess.

So have I convinced you that my body has been taken over by someone or something that is not me?

Orange wednesday

Ok so maybe underneath it all perhaps I am more blonde than I appear to the outside world or perhaps it is just me who doesn't see it.



As you know back in May I proccured a nice new laptop for myself.......it was around this time perhaps a week or so later that I finally gave in and rang Talk Talk to upgrade my account. I have been with them for about 18 months for my landline but every time they suggested I have my broadband with them for free I obstinately refused to change over to their free service, preferring instead to continue paying £17 per month to Orange for our broadband. Anyway DC has had his laptop for over a year and has never been able to connect to our broadband with his wireless connection yet he can connect it at his friends' homes. So after a long discussion about the difficulties of connecting various computers to our network we decided to change to Talk Talk. I rang them and arranged the transfer. I would get a welcome letter (received but mislaid) then I would receive my modem etc (collected from sorting office on wednesday) the whole process would take around 20 days but the switch over would not cause any interruption to our broadband (as Cake says very important when you have teenagers in the house).



During wednesday afternoon ET told me that the internet connection isn't working. So I spent over an hour on the phone to one of those 'overseas help desk' you know the ones they speak very good English but the accent is difficult to understand and they don't fully understand me either. First we try the technical support who after a protracted discussion and investigations tell me to contact Customer Services as there is a problem with the account. Have I been cut off by BT? UM NOOOOOOOOOOO I am phoning from my landlline!!!

Next its the turn of Customer Services.......'No madam there is nothing wrong with your account, no billing issues your account is live I will transfer you to technical support'

Again a long discussion and line tests are run. Our ADSL status is constantly unvalidated. He will do further line test and ring back in 2 minutes. 30 minutes later I call them again, again we are constantly unvalidated............the line is fine, the account is fine, the server is not recognising our username and password. Engineers will look into this and call me within 24 to 48 hours. So it is now saturday and I ahve heard nothing and it still won't work.

There are only ET and myself in the house as the others have gone to watch cricket. So as it is relatively peaceful I phone Orange technical support. There is a problem with the account the engineer has tried to phone me to tell me. I have had no calls!! I am told to wait 5 minutes while notes are put across to the Customer Services then phone them and tell them to read the notes.
Ten minutes later (just to be sure) I rang Customer Services again I am told it is a technical support issue but after arguing my case I am put on hold for a minute then .........I am put through to an English woman! who first asks if I ahve moved home recently 'no we have been here 11 years' have you changed your phone number 'not for 2 years'. Finally I am told that my Postal Code has been taken off my account and the server cannot recognise me without it. I have to phone my telephone provider to ask them to put the Post Code back.

I phone Talk Talk and explain to the man there that I am in the process of switching to Talk Talk but they have managed to get me cut off from Orange...............'Our records show that you went live with Talk talk broadband on 11th June'

Penny starts to drop......it wasn't the 20th June but 20 days from when I agreed to switch over . So it is all down to me being blonde that we have had no connection for 3 days. So now I have internet on the downstairs PC and on my laptop (still can't connect DC's laptop password problem) and ET has the PS3 back online.

So its a good thing nobody knows how stupid I can be sometimes. If I keep quiet no one will ever know it wasn't Orange that had done something ;-) Perhaps now I ought to ring them one last time to tell them I have left.

On tuesday I was wearing a sleeveless top for work....it was a hot muggy day. BG took one look at me and said she wanted to draw on my arms.........I didn't reply but I figured what had made her say that ,was that over the last few summers I have had a fair few insect bites on my arms. I am terrible if I feel anything on my skin (scab, spot, a lump) anything that prevents my skin from being smooth to the touch I have to pick at it until it goes. this means that I often make it worse. I cannot help it. the only thing that stops me is to have my skin covered by clothes. My bad habit has left a lot of marks on my arms. I have been trying to always wear short sleeves rather than sleeveless, but on tuesday and again on wednesday I found myself wearing sleeveless tops. On wednesday rememebering the dot to dot idea that had come to mind at BG's comment I decided that perhaps I could make the marks less visible by spraying a thin coat of tanning lotion on my arms and chest. It is one that I had bought ages ago and used once or twice last year or was it the year before. I ignored the warning bells in my head that said this won't be a good idea.

I was wearing a white top and my arms looked quite pastey, during the morning I noticed that they were actually getting darker. At one point about 4 1/2 hours after I had applied this tanning lotion I was walking through the warehouse when I noticed that I had become quite orange. I just wanted to hide but oddly no one said anything. when I next went to the Ladies I checked in the mirror.......it looked ok but if I looked at the back of my arms there was a bit I hadn't quite managed to reach so there is a pale strip just where my arm reast against my body.

It is now saturday and nobody has said a word except that when OJ got home from his camping trip he commented that I had gone brown in the two days he had been gone. I confessed to him and DC but no one else knows that I had made myself orange by using a bottle.

Sometimes I wonder if I am a fit person to be let loose, let alone have the responsibilies of bringing up 4 boys.

Other news I finally went to the gym on Thursday for the first time since March......I didn't over do it just spent 30 minutes on the bike. Sent a picture of myself afterwards to Romeo which he loved, saying that I looked 'relaxed and glowing' we continued to text all evening until finally his last text telling me he was shattered and going to sleep woke me from a doze.