Come climb with me

I wrote, early on in February about presence. Every week I go to yoga and struggle to be present. The most challenging times are in the least challenging poses, when my mind will wander off to home or work or (more commonly) breakfast.

The one sport I've found that really clears my mind is indoor climbing. Honestly, you're suspended in the air, 50 metres above the ground, the only thing you can think of is the next hand hold or next foot hold and making it to the top.

I've had times when my mind has been spinning, obsessing with a particular thought. One climb will clear it.

If you'd like to try climbing but never had anyone to try it with you let me know. I'm happy to meet up and have a climb.

Ten reasons why

Feb is nearly over and it's time to celebrate the fabulousness in our lives. Here re the top ten reasons why Amelia (my daughter) is awesome **

1. She is the best, most loyal friend anyone will ever have
2. She will never tell your secret to anyone
3. She describes herself as 'not short, just fun sized'
4. Her Facebook comebacks make me LOL
5. There is no one in the world more patient with children
6. A letter from my 92 year old, dying,Grandmother is one of her most precious possesions
7. She loves the Beatles
8. She knows the moves to every dance
9. She found fun at an 80th birthday party
10. She cares about the important stuff 

Last year her teacher wrote on her report 'the classroom is a better place because Amelia is in it'. I think my world is better because she is around.

** For those interested Amelia chose today's topic

Take it away

My normal nights involve, almost in their entirety, preparing for the next day. Every night I lay my clothes out for next morning ** cook my egg white omelette (unless Ali does) make up my protein shake, and assemble my lunch. So on Wednesday night I decided to give myself a break and on Thursday I lived on take away food.

Now, take away (and cafe) food is tricky. You can never be certain exactly what goes in it (who would have thought there were 9 grams of sugar in a Big Mac or at least 400 calories in a blueberry muffin?). But I wanted to try it for a day in Fit and Fabulous February to see how I went and to prove you can choose healthy take away options.

Breakfast was a delicious quinoa porridge with stewed apple and a tablespoon of yogurt from Organicus in Manly. The bowl was so big and filling that I couldn't finish it. It felt like the perfect chill-post-yoga breakfast. This was probably my smartest choice of the day. Quinoa is high in protein, and for what feels and looks like a carb, low in carbs. ***

Lunch was supposed to be two vietnamese rice paper rolls, made by ICMS term one hospitality students. But they'd done such a great job I decided to buy a salmon sushi roll too. The big shock, I'd always thought of sushi as 'diet food' but when I looked it up I'd found I'd added 300 calories (just under a quarter of a day's intake) to my day's calories by adding that sushi roll. That's the main problem with buying your lunch. If you're like me your eyes will be way bigger than your stomach, it's easy to get carried away.

Dinner was a serving of Hoi Dub Bub, a Japanese dish with salad, raw fish and (more) white rice from Dong Hae in Campsie.

Yeh, so you're better off putting the work in and cooking and preparing, but there are definitely healthy options out there and I think I did OK. In fact I'm thinking of giving myself Wednesday nights off and making every Thursday take away day.

** This has to be done as it is a proven fact that one has absolutely no fashion sense at 5am. Also the chances of forgetting to pack your undies at that time in the morning are much greater.

*** For those that read my last blog on Quinoa, I decided to brave it again, this time without the drastic consequences.

Having one of those days

You know those days, well, today was one of them. You get bad news. You jump on the scales only to find out after a week of serious exercise and calorie counting that you put on a kilo (Grrr). You lose your trainers with your $500 orthotics in them.

You're pretty down. And then someone, out of the blue, gives you a gift, a gift  that reminds you of everything you are and everything you could be. And then someone else send you a youtube link that is totally inspiring. And then someone else sends you a link through facebook, a volunteer opportunity that fits so well it could have been glove designed just for you.

I'm not a religious person nor do I really believe in fate, but sometimes I really like the way this universe works.

Cauliflower never tasted so good - Ali's Cauliflower Mash

Ali's major contribution to my health this Fit and Fabulous Feb has been this fit and fabulous cauliflower mash recipe. ** 

It will remind you of mashed potato but with fewer calories and way fewer 'evil white carbs'. It works out to be around 175 calories for the whole recipe. That's only 44 calories per serve. Team it with a 200gm serve of white fish and you have a whole plateful at less than 300 calories.

Ingredients

1 whole cauliflower

1 cup water

1 vegetable stock cube

2 cloves garlic

4 tablespoons lite sour cream (or no fat sour cream if you can find it)

1 tablespoon caramelised balsamic

¼ cup white wine

1 tablespoon grated parmesan

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp ground cardamom

Salt and pepper to taste

Method

Cut cauliflower into florets

Boil/stem/microwave cauliflower with stock cube and garlic cloves until cauliflower is tender

Retain liquid

Put cooked cauliflower into a food processer.

Add all the other ingredients and as much of the retained liquid as necessary to achieve the desired consistency (think mashed potato).

Add salt and pepper (and anything else) to taste.

Why Cauliflower is good for you.

Cauliflower contains allicin, which can keep your heart healthy and reduce the risk of strokes. Eating cauliflower can also help to maintain a healthy cholesterol level.  Folate, needed for cell growth and replication is also found in cauliflower and cauliflower is an excellent source of fibre. Most recently, scientists have found that cauliflower contains indole-3-carbinol, a substance that can affect the metabolism of estrogen in the body, and prevent breast and other cancers.

** He has also contributed in many other ways, including going along with my crazy aqua aerobics class, keeping me company at 6.30am spin, and digging through mounds of lost property, twice, to try and find my lost trainers.

Shoes!

Sarah Jessica Parker can definately rock a pair of high heels, but I wonder if she knows she's helping the world to shorten their calves one stilletto at a time.

High heels have never been so high, and so trendy. I blame Sarah Jessica Parker who can even make the normally trashy shorts and stillettos combo look amazing.

I haven't always worn heels. In the early 90's I was a confirmed Doc Martens fan (I had a pair of size six greasy bucked Docs I wore all the time). It was my friend The Glamourous Jas who introduced them into my life. At first I saved them for special occassions, but now, let's just say I'm starting to feel my height.

I didn't realise how often I wore heels until I walked into the staff kitchen at my work bare-footed, and a colleague asked if something was wrong, before realising it was just that I was two inches shorter than normal.

But heels are not good for you. They throw your body out of allignment, put super amounts of pressure on your feet and limit the motion on the ankle joint. I know all this and I'm certain that Sarah Jessica Parker and her alter-ego Carrie Bradshaw did too. I have lower back aches, strange rough patches on the bottom of my feet and exceedingly tight calves.

I'm like the smoker who never reforms because they never think the worst will happen to them. I just can't give up my heels!

Socks!

This week I bought a pack of new socks (5 pairs for $4 from Coles, great value). And it was just as well they are cheap because I know that, in two or three weeks, I'm only likely to have one or two of those socks (non-matching) left.

My father has a theory about socks disappearing. I don't quite get it but it's something to do with quantum physics.

Personally, I believe that your likelihood to loose your socks increases with their necessity in your life.

I work out six times a week. I'm a sockaholic. So my ability to hang on to the suckers is low. My husband on the other hand (while working out like a demon in Feb) has much less of a requirement and seems to be able to hand on to them for years.

If anyone else out there has a theory on where all my socks go, I'd like to hear it. Especially if you are the bastard stealing mine.

The great sacrifice

So far, for me, Fit and Fabulous Feb has been no great sacrifice. I drink, but not that much and not that often-  I can take it or leave it. Sure it's a pain to get up at 5am to exercise, but once I'm up and going it's a great feeling. And I actually enjoy eating an egg white omelette.

But today I made the ultimate Fit and Fab Feb sacrifice. My morning cappuccino.

Anyone who knows me knows my standard order, skim cap with one and that I like to nurse it, for ages, ruefully taking the last sip almost an hour after I started it. For years, many, many years, it has been my morning companion. There may have been people who have not known me without a coffee in my hand. I've driven out of my way, to find the best cappuccino in the Inner West (or Manly), turned up late to many a meeting, all for my skim cap with one.

But this morning I changed. I've looked at what I'm eating and realised some calories have to go. There are around 75 calories in my morning cappuccino, and an additional 35 calories in the teaspoon of sugar. That's over one twelfth of my daily calorie intake.

So this morning I bought a macchiato** . No sugar.

I still get the caffeine hit, but without the 110 calories. But sadly downed, not over an hour, but in less than 5 minutes.

May seem like a small sacrifice, but as I sat in front of my computer this morning, my hand reached a number of times for the coffeethat had been finished an hour before, and I was very sad not to see it there.

** What? You didn't think I was going to give up coffee altogether did you. That would be crazy!

Water, Water everywhere (and not a drop to drink)

When I was a kid I used to love a drop of Sydney tap. Drunk straight from a tap or bubbler on a hot day, there was nothing more refreshing. If someone had told me 20 years ago that I'd pay money for water (the same stuff you get from the tap) I wouldn't have believed them. What's happened in those 15 years to make water one of Coca Cola's top selling drinks.

Number one reason, a massive public relations and marketing campaign from bottled water producers has led us all to question the purity of tap water. The average bottle of water costs 2.53 to buy, compared to a mere 1 cent a litre to get it from the tap. Each year there is billions and billions of dollars of sales in bottled water. Think about it, and you'll work out that an investment of millions and millions of dollars in a PR campaign can quickly pay off. Ironic when it is estimated that about 30% of bottled water sold, comes directly from a tap.

It only takes a quick stroll along the banks of the Cooks river at low tide to see the effect all this bottled water drinking is having on our environment. I would estimate that 60% of the rubbish in the river is from discarded water bottles. ** It's sad to note that these bottles will take more than 1000 year to degrade.

So, for both the environment and my hip pocket, I've decided to rediscover my inner child and go back to loving a drop of Sydney tap.


** Curiously the remaining 40% seems to be rusting shopping trolleys. I m not, however advocating for the end to the shopping trolley, that would be too much.

Addicted

Hey you! Yes you. Come closer. I'm about to reveal a secret. Don't tell anyone but I have an addiction.

Every morning I wake and my heart thumps for it. I hide it from other people and have taken to doing it alone, in my car. No one else has known the depths of it ... until now.

My every waking moment is consumed by killing pigs. Not actual pigs. Small green pigs who hide in stone, glass and wood houses and often wear helmets. That's right, I'm addicted to Angry Birds.

For those who don't know Angry Birds is an 'app', an evil app, that involves firing birds from a sling shot in order to kill pigs (well, why wouldn't you when those evil little pigs have stolen your eggs).

It's good to know I'm not alone. More than 50 million people have downloaded Angry Pigs, making it one of the most mainstream, and addictive, games. Around the world almost 1 million hours of Angry Birds is played every day. There's even talk of a movie.

When I'm not playing angry birds my other addiction is watching TV shows about people with addictions. Shows like Eataholics, where people are addicted to one type of food. On Eataholics last night one unfortunate fellow was addicted to Yorkshire Pudding (eating 24 puds a day). Another woman was addicted to cheese and consumed more than 550 pizza a year.

Why are we always addicted to the things that are bad for us? How much better would the world be if I was  addicted, say, to consuming my recommended daily intake of fibre each day, to hanging out the washing, or to finishing my next book.

And how much better would the world be if those 1 million hours spent killing cartoon pigs each day was devoted to, say, world peace.

Contentment

I often think back to when I was younger, slimmer and, well, less droopy and wonder why I wasn't more content with my body.

I also wonder if, in twenty years time, when the wrinkles and cracks have really set in, I will look back on the body I have now and wonder why I wasn't more content with it.

My yoga teacher told me the other day that the path to contentment is to want what you already have. I think she's right.

425!

425! That's the number of calories I burned in 6.15am boot camp this morning. Which is amazing because at 6.14am I thought i was going to get out of boot camp all together.

By Thursday morning I'm usually pretty tired. This morning I was more tired than usual as I was still recovering from the Great Valentines Opera Trauma (see Tuesday's blog) which kept me up a couple of hours after my normal bed time. Add to this the fact that I am usually the bright red person puffing and panting and bringing up the rear and I was not at all looking forward to boot camp.

Boot camp starts at 6.15, but when the instructor hadn't turned up at 6.14 my heart I wa thrilled. How many mornings had I prayed that The Amazing Cate would sleep in. My mind wandered to all the lovely things I could do with my morning. Leisurely breakfast by the beach in Manly; complete my to do list before anyone arrived at work to interrupt me; grab a snooze in my car. I was ready to make my way to the nearest coffee shop when I saw The Amazing Cate striding towards me. My heart dropped, my legs turned immediately to jelly, I thought of a thousand excuses why I couldn't participate.

As soon as boot camp started everything changed. I found that I wasn't the slowest but one of the fastest and strongest (different people participating not any new-found ability on my part). I sprinted around the running track. I boxed like a demon. I planked like the wind! My heart rate reached 98% of my max. And after all the running and boxing I  ran all the way up Marshall St**. Without even stopping.

The mind is an amazing and powerful thing. By 7.15 the power of positve thinking can help us achieve things that we never would have thought possible at 6.14

** I grew up at the bottom of a hill with a one-in-four gradiant, Marshall Rd is steeper.

Party!

I was reminded by my daughter's seventennth birthday party how much I used to love a birthday party when I was a kid.

The red a-line party smock. The broad white head band. The knee-length white socks with the frill I was only allowed to wear on party days. Even getting dressed for them exciting.

Then there were the games. Pass-the-parcel,  where the prize in the centre was coveted by every child in the room. Pin the tail on the donkey, where there was real and serious danger of sticking that pin in another child's eye, and the world's greatest OH & S risk -muscial chairs.

Today, our kids parties are more planned affairs. During pass the parcel (or parcel-parcel as my daughter used to call it) the music is timed so that every kid gets to unwrap a layer and under every layer is a prize of equivalent value to the last. Pin the tail on the donkey is played with velcro. Musical chairs seems to have been banned.

I never won pass-the-parcel as a child, but it never stopped me feeling the excitment as the newpaper bundle passed through my hands. Today the kids take their expected prize (of equivalent value to their friends) and stick it, absentmindedly into their pockets.

Yes I'm getting old (and you can tell because the above was just one long sigh of 'in my day') and wow kids have some great stuff available to them now but I have to wonder if they're not missing out on something too.

All about love

Yesterday was Valentine's day. I blogged about an avocado keeper. My romantic gift was a new bicycle seat cover.

My special Valentines treat was a visit to the 'opera'. I've never been to the opera before, but I'm assuming this was no madame butterfly. The orchestra sounded like castrated dog wailing. The singing sounded like the mating call of the cat. To hear someone scratch their fingers down the blackboard would have been sheer relief. After taking a short nap during the middle of the show  (I had to do something to distract myself from the extraordinary screech projected at me from the front of the room)  I awoke to find the lead character singing to a giant purple plastic horse that was being led across stage by a guy in pyjamas. It was at best 'avant guard' at worst one hour and forty five minutes of my life I'll never get back. I would have left at intermission, but there wasn't one.

Valentine's day is not love.  Love is laughing about the good times and keeping laughing through the bad times. Love is sitting calmly next to your wife, knowing she would quite happily plunge a knife into your thigh for bringing you to such a god awful place. Love is forgiving your husband because you know he meant so very, very well. Love is the gift of an avocado keeper or presenting your love with a bicycle seat cover for Valentine's day because you know she's just not the kind of girl who wants flowers.

The invention that changed my life

Occasionally Ali gets carried away and purchases an item or two from a dodgy catalogue. They don't always work out. (I'm thinking particularly of the anti flea cat collar device that was supposed  to emit some kind of flea repelling sound but which i believe to be a piece of coloured cardboard.) This time, however Alistair, against my better advice, bought an item that changed my life.

The avocado keeper (pictured below) is a truly wondrous thing!

It was my my brother who introduced me to the avocado. It was winter, he was home with a broken leg, I was home from uni on a mid-year break. Avocado on toast with salt and pepper became our new favourite lunch.

Avocados are a superfood. They have been found to help prevent various types of cancer, to lower cholesterol. It's rich in folate which can help keep your heart healthy and help prevent stroke. the avocado can even help with the absorption of vitamins in the foods you eat alongside it. They are high in vitamin E and in antioxidants that are said to be important in preventing aging.

I love to eat some avocado everyday but as they are high in fat (good fat I know) and calories, I rarely eat a whole one. Before the avocado keeper my fridge was filled with browning half avocados.

But now, I can keep a half an avocado for three or so days before it starts going brown. I have no idea why no one invented one before and why it has taken so long for me to welcome this little darling into my life.

Why Andy can't put on weight

I have a colleague who can't put on weight. Honestly, I've watched him down three people's deserts in one sitting. The other day he ate chocolate cake for breakfast. He deserves to be huge. But he's not.

I've always wondered why, until I watched him at one of our events. He charged around the place, setting up, taking down, talking, dancing, sliding the giant slide, jumping hugging.

While I sat, like a proper adult, watching on the sidelines, he was like a child, totally absorbed and having 100% fun.

I remember being at primary school, and still playing at lunch and recess, but when I reached year 7 it became somehow uncool to charge about the playground (now more respectfully called a quadrangle) and cooler to sit around talking about how often we shaved our legs and the new blue eyeshadow we bought on the weekend.

I know we have to grow up, but do we have to loose our energy and spontaneity too. Maybe we should all just start channelling our inner Andy.

Better to have blogged and lost than never to have blogged at all

I'm not sure if my friend Jo has read this blog but if she has then she will no doubt have noticed the many and various spelling and grammatical errors. The other day I spelled queue, 'cue' and I'm sure there are many more than that.

My friend Shari says that the art of writing is the art of applying bum to chair. She's right. Many of us dream of writing, but we're held back of our fear of producing something far from perfect. It takes a certain amount of courage to be prepared to make mistakes. To risk writing crap.

Kate Grenville,who dreams up her best ideas in the shower,  talks about the beautiful perfection of the story before she commits it to paper. At that moment, she says, it's perfect.

The thing is, I'm busy. Gym, work, child, life. A never ending succession of alarm, gym, work, home, preparing for the next day sleep, alarm, gym,work ... you get the picture.

So my choice is this, dream the perfect blog and never write anything, or blog with a few inconsequential ** spelling errors. I choose to blog! 

** I apologise to Jo for the use of the word inconsequential. Spelling and grammar are important. I know.

The morning after ...

Boys reading this close your browser now, for it will neither interest or amuse you. Women, listen up because this is important! **

We've all experienced those 'morning afters'. The night before it all felt right and, oh, so good. You were bouncing, glowing, on top of the world. You had never felt so confident, so ... fulfilled. And then, the morning after. You feel different, flat, let down, there are moments when you wonder if you made a mistake.

The same feeling, over and over again, every time we get our hair cut.

No matter how much we love our new cut and colour, no matter how good our hairdresser is,  the day after a visit to the salon all of us experience Post Haircut Stress Syndrome (PHSS). You go to bed with quite possibly the best haircut ever. The first thing you notice when you wake is that is looks flatter, or fizzier than the night before. So you try and work with it, only to find it looks less and less like it did when you stepped out of the salon. The more you fiddle, brush, blowdry or staighten the worse it gets. In the end you give up and wash it, blow dry it, even try the outrageously expensive product that worked so well in your hairdressers hands. And that is the end of your salon perfect hair.

When my daughter was 12 I took her for her first full salon cut and blow dry. (12! What are we doing to our children people? I'm certain my first blow dry was the day of my Year 12 formal). The hairdresser worked wonders with her formerly unrully locks. My daughter was so excited she made me take a photo to send to her Dad. I still have that photo. Her eyes are shining and and she is beaming. She really thought her hair would be that way forever. I considered warning her about the existance of PHSS but I couldn't just rip her last moment of innocence from her. I knew that she would learn ... soon enough.

** Probably not as important as the situation in Egypt,  however I bet as you read this there are Egyptian woman waking up with PHSS looking for someone who understands.

Stamp!

When I was in sixth grade my teacher had a set of stamps lined along the edge of her desk. I can still picture them now. Wooden, well-worn and and hand-inked from an battered, blue-stained pad. Each stamp had an individual design. If I close my eyes I can see them now. The rounded 'good'; the floral border around the oval 'very good', the long thin 'excellent', and the stamp-of-all-stamps the 'special merit'. With it's swirled writing, this was the stamp we really wanted. And if we went above and beyond we could even earn a special merit with a gold star.

We used to cue with anticipation at our teacher's desk, work in hand. What stamp would we earn today? She would sit in her chair pondering our work with a slight head-tilt. We would watch, hearts pounding as her hand passed over each stamp in turn.  If it came to rest on the 'special merit' we would almost burst as we watched her arms tremble with the force it took her liver-spotted hands to pound it into our work. I can hear the noise, the definitive thump as the stamp pounded it's judgement into our pages.

Our teacher was old (although probably not nearly as old as I remember) and sadly died a long time ago , but sometimes I wonder if I'm not still queuing for those stamps.

Killer calories

There must have been a time in my life when I didn't consider every little calorie I put in my mouth-but I don't remember it.

As a child, I was convinced by the presence of a sister with an unnaturally flat stomach and above average athletic prowess, that I was fat. I was, at most, chubby.  I used to lay on my bed every night and wonder what it would be like to be skinny. I remember thinking it would be good to be pregnant, because once the baby was born I would be thin. (I was young, very, very wrong and kind of ... well .. weird).

So I've always thought about it, a lot. But I've never really understood them ... until now.

A calorie is a mesure of energy, to give it it's true definition it is "a unit of heat equal to the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one kilogram of water by one degree at one atmosphere pressure." Now, I have gone over and over this statement and still have no idea what this means or how it relates back to what should and shouldn't be eating. But. here are the top five things I have learned this February.

• To loose weight you must expend more energy than you consume. So, your calories out need to greater than your calories in.
• One pound of body weight is equivalent to 3500 calories. So to loose  just one pound (just under half a kilo) a week you need to eat 3500 fewer calories than you consume in that week (roughly 500 a day). (Makes you wonder how the biggest losers do 15kg in a week!)
• This can be achieved by both reducing your intake of calories, or by increasing the amount you expend.
• Different foods have different 'thermic effects'. That is some take more energy to burn than others. Dietary fat, for example has very little thermic effect, while protein is harder for the body to process and has a much larger thermic effect.
• To be really healthy we need to have include food from all the food groups in our diet (including fat and carbs) and make sure our diet is colourful, plenty of green, red and orange!

The foods to avoid are not a surprise to anyone. Face it, we know before we put them in our mouth that a Krispy Kreme doughnut or a bowl of wedges isn't the  best thing for us.

My heart is all a flutter

Yesterday I wore my heart rate monitor for 24 hours, just to measure how many calories I burned in a day. the magic number was 2462 (more than 300 burned while sleeping!). I found the whole thing fascinating, got completely obsessed and, quite frankly, was possibly more than a little boring on the subject.

Here are some of the things I learned.

My maximum heart rate is estimated to be around 180 bpm (very roughtly calculated as 220 minus your age) . The fastest my heart ever beat was at 94% of my maximum (in track 5 of a spin class). When sitting at my desk working my heart was beating at  between 42 and 44% of my maximum (around 75 bpm) standing it was closer to 50 but while having coffee with friends or eating dinner at home I was more like 38% of my maximum (around 68 bpm). Climbing stairs got me to about 60% of my maximum (around 108 bpm) .

All of this burned 2462 calories.

Tomorrow I calculate my average daily calories and see how they measure up

All hail to the trainer

Aly forgot to take his shoes to RPM (spin) yesterday and so had to sit the class out. So naturally, I decided to give him a work out of my own (get your mind out of the gutter people).

Inspired by watching a aqua class and Sydney's high temperatures I decided we'd jump into our pool and get water work out. This is what I learned ...

It is not easy to be a trainer. Firstly there is the planning and researching the best exercises. Then there is getting the balance right -you can't let them get too bored, there needs to be enough repetition, but not too much.

Also, an hour is a long time. Not a long time, say, to watch an episode of "The Biggest Loser" - an hour of the biggest Loser passes in a flash. But if you have to keep someone motivated it seems to take forever.

I think the low point of the class may have been when the post-it-note I wrote the list of exercises on blew into the water and sunk to the bottom of the pool.

So, to anyone who has ever trained me, to Lou Lou, to Nina and especially to Amazing Cate. I raise my protein shake to you. I now appreciate the effort you all go to every week to make your sessions interesting and inspirational.

Keen on Quinoa

Quinoa (pronounced much to Ali's amusement as 'keen-wah') seems to be today's new wonder food.

A grain-like food, quinoa was once considered the 'gold of the Incas' because it provided warriors with sustained energy. it's also high in protein and amino acids.

I've been hankering to try it ever since Arthur, the Mexican retail student who from time to time sets diet and exercise plans for me, put it on my 'to eat' list.

Now, Arthur is a guy who is serious about his diet and exercise. On graduation day he was so concerned we wouldn't have healthy enough food and he brought his own tins of tuna. The result is pretty amazing. In an end of term video he was cast as 'the incredible hulk'* and there were absolutely no need for special effects. This guy is ripped!

I had Quinoa in my cupboard for about three months, but was unsure what to do with it, until I found a breakfast recipe for Quinoa porridge in Michelle Bridge's new book 'Losing the Last 5 Kilos'. (It's awesome, you should buy it).

So we made the porridge and it was with great excitement that I ate it. It wasn't nice. And the after effects! A couple of clammy and lengthy trips to the bathroom were required.

My point is this. Not every health fad is for everyone. Take advice, try it, but if it's not serving you, feel free to discard it and try something new. I know I will be.

* I lied, Arthur was actually cast as 'the incredible sulk' who broke down crying at any sign of danger. He is, however, ripped.

Too damned hot

Ten good things about a hot, hot day.

1. The comforting smell of the stiff, clean washing when you pull it off the line, only an hour after you hung it out
2. Floating on the pool with a good book
3. Our beautiful Sydney beaches
4. The sizzle and spit of the evening BBQ
5. Cool sparkling mineral water with a squeeze of fresh lime
6. Remembering when you were a kid and you forgot your thongs (flip flops for my American readers) and you had to choose between burning your feet on the scalding tar or walking through a bindy-eye patch - ouch.
7. Watching the grass grow
8. Knowing that you'll be pining for it in the middle of a grey winters day
9. Slipping on a summer frock
10. The cool relief of a southerly change.

I've been doing yoga for a while now but it's taken me this long to realise that things can be easy or things can be hard - it all depends on how you choose to react to them.

Rejoice in this beautiful summer day people. 

Presence -part two

Twice a week I attend an early morning boot camp run by my work in the beautiful surrounds of Shelly Beach, the Manly Headlands and the area around ICMS

It's probably my most dreaded activity of the week. It's not the instructor, she's passionate, creative  and enthusiastic. It's the running.

Some people have bodies built for running. I have a body built (courtesy of my Scottish heritage) for surviving Scottish winters and eating porridge made with salt. I seem to be missing some kind of underfoot spring that allows normal people to take long loloping strides. And every week there I am bringing up the rear.

But this week, boot camp was going to be different. This week we were doing 'water work'. At last, I thought, it will no longer be me trailing the group. Only one problem. I'm short. Maybe a good half a foot shorter than the other participants. So when the others were bounding through chest-high water, I was struggling to keep my head from going under. I was cross. This was going to be my week.

That's when I decided. I had to change my thinking. Maybe I was the fortunate one. I mean, I was getting the better workout. I started to feel better, lighter ... for about 5 seconds before I got knocked down by wave! Still  for those 5 seconds I was 'the fortunate one.'  I had been present. I had chosen how to react to my circumstances.

My aim for next week is to try and re-focus my mind for an entire boot camp session. I'm going to take each run one step at a time thinking 'I am the fortunate one, I am the fortunate one.'

And maybe by the end I'll actually believe it.

Stuck for a healthy dinner party recipe this Feb - try this salmon dish

Salmon might be relatively high in fat (but only when compared, say, to other fish, not when compared  to a bacon double cheese burger) but it's good omega three fat. And it's so delicious and filling and ... did I mention delicious. Bring this recipe out if you have a dinner party and want something quick and easy to cook that's yummy, healthy and low in evil white carbs.

Ingredients
2 bunches baby bok choy
4 salmon cutlets

For the sauce
2 TBL fresh lime
2 TBL sweet chilli saice
1 TBL fish sauce
2 TBL sesame oil
2 Garlic cloves chopped
2 TBL grated giner

Method
One hour before serving mix mix all ingredients for the sauce. Cover the fish in 2 tablespoons of the sauce and allow to marinate for an hour.

Close to serving time, stir fry the remaining sauce in a wok. After about 1 minute toss in the bok choy and cook for a further 2 minutes.

Meanwhile, fry the marinating fish- The amount of cooking will depend on the size of the cutlet but it shouldn't take longer than three or four minutes.

Serve the salmon on the bok choy. If you are (god forbid!) eating carbs at night time you can also serve with rice.

Moving with a tribe

I mentioned in my intro that this year Ali and I decided to bring our tribe along with us on fit and fabulous February. Our tribe are our firends, colleagues, acquaintances, gym buddies and their friends colleagues etc etc.

For those of you who read the master -Seth Godin you'll be the familiar with the concept of tribes. If you haven't read his book, buy it, it will bring out the tribal leader in you.

My colleague reminded me today why it's important that we don't do this FFF thing alone- why we move in tribes.

Once a month at work we have cake. And not just your ordinary cake; this is a slab of  luscious, moist, thick iced chocolate cake with extra layers of dark and white chocolate. While cake is not officially banned in fit and fabulous February - me and my colleague are aiming for weight loss and good nutrition, so eating that chocolate cake wouldn't have helped.

My colleague spied me in the room and said out loud. 'I'm only going to have chocolate cake if Adrienne has it.' Needless to say neither of us had cake.

Our tribe keeps us motivated and honest we help each other stick to our commitments. Long live the fit and fabulous February tribe!

Presence - February 1

Sometimes I think (if I take the time to think at all) that I live every moment planning for the next. My mind is busy A new goal. New plans. And what for?

This morning before my yoga class I pick a card from a pile that are always left in a bowl at reception. The cards carry messages designed to guide your yoga practice.

The card this morning was 'presence' and it had some impact.

My daughter has grown up. A blink of the eye. A lifetime missed. So busy.

Just for now I'm going to take from time ... for now.

That's why this February I'm going to practice presence.

About Fit and Fabulous February

Every February Ali and I endure fit and fabulous February. This year we're taking our tribe with us.

Why fit and fabulous February?

1. Shed those Christmas kilos
2. Set our intentions for the new year
3. It's the shortest month of the year.

We encourage everyone to set their own spiritual and physical goals for February. We encourage no drinking. My goals are:

1. Get back the bikini body
2. Get home by 6.30pm three times a week
3. Cultivate presence