Tips From a Frustrated Caterpillar

We all know how hard it is to exercise and eat well. It is easy-ish for about 3 days and then the reality sets in that this is all going to take a lot longer than you anticipated. I realised this rather acutely when I read that there are 3500 calories in ONE POUND. That means if you continue to eat as you normally do and work out 7 days a week for an hour, you will only lose a pound a week. Horrifying, right? So you have to eat right every single day too and then things will start to happen. I'm learning little things as I go along and I'm willing to share every little thing I learn so that we can all try to make the transition from chubby little caterpillars to beautiful butterflies together (too much?). I'm tired of being the little caterpillar that almost did. I want the full bloody cataclysmic transformation.

So here are the things I've been doing and that I recommend:

1) Put your gym clothes out every night - from socks to undies to sports bra - all of it. Have it ready. That way you can wake up bleary eyed and just wriggle your blubbery arse into the gear and walk out the door. No excuses.

2) Go to the gym. Toned fat looks better than wobbly fat. It works better than a spray tan.

3) Keep a food diary. I've been using www.myfitnesspal.com on my iPhone and online every day for 7 weeks. I can tell you every morsel of food I've eaten since February. Don't LIE on your food diary. WTF for? Who are you trying to fool? Oh so you've eaten 950 calories a day for 5 weeks and gained 2 kgs? Righhhht. Stop being an idiot.

4) Remember that fruit and vegetables have carbs. If you're on a low carb diet remember that an apple has about 23 grams of carbs in it. Fruit juice is horrifyingly high in carbs. Do some research. Your food diary online will tell you specific details and will really help.

5) Stop wearing stretchy clothes in a size 10 that lull you into thinking you're a size 10. Go and try on a pair of size 10 jeans. Step on the scale. Sometimes a rude awakening is necessary. Ok so size doesn't matter, numbers don't matter etc. But you say that... ummm... do you believe that?

6) Saying No is hard the first few times and then it's empowering. You can go to a kids party and say no to cake. You can go out at night and stay off the carbs and alcohol. Say no. Make the buttons close!

7) Do not reward yourself with food. You are NOT A PUPPY.

That's about all I know for sure right now. I know this now. I need to keep knowing it. I'm tired of starting over.

Vision 9 Week Challenge - Week 2

If it were easy, it wouldn't be a challenge. Right? It's not called the "9 Week Holiday". I'm in week 2 and I must confess to being a bit grumpy. I am, however, feeling rather virtuous about my exercise and food discipline. I've trained 10 days out of the last 14 and I feel like there should be some kind of medal? An audience with the Queen? Or perhaps a cheque for a million dollars? That's not going to happen - but I did get something this morning which felt like a reward. I bought a dress 8 months ago that 'almost' fit (not at all) and today it does!!! All the buttons closed with ease and I felt awesome! I think this is in part due to this ridiculous circuit training class hosted by the sadistic Bladen last weekend. I've been hobbling around like a 90 year old since Saturday morning and I choose to believe that one of the buttons is as a direct result of those punishing lunges and squats!
I'm down nearly 5 kgs now since joining Vision and I have to say this is working. How is your challenge going? Are you aching from head to toe? If not, try harder. You're doing it wrong.

The Vision 9 Week Challenge

I have gained and lost and gained the same 10kgs many times over. In my late teens it was easy. In my early to mid twenties it was easy. Now I'm 35, I have a 3 1/2 year old, I work, I run a house and have an active social life and IT IS NOT EASY. I struggled on my own for a few months... and failed. It was time to call in the artillery and pull out all the stops. I started with Chris Vision Personal Training Crows Nest a month ago and I have dropped 4 kgs so far. I can't quite tell that I've lost weight yet - my jeans still don't close, my SPANX are still working over time and my wardrobe is still largely made up of stretchy. forgiving (deceitful) fabrics ... but I am on my way.

As a self-confessed exhibitionist, I am putting all of this out there - my facebook friends and my twitter followers are acutely aware of every gram I lose, every meal I eat and every time I hit the gym. I feel like I am at the forefront of a revolution - a VISIONARY - if you will. Of course, I'm not really. What I'm doing is perfectly normal. The vast majority of people exercise and eat well on an ongoing basis. For me, however, this is a challenge. Not only a 9 week challenge but a challenge to stop quitting, stop having to start over again from scratch and employ these basic principles to my daily life on an ongoing basis. I'm learning lessons, I'm making changes and I feel GOOD. What's your vision for this week? Mine is to exercise 5 times, fuel my body well and drop another kilo. Join me?

Didn't We Almost Have it All?

When I think back to my tween years - when I started actively listening to music and knowing the words to songs - there are 3 performers who come to mind: Madonna, Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston. They provided about 90% of my soundtrack. I had posters of Michael on my wall, books about Madonna - I memorised her life story - and I knew all the words to Whitney's songs. When I got dumped by my first boyfriend, a friend wrote me a letter and enclosed the lyrics to 'Where to broken hearts go'. I even sang 'The Greatest Love of All' at an Eisteddfod once!

Michael died the day after my son's 1st birthday and I remember feeling a sense of loss - like part of my childhood had been extinguished. Today, Whitney Houston is dead and I have that same feeling of loss. Yes, she has cut a tragic figure for many years. Her career waned from the moment she met Bobby Brown and became an addict. But her songs resonate - they bring back endless memories of slumber parties and slow dances, shuffle socks and scrunchies.

My husband and I started discussing Whitney, Madonna and Michael as we drove home today from a night away. While Madonna is arguably the least talented of the trio, she is the one who remains at the top of her game. Her career has lasted the longest, transcended all musical genres and fashions and she continues to thrive. It is incredible to me that in the very same week that Whitney (probably) overdosed, Madonna has launched an extensive world tour and a new album. While Michael and Whitney were fragile and broken, endlessly searching and becoming increasingly lost, Madonna seems to be bullet-proof. She has survived failed marriages, dismal reviews, questionable career moves (and fashion choices) and has never ever backed down, seemingly never even floundered.

What is that thing that she has in abundance that the others lack? Is it because she entered the industry and treated it wholly as a business? She wanted to rule the world (she said it herself). She had no famous relatives, she didn't have a famous surname (she has no surname at all) and she isn't even especially good at singing or acting. Yet she's not only still alive, she's at the top of her game. Michael Jackson was the product of a fame hungry father. Whitney's entire family were well-known gospel singers and Dionne Warwick is her auntie. Madonna headed to New York a complete unknown and worked her arse of. She is above all things a skilled and brilliant businesswoman and she epitomises indefatigable resilience.

It will be very interesting to see what happens next. How will this fame monster affect Gaga, Beyonce and Kanye? Who will be the Madonna and who will be the Whitney/Michael? We will probably know way too soon.

Transported

I woke up to the news of Reza De Wet's passing and was instantly transported to another time in my life... so long ago it feels almost like it was another life altogether. I'm in a lecture theatre in the far away regions of the Drama department waiting, waiting, waiting (ironically) for a lecture about Beckett's Waiting for Godot... Reza De Wet is lecturing. We are excited. It's like an international celebrity is coming - a recluse, a mythical being - someone like Garbo or Howard Hughes. It will be a rare, auspicious sighting. We have all heard of Reza but, being 1st years, we hadn't quite reached Reza-worthiness yet.

It became apparent over the ensuing 4 years that we would never reach Reza-worthiness. Reza was a deity - a free-spirit- a force of nature. She was not made for material, concrete stuff, she was ethereal, brilliant, gifted and - to the conventional human eye - completely bat shit crazy. I mean that as a compliment. Reza's brand of crazy was aspirational - we ALL wanted to be that kind of crazy. The crazy that writes sequels to Chekhov and appears only after dark, who only allowed people to photograph her from one side as she thought the other side was ugly, who puttered through Grahamstown in first gear because she didn't know how to change gear, who managed to work into a lecture on Godot that there were some mad nuns somewhere who used to 'fuck pots and pans'.

In my Honours year I was terrified and ecstatic when she cast me in one of her Chekhov farces for the Graduation play. I will never forget her appearing in our dressing room and giving me one final piece of direction 'I WANT YOU TO BE MORE CATACLYSMIC'. And then she turned and left. I was 21. My friend Kevin and I collapsed in giggles and tried to figure out what the bloody hell cataclysmic meant. If I could figure out what it meant I would definitely be more of THAT for Reza.
So, today my heart is in that building on the corner of Prince Alfred and Somerset in Grahamstown where I spent 4 magnificent years. I know everyone who was there with me - before and after - is feeling exactly like this. RIP beautiful lady.

On Loss

It took me a long time to decide where home was and what 'home' meant to me. The longer I've been away from 'home', the clearer the concept had become. However, in the last year, that concept has changed. When I pictured 'home', I saw my childhood house in South Africa. Last year my parents moved and so now I have a new visual for that. When I pictured 'home', I saw my parents and our dog, Bello. Three days ago Bello left that picture.

There is nothing that can prepare you for the loss of a loved one - furry or otherwise. I come from a small family and so our dogs (we've had 2) were always a strong part of our unit. As a 6 year old I wrote one of my first stories about my brother, Boomer. Boomer was a sheepdog who left us during my final year at school. We got Boomer when I started school and he passed away the year I finished - he traveled that road with me to the end. Bello joined us in 1999 from the SPCA, a sprightly, beautiful spaniel cross something with a mop of golden ginger fur and the playful, loving temperament to match. I left South Africa about 6 months later and Bello provided a much needed buffer for my parents - someone to adore unconditionally while I flew off to explore the world. After 12 years of exploring, i might have reached my destination...

So, now the picture looks like this: me in Sydney with my son and husband. My parents in their new house in South Africa... and it doesn't look right. I can think of it as a period of transition while the fractured pieces of that 'picture' rejoin in a new form. The person who boarded that plane in 1999 would think of it like that - optimistically. Right now it's blurry, distorted by tears and grief and a feeling of intense loss. I have a fierce urge to 'fix' it - to paste it all together again but I don't know where or how to start. I've never been very crafty. So, answers and solutions on a postcard please. Address it to me at my home. Wherever that is.

Concrete Blonde

As seasoned foodies, enthusiastic eaters and unabashed social critics we headed for Concrete Blonde with a slightly world-weary insouciance. A new restaurant in Sydney is about as rare as a d-lister with a fake tan. Right? Restaurants open with such regularity in this city that it takes a real gem to rise above the rest and challenge the very institution of fine dining, glamour and excellence.

Concrete Blonde, in the heart of Kings Cross, thwarts convention with quirky design, innovative menu combinations and a heady ambience that immediately makes you feel like you have been let in on a fantastic secret. The decor is edgy with nods to New York’s Tribeca, while the cocktail menu offers a fresh twist on the famous Bellini from Harry’s Bar in Venice. The menu itself is infused with a strong sense that the owners and/or chefs have travelled extensively and brought the best of everywhere to us in Sydney. If you book ahead you can even get them to cook a whole animal for you – tribal celebration style. We ordered about 15 things off the menu and are already talking about going back to order the rest. It’s been a long time since we’ve sampled anything so completely authentic and fresh. Challenge your pallet and ditch the diet – Concrete Blonde is an instant favourite.