Weight Loss: Battling with Yourself and the People Around You

'You've put on weight', said mum, circling me like a trader sizing up a horse at market. 'Your dress looks tigher on you than before.'

Indeed, I had put on two pounds recently, from a lapse in my exercise routine, lack of sleep from insomnia (which every so often I'm plagued by) and, more depressingly, a recent lack of self-control when it comes to grapes and strawberries (which are cruel and sneaky and masquerade as healthy fruit when in fact they pack a load of natural sugar). In fact, I've already lost one of those pounds since laying off those tricksy strawberries and buying a skipping rope to force myself to exercise at home when I'm unable to go to classes after work, and I'm on track to being at the weight I was when I got the dress altered by the end of the week- but of course that's not the sort of thing mums notice. My mum being a Chinese mum (and here I may sound a little controversial), few things I do are ever quite satisfactory. Also, when you're a lot slimmer than you used to be, an extra pound or two can be noticable.

Today, I was making some last-minute alterations to my bridemaid's dress, as one of my best friends (the same one who witnessed the whole incident with the chocolate shop guy in my previous entry) is getting married next week (and I'm the maid of honour, woot! But that's not really part of the story, I'm just bragging). I've lost two stone in a year (which is a lot), and had the dress altered recently to fit my new less wobbly and less chunky figure. It was perfect except the shoulder covers were a bit long, so I tucked and sewed them shorter today. I made the mistake of modelling the finished article in front of my mum (who I thought would be pleased, as she was pleased with how well the dress had been altered to fit my size when I had it done).

'You went to all that trouble to get your dress done, and now you aren't even bothering to watch your weight!' She exclaimed, with the inexplicable glimmer of triumph that my mum always gets when discovering something I've been trying to hide and then ticking me off for it.

Well, that's not really fair- I have been watching my weight. I watch it like a hawk all the time. It's just that recently I've watched it go up a little.

Anyone who's ever loved food and successfully been on a diet will know that losing weight's only one battle: the real war is with maintaining it. I've been very diligent (well, mostly- I underestimated fruit and, alright, maybe stumbled upon a few more cakes than usual). So diligent in fact, that some of my friends have expressed a bit of concern that I might be on a dodgy track: but it's okay, I know my brain works in slightly obsessive ways when it comes to calorie counting and nutrition percentages sometimes, but I can also recognise when I'm being a bit too crazy. However my parents didn't seem to trust me, and of course mum was quite vocal about it.

Flash forward to a couple of months ago.

'Only a small bowl?' Frowned my mum at dinner time, glancing alternately between me and my bowl of stew.

'I bought an extra banana at lunch at work today,' I said, knowing it did sound a bit mad but trying to explain, 'so I have to sacrifice a few calories this evening to balance it out.'

'You have to eat more,' scolded mum, 'you're becoming anorexic!'

There. That word was finally mentioned.

I was not, have never been and will never be anorexic. I simply love food too much, and believe you or me, when I'm calorie counting I get the most out of every single calorie. However quite a few times I've been ticked off for not eating enough, despite the fact by this stage I was reaching my optimal weight and was now losing weight more and more slowly.

Flash forward to this afternoon.

'You haven't been eating the right things,' continued mum, whilst I seethed about how someone could tell me off at one moment for turning into an anorexic, and at the next moment for not watching my weight enough. 'Like those three puddings you bought for yourself two weeks ago.'

'What, the WeightWatchers ones?' I exclaimed incredulously.

She's right of course, just not in the way she thinks. It's not always what you eat, but how and when and of course, how much of it you eat. I thought I was being healthy and appeasing my parents at the same time by increasing my food intake a bit, but in the end I misjudged and I wasn't doing anyone any favours: especially not me.

So now I'm back on the straight in narrow, and just in time for my friend's wedding!

Romantically Challenged: Rejector and Rejectee in One Day

I swear, this sort of crazy stuff can only happen to me. This happened only a few days ago.

I've been on jury service for a couple of weeks now (my last day this coming Monday, in fact), and I got asked out by a guy I'd been talking to for while that I'd been sort of hoping that he wouldn't (I liked him well enough, but not in that way, and was dreading having to hurt his feelings). It was difficult trying to be friendly but not too friendly since I'd loathe to be one of these girls that just leads people on. Anyway I felt a bit cruddy because he's a nice guy overall and I admired his courage to ask, and I know well enough the sting of rejection myself- but it'd be crueller to say yes when you already know you have no intention of anything going further, I think.

In any case, this guy's courage gave me the courage to ask after another guy who'd caught my eye, working in a chocolate shop in London a few days earlier (I know I know, I sound terrible- I'm not what this sounds like, honest!) If the guy at court had the guts to ask me, I thought, then I shouldn't let myself down by being a wimp and I should go and ask after chocolate shop guy. Although going around fancying random people I've only seen once before and then asking after them right away isn't something I'm used to, it wouldn't have been the first time I'd expressed my interest in someone to their faces (it was only one time, and I ended up with them for three years, so it was worth something at least!) So that's where I went when court was adjourned that day.

A bit of background: I had gone to this chocolate shop with one of my best friends the day before and noticed this guy when he brought out some samples for us to try. I mortified myself by trying to open conversation by asking him 'so... are you much of a chocolate guy then?' (What a question to ask someone who works in a chocolate shop...) I decided I liked him even more when he didn't poke fun at me for that.

To continue the story, I met up with my friend/ partner in crime in town first (who happened to be visiting from Birmingham for a few days and who's sharp eyes had noticed my interest in this guy when we'd visited the shop together the day before), along with another of her friends she was meeting up with, and they came with me for moral support. I was a little glad that the guy wasn't actually there so I could just ask one of his colleagues, but I was about to be even more glad of his absence.

After walking around looking at chocolate and plucking up as much courage as possible, and telling myself I wouldn't be struck down dead on the spot for asking, I finally went to the counter and asked, bashfully, if she knew the tall guy with blue eyes who was working there the other day, because I thought I quite liked the look of him (or something silly like that- I was having a hard enough time getting the words out from sheer embarrassment to focus on what I was actually saying). The lady grinned playfully.

'Aah,' she said, 'are we on the pull, then?'

I think I must have gone beetroot red by then and laughed near hysterically whilst saying something like, 'I guess, when you put it that way, I sort of am!?' It had never really occurred to me to think about it like that, and although I'm no pure shrinking violet and and pretty much unshockable, all I knew was I was hoping to get to know someone better (through talking!!) and was suddenly getting a concept that I hadn't bargained for. I think it was mainly the extreme sheepishness I was feeling about the whole thing that made me less than my usual eloquent self.

'Let's see...' The lady went into the little staff room thing and looked up who I might have been talking about on the staff rota. She came back and sighed, smiling sympathetically.

'He's got a girlfriend.'

Bugger.

We chatted a little and and I did buy some stuff (cocoa nibs for making truffles- expect a recipe to go up on my other blog Tashcakes! soon). I told the lady how glad I was he wasn't there in the end to endure this awful embarrassing moment- because I quite like that chocolate shop, and I'd like to visit it again without dreading if he'd be there or not.

'Well I'll let you know if he ever becomes available', the lady laughed. 'And don't worry!' She winked at me. 'I won't tell him!'

Of course she will, it's bloody hilarious- I don't mind though, I would too if I were her! At least he probably won't rememeber me, so I can continue to buy chocolate there in peace.

And that's the story of how I got asked out and declined the offer, and a few hours later got indirectly shot down upon plucking up the courage to ask after someone else.

Romantically challenged!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Read out this entry for another story about that same chocolate shop.

Of Whistling and Dancing Without Abandon...

My status update from Facebook, 5th February 2012:

I just cleared inches of snow off my car with a broom while whistling 'Whistle While You Work' (and sweeping in time to the song too). I didn't notice the people behind me watching the whole charade.

Of Entertaining Train Journeys and Stoners...

I can almost never have a normal train journey. Every time I'm on a train, I'm pretty much guaranteed a show of some kind, from having to sit next to a weirdo (and I mean weirdo as in unpleasantly strange this time, not endearingly strange), to witnessing something amazing. This by far is one of my favourites so far.

I was on my way back from visiting Birmingham, in which a good percentage of my friends live (I studied at university there and lived there for five years in total). I had a double seat to myself, there were no screaming children or people playing music loudly on their mobile phones, and all was well.

About an hour into the journey, a huge towering guy with a thick Jamaican accent and rastacap hat (and clearly stoned legless by the smell of him) came slowly staggering down the aisle, laboriously grabbing the backs of the seats as he went along to keep himself upright. This is it, I thought, this is going to be one of my moments, I know it- he's going to come over and talk to me, and probably sit next to me. However although this sort of thing does happen to me, I was wrong this time- because just as this guy reached my row of seats, the ticket inspector came.

The ticket inspector gave a polite 'excuse me' to the stoner, but it was no use: he wouldn't budge. Now a little annoyed, the inspector asked to see his ticket. This is where it gets good.

Stoner dude nodded and loudly slurred 'I will do magic for you'. He procured what looked like a bingo scoresheet from his back pocket, did a few grand hand gestures, made it disappear, and made it reappear under his hat (to his credit, it was a good trick). The conductor made him buy a real ticket after some argument from stoner dude, who clearly regarded his bingo sheet as a proper ticket. The inspector, his job now done as far as he was concerned, tried to move on- it was then that stoner dude grabbed his arm in an affectionate bear hug and declared 'I'm never letting go!'

When the inspector managed to shake himself free, he quite speedily retreated backwards, to which stoner dude called after him with genuine concern: 'Hey mister ticket man, you're going the wrong way!' He then laughed himself silly for a full minute, stared silently at something on the ceiling for another, then made his way back down the train, all the while clinging for dear life onto the seats to stay upright.

It was brilliant, my face was red from trying not to laugh, especially at the Britishness of the people around in the carriage trying to pretend that the whole thing just wasn't happening!

I doubt this will be the only weird train story I post here- but it's certainly going to be hard to beat.

Of Street Food and Melting Makeup...

True to form, my first tale of woe will be of one that only happened yesterday.

I was milling around in Camden Town yesterday evening, waiting for the precise moment to start walking to London Zoo for the summer Zoo Lates event (one thing about me- I hate, hate, hate to be late for appointments and meetups, often resulting in me being somewhere ridiculously early and then having to find ways of entertaining myself- thankfully easily done in Camden Town, on this occasion). I noticed it was getting a bit breezier now, so I put my cardigan on, but without buttoning up- it wasn't that chilly (trust me, this is a key bit of information for later).

Having grabbed some food from one of the stalls and found a nice bench to sit and eat at, I suddenly remembered that the shirt I had on was white- not a crisp white mind you, but white with grey pinstripes. White enough to make a bad impression of a messy eater, in any case. Noting my poor choice in food in terms of stain factor, I ate the fluorescently orange (and very delicious) sweet and sour chicken with utmost care, and for once, successfully.

Making a note of the time, I decided to touch my makeup up a bit, being forever conscious of my oily (and therefore shiny) skin type. I checked myself in my compact mirror. Alright, was my internal assessment, but a bit reflective around the nose and forehead area: better sort that out before I meet the guys. I fished out my trusty tube of Benefit The Porefessional primer from the depths of my bottomless bag (I always make a point of buying bags with TARDIS technology), unscrewed the lid and carefully squeezed a tiny blob onto the back of my hand.


At least, I intended to squeeze out a tiny blob.

What I actually squeezed out was a whole lot of runny mess, and all over myself: the primer had melted in the warm weather. Cursing, I hurriedly screwed the top back on and made that pose everyone does when suddenly covered with wet stuff (you know, the 'looking generally down at yourself in disbelief with your elbows at your sides but your forearms stuck out like an incredulous velociraptor' pose). It wasn't looking good- now my shirt was streaked with light peachy marks. Could be worse, I thought to myself, at least it's nowhere near as noticable as sweet and sour would have been. I managed to mop myself up well enough with some tissues, but couldn't help noting that I hadn't solved my shiny face problem yet. It occurred to me that I should have kneaded the tube before using it. Silly me! It had been in my bag for a while, after all. I picked the tube up again, and squished it around.

I didn't realise that, in my previous haphazard hurry, I hadn't screwed the top back on properly.

So here I was, shiny-faced and with primer makeup on practically every part of my body except for my face. A bit fed up now, I managed to smear a bit of the stuff straight from my shirt onto my face, re-mopped myself up as best I could, and decided it was time to get myself to the zoo.

I should have just kept walking, in hindsight. Instead, I stopped by a churros stall. I noticed they were doing large, filled churros instead of the traditional thin ones that you dip into chocolate, so I went to get one, deciding that it would cheer me up. And it did, for a while.

I got about halfway through it until it very quietly and very messily exploded.

Now thoroughly fed-up indeed, churro-less and looking like the posterchild for a Persil advert, I resigned myself to the fact that I'd now be meeting my friends looking utterly ridiculous. I whipped out some more tissues and started cleaning the sticky stuff from my bag, and as well as I could from my trousers. I sighed, preparing myself, and looked down to properly assess the state of my shirt, which was of course terrible.

It was then that I noticed why it had suddenly gotten breezy earlier.

The middle button of my shirt had been undone the entire time, exposing, in all its green and spotty glory, my bra.

Which was now also splattered with chocolate.

Life's a Drama- Mine's a Sitcom

Well, well, well.

Greetings and welcome to the Wacky World (et. al.) I tried to use thesaurus.com to find another way of saying 'welcome' because it was becoming apparent that there were far too many 'w's floating around like a flock of crudely drawn birds, but came up short.

When I say 'of a weird girl', I'm referring more to my life. That is to say, I'm not denying that I'm weird- far from it in fact, I'm a little odd and little proud of it (but more on that another time). The Wacky World of a Weird Girl is more to do with the weird things that happen to me on a daily (alright that's a bit of an exaggeration- more like weekly) basis, and posting these often fun and sometimes slightly unsettling occasions on dear old Facebook just doesn't cut it any more.

Here, I'll post my musings and observations, but most importantly of all, my stories; I promise not to exaggerate. Believe me, I won't need to do any exaggeration, and some of them will still begger belief.

Enjoy/ brace yourself!