LJ you would love the “magic roundabout” at Hemel Hempstead. There is one large roundabout with a ring of six smaller ones around it. Each has to be negotiated following normal roundabout rules – for us, when entering the system give way to vehicles already on the roundabout – which makes it rather like the cogs in a gear box. At one time I had to take convoys of RAF trucks through it. We would close up, no gaps and go through like a train. The locals did not like us, but if we went through as individuals we would wind up scattered over several miles.

When I go back to the town of my birth I revisit my primary school – I drive round the quite small roundabout where it used to be.

Cinque, if you’re well enough to read, I hope you’re recovering well and being thoroughly pampered.

LJ, a roundabout requiring written instructions would appear to be counter-productive! That one looks mad. When DD took her driving test a few years ago, she had performed everything perfectly and was almost home dry when the examiner directed her to an unfamiliar roundabout that, once on it, had directional arrows painted on the road itself. She got an instant fail for not being in the correct lane, despite there being no other cars in sight. She later took us back there and I did exactly the same thing. There was no way to know which lane you needed to be in until you were on it. I ended up in a ‘left turn only’ lane, as had DD, when I needed to proceed through. I have never seen that anywhere else in Perth.

CalifD, my OH has still not mastered roundabouts after 25 years. He seems to think he has the right of way whether he’s on the roundabout or approaching it. I don’t remember any roundabouts when we lived in California. One US traffic rule that makes so much sense and I wish they’d adopt here is the legal ability to turn ‘right on red’ at a traffic light (which would be left on red here). Apparently, we can’t be entrusted with such decisions.

Anyway, back to 5:2. It’s a FD for me. I’m running low on cauliflower soup and I saw teeny cauliflowers for $5.50 a head yesterday which is a bit steep. Tonight’s meal is Spanish Fideos 142 cals and I might use the Chang’s noodles for a change. Have a good day everyone.

Good morning all. Well I’m so far behind on posts there’s no hope of catching up now so cheers to everyone on everything….lol ! And welcome to any new posters.

Has been a rollercoaster week since returning from Adelaide. Have had huge issues with an ex family member, mum goes into an aged care home today, work is unbelievably flat out and I’ve commenced my next unit of study. I also had some minor surgery on Monday which resulted in some complications so have to go back again next week to have the procedure re-done.

Were off to Wallaroo tomorrow arvo for a few days so looking forward to getting away from it all and relaxing at the beach.

A bonus is that for this beach trip I wont be packing my big board shorts and t-shirt rashie top as I would have done in the past…..its bikini time !! I tried it on again last night to ensure fit was ok and also to make sure I felt comfortable wearing it. Even MissD said ‘oh wow mum are you wearing that’.

Scales are up by 1 kg this morning which is not surprising given the events this week. Not worrying about it at the moment as I just want to relax and enjoy the weekend. Will do some serious fasting next week to get back on track.

OH has been such a wonderful support to me during this very upsetting and stressful week. It’s been a blessing to have him in my life. Take care everyone.

Hi Everyone
Sorry I haven’t posted in a while again.We had some birthdays in our family over the last 10 days and had extended family here for a big BBQ on Sunday. We had lots of bubbly leftover from DD engagement-bought from a winery but not very nice- so we made champagne cocktails that went down too well on a hot day. I was supposed to be home Monday but OH asked me to ‘go to work ‘ with him. He had a few errands to run in the city and we had lunch with a couple we love to meet up with from time to time. That meant no FD for me on Monday and I was supposed to do one yesterday but ended up bingeing. 🙁 a few hot days in a row and I bought chocolate coated ice creams (for the grandchildren of course-and I did give them one each lol) Oh well, its FD today and Ill make a nice salad for dinner.

GDay, sorry to hear you’ve had a difficult week, but how nice to have someone to share that with
Bikinis??!! WOW! Apart from the fact Im too old, I dont think I will ever have a flat enough stomach after having 4 (big) babies.- but they are worth it, lol. I pray that the next surgery will be more successful.

In regards to the birds, sorry but cockatoos are a pest! They have totally destroyed our apples in an early morning feast and we now have to net all our trees quite early. There is a tree on a nature strip where we walk that has lovely big apples that dont belong to anyone. The apples fall rotten on the ground grr. There is always kookaburras to be seen here, I love them. And the little blue wrens are so pretty. I love to point out the Crimson Rosellas and King Parrots to the grandchildren when there are here too

Cinque, I hope all is well with you xx

JJ, Ive been amazed at all your beautiful photos in Japan. One of my DD went last year and my mum went earlier this year and both loved it so its on my list 🙂

Have a great day/evening everyone. I’m off to do some housework and ironing before it gets too hot xx

Good morning

My veggie cooking went well. I have an entire shelf of the fridge crammed with veggie dishes. In total it was 2 hours work for 4 veggie dishes. I even went to the trouble of roasting the tomatoes and capsicums for maximum flavour. Rather than boiling, I roasted the unpeeled whole potatoes, sweet potato & carrots, thinking I’d throw them into a pot (with roasted skins and all) and mash when cooked. But they looked so good once roasted that I changed the plan. I cut everything in half and scooped out the centres. Then I reserves all the skins for a separate veggie snack – they just need to be spayed with oil and put in a hot oven or into the airfryer. The innards were mashed with a little butter and pepper. It’s a wonderfully flavourful mash. I’ve ended up with so much food, some will need to be frozen. I’ve already frozen the potato/carrot skins and next week I plan to make some hommus and have it with the crispy veggie skins. The batch of ratatouille is huge, so I’m thinking of cooking some lentils or beans and making a legume-veg pie from some of the ratatouille and mash – most of this I can freeze for easy meals.

Stay – Sounds like your social life is interfering with your FDs, but I’m sure you’ll get back into the rhythm once the number of events reduces – althoug it doesn’t sound like that will be next week. I find I cope with one social event a week, but more and I struggle to keep my weight stable with 2 FDs.
I don’t think my fridge would hold a weeks veg for 4-6 people. The raw veg just for me fills 2 shelves.

Thin – I agree about veg not keeping as well as I expect it to. In the book that I mentioned, the author made a scathing comment about the crispers in fridges – she said they were misnamed as she’d never known one to make anything crisper. I have some tupperware containers (with adjustable vents) that are vegetable storers and I keep most things in them – although some things don’t fit, eg a bunch of silverbeet. I still find some of the fresh veg only lasts well for about 5 days, unless it’s home grown or bought from a farmers market. Supermarket veg is the worst and I usually only buy things like onions or potatoes from them. I have agood green grocer with quality produce, that’s local where possible – but it’s expensive.
I have also expanded my use of frozen veg over the years, which fills in the gaps. Frozen brocolli & cauli are both good roasted, or baked into a cauliflower cheese casserole or made into soup. I also use edamame and broad beans frozen, because I can’t get them fresh. They are a bit of work as the edamame have to be thawed and shelled before cooking and I always thaw and skin the broad beans as I don’t like the grey skin. The final result is worth the effort – fabulous sweet flavour and makes a nice change from dry legumes. Because I try to include legumes 3-4 days a week, having options that can go with a normal meal as a green veg is very useful. I also keep a box of frozen spinach in the freezer (the one that’s has ice cube sized chunks of frozen spinach). I thaw 2-3 cubes and add to eggs for omelettes – it’s one of my quick FD meals.

GDSA, sorry to hear that so many things have piled onto you this week. I hope the trip to Wallaroo is relaxing and recharging. Hope it’s warm enough to get that bikini wet.

I have a Vietnamese banquet to go to Saturday night so I’m preparing by squeezing in an extra FD this week. I fasted Monday and yesterday and will do a third on Friday. I don’t want to be stressed about what I eat on Saturday and as I won’t be selecting my meal, just sampling everything, I felt I needed some extra insurance.
I’m planning to weigh myself at the beginning of the Thin’s December challenge and I’m really hoping to be a reasonable weight then.

Welcome Malcolmvivian, I think you might become MV or malc before this page is filled up. I expect Joffy and Penguin will enjoy some extra male company here. And I am delighted to have some more Perth representation. Indeed, it is a beautiful day and I have had my walk by the river. Are you NoR or SoR? What aircraft do you fly?

It is wonderful to read of someone starting this WOL to improve their health as the primary goal. Most of us jumped on the fasting bandwagon for its secondary benefit of weight loss but have enjoyed some health benefits along the way. Good luck with reversing the symptoms of your diabetes.

Hi again LJ, I’m with you. I can really only cope with one external eating event per week. Even then, it takes me some time to get back to the lower end of my wiggle room range. I’ll put the Silly Season Challenge up on 1 December. I’ve broken my one post per day max. pledge to welcome malc and as it’s quiet on here.

Stay, our posts crossed. Have a lovely, healthy weekend!

Welcome to the forum MV! Great to see another new faster here. I’m in Northern Calif but a regular in this forum. I snuck in behind a cockatoo and some Vegemite about 7 months ago and never left because I love this group of fasters. (Actually I think it was thin who invited me over when I was worried about getting off topic asking about cockatoos on another thread.) There are at least 4 people here who have met their goals some years ago and are continuing with 5:2 to maintain. They have so much good advice and lots of ideas when you get stuck or discouraged. I think the 5:2 is sustainable long term, but this forum certainly reinforces it. I hope it is the same for you.

Cinque, thinking and worrying about you tonight. (I am the forum’s professional worrier 😊 ) I hope you are recovering well and will post soon.

Thin and LJoyce, I have trouble keeping fresh vegetables too. One thing that has helpred with freshness for up to a weeks extra freshness are Bluapples. I use them in each crisper drwawe in my refrigerator and in my fruit bowls. They absorb some kind of gas that makes produce spoil. https://www.amazon.com/Bluapple-2-pack-Freshness-extender-ethylene/dp/B005W6DRNY/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1511406881&sr=8-3&keywords=blue+apples+for+refrigerator

You know it never ceases to puzzle me that I can head out to do some gardening wearing both socks and covered shoes (and clothes too of course – thought I’d make that clear before some smart alec decides to comment), and yet when showering off the dirt and sweat afterward I always seem to have dirty feet – especially between my toes. How does that happen, every time! As you may have guessed I’ve spent the afternoon gardening – nearly 3 hours of hard work. I now have a new garden bed along 12m of the back fence line – basically there was about a 40cm wide strip of dirt between the fence and an old ugly concrete retaining wall. The only thing in that dirt was masses of tall weeds. Over the last week I’ve weeded, dug the soil, added fertiliser, planted agapanthus and erigeron daisies and mulched with a bale of pea straw. It’s finished now and it looks a whole lot better than it did a week ago. I’m hoping that once the erigeron daisies grow a bit they’ll hide the ugly retaining wall. I’m quite happy with my efforts, and a bit tired.

MV – welcome, I really hope you settle into 5:2 easily. I lost my excess weight and have been maintaining with 5:2 since May.
If you haven’t done so, it’s worth checking your TDEE (use “how it works” from the menu at the top of the page). It’s important not to overdo it on the days you aren’t fasting, so knowing how many calories your body actually needs on those days helps. As you are a type 2 diabetic you may find your weight loss will be easier if you also avoid starchy white foods – they seem to be problematic for those with insulin resistance. I think Michael Mosely recommends the Mediterranean diet as a guide to suitable food choices for diabetics.
I’d also recommend you chat to your doctor about what you are doing as losing weight can change things like blood sugar, so you may require extra monitoring. (I quickly realised I needed to do that when losing weight as my blood pressure meds had to keep being adjusted – don’t need any now.)
Keep us posted on how you go with your fast days. Most of us get into a bit of a pattern with them (both days and food), to keep it easy to stick to.

Cali & Thin – I’ve never seen blueapple here – might have to wait until AmazonOZ starts up. I’ve seen “keep fresh bags” in the green grocer, that you can put veg in before refrigerating, but nothing that absorbs the gas that causes fruit & veg to rot. Some things keep better wrapped in paper – asparagus and green beans particularly.

I was hunting around in the pantry (yes, OK I was looking for a snack – although I settled for 3 small nectarines) and found some high fibre soy pasta I bought ages ago and hadn’t tried yet. So I’m cooking some tonight to have with ratatouille and parmesan.

Hi fellow SH’s
Like a couple of others,I have left it too long to reply to each post, so sorry about that. I hope that all those who have been unwell are starting to feel a whole lot better; am happy for all those that have had good results recently – well done; so glad that those still trying very hard are hanging in there; hope all those having holidays are feeling relaxed & rejuvenated; & welcome to all the new FD’s. Love all the posts esp gardening, cooking ideas, birds.
I can finally make use of my milk kefir – was frozen in milk for about 6 months – took a week of daily care before I was happy to try it again – now thickens up perfectly; is ‘putting on weight’ ie multiplied from 6gm to 9gm in a week; & tastes good.
Found some pho soup with miso & konjac noodles, at Woolworths – low calories & tastes good as well (I’m new to this soup). I’ve listed some of everyone’s suggestions on what you eat & this has been very helpful – thank you everyone.
Last Saturday was our workplace Christmas Party – held at a beautiful winery in a gorgeous country setting – gourmet cook, with non stop food from nibbles to main course then sweets – 4.30 to 9.30pm. Felt overfull going to bed & had very little to eat on Sunday – so glad it’s not a regular event, had a good time!
We are currently surrounded by storms but they keep going around us – the sky is dark, the thunder is noisy, but no rain!
Hope you are all enjoying whatever you are up to & have fun on the weekend, when it gets here!
Good evening, or morning for some. Bye for now

Good afternoon and evening everyone. LJoyce, our soil is mostly a red clay here and it also seems to get inside shoes and socks, especially when it’s wet. I have a pair of white cotton underwear that got stained by the clay, through a pair of jeans when sitting on the ground when planting something. (Got tired of kneeling.) I never was able to wash the clay stains completely out, even with oxygen cleaners. I keep them as a test garment for new detergents. I am convinced that someday I’ll find a detergent that will make them white again. And then I’ll buy that detergent forevermore. 😁

Thin, I can only see one site to get the Bluapple thingies in Australia and I think it’s more of a shipping service. And expensive. I could ship it from here if you’re really interested. The shipping weight says 8 ounces. Not sure what shipping would be. Couldn’t be too much for something so small. There’s also a good product called
Fenugreen FreshPaper Produce Saver Sheets that I use in fruit bowls. They work for a couple of months, but are suited to dry areas. The refrigerator is is too damp for them. There are 8 sheets to a pack. They’re especially good on the bottoms of apple bowls or in strawberry containers. They extend fruit life a week or more sometimes.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving Day here so I already started food preparation tonight. We have a couple of friends coming over. It’s one of my favorite cooking days so really looking forward to it. It will definitely not be a FD. Either Friday or Saturday will be my 2nd for the week. I ate quite a bit today which will probably push me above the 59’s where I’ve been for 4 days. But the nice thing opus that the FD will hopefully get rid of most of the excess and any extra should be taken care of with Monday’s fast.

Have a good day everyone. Got to get some sleep!

malcolmvivian. Welcome. I am one of the other token males, on the other side of the planet, time zone Zulu, which means I read most of these posts at what would be breakfast time, if I ate breakfast. Good luck with the type 2. If you have a look at the “Related Science articles” thread you will see that 5:2 has worked for some.

I did 27 years in the RAF, but was too long in the leg for military aviation, hence “Penguin”. Van’s RV7 is a new one to me, I had to Google it. It looks fun.

Hi Cinque💐

I hope you are doing well, and resting and recovering as much as you can. You have many people here who care about you as a dear friend, and not just on this thread.

Take you time getting back to posting. I know you will be reading first, and not posting at the beginning of your recovery. We are all thinking of you, praying for you, sending you positive thoughts.

Time to rest and recover💐
Merry

Good morning from Japan!!!

We spent the last two days at USJ walking and also spending up to 70 minutes on a line waiting for a ride!!! We balked at the one ride we did not get on that was 120 minutes wait. We just could not do 2 hours standing on a line…….

We ended up leaving the park around 5pm even though it was open till 9pm last night, but it was chilly with the wind and we had done it over and over again the past two days. Decided on shabu shabu for dinner and the restaurant had an all you can eat for 1,999 yen. You could choose your own vegetables, as much as you liked while they brought trays of the thin sliced meat to your table. We opted for two flavours of cooking liquid, one was kombu (really just water and seaweed flavour and very healthy) my daughter wanted the tereyaki flavour (soy sauce with a sweet flavour) I tried both but the kombu one was much better. The veg consisted of cabbage, carrot, daikon, bean sprouts, mizuna, spinach, 3 different types of japanese mushrooms, tofu, udon and ramen noodles, leeks, onions etc etc…. you get the idea!! A really healthy choice for dinner.

Today we leave this hotel and head to the southern part of Osaka city where it is easier to catch the train to the airport tomorrow. It is also a great shopping area and I am going to buy a shabu shabu cooking pot so I can make this at home as well. I will have to find a slicing machine that will slice the vegetables paper thin so they can cook easily. (we can buy the meat at the local butcher but it is expensive)

I think I am looking forward to getting home this time. Dont know why as I usually am really sad when coming to the end of a trip to Japan, but now just want to have a normal life not living out of a suitcase!!!

I have read all of the posts this morning, since I last posted myself and see we have some newbies on the forum so I send you a Japanese welcome…..Yokoso!!
I am not going to respond as there are so many posts, but I did enjoy reading everything and there are some interesting things being said.

Reading about the porridge posts made me think of the porridge my grandmother used to make and how good it was. I just can not seem to get the same flavour so have given up. My daughter sometimes asks for me to buy the instant porridge packets but I dont like them at all. So any advise on how to cook a nice porridge would be appreciated.

CalifD I have always been intrigued with the Thanksgiving foods that always look so delicious. We usually have turkey for Christmas, and I have now stopped buying the whole bird and just usually buy the oven roasted breast otherwise we are eating it for days and days after. My mother used to cook Christmas lunch with turkey, roast lamb, roast pork, cold sliced ham then all the vegies. I still do all the different meats, but on a smaller version and Christmas night the evening meal also has prawns added to the meal.

Well I better go as I have to check out of this hotel…..will catch up soon.

For those of you looking for ideas that can use some kefir I thought I’d share a soft-serve “icecream” I’ve been making with mine on some hot days.

This evolved from regularly having a bowl of fresh berries with kefir poured over it. On one hot day I wondered if it would be better turned into a really cold thick shake, so I started experimenting.

To make the “icecream”, I use a stick blender (has to have a strong motor) and the tall narrow 1 litre jug that came with it. A traditional blender should also work, but my food processor doesn’t work for this process.

I start with 200ml kefir and some frozen berries – my favourite is definitely raspberries, but strawberries, blueberries or mixed berries all work. I start with a handful of the frozen berries and blend. Then I add 2 tsp psyllium powder (you can omit this) and 2-3 ice cubes and blend again. I keep adding ice cubes 2-3 at a time or more berries and blending, until I have about 500ml of “icecream”. Then I taste it and usually add some stevia and sometimes some vanilla or coconut essence. Then I add more frozen berries and blend again and recheck the flavour. what I end up with tastes a lot like a frozen yoghurt – sweet, but also a little sour. It’s important to make sure all the ice is pulverised before adding more cubes – you need to be patient with this. As it thickens it becomes harder to blend the ice and can take a while. I usually end up adding about 150-200g berries and at least 2/3 of a tray of ice cubes.

I usually end up with about 500-700ml of “icecream” and the only calories are from the kefir and berries. If I use about 200g of each, the whole jug of “icecream” is 600-1000kj or 140-240cal, depending on which berries you use. You can make a smaller amount with 100g each of kefir and berries, but I find this is much harder to blend.

This will not keep, it will start to melt quickly and if you put it into the freezer you’ll never get a spoon through it – it’s mostly frozen water after all.
It has to be eaten as soon as it’s made – so find a spoon and a quiet corner to enjoy it. I sometimes make this on a hot day as my lunch. You can experiment with different fruits, spices and essences, but I use berries because I always have them in the freezer. If you have leftovers, it can be frozen in icecube trays – then re-blend it when you want it.

I also find this recipe is useful when I have one of those emotional moments that require ice cream. I don’t feel cheated having this instead.

If you use 100ml kefir, 100ml almond milk and 150g strawberries, you can actually make this fit into a FD – 450kj or 100 calories. Although I rarely do this, it’s a NFD treat for me when the weather is hot.

Thinatlast. We use steel cut oats and cook them in the microwave – just the oats and water. Depending on quantity, after 4 to 6 minutes at full power they will have doubled in volume and be ready to eat.

The kefir production is getting out of hand, we have been making curd cheese cake with the grains but a new idea for the kefir is welcome. That kefir ice cream has to be tried.

Thinking of you Cinque.

Good morning SHs, hope you all have nice plans for the weekend.

I’m having a day off from gardening and have started the christmas gift baking. I’m doing a batch of lemon & cranberry shortbread today. I only remembered yesterday that I’d need to take a small gift for everyone tonight. Apart from family & my best friend, I just bake small gifts for other friends. I thought I’d have to make an early morning dash to the supermarket as I had almost no sugar in the pantry, other than soft dark brown – lovely on porridge but not suitable for shortbread. After a bit of rummaging, I found a packet of icing sugar hiding behind the custard powder, that I suspect I bought for another baking project and didn’t use. I’d normally use caster sugar, but I decided the icing sugar would also work so I used that – we’ll see how well that decision went when the first batch emerges from the oven.
I think this is the first time that I can remember doing some impromptu baking and not having all of the base ingredients in the pantry.

Penguin, how do you stop the porridge boiling over? Whenever I’ve tried to cook it in the microwave it boils up the sides of the bowl and over the top and makes a big mess. I gave up and went back to simmering it on the stove.

I forgot to mention that the kefir icecream can be made without any additional sweetener if you prefer, or use some other way of sweetening it other than stevia. I have no problem consuming small amounts of stevia and I find the flavour too sharp without it. When I use raspberries I need about 3/4tsp powdered stevia, for other berries it’s a bit more.

As I mentioned earlier I have a christmas dinner to go to tonight, with the book club ladies. We are having a banquet at a Vietnamese restaurant. Not really my preference of cuisines, but everyone else seems to love it. I do enjoy their stirfry dishes that feature lemongrass, but don’t care for most of their soups and salads. I’m sure I’ll find plenty to eat though.

LJoyce, to keep porridge from boiling over in the microwave, try sprinkling some cinnamon on the top. Don’t mix it in, you want the powdery cinnamon on the top to break the air bubbles that rise to the top when it boils. It isn’t foolproof, but works pretty well. You don’t have to cover the whole surface. Other spices or powdered things that don’t quickly dissolve should work too.

There you are! So glad to hear from you!

It’s a good thing they decided to go in and check and have now removed the darn thing. It sounds like they took some extra just to make sure. Take care and we’ll look forward to hearing from you when you’re recovered from the surgery. It sounds like it was more extensive than they could do through the keyhole surgery. Big hugs and much love to you, Cinque. I hope you have someone there to help for a few days.

Hurray Cinque, you’re home! So good to hear from you. A relief that it’s behind you now and that you’re recovering well. You have been missed.

CalifD, that’s about the worst sounding FD coffee that I’ve ever heard of. Good for you for doing a FD though when others might have spent the day picking over the leftovers (me included probably).

LJ, I love our local Vietnamese. It serves really delicious food, freshly prepared and all their dishes have a distinctively different flavour. Best of all, it is reasonably priced too. Have fun tonight.

Cinque, hope you’re on the mend today and feeling better. I’m thinking of you.

Thin, that FD coffee certainly does sound bad! 😁 I need to learn to use more commas and reconsider the run-on sentences. My calories came to exactly 500 yesterday, and this morning my weight was 59.7. That’s right where I was at the start of the week. Still lots of leftovers in the frig, but I will have to pace myself.

Listening to Christmas music this morning to get in the mood. I want to start decorating today. We’ve accumulated lots of decorations over the years and it takes a while to get them all up.

Hope everyone is having a good day.

Penguin, our posts crossed. That sounds like a wonderful dinner!

Morning Cinque, it’s so good to have you back. At least you have plenty of experience in pacing yourself so your rehabilitation should proceed swimmingly. I hope you have one or more of your sister pool staying with you. Do you require any follow up treatments or did the surgery take care of everything? Perhaps this is what you will find out on Thursday. Meanwhile, I shall have to battle on alone with the Sunday fast. Or maybe LJ is joining me today?

CalifD, don’t change a thing, I was just joshing. Congrats on your great weight! It is so good that we can have a major food celebration and then, presto, one fast later and we’re back to where we were before it all began. We can apply the same strategy throughout the weeks leading up to Christmas with the result that we don’t end up 3kgs heavier by the end of it all. Enjoy putting up those decs. Christmas music is banned at our house except on Christmas Day.

Penguin, do you have to soak your steel cut oats before microwaving? My packet says I must.

DD had her last exam of six yesterday, attended a ceremony to collect her name tag reading, ‘Veterinarian in Training’ (Cinque I said that’s random use of Title Case; what do you say?) and then came home to collapse in a heap. She doesn’t quite know what to do with herself if she isn’t studying. I’m looking forward to spending a whole day relaxing and chatting with her today and then year five starts tomorrow. That’s her Christmas holiday!

Hello All, been skimming through all the posts. Cinque, glad you are home, hope recuperation is progressing.
I did another 4:3 week, but stupidly overdid it on one of my NFDs, so only lost about 300g. Doh!
Very interested reading about people using kefir grains. My sis and I would like to try water kefir, but not sure where to get the grains or how much equipment it requires. The few sites I’ve read make it sound a bit fiddly!
We’re in Brisbane, anyone know a good place to get the grains etc?

Cinque. It is entirely possible that the amount of technology you took into hospital was not the thing to which you were giving most thought. Good to hear from you. Stay with it. At a trivial level, animal names interest me. I was once given a dog called “William” which could cause confusion. Why “Miso”?

thinatlast. We buy our oats in large, plain bags. There are no instructions and we have never soaked them. OH favours a ratio 3 of oats to 4 of water, measured in a cup. I don’t measure mine and tend to use more water. It is a very quick routine – oats into dish, add water, place in microwave. Make cup of tea or coffee and they are ready together.

I never realized you could convert milk kefir grains to water kefir but according to this site, you can, although perhaps not an easy process: https://www.culturesforhealth.com/learn/milk-kefir/convert-milk-kefir-grains/

Hi Gday, I hope you can find some Monday motivation… somehow!

Penguin you are right about my hospital priorities, and when I realised I needed access to wifi I thought it would be easy to get it through the hospital, but no. However, I enjoyed the quietness. 5 days with no news (although my sister told me when Mugabe resigned) no internet, no radio or tv. My pleasure was my kindle and I read Our Mutual Friend, my favourite Dickens.

And guess what, my sister bought a bottle of kefir in! It was good stuff, all organic etc. I opened it and it had a creamy plug at the top, so I put the lid back on and shook it, but that just meant there was a big round thick plug at the top. As I didn’t have much appetite and was limited in what I could do, it went back to the nurse’s fridge. I was excited about getting it home, but guess what…. I forgot it.

Oh, and re Miso, when she was a kitten my daughter was planning to call her Missy, but I commented that her black fur, with flecks of gold, reminded me of miso, and somehow Missy became Miso.

Better go and rest again, but just had to share that I was in room 5 ward 5. No wonder I am having a good recovery!