This Week I’m…

Is anyone’s week of that much interest to anyone else? Blogging demands a certain conceit – that yes, your activities and opinions are either interesting or useful to others*. I’m HUGELY entertaining, but only really to myself. Sometimes, my mum and husband laugh along too, if they are feeling kind.

Nevertheless, I experimented with this blog form elsewhere and decided to run with it on the Diabetes Diet. So, this week I’m…

Trying out new recipes. Like most folk, I’ve been stuck in the same ol’ recipe rut for a while. Prawn cocktail Monday, seabass with avocado Tuesday, sausages at some point. (Well, they are so flippin’ good.) I decided to try out lots of new recipes recently, and I’ve enjoyed the process.

Some of them worked wonderfully – steaming seabass and dressing it with ginger, soy sauce, sliced chillies and sesame oil gave me something new to do with fish. And the crust-less pizza was fun too. I tried Good Food magazine’s budget-friendly pot roast recipe, using silverside of beef, carrots, celery and stock, which would have been good if I hadn’t overcooked it.

It was as tough as old boots. My jaw still aches remembering the workout it got. Still, the gravy and the veg that came with it was MARVELLOUS!

Re-discovering running. I started running 13 years ago, did it regularly, entered a lot of 10k runs and even a half-marathon, and then lost the love. It was hard, it needed a massive amount of willpower to make myself get out there and do it, and it was dull, dull, dull. Seriously, there are good reasons why runners look so miserable. Then, four weeks ago, I decided to go for a run anyway.

Just to see if I still could.

And I could! Two days later, I thought I’d try again. I still could! And here I am, four weeks later going for a run every two days, and LOOKING FORWARD TO IT.

What’s different this time? I run so slowly, your granny could probably overtake me. If you take it super-slow, you don’t get that nasty struggling with the breathing thing. Or the lead-like calves. And I listen to a podcast while I do it. Anything comedic is a good bet, though you try listening to Radio 4’s News Quiz as they tear into our politicians and Donald Trump, and run at the same time. Laughing like a loon and heavy breathing is HARD.

Adjusting to the dark nights. For those of you outside of Scotland, by the start of November, it’s dark by 5pm (and it’s only going to get worse). You can do worthy things, such as making sure you do get some daylight at lunchtime if possible. On the other hand, it’s a great excuse to park your a**e on the sofa and binge-watch your way through Stranger Things 2.

*The stats for any blog serve as a great reality check, should you ever find yourself under the illusion that your opinions/activities ARE fascinating to anyone else…