Weight Loss Zoltar

At the beginning of the year, I decided that to celebrate my 40^th in July, there would be a calendar of events and I would spend as much time as I could celebrating my “big birthday”. These events have included trips to the theatre, a “Come Dine with Me” competition with friends, weekends away, ghost hunts, a spa day, scarecrow making (don’t ask) afternoon tea and then a couple of amazing holidays.

  It’s safe to say that by the time I stepped off the plane last week at the end of what was technically the last in the calendar of events, I was well aware that not only did I have 7 months of amazingly happy memories, I also had a slightly expanded waistline!

  So from a calendar of birthday events to a Christmas countdown. I unashamedly use the “C” word, “The X Factor” is back and “Strictly Come Dancing” starts this weekend and everyone knows that means Christmas is on the way.

  There’s 13 weeks until the big man arrives, so even if I only lose a pound a week, that’s almost a stone gone.

  As with all great plans, they start with getting on the scales…. Well maybe not all great plans, I’m sure when Christopher Columbus set sail for the new world, he didn’t say “wait a sec chaps, I just need to see how much I weigh before I set off and make history”.

  However, that’s exactly how my plan began (not the new world bit) I got on my scales in my bathroom and had a little cry, according to them I’d put on 5 stones… was that possible? I got off and on again only to discover that I’d now lost 10 stone and was bordering on dangerously thin. I haven’t spent years reading mystery novels not to not have learnt some detective skills. I deduced my scales were about as reliable as the England football team at a major international tournament!

  Heading to the gym, I thought I’d use their all singing, all dancing scales, the ones that measure your height, weight, BMI, shoe size, length of your hair etc. 

   I’d given myself a stern talking to all the way to the gym, that even if the changing room was full, I would still get on them. I would brave the embarrassment of putting my pound in the machine and stepping on them. What did it matter if people were in there? It’s not like they’d be able to hear what I weighed! However ideal scenario…. The changing room would be empty (cue my use of visualization techniques)

  Walking into the changing room, I realized I was good at this visualization malarkey…. The changing room was empty! I made a note to work on the “me and Matt Goss get married visualisation”

  I put my pound in

*** changing room door opens, in walks two thin women***

I take my shoes off and step on the scale

*** changing room door opens again, in walks another woman*

I grab the side handles of the scales…

At that point, a great secret was revealed, it turns out the scales at my gym are the weighing equivalent of flipping Zoltar.

It’s big booming voice echoed all over the changing room “If you want to know your BMI, keep holding on to the handles”

  I could feel myself start to flush scarlet… how far would weight loss Zoltar go? Would he announce to the world my vital statistics, or would I find myself being turned into a 12-year-old forced to launch a comedy style mission to find weight loss Zoltar so I could turn myself back, whilst learning a few important life lessons along the way and cementing my lifelong friendships?

  I began hoping for number 2…. anything rather than those numbers being read out loud!

  Fortunately, weight loss Zoltar then shut his face and simply printed me off a ticket with a helpful suggestion of a goal weight.

  Whilst the ticket didn’t make for pretty reading, I’ve decided it probably deserves a place in my memory book, if only because it signifies the start of phase 2 of the calendar of events. A calendar that involves trips to the gym!

The Phone Call of Shame

“Ring Ring, Ring Ring” (or in my case, because my ringtone is “Uptown Funk”, it’s a quick burst of Bruno giving me some ...

ME: “Hello”

VOICE ON PHONE (VOP): “Is that Katie?”

ME: “Yes”

VOP: “hello, this is Matt from your gym, we just wondered if you were OK?”

ME: “Yes I’m fine, why?”

VOP: “well you haven’t been for a while and we wondered if we’d upset you?”

ME: “oh no not at all, I think the gym is wonderful and your teachers amazing, the staff are generally lovely, you haven’t upset me at all, I’ve just been really busy with work”

VOP: “Will you come back soon?”

ME: “Yes of course”

VOP: “When?

By the end of the conversation, I felt so guilty that I promised faithfully to go to the gym on Sunday morning and to go and find him to say hello, so he knew I’d kept to my word. I haven’t had boyfriends who cared about my welfare as much as Matt from the gym! Maybe I should date him!

  It did make me feel bad though, because oddly I really do enjoy going to the gym and I love Just Jhoom and Zumba and I even find it oddly enjoyable when I get to go first thing in a morning and spend half an hour on the treadmill listening to whatever randomly pops up on my iPod, although this is my new favourite work out tune at the moment!

The reason for causing my gym to worry is that I’ve genuinely been so busy with work and travelling around the country that I haven’t had time. The time I have had has been spent either catching up on housework or making sure the dogs are walked. Although apparently a 6-mile walk for Buddy wasn’t enough on Saturday!

Buddy wide awake & raring to go after his work....Cyril  having a kip!

 Even though I appear to have moved into my car, I have been sticking to my diet and on Tuesday faced a massive temptation! Lucy and I had to go to Portsmouth for a meeting and because we had allowed ourselves some “getting lost time”, which we didn’t we had time for a brew. Nipping into a branch of Subway, I ordered us a coffee and this is what happened.

ME: “2 coffees please”

LADY BEHIND THE COUNTER (LBTC): “would you like a cookie to go with it?”

ME: “no, thank you” (feeling virtuous, halo glowing a little brighter)

LBTC: “They’re free”

ME: “No, really it’s fine”

LBTC: “Would you like the receipt so you can have a free cookie, the next time you come in?”

ME: almost crying, “Please don’t make me eat the cookie”

  I appreciate the lady was just trying to be nice and having eaten Subway cookies in the past, I know they’re delicious, but and this is the weird thing; since I was hypnotized, I haven’t touched any form of chocolate, cake, biscuit or desert. I wasn’t sure I could say to the woman behind the counter, “the reason I don’t want your cookie, is because I’m fat and the reason I got fat was because I ate too many delicious cookies and now I’ve been hypnotized and so I think cookies smell like dirty toilets and taste like shit, so please stop offering me pieces of shit”

  Taking the positives from the week, I’ve made a new best friend from the gym and managed to clock up 5 weeks without any form of sweet stuff, I’m taking that as a win!

  

I Love to Go a Sauntering!

I know that sometimes my Slinky mission falls a bit short because I don’t exercise enough, I go through phases where I like going to the gym and other phases where I prefer staying at home and watching TV. 

  I think my main problem is I’m easily bored and am yet to find a personal trainer that really motivates me, or actually listens to the things I tell them! One skill I’ve had since childhood is being able to distract people with the art of conversation! I spent many a history lesson getting our teacher with the sexy bum to stop telling us all about the Industrial Revolution, but instead turn towards the board to draw pictures of what various rock climbing terminology meant. This was good for two reasons

1.     I found the industrial revolution quite boring

2.     The class, which consisted of all girls, got to stare at his bum for most of the lesson.

  A few years ago I started working out with a personal trainer, but again I soon got bored of lifting a kettle bell or lunging or stepping up and down on a plastic box so I soon worked out a way of distracting him. Apparently this came in the form of asking questions about anything from how certain foods boosted metabolism to what sort of car he’d like to own.

  Anyway with the best of intentions that if I was doing it for charity I would make myself train and go to the gym religiously, my sister Lucy and I registered for the Moon Walk. Every time I say that it gives me a vision of us wearing a black hat, white socks black shoes and something sparkly and going all Michael Jackson through the streets of London town.

  In reality the Moon Walk is a chance to raise money for breast cancer and as we both have friends and family members who have suffered we wanted to do something practical. You can do the Full Moon (26 miles) or the Half Moon (13 miles) We opted for the half moon because I have a manky ankle, I’m not sure this is the actual medical term, but the general gist is I have to be a bit careful.

  Over the last few months, we’ve done a fair bit of training, walking Cyril miles (something he never objects to), gym sessions, spin classes and pole dancing! I think I had images of the weight dropping off me, which sadly it hasn’t!

Cyril on one of his many walks!

  So by Saturday night, apart from the fact we were worried we’d be able to stay awake through the night we were ready and raring to go! We had our t-shirts; we had water and just for good measure we bought Walk the Walk bobble hats!

Who knew bobble hats could be such fun?

  There was a slight delay to the start time, and by the time we did eventually set off, standing in a field for an hour hadn’t helped my ankle. Still as people lined the route to cheer us on and homeowners leaned drunkenly out of windows to clap and tell us a bearded woman had won Eurovision it was hard not to get carried away with the mood. 

  So as Lucy and I strided through the streets of London talking about anything and everything from who had killed Lucy Beale? (Eastenders) Who was the best Batman? (Michael Keaton) and what we were going to have for tea (Chinese) we were in a pretty good mood. Sadly it would appear that not everyone doing the walk shared our good cheer and at one point where we reached a bit of a bottleneck on a pavement one woman exclaimed quite loudly “Well we made a mistake getting on the pavement behind these” before she then pushed through the middle of us. Still we let that go and continued discussing the issues of the day, (no we’re not sure when Katie Price will find a decent chap)

  By the time we reached the banks of the Thames my ankle was pretty sore and although we were still upbeat I was aware I had slowed down a bit, it was at this point, I heard a lady (and I use the term loosely) proclaim that “people who saunter should not be allowed to take part in this” I was a little outraged because surely whether I was sauntering or not I am still allowed to raise money for charity?

The walkers heading over a bridge, I forget which one!

  By the time we got back to our hotel about 4.30am we were pretty tired and sore, but proud of the money we’d raised despite sauntering our way through it!

Ouch! My poor manly ankle post walk!

  However on Sunday we celebrated with wine, a Chinese and there may have been a sneaky pack of Oreos, so despite my plan that the Moon Walk would help me lose weight when I stepped on the scales last night I’d put a pound ON, but at least I’ve raised pounds for a cause I care about!

 If you'd like to sponsor us via our fundraising page that would be nice.

A medicinal bottle of Chablis