Sharon's Lighter Life

Answers to your questions

2008-11-16T11:27:00.003Z

A number of questions were raised in the comments of my last blog and whilst I’m fairly sure that the people who asked those questions probably did return to see my responses, I thought that a number of the points were quite interesting and I could expand further on, for the benefit of all my readers.

Loose skin and surgery
Once I reach my goal I will consider any necessary surgery if I do have a large amount of loose skin. If I find that I do need surgery, I would of course approach my own GP and the NHS first, but I may also have the option of BUPA. In a few months (once I have been in my current job two years) I will qualify for the private medical cover benefit.

Whilst obviously I don’t know yet whether I will have loose skin, it is quite likely. I will play that one on a “let’s wait and see basis”. Other successful dieters who have lost over 100 lbs have said that drinking lots of water helps enormously with keeping skin plumped out and healthy looking, as does moderate exercise, particularly swimming apparently.

Goals and weight loss ticker
This weekend part of our Lighter Life “homework” was to focus on our goals and write down a number of targets in our book, both for our first 100 days on the plan (called “Foundation”) and also what our long term goals are. As the amount of weight I need to lose is likely to take more than 100 days, after the initial “Foundation” stage I will move into one of the “Development” groups for quite a few more months until I reach goal, and then I will join a “Management” group. Management is the 12 week “route to management” re-introduction to food programme.

Anyway, I have been concentrating quite hard on working out what realistic targets for me would be and I will post an entry containing all the goals in a few days.

I have created a weight loss ticker but when I have tried to add it to my header, Blogger does not display it in a nice way, so not sure where to display it yet, or whether just to keep it for my own benefit. Prior to the full “Goals” blog entry which I will post in a few days, this is a sneak preview of my current weight loss ticker:

Christmas and social events
For the moment I am declining all invites to works Christmas parties and meals as I think it might prove just slightly too difficult or too tempting, and I feel there is no need to put myself in the path of temptation when I don’t have to.

Christmas Day and Boxing Day
I will be in Dorset with my family (Dad and two brothers, various partners, nieces and nephews etc) and I *will* be taking my foodpacks with me and sticking to the Lighter Life foodpacks. Family people should understand and be supportive, not be trying to tempt me off the path.

My Lighter Life counsellor said at the first meeting that we must focus on staying on the LL programme, and not get tempted by food. Once you get out of the “zone” and start to stray, you might just end up straying again and again, and that could lead to disaster.

Also, as another LL member on one of the forums pointed out, by overcoming our obesity problem we will be adding 10 years to our lives, so what does missing out on one Christmas mean compared with enjoying another TEN?

Exercise and gym membership
For two reasons I cancelled my Virgin Active gym membership on Friday. One is the lack of energy I have to do an hour or aerobics whilst consuming only 500 calories a day, the other is the fact that I will be moving again at the end of the month to Greenwich.

Lighter Life do advocate moderate exercise, starting with walking (we have pedometers to try and get us doing 10,000 steps a day), but don’t recommend starting a strenuous NEW exercise regime at the beginning of the programme.

Whilst I do have perfectly adequate energy levels to do most things – you know, go to work, be active whilst at work, go shopping, walk for a few miles etc – what I don’t have is any stored glycogen in my body at the moment – the stuff that provides you with “instant energy” if you suddenly decide to do a short, sharp burst of aerobics or run for 20 minutes etc.

Therefore, I think exercise is something I am now going to have to build back in and increase very gradually and probably look into re-joining the Greenwich gym (Arches Leisure Centre) sometime in late spring 2009.

Internet dating – on hold again
Since blogging about Internet Dating Man No.1 I haven’t heard from him. I don’t think it was just the fact that I had told him about my blog and then blogged about him, I think there was a distinct lack of interest on both sides. The only good thing that has come out of it is that, having met someone who had been very successful on the Lighter Life programme himself, it has inspired me to take the Lighter Life route!

At the moment, I am so fed up of men that I have removed my profiles from all the sites that I had joined, and I’m going to try and forget about men and internet dating until I am a lot closer to my goal weight. (This, in fact, was my original intention when I started this weight loss blog back in May – not to think about dating until approximately May 2009, but then I got distracted .... I think I am the Queen of creating diversionary tactics for myself, but now I am going to try and concentrate very hard for the next 6 – 12 months on the Lighter Life programme and the main goal of shedding the excess weight.)

Lighter Life -- end of week 1

2008-11-13T23:34:00.003Z

Start weight: Thursday 6 November: 23 stone ..7 lbs (329 lbs) 149 Kg
By Day 4 ---- Monday 10 November: 22 stone ..5 lbs (313 lbs) 142 Kg
By Day 7 -- Thursday 13 November: 21 stone 13 lbs (307 lbs) 139 Kg

Loss in one week: 1 stone 8 lbs (22 lbs) 10 kgs

I don’t care what anyone says about Lighter Life now (and yes I am fully aware of the negative article in the Daily Mail today) I have finally found a programme that works for me and gets results, and gets them quickly.

Previously with “conventional” dieting it took me two months (May to July) to lose 20 lbs on the plan I was following earlier in the year. One week on Lighter Life and I have lost more than that already !!!

Whilst I am aware that a large part of the initial loss in the first 3 days was just water and glycogen I am absolutely sure that it is not all 22 lbs of water and glycogen – I can feel areas of my body that feel as if a few fatty deposits have evaporated already, and when I took my measurements this morning my bust and waist were 2” smaller than last week and my hips 3” smaller.

Dramatic results and New Goals

With this plan, because it does produce such dramatic results (especially for the mega obese like me), I can finally see light at the end of the tunnel – instead of being daunted by being more than 150 lbs overweight, I can see how quickly it will come off and I can see the project as being *feasible* now, instead of some very long term “will I ever reach the end of this?” type diet.

Because Lighter Life works mathematically on calorie restriction and even women who are only 3 or 4 stone overweight lose an average of 1 stone (14 lbs) per month (and mega obese women even faster) I can see signs now of .....

1. Reaching 21 stone by the end of November (ie this month)
2. Breaking the 20 stone barrier before the end of December
3. Weighing “17 stone something” by the end of February 2009
4. Reaching “14 stone something” by May 2009 (my birthday)
5. Reaching “10 stone” (or less) by October 2009 (my brother’s wedding)

I am *sooooo* excited!

Other diets – why they didn’t work for me

I know that lots of other diet plans do work, for different people, and for those who have been able to lose weight successfully on Weight Watchers, Slimming World, Rosemary Conley or any other ‘moderate’ eating and exercise plan, congratulations and well done to you. For me personally I have found I need a regime that is stricter and enforces more discipline.

I am a very undisciplined person and some of the reasons why previous “moderate eating and exercise” diets did not work for me include:

1. Food still being part of the diet, and falling prey to “temptations” in social situations, or at weekends .... of the “oooh I’ll just let myself have this and make up for it later in the week or down the gym” variety.

2. Sometimes I would work my butt off at the gym only to find that I was ravenously hungry afterwards and would end up falling prey to the temptations of the nearby kebab or fish and chip shops near the (previous) gym that I used to use.

With Lighter Life there is no need to become a madly furious gym bunny – in fact to do so whilst only eating 530 calories a day could be dangerous, as you simply would not have enough energy to do so, and then would definitely end up famished and ready to break the diet and desperate to eat real food.

Exercise

Lighter Life advocate moderate gentle exercise in the initial stages, including 10,000 steps a day and just issued us tonight with pedometers.

For me, this means I no longer have to feel guilty about not hitting the gym – I know that the Lighter Life food plan will take care of the (huge) daily calorie deficit – a calorie deficit that I could *never* achieve down the gym unless I spent all day there !!!

Also, personally, I see the end part of the Lighter Life programme (the “Route to Management” / 12 week re-introduction to food programme) as the time when I should then increase my exercise levels, as then I will be increasing my calorie intake and starting to eat (and live) like a “normal” person ..... a normal person who eats “normally” and exercises “normally” 3 or 4 times a week.

Power walking

I have taken to lunchtime walks again and no longer even have to fit “eating” into my 60 minute lunch break. As I am having my food packs every 4 hours (8 am, 12 pm, 4 pm and 8 pm) when I go out for my lunchtime walk I have already consumed my second food pack and have plenty of energy for my fast walk around the city.

New blog name

Some of you may have noticed that I changed the name of my blog (again) a few days ago to “Sharon’s Lighter Life”. To get my blog to appear as “Sharon’s Lighter Life” in your blogroll or Google reader you do need to delete and re-add my blog -- it’s something bizarre with Blogger that blogrolls and readers only show the name of the blog as it was when you originally subscribed to it.

You don’t have to. If you are happy with it appearing as “Sharon’s Blog” in your list that’s fine. I am happy that it says “Sharon’s Lighter Life” on my front page now as that is my commitment to the Lighter Life plan and how excited I am about it !!

Gee whizz ..... I thought this would be just a short little blog entry containing just my weigh in news, but there is so much else to say as well !!!!!

Personal blog -- intended for one reader only

2008-11-12T17:40:00.005Z

Hopefully the reader this is intended for does still read my blog, but I am not entirely sure

Sorry
Is all that I can say
Years gone by and still
Words dont come easily
Like sorry like sorry

Forgive me
Is all that I can say
Years gone by and still
Words dont come easily
Like forgive me forgive me

The reader this is intended for left a coded message on their blog today but I am not entirely sure whether that message was meant for me .... if I have misunderstood and XYZ's message was intended for someone else, I will unsubscribe to XYZ's blog forthwith and cease to be aware of whatever goes on, on XYZ's blog.

Additional verse (written by me)

I won't contact you

because you asked me not to

You said that you would do .......

Only if the other person asked you to .......

and not because you had asked them to ask you to .......

I had actually been planning this personal blog entry for a while (with these song lyrics and YouTube clip as above) but I was going to wait longer before asking for forgiveness.

And now it's up to you ......

[COMMENTS -- no comments required or wanted at all please.]

A fun free thing for a good cause

2008-11-11T23:24:00.003Z

My new favourite waste of time online -- you learn (whilst playing the vocab game), they earn grains of rice to help the UN World Food Program to help feed the hungry.

http://www.freerice.com/

I managed to get up to Level 43 before it started getting too tricky and I would have needed to consult the dictionary too often! But had sponsored 4,300 grains of rice by then so must not feel too bad!

Who pays for the donated rice?

http://www.freerice.com/faq.html

The rice is paid for by the sponsors whose names you see on the bottom of your screen when you enter a correct answer. These sponsors support both learning (free education for everyone) and reducing hunger (free rice for the hungry). We thank these sponsors for their generous participation at FreeRice. For information about how you or your company can sponsor FreeRice, please email freerice.rep@wfp.org.

Unbelieeeeevable -- how to lose 5 lbs a day !!!

2008-11-10T21:31:00.004Z

How to lose 5 lbs a day ....... go on the Lighter Life programme.

Start weight on Thursday 6 November: 23 stone 7 lbs (329 lbs) 149.2 Kg

New weight on Monday 10 November: 22 stone 5 lbs (313 lbs) 142.0 Kg **

Weight lost in 3 days: 16 lbs / 7.2 Kgs

I went for my midweek "pop in" check up with my Lighter Life counsellor at lunchtime today and was amazed to find I have lost more than one stone already!

It might well be nearly all water and glycogen, but I don't care because I have *NEVER* lost so much (of anything, even water) on any previous diet in a week, let alone 3 days.

About two years ago I went on a "boot camp" 3 day activity weekend which was also very restricted calorie food and about 5 hours of exercise every day. It was totally exhuasting attempting to do circuits, followed by half hour jogs round the grounds, followed by circuits, followed by some other activity whilst fed miniscule rations ..... and at the end of the 3 days of exhausting starvation I had only lost 9 lbs !!!

3 days on Lighter Life, without doing *any* exercise at all and 16 lbs have fallen off.

The Lighter Life diet works on two key principles: (1) calorie restriction and (2) low carb count which induces ketosis (similar to the Atkins diet but without all the fat and additional calories).

(1) The daily calorie allowance of 530 calories ensures that for women (who generally need 2000 cals a day to function) they are in constant calorie deficit of 1,500 calories per day = 10,500 cals per week. As one pound of fat = 3,500 calories, the deficit ensures that women on LL lose *at least* 3 lbs of fat per week (and possibly a few extra pounds of water).

For men the situation is even better, because the calorie defict for them is greater and leads to men losing on average 1½ stone (21 lbs) per month and women on LL losing 1 stone (14 lbs) per month.

(2) Ketosis is a very specific fat burning process that only occurs if carbs are restricted. Lighter Life foodpacks provide 50 grams of carbs and 50 grams of protein per day, which is more carbs than the even more limiting Atkins which recommends only 20 grams of carbs per day.

Lighter Life are very strict about you sticking to the plan and the benefits of staying in "ketosis" and they actually do a test at each visit to check that there are ketones in your urine.

Having failed on nearly every diet I have tried before, I felt the need for something a lot *stricter* where someone is going to be monitoring me and Lighter Life seems to be fitting the bill.

** I am aware that this weight is almost the same as where I was in Week 2 of my "previous" diet back on 27 May (although I had lost 20 lbs by the end of July) ..... and before anyone points it out, yes I know EXACTLY what went wrong during August, September and October when I moved flat twice / got stressed / had personal emotional problems / turned to food for comfort ..... I know exactly what happened and now I am trying to do something about it.

That is why I chose this programme -- so that when I move again at the end of November I won't end up turning to food as a stress busting crutch -- food will no longer be an option, and I will be using just the Lighter Life foodpacks.

Sharon’s guide to packing and moving flat

2008-11-09T13:53:00.041Z

I recently noticed on one of my distant blog buddies’ blogs that they might be moving soon (only from Point A to Point B within their own country, not this country) but it made me think of all the tricks that I have developed over the past few years (you may have noticed I tend to move quite often – not usually quite as much as I have done this year, but hey ho).

When I first moved out of the familial home at 19 years old I made the classic mistake of using my suitcases to transport all my clothes and soon found I had to re-iron them all.

Silly me! Suitcases are not for transporting clothes – they are for transporting very heavy items like books and marble book ends – trust me, your removal man with the van will be very glad you have stored them in a case with a handle and wheels!

Clothes need to be transported hanging, to make your life easier once you reach Point B and have the job of unpacking. Expensive garment carriers can be purchased, but in Heath Robinson (or Valerie Singleton) style I have invented my own very cheap garment carrier solution – here’s one I made earlier:

First you need to gather about 5 hangers together and tape them with sticky tape (or elastic bands) but I have found sticky tape comes off pretty easily afterwards.

Secondly, take 1 x large refuse sack and punch a hole in the bottom end –slide the hangers through this hole and roll the bag down the clothes. Et voila – one cheapo garment hanger – almost waterproof, and definitely crease proof.

Continue to tape groups of between 3 and 6 hangers together, tape and bag them until the contents of your wardrobe are ready to be magically transported from Point A to Point B without causing you any unnecessary ironing at your new destination !!!

UNDERWEAR: I store mine in a small 4 drawer storage unit (not a large chest of drawers) and tie it up with string (to secure it) and it is then possible for the whole lightweight unit to be transported with all the underwear in exactly the same place, without having to pack or unpack those items at all.

DAY BEFORE MOVING: pack nearly everything except one set of clothes and underwear to change into on moving day. Only leave unpacked: small amount of food, kitchenware and kettle, plus a few basic bathroom items (the rest can be packed).

MOVING DAY: pack the remaining items and bedding and nightwear you have slept in over night. Never “pack” your own bed and bedding in an attempt to be efficient and then force yourself to end up sleeping on the couch or floor or something equally uncomfortable. I choose the easy, comfortable life for me with as little interruption to the “norm” as possible.

ORDER OF PACKING:
1. Living room items / office items (bank and personal stuff)
2. Bedroom items / books / records / CDs / photos
3. Kitchen items (all except what you are leaving until Moving Day morning)
4. Bathroom items
5. TV / computer – moving day (morning) – absolutely no reason to make your life difficult or miss out on your favourite entertainment just because you are moving – did you notice earlier I said I like making life easy?

METHOD OF PACKING: just pack one shelf of a bookcase or drawer at a time, then the next, then the next, one wall at a time. eg:

* main wall contains: 2 x bookcases and 1 x chest of drawers – pack those 3 items,
* side wall contains: bureau / desk, small chest, video unit – then pack those items,

I always approach packing in just a very logical, plodding way – one drawer/shelf at a time, one unit at time, one wall at a time.

In this way the task is less daunting and I can “pack and wrap” a 1 bedroom flat in 6 hours (having done it a few times this year I am absolutely certain of the timing – last time I did not even start packing until 6pm in the evening and finished at midnight!).

BOXES vs LAUNDRY BAGS: use as few boxes as possible – the cardboard can get damp and the bottom fall out of big heavy boxes. I only use boxes for kitchen ware which I want to be transported upright to avoid breakages – this also makes it very easy to identify kitchenware as soon as it arrives at your new abode.

LAUNDRY BAGS: use for packing nearly everything else – they are incredibly useful and versatile – your removal man with the van will be about to carry about 5 or 6 at a time, using both arms, which is a much faster rate of transportation than 1 box at a time (boxes have to be carried properly).

SMALL LAUNDRY BAGS: heavy items – books, videos, files from your personal filing cabinet

MEDIUM LAUNDRY BAGS: cleaning products, non-breakable nick-nacks, plastic items, small radios and hifis, wrapped with spare blankets / towels or bedding that you are taking with you (make some of the linen you are taking with you “kill two birds with one stone” – using it to pack and wrap something else at the same time)

LARGE LAUNDRY BAGS: for the lightest items – eg duvets / pillows / bedding.

Your removal man will thank you for the logic and weights contained in your laundry bags (my removal man, a chap I have used several times and who knows me quite well by now, is always impressed by my packing skills!).

KITCHENWARE: do not use newspaper to wrap crockery and glassware – it will leave print marks and you will have to wash everything on arriving at your new abode – use plastic bags or tea towels.

Example:

Notice how I only wrap a plastic bag round every other plate – the one in the middle will be fine and protected from the wrapping of its sister and brother above and below it!

Everyone should have one of these: a bag of bags! My mother obviously brought me up right (or in a very practical way!). Whilst sometimes the “bag of bags” may nearly be overflowing, I am glad to have a huge number of spare plastic bags when it comes to moving time!

OTHER USES OF PLASTIC BAGS: to wrap round items like (a) letter rack (b) mini stationery drawers (black with flowers – each drawer contains various paperclips, elastic bands, etc), (c) yellow stationery box – so that you “pack and wrap” the whole item as it is – don’t go down the route of removing contents of things that can be packed as they are!

I will repeat that nugget again:

* don’t remove the contents of things that can be packed as they are!

Another example:

The whole cutlery tray goes into a box, and then either a tea towel or shiny magazine (not inky newspaper) laid over the top, so that you can then place the next kitchen items on top.

BOOKCASES: pack one shelf at a time, the contents of each shelf into one separate laundry bag – this may waste space but will mean that you are able to re-create your bookcase exactly the way it was on arriving at your new pad.

MOVABLE SHELVES: my bookcase has one fixed shelf and 3 movable shelves. I have learnt to keep all 12 metal pins / studs that hold up those 3 shelves in a very safe place – I wrap the studs in a plastic bag and keep it in my handbag – I do not want to be searching high and low for those studs after I have moved, even if the location of the 3 shelves is staring me in the face!

I hope this has been helpful – these were the main things I could think of, off the top of my head. When I actually get round to packing to move to Greenwich on 29 November I might think of a few more!

P.S. Lighter Life weekend is going fine.

P.P.S. The Ealing landlord has found another gullible mug (er, sorry, I mean new tenant) to rent my current flat within one day of advertising the flat.

Lighter Life -- Day 1 complete

2008-11-07T20:02:00.005Z

I signed up on Thursday evening, as planned, and I've just managed my first day on 530 calories and just 4 foodpacks (two shakes and two soups).

Today has been very stressful but not because of Lighter Life -- work has been pandemonium and I didn't manage to have a lunch break (away from my desk) at all and ended up working late as well. It was not a great day to be starting something as restricted and shocking to the body as LL, but I have (just about) managed.

I did manage to down the 4 litres of water and 4 replacement meals, including 2 while routed to my desk at work, snowed under with work.

I am extremely tired -- again not because of Lighter Life -- many other factors have caused this week to be a very stressful and tiring. Even by Thursday morning I had the beginnings of a stye on my right eye, which has now grown bigger and more painful.

THIS WEEKEND: I will be sleeping / resting / drinking lots of water and 8 foodpacks / possibly doing a small amount of gentle exercise. I have no money to go out anywhere, having spent £66 on my Lighter Life foodpacks, so the cost of the programme does preclude having any spare cash to go and buy any other food or treats !!!

MY COMMITMENT: even before I joined on Thursday night I had bought a hand blender, plus two Thermos flasks (so that I can take the soups and shakes already made up to work with me) and I had either used up or thrown away all the remaining food in the flat.

DISCOVERIES TODAY: I don't particularly like the shakes, but I do like the soups. In the past when I have been a "nay sayer" of meal replacement programmes I have mentioned that I don't particularly like Slim Fast (shakes) and other similar products, and I now know for sure that I simply don't like milkshakes, but that is not a problem because ....

SOLUTION - PART 1: our LL counsellor has asked those of us who started on Thursday to pop back on Monday lunchtime to find out how we are getting on, and she will also be able to swap any of the foodpacks we don't like for an alternative.

SOLUTION - PART 2: from the second week onwards we are allowed one meal bar per day, so I think from Week 2 I will choose 2 x soups, 1 x bar and 1 x shake per day. (I can just about manage one shake per day and I think 3 or 4 soups per day including for breakfast would be very strange!).

2ND DISCOVERY: when I finally left the office, tired and stressed out and on the brink of lapsing and grabbing some horrible high calorie instant gratification food, I went into Boots on Cannon Street and re-weighed myself on the scales and it appears I may have lost 5 lbs in one day (i.e. today) !!!

Yes, I don't know quite how it is possible either, but I won't argue if the programme works! Admittedly most of the initial loss will be water and glycogen, but our Lighter Life counsellor did explain very fully how the "ketosis" (fat burning) process works.

LIGHTER LIFE FORUMS: a friend who has done LL in the past sent me a link to some internet forums for various meal replacement diet support groups, including Lighter Life. Most of the Users include in their signature "Week 1 .... lbs lost, Week 2 .... lbs lost" etc as a running tally and the amounts people lose are very impressive. The majority seem to lose at least 10 lbs in the first week, but for some active people (especially men) it can be up to 18 lbs in the first week.

The weight losses and before and after photos are very inspiring and whilst I am aware that these kind of results *can* also be achieved by conventional diet and exercise, if you are happy for things to take a bit longer, because I have reached the stage of regretting yo yo-ing earlier in the year, I am keen now to achieve results much faster.

BEFORE AND AFTER PHOTOS: these are a few of the links from the forums of members who have posted inspirational photos (I am hoping they won't mind me posting links, seeing as this is already "out there" on the world wide web anyway):

Russiandoll

http://www.minimins.com/success-stories/8184-before-after-photo-thread-inspiration-post-your-photos-here-3.html#post52493

Icemoose

http://www.minimins.com/success-stories/8184-before-after-photo-thread-inspiration-post-your-photos-here-4.html#post52978

Sukie Sue

http://www.minimins.com/success-stories/8184-before-after-photo-thread-inspiration-post-your-photos-here-24.html#post150326

Mindless Man

http://www.minimins.com/success-stories/8184-before-after-photo-thread-inspiration-post-your-photos-here-64.html#post378238

Nadhak

http://www.minimins.com/success-stories/8184-before-after-photo-thread-inspiration-post-your-photos-here-2.html#post48579

Odds and ends (more flat and diet news)

2008-11-06T00:43:00.003Z

1. Whilst the world waited for the result of the US election, residents in Ealing waited for the result of the planning committee meeting decision on the Dickens Yard development which was held tonight (ok, Wednesday 5 November – I’m burning the midnight blogging oil again).

Non surprise of the century: Ealing Council approved the development. I’m glad that: (a) I have already found another flat to move to; and (b) I didn’t waste 4 hours of my evening attending a no doubt incredibly boring and long winded council meeting, but instead just did a google news search and found that some dutiful journalist had written up the result after 10 pm:

http://www.ealingtimes.co.uk/news/3822275.Dickens_Yard_given_green_light_/

2. I have received a letter and email from my new prospective Greenwich landlady who I am getting to like even more. Firstly, she is a very exuberant, expressive, French lady – but not in a dotty or nutty way, but in a very trusting and friendly way.

Secondly, I’ve discovered she is into all new age therapies and stuff. The stamp on the back of her letter led me to this website: http://www.alwayswelcome.com/ and then in the links I found Marie Claire’s other part time money spinning interest: http://www.tarotgift.com/

I really hope I am not in anyway prejudicing or jinxing my proposed move now, by revealing publicly on my blog the identity of my new prospective landlady but I was *delighted* to find she is into tarot and astrology. Perhaps she can tell me where I went wrong with Nico the Frog (actually I think I know, it’s not exactly rocket science working out what went wrong, but hey ho) or where my real soul mate or eventual Mr Right is actually hiding !!!

3. Lighter Life

There is a possibility that I might be able to start even sooner than Sunday. I found that there is a Lighter Life counsellor in the City who is starting up a new Thursday evening group near Bank tube station. As long as I get my medical form signed by a doctor tomorrow morning, it looks like I might be starting the Lighter Life plan from Friday.

4. Diet Funny

I just came across this on another weight loss blogger’s blog and could not help smiling!

A little bit more about the new flat

2008-11-03T21:52:00.007Z

I don't want to jinx things (and blogging excitedly about my previous moves to Beckenham and Ealing did nothing to help those moves go well), but a few tiny extra bits of info left off yesterday's long blog.

1. The advert was a private advert on http://www.gumtree.co.uk and is the first time I have used that site. I am delighted to have found a private landlord and landlady advertising a flat that they own. I am totally fed up of letting agents who (a) charge various letting fees and tenancy deposit / lease administration fees; (b) often don't tell you relevant information about the flat or the landlord; and (c) never introduce you to the landlord or tell you anything about the owner until you are actually signing the lease.

For instance, this Ealing flat is owned by a property management company who have no idea who I am (and I have no idea who they are) and they probably could not care less if I choose to move out as long as they can find some other gullible mug to rent the flat for another month or two.

It just occurred to me at the weekend that I might soon run into problems with not having a current landlord reference (obviously I was in dispute with the Beckenham landlord and currently have no idea who the Ealing landlord / property management company is) and that it might be wise to rent from a private landlord for the next year to actually establish a relationship (hopefully a good one) with a real, live, human landlord again.

2. The new studio flat in Greenwich (cheap end, Westcombe Park, near to Charlton -- there's no way I could afford the trendy chic western side of Greenwich near the touristy Greenwich Market!) is part of an old coach house and the ground floor studio flat is basically 1/4 of the original coach house, therefore the rooms are long and narrow and a bit unusual. I like unusual and quirky and nooks and crannies (cannot stand the boredom of a perfectly symmetrical square room with no features!).

3. To the right and back of the house is a courtyard (shared by all flats) and lots of bicycles are stacked up in the yard. I asked the landlord and landlady who the bikes belonged to and they were not entirely sure. As two flats are vacant or shortly due to become vacant, it seems unlikely that one tenant owns all 5 bicycles in the yard. It seems some previous tenants have just abandoned cheap bicycles that they did not think worth taking with them. The landlord basically gave me the nod that I could pick any bike I liked and start to use it!

This might turn out to be an excellent bonus as I have said several times (to myself and others) that I really, really should get a bicycle, and yet I never seem to have (quite) enough money in the bank to buy a brand new one ..... and on the few occasions when I have tried to bid on Ebay I have always been outbid, and the second hand bike (which I personally think is supposed to be *cheap* if it is being sold on Ebay) often ends up being sold at a price very similar to that of brand new retail bike!

There is one slight downside to this in that part of the area (the part heading towards Blackheath) is very hilly. I don't know how to calculate gradients, but on a map I found of the London Marathon route, it is clear parts of Blackheath are 50 metres above sea level and dip quickly down to less than 10 metres above see level at Woolwich.

In fact many of the roads in Greenwich, Charlton and Blackheath have not been given names like Maze Hill or Vanbrugh Hill for no reason -- they really are very steep hills. Personally I think I would have enough difficulty *walking* up those hills, let alone attempting to push pedal up them, but who knows!

http://www.london-marathon.co.uk/site/images/course_map.pdf

Perhaps if I get really ambitious I might start attempting to walk parts of the Marathon route -- if you zoom into the lower right hand side of this map the location of my new flat is at approximately 5.3 miles (just after the Blackwall Tunnel and very close to Westcombe Park train station).

4. Really, really hope I have not jinxed the whole thing now, by blogging a bit more about it.

Obviously, since Beckenham and Ealing moves went so spectacularly wrong I am now very nervously wondering what could possibly go wrong next? But I must STOP myself thinking like that and hope for the best!

Lighter Life and my crazy life

2008-11-03T00:22:00.004Z

Warning: very LONG blog ahead – but quite interesting and contains LOADS of stuff!

This evening (Sunday – before I started burning the midnight oil blogging in the early hours of Monday) I have been to a Lighter Life introduction meeting. I’m not actually “on” the programme yet because I have to get a form signed by my doctor to confirm that I have no major medical problems before I can commence. Then next Sunday I will attend my first full Lighter Life meeting and pay for my first week’s replacement foodpacks costing £66 a week.

Whilst £66 a week does sound enormous to start with, it also includes the support, weekly counselling, and at the end (once goal weight has been reached) a 12 week management / re-introduction to food programme (those weeks do cost less than £66 a week – I checked, so the cost goes down as you gradually re-introduce real food).

And I already know that I spend at least £50 a week on food, £30 in my main supermarket shop and then up to £20 a week in lunches and “extras” bought at work. It could be more than £50 a week some weeks, if you add on eating out at cafes or restaurants, and ordering take-aways.

Lighter Life v Diet Chef: reasons why I eventually chose Lighter Life instead of Diet Chef:

1. The weekly two hour counselling sessions and ongoing support provided with Lighter Life. (This includes cognitive behaviour therapy to change your thinking around food and food triggers to re-educate the stoopid obese person – that’s me – to have a better relationship with food when it is re-introduced at the end of the programme.)

2. The accountability of reporting to my weekly counsellor and not getting the foodpacks unless I attend those meetings.

3. The fact that it is *non* real food and all real food is banned. I thought a possible temptation with Diet Chef might be that I might still want to buy a few bits of fruit and salad to make it more interesting. With Lighter Life real food is no longer an option and you get all your vitamins and minerals and basic nutritional needs from the foodpacks.

4. This does make social situations difficult and Lighter Life customers are advised to take a foodpack or meal bar with them if eating out, and then to decline everything except water and the Lighter Life products, leaving your friends / colleagues / possible date / whoever eating real food, and you gently nibbling your meal replacement item. Lighter Life are very strict about this and have already told me that I should stick to the 4 x foodpacks a day even on 25 December this year when the rest of my family will be tucking into turkey and trimmings! Eeek!

Lighter Life is a VLCD (very low calorie diet) consisting of 4 foodpacks per day which total 530 calories (plus 4 litres of water a day). Yes, I know it is extremely low calorie but many people have done it and lost huge amounts of weight on the plan.

Average weight loss is: one stone per month (14 lbs or 6.4 Kgs)

Exceptional weight losses: Man A (pics + stats in my counsellor’s file) lost 11 stone (154 lbs or 70 Kg) in 8 months. His starting weight was 24 stone (336 lbs or 152 Kg) and after losing 11 stone he now weighs 13 stone (182 lbs or 82 Kg) averaging a weight loss of 19 lbs (8.6 Kg) per month.

Will I be able to stick it and stomach it?
I am not totally sure yet, but I want to give it a try as I am fed up of my inconsistent yo yo diet weight loss attempts so far this year (and previous years).

I now feel the need for something really DRASTIC as I still want to reach my goal weight by October 2009 (my brother’s wedding) and I can feel time slipping away – including all the months this year where I have messed about moving flat and getting sidetracked by distractions.

More Lighter Life info

More Lighter Life success stories (before and after pics)

My crazy life
Having said all that (about previous distractions and flat moves) I have decided to move out of this Ealing flat, due to the Sword of Damocles hanging over its future. Whilst it is entirely possible that the proposed redevelopment might get delayed or halted several times by objections, I have come to the conclusion that it is likely eventually to go ahead, especially when I found out that the developer is going to pay Ealing Council £7 million for the land – what greedy money grabbing Council would turn down that sort of cash?

(If you’re wondering how that affects my decision with Lighter Life, skip to the end of this very long blog!)

What annoys me most about the situation is that it is very difficult to “plan” your life when you are not 100% sure how long this flat might be available for. I have for a long time wanted to rent somewhere that I can call “home” and make plans around which gym / diet / social things I do in that area, and I just don’t feel I can do that in this current flat due to the proposed development.

Also, this Ealing flat is very expensive (typical west London rent) at £750 a month plus £75 a month private gym fee at Virgin Active (fortunately on flexible membership which I will be able to cancel next month) and Council Tax Band C (because it is a fairly big flat and in an expensive area) which I have recently discovered is due to cost me £150 a month.

I would just about be willing to stretch my budget and break the bank if I knew the flat was available on a long term basis, but as it is not, it does seem to be rather wasteful to pay this high rent and high Council Tax and gym fees etc.

OPTIONS ......
Whilst I have been living in this Ealing flat for the past month and realising how expensive it is, I have been contemplating moving back to just a large double room within a houseshare (especially if the room happened to have an ensuite – at 40 years old I don’t like the idea of sharing bathrooms very much anymore!). Financially that idea was very appealing because most houseshares are let on an “all bills included basis” and would (in theory) enable me to save huge amounts of wonga next year.

However , in reality I think I would find it very hard to live in a shared house and have to deal with “other” people who I may or may not like.

REALITY ......
By chance I came across a private advert for a cheap studio flat in Greenwich a few days ago and I went to view the flat this morning and fingers and toes crossed I will be moving into that flat in early December (and giving notice to Mr Charlatan West Ealing Property Developer who is still renting a flat that is subject to a compulsory purchase order, in lieu of my original deposit).

The Greenwich flat: costs £600 a month plus approx £38 a month council run leisure centre and £65 a month Band A low rate Council Tax – phew!

P.S. Gas, electricity and water rates will be fairly similar in Ealing and Greenwich (I think) so I have not mentioned them, only the things that would be noticeably different.

P.P.S. Whilst the new Greenwich studio flat won’t enable me to save quite as much as moving back to a large double/ensuite room in a houseshare, it’s a compromise and will be at least £200 a month cheaper than the Ealing flat.

SERENDIPITY ......
When I moved out of my Forest Hill studio flat back in August and ended up in (1) horrible, nightmare flat in Beckenham where basic facilities did not work and tenant above played loud music for long periods of time, and then (2) very nice but very expensive Ealing flat which is not even available to let on a long term basis ....... what I originally wanted was a flat in Greenwich, near to the Arches Leisure Centre which I was already using (whilst living in Forest Hill) but which was annoying me having to travel 7.3 miles (nearly 12 Km) and involved two long bus journeys travelling to and from Forest Hill to the Greenwich leisure centre !!!!!!!!

Why has it taken me 4 months and two failed flat moves to find a flat in Greenwich which I originally wanted all along ....?

(Also a lot of my friends are based in south/east London: J in Abbey Wood, T in Eltham, P in Norwood, and B and her husband were in Bow but have moved further out to Rainham in Essex.)

New flat and Lighter Life
I am 100% committed to the Lighter Life programme and to try my best to make speedy swift weight loss headway on that programme, so ....

1. I have already checked the details of the Blackheath (south east London, near Greenwich) Lighter Life counsellor and will make arrangements to swap to one of her groups as soon as I can.

2. If the Blackheath counsellor does not have any new groups immediately starting or on convenient dates, I have confirmed to the Ealing counsellor that I would be willing to travel to Ealing on Sunday afternoons for a while and continue to be part of her group.

3. The day before I move flat I will eat just 4 x Lighter Life Foodpacks. The day I move I will also eat just 4 x Lighter Life foodpacks and the day after I move I will also stick to just the 4 x foodpacks, therefore one of the “worst” times for me (the days before and after each flat move) when I usually get stressed out and eat junk (especially when trying to empty the fridge and cupboards of all existing food) will now be “just another day on Lighter Life”.

4. To get me ready for the strict discipline that will be needed from next week, I have devised a meal plan for the next week to use up all remaining food in my flat. This plan includes taking in tuna and beans and a few soups to work next week, so that I get used to taking in my own lunch items (instead of frittering away £4 a day or more buying lunch on a daily basis).

After all this moving, I have got my fingers tightly crossed that this latest Greenwich flat works out and that I am not yet further jinxed ..... or I will simply change job and become an estate agent as I think I may have a natural inclination for viewing properties or something!

Things that make you go aaahh

2008-11-01T02:16:00.013Z

1. Noticing that people you care about do very occasionally read your blog when they show up in your Statcounter stats, especially "David Darling" my former teenage crush. And, don't fear, David, I won't reveal the top secret far flung corner of the globe where you now reside but it is lovely to notice you now and then in my blog stats! :-)

2. Fluffy pictures of baby gorillas because I've got nothing better to blog about at the moment and because it's the weekend ..... (see very bottom of the entry for small rider to that).

[click on pics to see sharper / larger versions]

P.S. I've got an appointment to see a Lighter Life counsellor on Sunday evening. I will blog again late Sunday night to explain how it went and if I do sign up to the Lighter Life programme or not, and what things may have made me decide to go for that instead of Diet Chef.

More about Internet Dating Man No.1 and others

2008-10-29T21:08:00.002Z

Since meeting Internet Dating Man No.1 on Sunday we have communicated a little bit but no fixed date has yet been set for a second date. I am still keeping my options open, as will become clear later on in this blog, for a number of reasons.

Good things about IDMN1

1. He lost a lot of weight himself last year (nearly 100 lbs), so his view of my obesity is less judgmental and more supportive than most men – he *knows* exactly what it is like to be this big and to desperately want to be rid of the flab.

The route that IDMN1 took was the Lighter Life programme and despite the fact that I have been a ‘nay sayer’ of that programme before, meeting someone in the flesh who has had astonishing results using that programme is making me think again. (He lost all his excess weight in 19 weeks on the Lighter Life plan!)

Currently, I am considering either Diet Chef or Lighter Life, and the only reasons I have not yet signed up to either is (1) I currently still have too much food in the flat – I need to prepare meal plans for the next two weeks and work out how to use that all up wisely; and (2) my next big payday is 15 November.

2. The second thing that IDMN1 revealed to me that actually was a “good thing” (to me, although not everybody would view this the same way) is that he hoped I was not looking for something “too serious” because he still harbours feelings for his ex, and is keeping a chink of hope alive that they might get back together.

This, to me, was actually music to my ears – because I secretly (or not so secretly) still harbour feelings for Nico the Frog and long for the day that he might forgive me, and realise that we are soul mates, and want to get back in touch .... (obviously I might be totally kidding myself here and possibly eventually I will give up on this hope, and will eventually meet someone who I “click” with as much as I did with Nico and who will enable me to move on – but for the moment my heart strings still pine for Nico).

So this revelation from IDMN1 was perfect -- neither of us want to get seriously involved “just in case” the person we pine for does ever want to get back to us .... and he could just be some light hearted male company for the time being – absolutely ideal !!!

Bad things about IDMN1 (not bad about him, but you’ll see)

1. I actually told him about my blog ..... (damn) ....... so he is now aware every time he gets blogged about. This came up during our conversations about the people we both pine for – in an attempt to explain to him the history of “Nico the Frog” I emailed him the link to that blog entry of mine.

Note to self: do NOT tell any other internet dating chappies about this blog !!!

2. He’s extremely busy with work, being the time of the year that the majority of his clients have to submit tax returns. (I think people who do their own online have until 31 January but people who use paper forms either themselves or with the assistance of an accountant have to submit them by 31 October.)

Meanwhile .....
I am still keeping my options open / eyes open for other internet dating chappies, but usually after thinking that there is something that does attract me to a particular person or having a few brief conversations, it usually fizzles out within a few emails and there is no connection.

Also .....
I know that what I *really* need to do is get my butt down the gym and start exercising this flab off as well and not be so concerned about dating etc but it is only because my heart was aching so much over Nico the Frog that I have been trying to seek male company / solace / distraction elsewhere !!!!

So far these “distraction tactics” don’t appear to be working, although it seems I may have struck up a friendship with IDMN1 and a situation that might suit us both.

I have lost my Mojo a little bit with the original weight loss / diet / gym bunny aims (partly due to the breakdown in communications with Nico to be honest – he was until recently a large part of my motivation – no matter how much you might tell me that any particular man, or frog, should not be part of my motivation, he actually was), and I am trying to find my Mojo again, but it may take a little bit of time.

Joke of the day

2008-10-28T01:47:00.004Z

If a man is all alone in the woods, i.e. there's no woman there to hear him, is he still wrong?

I actually came across this joke on an advert of an internet dating chap (yes another one, what do you mean am I being greedy still looking?) and it made me roar with laughter, it actually reminded me of a conversation I had with a male friend a few months ago.

Obviously this made me view the man's advert extremely favourably although I don't think I am what he is looking for at all, it just gave me my first laugh of the day!

Menology

2008-10-26T18:26:00.006Z

This is a joke, right, because I usually manage to make a spectacular mess of things with men, especially the ones I really like. I guess this Blog thing means that I know the *theory* when asked questions in some silly quiz but applying this apparent PhD in Men in real life is when everything goes tits up and fantastically, horrendously wrong!

You Have Your PhD in Men

You understand men almost better than anyone.

You accept that guys are very different, and you read signals well.

Work what you know about men, and your relationships will be blissful.

How Well Do You Understand Men?

Having said that .... I did go on a date today, with Internet Dating Man No.1 (that is as inventive a name I can come up with him for the moment, so shoot me). Mr IDMN1 is 48, single and an accountant (that's all you're getting for now).

Don't want to say too much about it for fear of jinxing the whole thing and having now met the man and having spent a few hours in his company, I am now at that even more awkward stage (post first date) of waiting for him to text or call.

You know -- does he want to see me again? Did he like me? Is he now at home wondering if I liked him or wondering if I was just pretending to like him, and he's feeling nervous about contacting me ...? Did he enjoy the day as much as I did?

Questions, questions and dilemmas ..... does dating ever get any easier?

P.S. While typing this blog entry Mr Internet Dating No.1 texted me, so a small sigh of relief has just been exhaled on "Planet Sharon" :-)

Blog stats and weird google searches!

2008-10-24T19:31:00.002+01:00

Despite the fact that I added a Statcounter visitor counter to the bottom of my blog some time ago, I had (foolishly) never actually bothered to log into Statcounter since I first added the widget, many months ago.

I am a non techy person. Usually I manage to use the internet to do just about the things I need to do and that’s it (and if the layout of my blog in anyway looks like someone with techy expertise or anything that is pure accidental fluke!).

I was living in happy blissful ignorance about the full features of Statcounter and IP addresses etc until a few weeks ago, when someone pointed it out to me. (I was happy enough knowing that I did have a regular small collection of readers and commentators without looking much further into all the invisible readers who lurk and browse!)

Amazingly I actually managed to remember my original Statcounter logon ID and password, and since then I have been having a whale of a time seeing where all you lovely readers come from and the totally random google search results that have sometimes led people to find my blog !!!

Weird google search finders!
Apologies to the people who found my blog whilst obviously looking for something else:

“chillin line dance”
I’m sure this person was really into line dancing, not just blogging about failed relationships, like my blog about Line Dance Lenny

“line dances and men of mine”
Although possibly the above google searcher had experienced similar line dance heartache woes!

“blog osteopathy”
I don’t know who in Italy was looking for a blog all about osteopathy, but ended up finding my
Osteopath update blog entry.

“Slimming World liver and bacon casserole”
Which ironically brought that google searcher to my blog about
When I was veggie

“weight loss boot camps in Yorkshire”
A search which apparently ended up directing that internet browser to one of my non weight related entries, How did you meet?

“I recently moved into a new flat and I do not know the phone number”
What a crazy long google search to bring that person to My New Flat
-- hey, why not try and ring BT or Virgin Media to find out what your phone number is, instead of fruitlessly searching online?

World wide global village
I already knew I had a few blog buddies in Canada, America, Australia and New Zealand althoughI seem to have lots of readers dotted all over those countries, but what was more eye opening was finding I have invisible readers all over the world including:

Mexico, Sweden, Egypt, Portugal, Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), Caracas (Venezuela), Abu Dhabi (UAE), India, Afghanistan, Malta, Philippines, Brazil, Turkey, Croatia, Thailand, Hong Kong, Denmark, San Juan (Puerto Rico), Czech Republic, Ulaanbaatar (Mongolia), Kuwait, Russia, Norway, France and Italy (but nobody from Spain – boo hoo!).

I am now addicted to Statcounter – it is my new favourite online waste of time logging in every day to find out where people have come from!

Should I do diet chef?

2008-10-22T22:30:00.002+01:00

On Monday when I loaded my “weekend update” I received yet another unwanted comment from one of the exponents of the Lighter Life / Cambridge Diet plans (very low calorie meal replacement programmes). I have tried a few of the products (off friends who have been following those plans) and not been impressed with the unnatural meal “replacement” non-food taste.

However, in my attempts to try and get back on track and find some kind of new structure and routine (which will still include use of the Virgin Active gym and the Saturday morning Rosemary Conley classes) I have started to seriously consider the “Diet Chef” option, and wondered what my blog readers might think about that and whether anybody has tried it ...?

Diet Chef - food
The idea is you buy all your food from them – they provide 3 meals a day and one snack which will always total 1200 calories (for women) or 1500 (for men) and for women costs less than £200 a month (and it's *real* food, only one shake per day, the rest is proper meals).

Diet Chef – cost of women’s food hamper
Now, I spend wayyyyyy more than £200 a month on food including all the “extra” bits I buy at work (we have a snack bar that does fruit and smoothies, but also crisps and chocs as well) and lunches I buy from Boots or other shops in my lunch breaks.

I am beginning to seriously consider this option, as a way of making me more regulated – you know at the beginning of the month when I get paid I could order my £190 worth of food for the month, and then tell myself “that’s it” no more food to be bought for the next 30 days.

Weekend update

2008-10-20T22:14:00.003+01:00

Well, as you can tell from the massively impressive and scintillating blog entries I posted on Saturday and Sunday (ha ha) I was having a very lazy weekend.

Bad news:
It started with the fact that the Yeading Rosemary Conley diet and fitness class which I joined only 4 weeks ago was not running this week due to the instructor getting married this week, and being on honeymoon next week so that led to a bad “off plan” Saturday and almost continued to stay off plan most of the weekend. (Fortunately I now have until Saturday 1 November to put in a bit more effort before my next weigh in!)

Good news:
I have joined my new nearest gym, the Virgin Active in Ealing and at 7pm on Sunday evening I had my gym induction.

Current thoughts:
I feel slightly odd at the moment, in relation to my blog and the goals I originally had in mind when I started this blog back in May, because I have had so many life interruptions and distractions since then I really have not achieved the amount of weight loss I thought I would have done by now.

Even now, I am still not 100% sure whether this new Ealing flat is going to work out long term due to the proposed development.

What I need to do:
Is become like a hamster or a lab rat for 10 months or more, simply going to the gym every day and living on rabbit food (salads) and just keep doing that continuously day after day after day, for approx 300 days and I’m sure I would lose at least 10 - 15 pounds a month if I did that, and within a fairly short space of time I would have achieved my goals.

That would be wonderful in theory, if life didn’t keep throwing so many spanners in the works!

But I am going to get as much use out of the Virgin Active gym for as many months as I can whilst still living in Ealing. (Fortunately I didn’t have to sign up to a 1 year contract, they offer flexible membership although it does cost £75 a month for the flexible “cancel any time you like” deal as opposed to the fixed 12 month contract which costs £67 a month.)

At that kind of price I will be *wanting* to get my money’s worth !!!!

Know your type

2008-10-19T12:49:00.004+01:00

Another stupid blog thing. Some words with a brief weekend update will follow sometime.

Apparently my best match is "Comic Sans" (although that does not show here on the blog paste version, it shows on your own results).

I'm sure you always wanted to know what your own "type" was!

Stupid blog ("Sharon needs") meme

2008-10-18T13:24:00.002+01:00

Sharon needs .... a new stupid meme as much as a fish needs a bicycle .... but I can't think of anything much to write at the mo and am having a lazy weekend.

Comments not needed to tell me how stupid this is!

The idea is you type your “first name + needs” into www.google.com and see what it is in life that you actually never knew you needed!

These are the results for the name Sharon:
(many of these entries relate to Ariel Sharon, the former Israeli prime minister.)

Sharon Needs to Be Told to Stop Shooting and Start Talking ...

Sharon Needs a New Word
Help me out, world. What can we call non-subscription based digital audio that will sound just as cool as podcasting? ...

YouTube - Sharon Needs a Friend

Sharon needs scarf help - KnittingHelp.com

Sharon needs surgery on heart defect after stroke
(also about Ariel Sharon)

Sharon needs a hand

YouTube - sharon needs to pee

SHARON NEEDS TO BE CONTACTED, NOT WATCHED
Alternative News and Views,www.rumormillnews.com

Ariel Sharon needs to shut up

Metal News - Sharon Osbourne Needs ....
sharon needs to shut her f***in mouth that old lady complains too much ... Sharon needs a prescription for the new drug "Get-over-it-all". ...

Sharon needs to leave Jack - Soaps Community

Celebrity Nonentity Bimbo Babes

2008-10-16T20:36:00.013+01:00

This article is a complete departure from my normal weight woes / man woes personal blog. Some of you have noticed over time that I have an interest in writing.

A few months ago I wrote this article in response to a particular news story ("Miss Bimbo" computer game -- see link near bottom of the article) and tried (without success) to get it published. Today, however, I have been inspired by Clair's blog (http://theurbanwoo.blogspot.com/2008/10/girls.html).

Having recently renamed my blog "Sharon's Blog" I've now decided that I can blogging well blog about what I blogging well like and that might sometimes be articles that I have been unable to get published (and paid for), but will now air for free on my own blog.

So here goes -- let me know what you think!

==========================================================
In the pursuit of mammon it no longer matters what you do or have done to reach the headlines, as long as you are skinny enough or have bazookas that are huge enough to interest the paparazzi.

As long as the punters continue to buy the celebrity brulee that passes for magazines these days, your best career option is actually to become a luminary nobody, notable only for your body, your wardrobe and dating a footballer. Such small claims to fame can actually generate a media career of their own. Both Alex Curran and Colleen McCloughlin have obtained columns in magazines off the back of their vicarious fame. Bingo!

Why waste years studying / doing work experience (for free) on a local newspaper / writing for start-up websites (for free) / struggling to survive while waiting for the big “break” when the right looks / attending the right parties will bag you a celebrity footballer boyfriend no problem? Silly me.

The majority of the skinny babes with unnatural cleavages are simply playing the media at their own game and they know exactly what they are doing, even how they can milk the next emotional crisis for yet another 3 page splash on "my drink and drugs binge hell".

No one would surgically alter their own body and apply so many chemicals to their skin and hair unthinkingly, airheadedly -- it is usually a calculating decision of the barracuda blonde. "You want big blonde hair, a smile as wide as the Humber Bridge and massive mammaries? Well I got 'em! I got 'em in spades! Now make me famous!"

And the media / paparazzi / celebrity trash mags like a pack of starved and depraved Pavlov's dogs oblige. QUICK! TITS! FLASH!

Girls will be asking for highlights and booster bras at 8 before long, because if the media (celebrity trash rags, the style and content of which permeates and infects tabloids, and occasionally even a few broadsheets) decrees that all you need to get in the papers is synthetic, artificially created Barbie doll looks and young women decide to pander to the demand it creates a self fulfilling prophecy (viz: Chantelle Houghton/Jodie Marsh etc).

In fact, girls of 8 and 9 are asking for these kind of things courtesy of a computer game “Miss Bimbo” as was reported in the news a few months ago:
http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2212764/bimbo-game-sparks-outrage

I understand Ashley Cole might be coming available soon. All I need is next Saturday’s winning lottery ticket and I will be able to afford the plastic surgery necessary to transform myself into a celebrity nonentity bimbo babe.

Princess Fatima and Nico the Frog (a modern day tainted love story)

2008-10-15T01:49:00.006+01:00

Once upon a time beautiful but overweight Princess Fatima decided she would like to lose weight and become less Fatima and more like Princess Thinsexygoddess. One day a frog hopped across the blogging pond to visit Princess Fatima and introduced himself as Nico from Narnia (a land far, far away).

Princess Fatima and Nico the Frog chatted for a few months by email, text message and frog-cam (Nico is a modern day techno-literate frog, OK?) and they both said how much they liked each other. Princess Fatima expressed the wish to kiss Nico the Frog and hoped that he might one day be her Prince. Nico expressed similar desires to Princess Fatima, although Nico's messages were always tinged with strings, strings tying him to his current lily pad in Narnia.

Nico and Fatima found out that they had loads of stuff in common. They shared the same view of life, intelligence, sense of humour, the same morals and values, philosophical and (non) religious views and just, well loads and loads of stuff, you know.

Nico the Frog lamented his current situation tying him to his lily pad in Narnia and often said how much he would like to visit Princess Fatima in Ruritania. Princess Fatima reciprocated and even offered to travel to Narnia, but that proved too difficult, for a number of reasons, not least the fact that Princess Fatima's passport had expired.

After a while Nico the Frog made a promise to Princess Fatima. Instead of any wishy washy "I would like to meet you" or "I hope to meet you one day", Nico the Frog declared: "I promise to meet you by this time next year, or a sorcerer's apprentice will bite my ear" (actually the last 8 words of that sentence are made up, but a promise was made).

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Er …… it is at this point that I must interrupt this fairy story to announce that there never will be a happy ending.

Princess Fatima and Nico the Frog spent the next few months arguing mainly because Nico wanted to keep things cool and “let’s just be friends” whereas Princess Fatima thought she had found "the one" / her Prince / her ideal frog / her soul mate …. which kinda scared the shit out of Nico the Frog.

An impasse was reached, and Nico and Fatima agreed to part company.

Nico hinted (weakly) that he may or may not contact Princess Fatima at some dim and distant time in the future, once he had sorted out what he wanted, and once he was able to move from Narnia back to Ruritania.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

When Nico and Fatima originally agreed to go their separate ways, Princess Fatima was annoyed that Nico was still subscribed to her blog and that Nico might base his decision on whether to resume contact or not on Princess Fatima's weight loss / dating progress recorded in her blog, and that Nico held all the strings, the power to choose whether to re-contact Princess Fatima as and when he liked, if and when he made his mind up, but Fatima had lost the right to re-contact Nico.

Princess Fatima was so pissed off by this that she wanted to stop blogging, or let Nico know that should he take a long, long time to sort his head out (like until the day Princess Fatima might unveil the new Princess Thinsexygoddess on her blog) her response would be "hop it" but all her lovely blog buddies told her how much they liked her blog and that they would miss her.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

When Nico and Fatima first agreed to part company, it was mainly Fatima who was hurting. Fatima missed Nico's company and wondered how long she might have to wait for Nico to make up his mind, or whether Nico would make a play for any other princesses who might bump into his path during their separation. (You know men – sorry, frogs -- will chase after the first available next bit of skirt that comes along.)

Princess Fatima set up a honey trap test with an online fictitious princess and Nico fell for it. Initially Princess Fatima only intended to test Nico and as soon as she knew whether he would respond to the fictitious princess, Fatima intended to say "bye bye, froggie please don't come running back to me in nine months' time" …....

….. but Princess Fatima found that Honey Trap Princess enjoyed chatting to Nico the Frog and was beginning to like the attention again, when Nico the Frog worked out who Honey Trap Princess really was (or HTP gave it away).

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Now Nico is hurting as well, due to the loss of trust. Hey, at least it's even stevens now, we both distrust each other equally and Princess Fatima is no longer in love with an unobtainable cyber cipher from Narnia, the land of make believe.

Here endeth this tainted love fairy story.

P.S. I will read and consider all your comments, but I may not publish all of them, for reasons of privacy / not wishing to hurt either myself or Nico the Frog.

P.P.S. I am trusting that the few blog readers of mine who are aware of the identity of Nico the Frog will be discreet and keep it sealed. Thanks.

The Stress Factor 10 Diet -- it works!

2008-10-12T13:49:00.014+01:00

Went to the Saturday morning Rosemary Conley class yesterday and have lost another 5 lbs.

Accountability: for the moment I am going to scan in just the losses (or gains or stay sames) recorded on my RC card. When I first started this blog I scanned in my weight tickets from Boots the chemist for a while, but I am now taking my official weight each week as the one recorded at the RC class.

For a number of reasons I don't actually want to reveal yet what my starting weight was at Rosemary Conley on Saturday 27 September but hope I will feel like doing so once I have achieved a significant loss (say 50 lbs or more).

Whilst this may appear to be only "partial accountability" my full accountability is at my official weigh in at the RC class and I am nervous about starting a weight loss tally thing on the right hand side again until I know that I am "on a roll" and have got this thing licked with continuous weight LOSS weigh in results for several weeks.

Also, I am embarrassed that after things went wrong for me in August my weight went up and therefore my start weight on 27.09.2008 was higher than it was last recorded on my blog in July (at that time 300 lbs / 21 stone 6 lbs).

So you can all work out (vaguely) that in July I weighed 300 lbs therefore my current weight is around that ball park area ..... and personally I don't think there will be anything majorly EXCITING to report until I lose at least 50 lbs, or possibly 100 lbs.

10.5 lbs lost so far (in my first two weeks back on the RC plan) is a very very small dent in the large battle against the bulge that I need to fight at the moment!

FLAT NEWS: see separate blog below about the development affecting my flat

TO BLOG OR NOT TO BLOG: I am still a bit wibbly wobbly and emotionally unsure about things, but the support from all the bloggers and non-bloggers who seem to like reading my blog is WONDERFUL -- if it wasn't for you lot all wanting to hear more about my crazy life, I probably would have abandoned this by now!

Flat renting nightmare part 5,962

2008-10-12T12:58:00.030+01:00

On Friday night I started to search online for details about the proposed development that affects the building which I am currently renting a small part of. I found out loads of useful stuff, including that objections have to be received by 5pm on Monday 13 October (phew!) and there are various local council discussion / objection meetings next week. Then the final decision is due to be taken on 5th November.

This is the land that is proposed to be developed -- I am in a flat above one of the shops that is the proposed "accessway" to the new development at the back. Currently the car park belongs to Ealing Council for use by their own staff during the week and cheap and easy use for shoppers at weekends (£2 per day Saturday and Sunday).

(Please click on pics to enlarge.)

The new development is to provide about 700 new (expensive) luxury upmarket apartments, 500 car parking spaces (shoppers and residents of the new flats) and 6,000 sq metres of retail space. Which will end up looking something like this -- sandwiched between Ealing Town Hall on the left and Church of Christ the Saviour on the right. The proposed buildings vary in height between 7 storeys and 14 storeys high.

Not surprisingly, there have been a lot of objections, notably from English Heritage who have pointed out that both Ealing Town Hall and the Church are Grade II* listed buildings and the development is out of scale and proportion with the nearby (low rise) buildings. Other reports have called it an "overdevelopment too far". The new development is to be called 'Dickens Yard' which is hilarious (not) as I feel like I'm living a Dickensian nightmare right now! This (left) will be the glorious street level view (ha ha) from the back.

Whilst I am of course about to become a total NIMBY (not in my back yard) objector, I do think that Ealing has enough retail space already, with the very large Ealing Broadway Centre and the new Arcadia shopping area almost directly opposite the Broadway. The new development would be slightly further away from the high street, possibly one of those preccincts which never manage to attract the top quality shops, always remain under-occupied and never do quite enough trade. This picture (right) is the beautiful Ealing Town Hall, almost more glorious than the church.

Whilst it was heartening to find that there are a lot of objections from English Heritage and other imporant organisations, the downside is I found out the land and buildings are already owned by Ealing Council, and I have this horrible feeling that the developer may be paying backhanders or sweeteners to Ealing Council to make it worth their while selling their own car park, one of their own buildings, and a few surrounding buildings.

In the Save Ealing Campaign info, they said that a lot of councillors are in favour of the development (if they have been sweet talked by the developer or are already mentally counting how many millions of revenue the development will provide to Ealing Council, then I expect they would be).

I also found out (in publicly available documents) that the developer already paid £70,000 just for the planning permission back in January 2008. I assume the developer is expecting to pay several million for the land and construction costs, but expects to make ten times however many millions it costs them ...... if they don't get cold feet because of the current credit crunch (Sharon says hopefully, somewhat wistfully).

Possible last blog – update

2008-10-08T22:36:00.002+01:00

A few updates and explanations needed on yesterday’s blog entry which I know startled quite a few of you.

TO BLOG OR NOT TO BLOG: well I thought I was totally decided yesterday, but today I am not so certain (about anything). Some of you thought I might be ending my blog due to the occasional negative comments and block attacks, but that is not the reason.

The reason is personal (relates to a man) and I really don’t want to blog about it in detail because I do not want to hurt the man any more than I have done already. The man and I have both caused hurts to each other ….. and I have ended up breaking his trust, which I regret, and is why I wanted to disappear off the blogosphere for a while, possibly forever.

However, I think that the man in question would say himself (if we were currently speaking which obviously we are not) that I should not base any decision about whether to continue to blog on him, and that I should blog if I want to blog etc etc ….. which is pretty much the same as what my supportive blog readers and friends would also say.

So, I am currently an emotional wreck and UNDECIDED about whether to continue this blog or not – sorry for any continuing confusion – I am a woman, and an emotionally fragile stressed out wreck at the moment, so I cannot decide properly one way or the other.

BT / PHONE LINE UPDATE: they have successfully connected a phone line at my new flat but broadband won’t be up and running until the weekend (fingers and toes crossed) so I am still using internet cafes and mobile web access for a few days.

INTERNET DATING CONFESSION BLOG: after a few conversations with other bloggers in the comments section, I did say I would expand a bit further.

BRIEFLY: it’s more than just a man’s earning power. In every single case there were other things that put me off many of the respondents (smokers, religious people, poor spelling, lack of ability to string a coherent sentence together) … and quite often only having a low paid job is tied up with lack of intelligence and/or lack of ambition to do anything better.

Smoking puts me off because I have watched two people very close to me die from lung cancer (my mother and best friend) …. and religion puts me off as I am totally agnostic and list myself as “agnostic” or “atheist” so any respondents who devotedly hold a particular faith might cause a few problems for me. (Apologies to readers who are believers, but this is a personal thing, and my own personal choice.)

Yes, I know I am picky and perhaps as some of you suggested (Kim Ayres and others) I just need to “get out there” and have fun dating a few guys non seriously for a while, and not concern myself so much about whether the guys tick every single one of my criteria, and that if I did that I would get a bit more confidence just chatting and socializing with men, and then not get so hooked up on finding “the one” -- I may well do that sometime soon, as I know I need more confidence with men.

FLAT NEWS:

I have introduced myself to the tenant in the flat below me and she was as delighted about the redevelopment as I was but we are now joining forces in our research efforts. She seems to be a lovely lady and I have not heard one tiny bit of noise from her flat (I think the sound proofing in this particular building is simply better).

Admittedly I have heard a few police sirens and noisy people in the high street outside the shops (the flat does have double glazing which eradicates most low level noise but not sirens and drunk people shouting etc – such is life really living on a high street above a shop) and bells ringing in the nearby church (I have worked out that Monday evening is bell ringing practice from 7pm to 9pm – oh what joy for me – but best thing will be to go out and do some exercise on Monday evening during those hours).

Anyway I have also found out that the following:

(1) the proposed redevelopment is not for the megalomaniacs at Ealing Council to extend their own building, but to knock down the row of shops (with flats above) and replace it with a new shopping centre, to be a mixture of “retail and residential” …… which is exactly what the current row is – a mixture of retail and residential, so why replace like with like?

What is the benefit other than increased rents and rates for the businesses and shops?

(2) there is (unsurprisingly) quite a lot of opposition to the proposed redevelopment from many businesses and English Heritage.

(3) all the shops in the row are what I would call really well established and well known businesses: Ryman, Jessops, SpecSavers, Toni & Guy hair salon, two restaurants and a café, and two building societies.

(4) what would be the benefit to west London businesses and banks / building societies in these “credit crunch” times of turfing all those shops and businesses out of their premises when they are currently doing good business ….?

Anyway I also noticed this morning whilst staring out of my kitchen window at the back of the flats and various roof terraces and metal staircases at the back of the flats leading to the car park (and church) that somebody was moving into a flat two units further down. For half an hour I watched two men haul boxes up and down the metal stairs and across the roof terrace into the flat ….. I was tempted to walk round to the back of the building and give that new tenant the wonderful news, but I was not dressed so I decided to pass on being a wonderful citizen for today – I’m sure someone else will inform them soon enough. So my landlord is not the only one shamelessly re-letting properties that everyone else had been told to vacate in October (what a surprise!).

BACK TO …….

TO BLOG OR NOT TO BLOG: still not 100% sure either way, but I know that some of you were wanting updates about the flat and the internet dating thing from a few days ago.

Blog closing

2008-10-07T18:27:00.000+01:00

Dear Friends

For personal reasons this blog will be closing.

I have been debating whether to end my blog or turn it private since 25 September 2008 and I have been undecided for several weeks.

I am sure that I can sort out my weight problem and my current accommodation problem without the blog. Thanks to those of you who have supported me so far.