Happy New Year all!!!

From a very wet, sodden and grey Alexandra in Central Otago, South Island. We completed our house sit yesterday which turned out to be in Wedderburn (not Bannockburn as originally planned) and moved on to here yesterday in lovely warm sunshine. Hasn’t lasted very long, fell asleep last night to the sound of gentle rain on the roof, woke this morning to the sound of heavy rain on the roof.

I hope you all enjoyed the Christmas and New Years activities and gatherings, those of you who were allowed to that is! We thoroughly enjoyed ours, quiet but good, lots of conversations with overseas friends and family, cementing our feelings of just how fortunate we are to be in such a fabulous place right now. My thoughts are with you both Thin and Penguin, with the new indefinite lockdown announced earlier today, such awful news but feel it is needed, should have been in place a while ago in my opinion.

Sorry to hear of your hospital stay Anzac, but guess you were in the right place and also for the loss of your friend. I lost my brother the same way 10 years ago and I find it something you never quite reconcile because of the ‘why”. Time does however, make the pain of loss easier, I have found.

With you with the weather Neil and John, rotten summer so far, even worse than last years and we thought that was naff. One good day versus three bad ones, got rid of the wind from earlier only to be replaced by rain, arghhhh! Hope your knees improve Neil, sounded a pretty nasty crash, with the others who think you should possibly seek some professional medical attention to them both, either sports physio or the like, surely it will come under his insurance payout??

Sounds like you had a blast at Cromwell John, did you get to the new water park near Lowburn, looks great for the kids and families. We were going to head to the cricket on the Monday but kinda pleased we didn’t because it got to 32’ and OH not so keen on that sort of heat. Stayed home and watched in on TV instead, good turnout though. Parked up next to the cricket pitch now, would think its more like a duck pond now though.

All this cake baking sounds wonderful, the first day at the house sit I found a recipe book on scones (just scones) and found one I had to try, seeing as it was Xmas, Whisky soaked prunes and dark chocolate, and they were yum, baked half a batch and they were so good. Next time I shall soak the prunes overnight as the recipe, but they were still good and will become a firm favourite. I asked OH the question of his preference for choc ganache or fondant icing as a cake covering, and his reply was hilarious, neither, just cream! haha

I had my first weigh in today since Dec 23rd and my weight is exactly the same, higher than where I would like it but still the same. I am pleased with that as I have been what I thought at the time was quite reckless in my food choices, but I do still practice 16:8, drink 3 ltrs water daily, and only have two meals a day, so at least I know that is good practice. It is obviously my food choices and quantities that are at fault so those two concerns will be addressed this month.

On that note I shall make another cup of tea and ponder what to make for dinner tonight,

Turn

Good Afternoon All,

Have once again been absent from the forum but have been skimming through and kept up (mostly) with posts.

We had a quiet Xmas here and then spent 4 days in Adelaide over New Years, watching the Big Bash Cricket (Adelaide Strikers) at the Adelaide Oval on NYE. As usual when we go away, we ate out at some really nice restaurants and of course drank and ate too much which has not helped the waistline at all. But had a good time and did some things we’ve been meaning to do for ages, such as a lovely visit to the Adelaide Botanic Gardens and St Peters Cathedral, both of which Mr GDay has never been to before. Disappointed the NYE riverbank fireworks were cancelled but they had a small fireworks display at the oval after the cricket so all was not lost.

Miss GDay received a surprise gift for her school graduation, a kitten. He is a right little terror but also cute as a button and has grown so much in the 3 weeks we’ve had him. Much to Mr Gday’s disgust the kitten spends a lot of time inside the house and takes much delight in biting our toes and ankles and exploring every nock and cranny of the house. Our dog adores her new playmate and they have become inseparable.

My work experience placement for my Fitness study has been approved by the Academy which I’m really happy about because there are only 3 gyms within a 15km radius of where I live, and 2 were not interested in taking on a placement at all so luckily the 3rd gym had all the facilities the Academy required for the placement and they were more than happy to take me on.

Now that the festive season is over I am back on the low carb, medium protein and high fat diet, no alcohol and increased exercise routine. Even after a few days of ditching the carbs I feel so much better. I’ve been logging my food on the Carb Manager app so I can keep an accurate record of my macro intake. We did visit Haiges Chocolates while in Adelaide (how could we not) so I will keep them hidden and only eat as an occasional treat.

Our vegie patch is going well, a huge variety of chillies, tomatoes, apple cucumbers, radish, spinach, rocket, capsicum and a variety of different herbs. The lemons are nearly ready to pick and today we picked our first lot of almonds from the tree which I’m really happy about given the tree was only planted about 6 months ago and is still quite small. We recently harvested a heap of brown onions and garlic and still have some pumpkins in storage from last years crop.

The other fruit trees we have planted over the years but have yet to fruit are Red Delicious and Granny Smith apples, 2 lime trees, orange, pomegranate, bay tree, 2 avocado trees plus another lemon and 2 blueberry bushes. I also have turmeric and ginger but they won’t be ready to harvest for a little while yet.

I can’t comment on any other posts as even thought I’ve read them, it’s been in bits and pieces over the last 3 weeks and I can’t remember who said what now. But I do remember the Black Books conversation, that’s one of my favourite shows. Neil’s bike accident – hope you are okay Neil and the bike comes back as good as new. And yep Dr MM has ramped up his social media posts with the release of Claire’s new book. I follow Claire on Instagram and she is really lovely, always replys to peoples comments and I was quite excited the first time she responded to one of my comments.

Time to go and make tea. Chicken thighs and veg in a coconut cream, turmeric and ginger curry. And definitely no rice to go with that! Bye for now.

Good morning everyone,

LJoyce, I do hope you got a better sleep last night.
That is a great plan for introducing foods you need to be careful of.
When we can have a small amount and feel wonderfully satisfied, it must be a sign we are doing it right.

I have decided to go slow on restocking the fridge. I am on a roll with light eating and I have enough in the fridge to continue that for longer. I still have the joy of deciding what I plan to make, though. (I’m working on an African meat stew first).
I did make a great saucepan full of lentil soup yesterday. It was dictated by what I had on hand and ended up a cross between the french style (with celery and carrot and onion base) and Greek style (with lots of greens and lemon). Some roast capsicum in it too. I have a container in the fridge, and one in the freezer.

But also that means I can go opshopping today, instead of food shopping 🙂

Turn! HNY to you too! And Mr Turn!
Hmm I think I would prefer rain to wind, but I hope it is warm and still for you today.
Those Christmas scones sound wonderful!
Cheers for a stable weight over the festive season, and yay for your good practices.
Those food choices and quantities do remain a work in progress, don’t they.

Anzac, oh no for the lost post! Thankyou for writing again.
My heart goes out to you, with the funeral of your friend.I’m glad the letter is there, ready for when the time is right to read it.

A few days in a holiday house by the sea sounds like just the thing. I do hope you can enjoy every moment and make some beautiful meals with your garden produce.

On Sunday I went to Savers, the big opshop in Brunswick and found NOTHING! But when I got home I decided to go to the other Savers, in Greensborough. It was fast day after all and I felt like running away. Good move. My little car got to travel at 80 kmh for once! And I bought 22 items at the cost of $80! At least 8 were pale cotton things, and lots of size 7’s which Miss 6 is ready for, and she can dye or not.
After a couple of days rest I plan to hit a couple more opshops today. Just to see!

And yes! I did my henna on Monday, such a relief.

Gday, what a lovely catch up, and so good to hear you are all set for your work experience.
Welcome little kitten, to your menagerie! They are such fun. I bet Miss Gday was so delighted.

So glad you are feeling good on your eating plan after the feast season. And how wonderful to hear about your garden and fruit trees.

Merry! So god to hear from you. I am sending heaps of good wishes and hope life this year will be a gentle, healthy one for you and Mr Merry and all your family.

Penguin, I asked google for images of wonderful flowers, and it came up with these: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f6/bd/84/f6bd84153caf3ea4939b66813ade5ec6.jpg Best wishes

Cheers all, time for coffee, followed by opshops! Cheers for good, mindful, frugal, delicious eating today.

Good evening everyone.

I have just returned home from an unexpected dinner out. My great-niece decided at the last minute that she wanted a birthday dinner after all so we went to the Christies Beach Hotel – nice meal and a really lovely ocean view. She liked her cake, which is good because it was a very simplistic design as I only have a few cutters for scones and biscuits. https://imgur.com/a/v4y5v5A From the this angle the edge of the fondant looks a bit odd, but I did put it on straight – it had a scalloped edge – it reminded me of table cloth.
I needed to have a light meal and luckily there was a salad with baby spinach, roasted pumpkin, feta and a pearl couscous. It was one of the few things on the menu that didn’t come with a mound of chips.

How lovely to hear from so many people after long absences.

Merry, happy new year, I hope life is treating you and Mr M well.

Klondi, what an effort to read a whole year of posts – I’m surprised it only took you a week! Welcome back. Lovely to have you back. It sounds like a very lucky circumstance to find yourself out of Melbourne for the duration of the lockdown.

Turn, the weather does sound a bit dour over there. Those scones could be addictive. The chocolate must be an NZ thing – you don’t see scones with chocolate in them here, but I was served chocolate scones for afternoon tea on a visit to NZ in the 1990s.

GDSA, what a relief to find a placement and to have it approved. I hope you learn lots. I bet that kitten was a treasured surprise for your daughter. (I think they are all terrors when they are young.)

Anzac, have a lovely break by the beach – a wonderful thing to do before you have to face work again.

Cinque, I think the go slow with restocking is a sensible plan. I tend to go overboard and end up with so much fresh food I have to cook madly to avoid waste.

Well I need to head to bed, my infusion appointment was moved on short notice and is first thing tomorrow. That means I should have done a FD today, but I would have been under 1000cals and I made only healthy choices today so I think I’ll be ok.
Night all.

Good morning,
A beautiful Melbourne day here, but I have so many things to do that I need to be living today three times to fit them all in. And it is fast day.

Klondi, woot! So typical of you to do a complete catch up and then write such a lovely post making us feel so good. No wonder we have missed you here.
We will all have a nice time waving goodbye to those creeping kilos. Hooray for that kilo of yours already gone. And hoping the new scales last longer!
Haha yes, smaller portions, stopping before full and mung bean soup. The SHthread trinity 😀 😀 😀

LJoyce, a wonderful cake. I love the green marbled butterfly.
It is good to test the boundaries, and hopefully you find that yesterdays limited amount of eating works fine with your infusion today. (Otherwise it will be back to hard fasts!).

Thin, I have learnt a lot! I am good at not touching my face when I am out and about. I put on my mask with one clean move and don’t touch it til I take it off with another neat action. I keep it over my nose! I am aware of people around me, and wait, or if necessary move past with face averted.
But I bet after listing those things I will do something dumb at the busy veggie shop today.

Well, I have to run, but I am glad things seem to be starting to calm down in Washington, what a morning of news!

Tomorrow I have Miss 4 first thing in the morning and for most of the day, but I am looking forward to a more leisurely post after that. Best wishes all.

Happy New Year to you all – a little late, but Klondi’s very chatty post made me want to hop right on and send good wishes to you all.

Klondi, how wonderful to hear from you, and what an amazing post. It made me feel good to read it.

Our feet are all better – nothing like a shot of cortisone between the joints to set mine to rights, and OH is seeing a rheumatologist who took one look at his and told him they had collapsed (arches, I guess) and he needed to make best friends with a podiatrist. So, that’s what he will do.

My poor OH had some dispiriting news from his optometrist in the Christmas week – further loss of 10 to 15% sight in his only sighted eye. He’ll see his opthamologist on 11 January when he returns, to see if more treatment can stop the decline. In the meantime, he’s getting on with things in his wonderful, cheerful way.

About the bees – here’s something funny ….well, odd anyway. In the pool on Tuesday I flicked a leaf out, but the bee that was happily resting on it decided to give me a super sting on the way out, just at the base of my thumb and palm. The antihistamine I took didn’t do much to stop my hand from swelling to twice its size. But here’s the odd thing ….later that evening in bed my knee started throbbing for no good reason, and yesterday was so stiff and painful I couldn’t really walk or bend much. But as the hand has returned to normal, so has the knee. The reaction must have been connected, surely?

I’m not going to try to respond to everyone today – I’ve been reading but not posting lately. As you know, when I’m a bit troubled I tend to recede.

But I do want to say that I’ve read such honest and painful revelations, particularly since you lost your friend Anzac. I was so sad for you all and so admired your willingness to share your stories. What an amazing group of people you are.

And so good to see people back – Merry, Turn, G’day.

I’ll try to pop in tomorrow.

Klond, ‘glass half empty’ people should remember that the glass can be refilled.

Jony, great shark story!

Evening all

I’m still on holiday, I’m back to work on Monday unfortunately, which will probably be both a good and bad thing. Bad that I’ll miss out on my nice long morning rides, good thing because I’ve been eating more bread and dairy than I should and subsequently gained another kilo to hover around the 87 kilo mark. It should come back off when I get back to work and can be more disciplined in my eating. My goal is to eat mostly whole foods with minimal, but some dairy and gluten.

I hit just over 3,200 kilometers on the road last year plus what I did on the exercise bike during the winter, my goal this year is to hit 4042 kilometers, 2 kilometers for every year of 2021. I’m also planning on riding the alps to ocean ride sometime in the next couple of months so I’ve been doing some nice long hilly rides to get some miles in my legs before heading out. I’ve hit 200kms already this year. Today’s ride was a battle against the wind up the harbour to Portobello before heading up the 8 km climb up Highcliff Road, round the beaches, up John’s street (Aberdeen Road), up Kaikorai Valley Road and then up the hill to home. 2 hours 45 minutes, 55 kms, and 1.2 km of climbing. My philosophy is to train hard and then take it easy on the ride. The alps to ocean ride will be over 100 kms a day, but other than one grunty little climb on day 2 it’s pretty much all downhill.

I heard back from the bike shop about my bike, it will cost $1400 to fix including $999 for the front fork which will need to be shipped from Australia. Since it only cost me $1450 to buy the bike I’m pretty sure the insurance company will want a replacement. I’ve forwarded on the quote to them and I’m waiting to hear back from them

Good to see a few absentee friends posting back on the forum again and I’ll have to make time to head back through the forum and have a decent read through the posts.

Have a great one everyone and I’ll catch up with you later.

Good evening all.

For those bemoaning the lack of a summer – beware what you wish for. Perth had just experienced a week of temperatures in the 30s-40s and bushfires. The heat arrived in Adelaide today and I suspect it will continue to head east. It looks like it hangs around for about a week. it will mean early morning walks only for me for the next week.

Cali, the events of recent days beggar belief, although in some ways I’m actually not surprised. I imagine everyone is holding their breath for the new 2 weeks to end.

Thin, I hope you are coping with the new restrictions, although as you say, there will be little change from your normal behavious. As to how to get people to keep their distance, there was a comedy skit on tv here a few months ago which had Ray Martin wearing a crinoline and insisting he didn’t leave home without it. Not sure you’d fit on a narrow boat on one of those though – I’d think you’d get stuck in the doorway.

Jony, Neil & Turn, congratulations on reaching number one in test cricket.

Jony, I did have a good giggle at your shark scare. To this day I hate ocean swimming. I grew up inland and learned to swim in a freshwater lake – I firmly believe that there should be nothing fore dangerous that a yabby in any water I swim in.

Neil, if the insurance company does replace your bike with a new one and you can get the same model, you may be able to keep the old one for spare parts – just in case of further mishaps.

Lindsay, Pleased about the improved feet, but so sorry to hear that your husband’s precious remaining sight has reduced again. We will all keep our fingers crossed for better news from his opthamologist.
I do think it’s possible for an allergic reaction to show up elsewhere a few hours later. I had an allergic reaction to a cortisone injection that was put into my foot and then 24 hours later my face started swelling and my throat almost closed off. The only reason I connected the 2 events is that it happened again the same way, the next time I had a cortisone injection in my shoulder. I think that when something you are allergic to gets into the blood stream it can travel anywhere in the body.

Klondi, I’m very glad to hear that you are happy with your first week back – that will spur you on.

Cinque I hope you had a lovely day with Miss4 and are not too exhausted.
The cake was for my eldest great neice (22), but my youngest great niece (7) really really wanted that butterfly – her favourite colour is green. I think she has the belief “if it’s green it’s mine. The marbling was a bit of fluke actually – I was mixing a drop each of yellow and blue gels into the fondant and only had the job half done when I realised I like the marbled effect – a happy accident.

I learned a difficult but welcome lesson yesterday. My willpower is completely MIA when I’m really tired and the only safe option is a FD because I never break those regardless of fatigue. My infusion appointment was moved to first thing Thursday and as it always makes me very timed within minutes of completion I was figting fatigue all day – not helped by babysitting from 3-6pm.
Yesterday was day 13 of me trying to eat within very strict rules. I managed to stay on plan with a little extra fruit until dinner time but after a bowl of soup for dinner I still felt really hungry and had about 120g grams of sourdough with cheese. I really enjoyed it while I was eating it and then felt ok, but within half an hour I felt too full and slightly sick. I’m actually pleased I had that reaction as I don’t often get clear signals from my body about appetite and hunger. Now I know that as far as binges go it barely qualifies, but it was the first time in the 13 days that I didn’t feel in control of my food decisions.
I have decided to end what I had been doing and return to normal 5:2 immediately. Today was a NFD and a test of how I’d behave when all foods were now available. I’m quite happy actually as I managed to eat quite lightly and the only diversions were one Haighs lemon truffle that I was given for christmas and a small piece of the cake trimmings from Wednesday – I’d frozen it so that I could taste it later as it’s a recipe I hadn’t made before.

Tomorrow is my first proper FD since before christmas. I have a little of the grilled haloumi that I’ve been having in lunchtime salads left. I will make a large baby spinach based salad for my FD dinner and add that to it.

Hi Jony,
If you are just looking for some solid protein and don’t want to change the roast veg as the bulk of your plate then you have a few options:

Lean roast lamb (100g cooked weight or 150g raw)- If the whole family has a roast you could just measure your portion. My method however is to buy a leg of lamb, remove the fat and cut small hunks from the leg and freeze them individually – 200cals would be roughly a 150g hunk of raw lamb leg – this could then be roasted with your veg. I do this in an airfryer.

Lean steak or roast beef is similar to lamb, approx 100g cooked or 150g raw.

A beef & veggie burger – take 100g very lean beef mince and add grated/minced vegetables (eg onion, carrot, zucchini) and herbs, garlic, spices you like and make a hamburger/rissole. I usually add dry couscous per burger to absorb the moisture that the veggies release when cooking. I also find adding beef stock powder to the burger mixture also helps a lot – it basically helps the whole burger taste like beef, even though it’s half veg. If this option appeals to you, the easiest way would be to do this in bulk and make 500g lean mince into 5 burgers. They will freeze uncooked and can be thawed the day you want them.
A recipe to start that you can adapt to your taste: For 500g very lean mince (5% fat content) if you add 2 cloves crushed garlic, 1 medium chopped onion, 1 medium grated carrot, 1 medium grated zucchini, 1 1/2 tblsp (20g) dry couscous, 2 tsp beef stock powder, 2 tsp dried mixed herbs, 1 egg and 2 tsp olive oil. Mix everything well and form into 5 burgers. They will be roughly 200 calories. They also have 6.5g fat, 24.3g protein, 6.8g carb and 2.4g fibre. (In case you were wondering, the egg helps to bind the burger together and the olive oil increases the fat content just a little to reduce the dryness of such a lean burger.) If you leave the oil out the burgers are 180cal each. You can make these spicy by omitting the herbs and using garam masala, cumin, chilli etc.
If you are ready to be even more adventurous you could also replace the 500g of mince with 800g cooked drained brown lentils for a completely veggie burger.

An omelette – You could have a 3 x 60g egg omelette and stuff your veggies into it. Alternatively you could make a smaller omelette with 2 eggs but add 20g grated parmesan to the omelette. Both options are about 200cals. (I use omelettes a lot on FDs, especially when I have some leftover cooked veg that I can stuff into it – dinner in 10 mins!)

One final thing you might consider is to do a veggie stir fry instead of roasting veg. I often do this on FDs in hot weather. For protein I add either cashew nuts or cubed chicken breast and I flavour it with garlic, ginger and a little tamari sauce.
200g of raw chicken breast pieces is about 200calories.
35g or raw cashews is about 200cals. It doesn’t sound like much but they still feel like a treat among a big bowl of veg on a FD.

Something I use a lot for FD dinners are hearty soups which are mostly veg but also have plenty of legumes which add protein and make it filling (eg minestone without the pasta and very little oil). I can usually have at least a 2 cup portion and stay within my FD calorie limit.

I hope some of those options help.

Jony. I agree with LJ re stir fry. I use a small chicken breast between two and lots of veggies. Not sure of the exact calories but it’s low. I also sometimes poach a fish fillet with tomato and onion with some steamed veggies and that is also low calorie. You are doing well.

Morning all….I started my post yesterday so will push on..

Cali, such scenes in Washington. Just beyond imagining. I hope Trump will quietly fade away after the inauguration – removing him earlier would make a martyr of him, surely?

Thanks too Cali and LJ for the concern about the bee sting – but really, nothing too painful or unusual (it’s the ones on my face that have caused concern in the past, as Cinque reminded me just the other day). I was just commenting on the unexpected connection between knee and hand. (definitely not a sting on the knee …I definitely would have felt it, but also I was up to my chest in water at the time. Here’s the pic, after the antihistamine. https://imgur.com/a/Yb4mhql

Congratulations Jony on the cricket. I’ll ignore your comment about India thrashing us. ABA hey? (anyone but Australia?) 🙂 Didn’t Smith do well yesterday?

Neil how well you’ve done to be so firmly in the eighties, despite holiday relaxation. Hope your return to work isn’t too painful.

So we in Brisbane are in lockdown for 3 days, while contact tracing happens for the hotel cleaner who has the new highly contagious strain. And mandatory masks outdoors. I can take Rosy for a big park run, but not to our usual cricket ground. The dog owners are a lovely bunch, but do tend to congregate.

Cinque, what lovely op shopping. Are you able to see the family regularly now?

LJ do you suffer regularly with insomnia? I struggle to sleep. Years of shift work as a journalist I suspect. But I also suffer with cramps when I am low-carbing, and I’ve started taking magnesium powder, and it’s helping with sleeping. I’ve also gone back to books to read at bedtime and not my ipad. My habit was to jump into bed and tackle the diabolical suduko in the Australian. I’d get to sleep fine, but wake half an hour later, wide wide awake. So, another small pleasure gone as I search for that elusive 8 hours.

Turn I’m with LJ….scones with chocolate seem a bit odd …I can’t imagine what they are like. But then I’m a traditionalist who doesn’t like chocolate hot cross buns either. Did you see they are in the shops already? Crackers. (And I’m with Mr Turn …cream’s fine). Sorry the weather’s not been great. Ditto to Johh and Neil. As I write this I’m sitting in jumper and slippers, listening to the rain, after days of sunny 35 degrees earlier in the week. The weather gods just can’t make up their minds.

Loved your shark story Jony ….hard to tell from a black fin what lurks beneath. And well done on your success with this WOL. Isn’t it amazing? I felt such relief when I finally found a ‘diet’ for want of a better word, that would allow me to lose weight without having to sacrifice my social life.

Speaking of which, I find meals out are absolute killers, no matter how hard I try to order well. This week, lunch out with big brother and SIL. I ordered laab with tofu ….next morning, my weight was up by half a kilo. grrrrr.

And Thin, I’m with you on telling people to keep their distance. Yesterday, in Aldi, everyone calmly going about their business, and a woman in a mask was standing on the marker behind me. But then the teller moved the belt and her groceries shot forward, and so did she. Almost touching. Not politely at all, I told her she was far too close, to move back. Another grrrr.

Love all the ideas for FD meals – so easy to get caught in a rut. LJ those burgers sound ideal….and OH could have the same, but with some extras.

OK I’m off now to listen to the silence. It’s always just the birds that we wake to, but this morning they were particularly clear and bright. But it’s so still here that the early train that is usually just a faint noise in the distance sounded like it was chuffing up our back verandah.

Be safe everyone.

Jony, LJ, Klondi and Neil gave you some good suggestions for FD meals. I always go for high fiber or for soup which is filling.

Lindsay, your hand looks really painful in that picture. And that was after the antihistamine? Ouch!
I doubt that Trump will fade away quietly after the inauguration. I don’t think there is enough time for impeachment, but that’s the direction they seem to heading. I just wish these last 12 days were over. He is still capable of doing so much damage.

Jony, I’m surprised that no one pointed you to our recipe page: https://thefastdiet.co.uk/forums/topic/southern-hemispherites-fd-recipes/

LJ, yes, that skirt was exactly what I was thinking. Since the national lockdown, there are far fewer people about because non-essential shops are closed. This will make a big difference. I hope your return to 5:2 is rewarding for you.

Lindsay, good for you telling the woman to back-off. We stand at the far end of the conveyor belt while the person ahead checks out. Our groceries advance but we don’t. Then, when it’s our turn to pay, we pointedly place the marker well beyond our groceries making eye contact with the person behind us almost defying them to come closer! I think Aldi is the worst for compliance and enforcement. I notice in the upmarket Waitrose, customers are very well heeled!

CalifD, I read that the Mexicans are now happy to pay for the wall. And the Canadians want one too. I don’t think the basket of 70 million deplorables will disappear on 20 Jan. Pelosi needs to focus her energy on what attracted them to Trump and start addressing those issues if the democrats genuinely want ‘healing’ to begin.

Great shark stories. I’m one that looks around for sharks in a swimming pool and there’s no chance I’d ever get attacked by one unless they find a way to get on the beach.

Our trip to the Canaries began as wishful thinking, then became increasingly complicated (and costly) as more and more restrictions were brought into play first by Britain requiring us to self-isolate on return, then the Canaries requiring a specific negative covid test, then Spain banning all UK flights. We’d always been prepared to forfeit the money and entering tier 4 lockdown before Xmas, we decided it was unsafe to pursue. Our national lockdown has given us a bonus we hadn’t anticipated – the cancellation of the flight and a full refund.

Hello, it is fast day for me, and nearly midday.

I am in recovery mode after doing too much including a trip to the creek with my granddaughter and my weekly skipping which is much needed for my cardio vascular system but takes a few days to recover.

So I am just going to do short posts to catch myself up, and hope I can do more tomorrow.

Klondi, that fenugreek is definitely a key ingredient in that mung soup! Haha chucking it out. Luckily 5:2 is possible without mung bean soup 😀

Lindsay I am so glad your feet are better (you and Mr L). So hard that Mr L’s sight is fading further, I do hope treatment may help. I do hope things get better generally, and not just so we see you here more often 😉
I do understand that your bee sting thing indicates you are having a systemic reaction, rather than a localised one, and you probably should mention it to your doctor.
It is nice to hear how well the Brisbane lockdown is going (once the supermarket rush slowed down) and what excellent mask wearers you are. Keep keeping others in line!

Jony, cheeky man, ofcourse the Australians are winning this cricket match!

We once had a shark scare on a beach in FNQ (Far North Queensland) but the locals laughed at our alarm because it was such a baby.

Have fun trying some new recipes. Thin beat me to sharing the link to the recipe thread. Hopefully you will find plenty of inspiration.

I have a new toy, a little lidded stoneware ramekin for the microwave that were apparently all the rage 5 years ago. Opshop find ofcourse. I am still experimenting with it, but it easily makes a small meal (about 1 1/2 cups), which is really useful for fast days and most days, and I can cook in it and eat out of it, so that is handy.

Jony, when you first got under 100kg I was cheering, but thought I would wait til you settled before having a big celebration. And you have! Fireworks are in order!
https://bestanimations.com/media/fireworks/1694668762blue-erd-green-fireworks-gif.gif

Off to rest again. Backson.

Good afternoon everyone.

Hi Lionel, welcome. Seems a silly to be saying that to someone who has been doing 5:2 for so long. There are a few of us here who came to lose some weight and stayed and used 5:2 to help with maintenance.
As to ideas to help your wife. If you can sync your FDs to hers it would be very supportive as she wouldn’t have to watch you eat normal meals while she’s on 500 calories. You could also tell her about this forum of Aussies & New Zealanders (plus a few others we’ve adopted from the US and the UK). I have found this group supportive, encouraging, and so helpful.
I suspect Neil & John (our Dunedin crew) will love chatting to you – they are avid cyclists too.

Lindsay, hope you are coping with lockdown. The lack of new cases today makes it look very hopeful that just the planned 3 days is all that’s required. We are keeping our fingers crossed for you.
Insomnia, sorry to hear you have had issues with it too. I used to have a lot of trouble getting to sleep when I was working – probably because I was worrying about not getting enough sleep before the alarm went of at 5:45am. It is easier in retirement as I don’t have that anxiety keeping me awake. I still usually take a while to get to sleep and I always read myself to sleep. I also won’t use a tablet for reading in bed, but I use a kindle which is not backlit and doesn’t make my eyes tired the way a tablet screen does. I find it’s much easier to hold than a novel with my arthritic wrists. These days I usually get to sleep within 1-2 hours of going to bed but I never stay asleep all night. I always wake needing the toilet at some point. I really should stop drinking all fluids after dinner but never seem to manage it.

Thin, sorry that your trip to the Canary Islands is off – although I always thought it was a bit of a long shot. Excellent news that you’ll get a refund though.
I saw the news yesterday that 1 in 30 people in the London area are infected – it just beggars belief.

Cinque, I hope you had a restful afternoon. I’m not surprised that shopping and a day of babysitting with an outing has laid you low. It would do that to me too.

GDSA, I think it’s a great idea that the assignments create products for you to use when you are working. There’s a real incentive to do a really good job of them.
I fully expected that our high 30s days would mean 40s for you. It’s one of the things I hated about where I grew up – the relentless heat in the summer was just awful.

Cali, the horror show that is the end of this presidency has been getting a lot of media time here too. The second impeachment seems like a symbolic act to me as they have to know they have no hope of it getting through both houses before the next president is sworn in. While I agree that Trump should face consequences for his recent actions, I worry that this will just stir the flames of discontent among his ardent supporters and result in even more violence.

Klondi, how are you doing? Back onto the 5:2 wagon without too many issues I hope.

I managed to get a walk in this morning along the esplanade at Brighton before the heat became too awful. I have spent the afternoon cooking to set myself up for this week. I’m minding my nephew’s kids all day tomorrow so I expect to be exhausted – having dinner already made will help a lot.
I did my first FD500 in a while yesterday and it went fine. I’ll do another on Tuesday.

Hope everyone is having a good day.

Morning all

I’m back at work again unfortunately. Although because the kids are still off for a couple of weeks I can take my bike and take the long way home as well as the long way to work.

Welcome Lionel, although I’m a baby compared to you on this way of life. I’m coming up on my second anniversary. I started fasting on 23rd January 2019 at 131.5 kilograms and I got down to 85 kilos (although I gained a couple over the Christmas holidays) I’m a bit taller than you at 1.78m (5’10”). I cycle to work as well, I usually take the long way and do about an hour of riding before I start work in the morning and go for an excursion in the weekend. I’ve racked up about 310 kilometers so far this year as I’m getting some conditioning in my legs to ride the Alps to Ocean trail in the next month or two. I would have thought that your results are enough to convince your wife of the benefits of sticking with the fasting.

Ljoyce, well done on managing the walk and a 500 cal fast day.

Thin, sorry you missed out on your trip to the Canaries, although getting a refund of the money has got to feel good. My niece had a school trip to Cambodia booked and during the initial Covid lockdown the Australian based travel company went under and they have been through a long legal battle to get the funds refunded. Luckily she had only paid a deposit of a thousand dollars or so, some of the kids on it had paid all of the money up front and are out thousands of dollars.

Cinque, hope you’re feeling all refreshed after you trip and skipping.

Hi everyone else, I have a huge pile of work that needs working though so I can’t post much more.

Have a great one everyone.

Hello,
Day after fast day for me. Too hot here (I wouldn’t survive in Gday territory) but a cool change tonight and so a nice day inside catching up on posts and then emails, I hope.

Welcome Lionel, hooray for your 7.5 years on 5:2.
It was such a relief to find something so easy and sustainable to help my health. I have a chronic illness (me/cfs) so I am extremely limited in the amount of exercise I can do, but luckily 5:2 works anyway.

My thoughts on your question about encouraging your wife are very like Thin’s. ie hope inside that she gives it a good try, but just go with her decisions about it, make it easy and kind. (I’m like her, there is nothing like being told what to do, to make me decide the opposite).
We’d love to have her here if she wants some community support.

Oh Gday 40 plus ….that’s dreadful. I was reading on the ABC news site that a lot of the old wives’ (or old husbands’) tales about keeping cool aren’t that effective. One recommendation to stay cooler was to keep the fans on and air con at 26… … or just fans if you don’t (like us) have air con. Once it reaches 45, it doesn’t work – it’s just hot air circulating. For a good night’s sleep in the extreme heat I freeze my hot water bottle then wrap it in a hand towel and slip it between the sheets. It won’t make the temperature cooler, but it means I can get to sleep more easily.

Cinque, I love to read your posts each day. I am sorry you aren’t on top form at the moment ….hope you can get some good rest in and back on form very soon. I did a hive inspection (minus DS) yesterday….I only meant to have a look but one of the combs broke away so I had to harvest it. I didn’t take the smoker (DS’s job) so the girls were extremely cross and stung me in 3 places through the suit. Fast antihistamine, and no reaction at all. And 3 jars of honey.

Calif, I hope now Trump’s social media voice has been silenced, he can’t spread his poison so virulently, particularly pre-inauguration. Had it been you or me not abiding by the Twitter rules, we would have been shut down a long time ago.

Welcome Lionel – you’ve done brilliantly. Hope you can get your OH on board, but as Thin says, ultimately she’ll decide.

Have a good day back at work Neil. You too Anzac. Glad the last part of your break was so lovely and relaxing.

LJ we are lucky that we live down a long drive so don’t get the traffic noise, although during winter when it is very still we can get the buzz of the freeway early morning, even though we never hear it normally. And that said, when my neighbour roars up our adjoining drives in her huge 4 wheel drive, the serenity is shattered! But usually, birds, and the distant sound of the train is the norm.

Cinque, I love the sound of your little ramekin. Such good op shopping. I have decided to look for dinner plates in our op shops, when they reopen. My pink and grey Villaroy and Boch dinner set has lost a few pieces after being used daily for years, so I want to get some odd plates in those colours. I want to be very particular in which ones I choose. I’m quite excited by the thought.

Brisbane lockdown is going well, and we’ll find out soon if it’s to be continued. I have taken Rosy to the park each day and people are all mask-wearing and keeping their distance….all but one older man who was running without a mask. I told him yesterday he needed one (I’m getting quite assertive about this Thin) and he was most appreciative fortunately … he hadn’t caught up with the new regulations.

Jony, another FD meal suggestion is a minestrone soup, minus the pasta. I cooked it for dinner last night, and it was filling and delicious. When I’m being super conscious of carbs I don’t put in the beans either.

I skipped off to do some vegetable shopping yesterday while OH was at the field with Rose… and ran into our doctor, whom I am sure I’ve mentioned before is an absolutely angel. He’s been managing OH’s gout for such a long time – which apparently gave him carte blanche to look into my trolley and congratulate me on very healthy shopping…lots of vegetables, wholegrain bread, etc “no purines there”…and for only buying 4 rolls of toilet paper. Unfortunately I also had 15 bars of Lindt chocolate in the trolley, but as luck would have it, most had slipped under other items, and the ones he could see were the 70% ones, which he also approved of. So funny.

And to finish, a little story about Miss 4. She wanted to choose journalist DD’s lipstick for work today and was quite surprised to find she had to wear a mask even at her desk. “But what about when you’re singing, Mum?” DD told her they didn’t do singing at her work. “But Mum, what about when you’re in the playground.” No playground. Sadly, “Oh Mum”. So hard for a kindy kid, soon to be a prepper, to understand the world of work.

Post Script!

I just had to pop back because I missed the other bookend of world sympathy. US one end, UK the other. So much sympathy Thin and Penguin for the case numbers in your homeland, and the terrible stress on hospitals at the moment. <3 <3 <3
And I missed this when it first came out, but it gave me such a lovely giggle this morning. Language lovers will appreciate it so much
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVQ29tfOvl8&feature=youtu.be

And a lovely Lindsay post in the meantime. Woohoo the three stings no reaction, not to mention the three jars of honey.
And what a clever trolley to hide all the high sugar Lindt!
Good luck opshopping! I love having a specific thing (or things) to hunt for. It can take ages, but when you find the right thing… such pleasure!
Ooh I love Miss4’s (previous) idea of work. Lots of lipsticked people singing!

Ok back to resting! With the fan on, because hooray it isn’t 45 degrees here!

Cheers all. Looking forward to my lunch ramekin in a couple of hours. I watered the garden and harvested early, and it is a non fast day, so it will have warrigal greens, spring onion and zucchini from the garden, bacon, chickpeas, roasted chili pepper and carrot. And I might melt some cheese on top!

Lionel, welcome to the forum! You’ve had wonderful success with fasting. It makes it so much easier when other members of your household are following the program, especially doing the same FD’s. My OH, like Thin’s, doesn’t need to lose weight so I either add more starches other calories to his portions or he eats something different on my FD’s. We’d welcome your wife if she’d like to join us here for support. I’m so sorry to hear that your dog has cancer. What type of dog is she?

Cinque, I loved that YouTube video link you posted! It was funny. I found another on the page, just below it. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9Eo9M4-BrJA This guy did quite a good job on Covid Rhapsody and should appeal to all our Queen fans.

Anzac, going back into the office must seem a lot different after working from home and having days off. After catching up on sleep I hope you take it a little easy with work hours. I know it can get pretty hectic for you.

I got a lot of sleep last night since I fell asleep on the sofa about a third of the way through a series episode of Coyote and then slept through a whole movie that OH and DS watched. I was completely out, even though the volume was pretty loud on the tv. Lately my sleep has been impacted by stress along with my normal insomnia, and I felt so much better today after catching up.

Thin, I’m glad you got your deposit back for the Canary Islands trip and am sorry things have gotten worse there. You mentioned Mexico now wanting to pay for the wall, but while driving back and forth is limited to essential travel, it’s ok to fly or take a train to most places in Mexico. A voluntary 10 day quarantine upon returning to the US is suggested. We can fly to just about any country that will allow us in. I hope the new administration puts some restraints on travel. There’s a reason Aus and NZ have such low Covid cases.

Lindsay, minestrone soup is a great FD suggestion, especially for summer with all of the fresh vegetables. Miss 4 must have been disappointed to find out her mum couldn’t wear lipstick and sing at her desk and have no playground time. Working is just no fun at all! 😁 It’s strange not to hear about Trump’s daily insults to his cabinet members or lawyers. Not only Twitter and FB, but Instagram and youtube has banned him as well.

LJ, I love that cake with the green butterfly. Another decorating success.

Stay well and have a good day, everyone.

Klond, so true – there is always a silver lining! Although I am still trying to find the one that goes with losing my long missive this morning. Perhaps it’s that it saved everyone from my ramble. Like technology’s way of saying, “oh shut up!”. Good job on your first kilo gone without issue.

Lionel (you’re not getting shortened to LFFL it seems), I completely concur with your observations. Over time, IF shaped my food desires and portions without my ever realising it. Sugar is SO addictive. As the others said, it would be great if your OH joined us here. We’d whip her into shape, ha ha!

Anzac, wonderful that you had such a lovely break after all the unpleasant events in your life recently. Don’t let the employer take advantage of your strong work ethic, OK?

Cinque, what a marathon posting session! And a great ramekin find. I could well imagine you running that vintage clothing shop with Rose.

Lindsay, your mention of freezing the hot water bottle prompts this question: can a hot water bottle be microwaved if it has no metal parts in the screw top?

CalifD, so good that you had a good night’s sleep, always a bonus. I try to limit the news to once a day rather than the 24 hour absorption method. And never, ever would I get my news from the likes of twitter or FB. What an alarming level of political power those social media outlets seem to wield. I can’t imagine following anyone’s ‘instant thoughts’ let alone Trump’s. I’m far too busy living my own life.

We won’t be re-booking our trip. The window of opportunity expires next month. The boat would also need a holiday as it can’t be left unattended on the canals so, at £300 pm for a marina mooring, it’s not viable. In any event, we’re excited to get back to constant cruising come March. We are safe and well and can have the occasional walk in a soggy field with DD over the next seven weeks.

There are far worse places to spend lockdown and I’m grateful that we can float away whenever and to wherever the mood takes us. Meanwhile, our marina neighbours are really lovely. Snippets of conversation while freezing to death outside and standing 6ft apart is all we can manage for now.

Neil, that was awful for your niece’s family and especially those who’d forked out the entire sum for that school trip. Our plans were mere folly and, at £17 per flight, no real risk at all.

Klond, the UK has vaccinated more people than the rest of Europe combined. The NHS is under intense pressure right now. I have great faith in its ability to deliver the vaccine. Tens of thousands of people are administered the ‘flu vaccine every year and they know what they’re doing. The first four categories identified should be vaccinated by the end of February. I’m grateful that includes OH. It’s determined in order of likelihood of death by covid – so largely by age. I miss out by a few weeks on joining the 65+ group which already puts me 11 million further down the list. Now every special interest group imaginable has its collective hand up to queue jump. Logistically, I doubt I’ll get one at all because appointments are by invitation in the mail and we’ll be constant cruisers when my turn comes. No local address = no registration with a local doctor.

I’m grateful that supermarkets have stepped up their resolve today concerning customers refusing to wear masks and social distance. I wasn’t the only one lodging a complaint last week.

Penguin, hoping you’re safely installed in your new, temporary accommodation and that the treatment yielded a satisfactory outcome.

Ok so it turned into a ramble anyway. I may have replied to others this morning, but that’s it for today!

Good morning from a gloriously sunny and warm Sydney. Tops of 30 here today

I am going to write lots of small posts because if I try to save it all up I’ll never write it

Firstly a HUGE hello to dear Klondi! Welcome back and thank you for rejoining our little community. I thought about you often and hoped you and Mr Klondi and lovely Bobby were ok. As the only person I’ve met in person (and can you believe that was August 2019?) I missed you lots.

Sorry work is crazy Neil. I hit the ground running yesterday too. We have a crazy deadline of the end of March to implement two branches into the new product system. Initially this was planned to take one year but they are squeezing it into 3 months. Just because. GAH. First day back and a rude person sent me a meeting request for 7.00pm Sydney time that I politely DECLINED. For goodness sake!

So sorry about your trip Thin, but it wasn’t a huge surprise that it had to be cancelled. Glad you are safe and able to do some walks with your daughter. I saw some terrible pictures this morning of hospitals in the UK that are well beyond breaking point. It is just so terrible and it makes my heart ache.

Welcome Lionel!

Ok, a meeting looms. Back soon 🙂

A quick post to say hello. Good morning everyone.

I’m still feeling shattered after a hot day of babysitting yesterday and too many nights of quite broken sleep lately (the heat I think). Luckily today I have no requirement to be anywhere or do anything at any particular time – what a blessing.
Despite the heat I got the kids covered in sunblock and hats and insisted we still had to walk if they wanted to go to the bakery for lunch yesterday. Miss 7 was incredulous and said “I can’t believe you’re making us walk.” She recovered from feeling aggrieved quickly enough and as usual they both enjoyed themselves. When we got home she wanted to go on the trampoline – I’m the only one who saw the irony in that.

FD for me and I thankfully have a large tub of freekah, sprouted legume and crunchy veg salad in the fridge so I can have a bowl of that for dinner.

Time for a second cup of tea and a hot wheat bag for my back. I’ll try to pop in again later and catch up properly. Hope you are all having a good day.

Hi Lionel !

Good to meet you and read your story. My suggestions, as you’ve already noted, are to sync your Fast Days, and ask if your wife would like to say hello on the forum here. There is a lot of experience here on this thread, with long- term fasters, several with spouses on, off or sometimes on or off 5:2 or otherwise modifying their diet and lifestyle. We are an eclectic mix of people who recognise that everyone works through their own path on 5:2 finding out what works for them and what doesn’t. Suggestions are made and individuals encouraged without people telling anyone what to do. We recognise that people’s lifestyles can be very different and that 5:2 is worked through by them to fit their invidual lifestyle, philosophy and circumstances.

Cheers,
Merry