HI

Tokyo – I’ve been out all day (too hot to be very active though) – just about to catch up on posts and emails, but misread the opening line of yours as “what a bikini weekend” rather than blinkin. Thought ‘someone’s been doing extremely well’

think things will be quicker, but maybe less amusing, if I put my glasses on.

Delighted to find some samphire today, which I adore, but haven’t had for ages, and lots of rhubarb.
There’s some slightly past their best strawberries in the fridge, so I might cook one bowl of rhubarb with strawberries.
I saw a recipe for toasting oats in the oven – a sprinkle would give a nice crunch to yogurt, so I’m going to try those too.

LOL Frog! That made me titter. Bikini weekend would be good, wouldn’t it? This time next year we’ll be bikini babes. Or at the very least swimsuit. Haven’t worn a swimsuit since 1999. Bournemouth. Burned to a crisp. My cousin burned more, I could hear him screaming from his bedroom. His legs were purple.

Toasted oats are lovely.

I’ve just had a bacon chop, small mushroom omelette and 4 turnip wedges. Don’t remember eating it I was so hungry. My head is all muddled. In laws not coming now. I could scream and husband is so laid back and I’m like
nnnnnnnnnnnnnggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg

I need wine.

Hi Lucky
hope the car gets sorted – sounds like you’re landed with most of the holiday preparation – including bikini packing!
Do have fun when you get there – if you’re being lots more active, staying low carb but more relaxed on the 800 cals sounds sensible. Where is it that you’re going?

I’m going to cook all the fruit & oats, then have salmon fillet with samphire – and maybe some courgette.
I might have overdone it with the vegetables, there are tons. I did realise this at some point and stopped putting any more in the basket. They had something called choi sum that I’ve not had before; another time – I do have some pak choi that I don’t cook very often.

Yowser, Blitzen was rescued at Christmas so named after one of Santa’s reindeer – the sad thing was that the small rescue used all the reindeer names and more over the Christmas period.

Blitz and I had a 40 minute walk earlier, and we’ve both now had our tea – mine was an avocado and prawn salad and Blitz had dog food, though I think he would have preferred mine 😀 I also treated myself to a little bottle of a 5.5% wine as it was only £1. It was about 1.5 standard glasses but made the dinner seem really special.

Thanks Frog. Oh, he’s pulled his weight today in all fairness but I wanted it ALL done tonight, and it’s not going to be. Stuff needs ironing, I can’t be bothered, and I need to do something with chicken. Decided against fajitas, going to marinate some chicken breasts overnight and cook them in the morning, then we can have those with veggies or salad. Less faff. Don’t need to leave until about 12 as we can’t book in until 2. We’re off to Llangollen, to a lovely little site in the shadow of a ruined abbey. I just need to chill out. And my previous method of chilling – wine – is not a good idea. Tomorrow night, however…

I had to google what samphire was, never heard of it before! Nor have I heard of choi sum. Can’t go wrong with salmon though, good for you and filling too.

Mmmmm prawns and avocado together, lovely. I don’t know if anyone here remembers me asking about frozen avocados weeks back? I went to Tesco the other day, and I had extraordinarily good luck in the end of aisle clearance – camping chair 70p!! We’d gone in to pick two up. Only thing was it didn’t have the bag to hold it. Non slip Bath mat (I’d just chucked mine) – 25p. 30 really decent adult sized clothes hangers that they were charging a tenner for, packaging broke – £1. And a bag of those bag clips for packets – 25p. So, I decided to investigate the frozen avocados seeing as I’d saved so much lol. Haven’t tried them yet though.

Frozen avocado – such a thing is sold? I’ve not seen that, I’ll have to keep an eye out for it. Wonder if it’s a Tesco only thing as I don’t have one near me.

Also, Lucky, were do you get the things like almond flour and flaxmeal? TIA

Lucky you will have a great time away. Its a lovely place to go to.
Found frozen avocados on tescot online groceries so must try them

Tigger I find Aldi best price for ground almond and they often do flax meal or similar at decent prices if you are nearby one. Holland and Barret do them too.

Well I succumbed to my families insistance to have a treat as we are away!! So, chips and a couple fish bites downed followed by some spearmint chews but THAT’S IT!! I am not doing this for them but for me….

I even made oopsie breads for my sandwiches so don’t want to waste or fall too far back.
My bg was awful earlier so think they are understanding how important it is to do this right! !

I’ve only ever seen it in Tesco and nobody I know has tried it yet. You don’t know unless you try, do you? Might not be as good as fresh avocado, but better than no avocado at all.

I got my almond flour from H&B right at the start, they had a buy one get one half price on loads of stuff, so I got that and my coconut sugar and my coconut flour. It is cheaper online, but I wanted to see if it was something I would use before I bought kilos and kilos of the stuff. There is a bit of a debate about whether normal ground almonds can be used in place of flour, some recipes yes, some no (apparently). I’ve used ground almonds in things that say almond flour or almond meal, it’s a lot cheaper to pick them up from Aldi in that case. But I will get my almond flour online in future because it makes lovely cakes. The flax I got on the baking aisle (IIRC) in Tesco, it was a big bag for about £6. They also sell the seeds for about 80p a pack in the fruit aisle which you can grind yourself. Things like coconut oil I pick up the organic one in B&M for about £2.

Thanks Lucky and SMP.

I’ve only drunk half of this low alcohol wine and it’s gone to my head!! It’s nice though but I better go prep my breakfast and lunch before it makes me fall asleep 😀

Yowzer – yes Gabi is a rescue dog, she is 9 and 1/2 and we have been together 3 1/2 yrs. I am her third home, though no cruelty history. She is gorgeous, gentle (if you are not a rabbit or squirrel when she gets into chase mode) but emotionally independent in many ways – she occasionally sleeps on the bed, but on the spare bit, and on the sofa next to me but never on the lap or head on knee etc. Would say she had ‘attachment issues’ if human – understandable with the changes she has faced. As for rescue dogs from street dog packs abroad – great to offer a new home, but be wise to the issues a feral past may bring and if you have the personal resources to cope. I have another dog (or rather a share in sponsoring) who is one of the Dogs’ Trust residents that will never be able to adapt to a domestic home.

Gabi is half samoyed so thick fur to cope with on hot days, an half border collie giving her colouring.

I love Llangollen, we spend a lot of time in that area, Corwen, Llangollen, Wrexham etc 🙂 Don’t live too far away from there, but far enough for it to be a world away too.

Ooooh I haven’t seen flax in Aldi, although I probably wasn’t looking for it there either. I will have to have a proper look next time I’m in, just in case.

I’m going to have my meal deal bottle of wine (the longest a bottle of wine has ever lasted in my life!) and I know for our ‘meal out’ we’re going to a little tea room we found off the beaten track on my 40th weekend. They do homemade soups, lovely sandwiches, cream teas, cakes, gluten free cakes. After my cheesecake last night, I’m pleased to say I’ve been put off standard sweet puddings for the time being, I even had to leave the cheesecake base! Too, too sweet! Never thought I would see the day that I’d utter those words! I’m umming and aahing about having soup and a sandwich, or just the soup at the moment, which I know is veg and GF. At least soup and a sandwich would be better than me going to the pub and having pie and chips or something! We’ll see. Like you say, it is my holiday. And when I think back to last year’s holiday, takeaways, meals out, and when I did cook in the apartment it was naughty stuff, loads of wine, ice creams, full English most mornings, cream cakes and pies… I think I can allow myself one egg salad sandwich without tearing myself apart! 😉 This diet is great but it ain’t half making my conscience work on overdrive!

Did you enjoy your chips? It’s not something I’ve missed really, which has surprised me. When I think about having fish and chips, it’s the fish I’m missing more. Odd.

Oh no Tigger, on a 5% wine? I’m going to be on my backside tomorrow night after a sip of this one I got from Tesco!

quick catch up on all the things I haven’t read today until now!

Avila – Gabi looks adorable
as does Blitzen Tigger – they both look as if they provide long and active walks (I had half an hour in the park with Froglet this afternoon, and she was happy exploring a patch that was about a metre square).

Imogen – 6.4 miles is 10.3km – depends how long your average stride is, but mine is 80cm
if your stride length is similar, that would be 12,875 – so around 13k, which is great.
Lucky calculated that 10,000 steps take her about ten minutes, which is probably an easy conversion to have in your head.
I don’t have a snazzy fitbit or similar, but quite a good pedometer which tracks aerobic steps and less fast ones, so I have to manually record daily steps in my fitness pal, which measures in time. On days when I forget to put it on, I now find it quite easy to remember how long I’ve fast walked, and the slower steps.

Gavin – Froglet is loving all the fish and meat, she expects to share everything, I have to moderate how much greek yogurt she has, as it doesn’t agree with her if she has too much, but she adores that too, got it smeared all over her whiskers the other day (the bowl was too small). She;s quite keen on avocado too.
I bet your dogs made sure that you got further than 110 steps!

Happy Birthday Bissell
http://paleononpaleo.com/paleo-recipes-portuguese-almond-cake/
I googled for a picture of a healthy cake – this recipe, honey aside, looks quite good!

Lovely photos Izzy – is that all really close to you? Looks amazing!

Verano & Yowzer – the responses were predictable, but mixed – the philosopher was very definitely on the ‘must be prioritised, of course we can afford it, the Labour MP was in favour of providing it, but quoted a very odd list of ‘people that didn’t deserve to get HiV’ (I’m paraphrasing!) that wouldn’t benefit from the drug anyway, the Conservative MP tried to sound very patronisingly caring, but comparing it to people needing cataract operations, and the the economist was very anti. Interesting though!

I used to seriously dislike cottage cheese – it was “diet food” – but pre BSD had only had the no/low fat stuff – I’ve found the full fat stuff a revelation!

Middleage – bags of sugar is probably more appropriate, but I worked out that the gross weight of a can of catfood is 1lb – not that I’m full of catfood, but every now and then I have to lug trays of it around, so it’s a great comparator for me, both visually, and appreciating how much it actually is to lug about.

now to cook the salmon and rhubarb!

Frozen avocado? I have frozen blended avocado flesh (a bumper pack of cheap because over ripe ones) and that is ok.

Naughty wine night here too – on day 7. But common in Mediterranean diets so better than the cider option??? That’s my theory – though I know water is the well behaved option!

Frog – 1000 steps takes me 10 minutes 😉 At a steady pace, non sweat breaking 🙂

Have I missed Izzy? 😮 I’m going to make a coffee and go back through the thread. I’ve missed a load I think.

No I didn’t really enjoy actually prob because I didn’t want to lol but to be fair to the restaurant they were very well cooked and not oily. Still it’s done and tomorrow is a new day. Am trying but will def do 800 calls on my return at weekend.

Loving the photos and stories of our pets😀 I love animals. We have an old boy now , a greyhound , x racer rescued who is the most affectionate loveable chap. However he is 12 yrs old and recently diagnosed with dementia!!!

Yeah Avila, I think they’re quite new. Saw them a few weeks back but didn’t take the plunge then. I usually buy the big nets from Morrisons they have about 7 for under £2 but they’re hit and miss.

I’ve just been too worried to have wine because apparently low carb makes us lightweights. Which is good financially, I suppose. Think it’s about 11 weeks since I had wine 😮 Lordy.

Samphire is amazing – salty-ish, and crunchy if it’s cooked right, it has quite a short season though, so I was concerned I;d missed it and not had any.
I’ve just looked up the nutrition, 50g will probably be a good portion, and that’s 22 calories and 4.5 carbs
as long as I don’t chuck to much butter on it it’ll be fine!

Thanks for doing that calculation for me Frog….better step number than I thought😊 Now I just have to keep it up!!

Hmmmm Samphire, haven’t had that for years…must check the local stores.

Lucky, Have a great holiday…and relax…mind you, the wine will sort that!!😉

I bought some of those multi pack avocados today Lucky – small ones are good for me, because the second half of a large one never looks so good the next day, even if you cover it in lemon or lime juice. I saw posts about frozen avocado – not a good option given my lack of freezer space, but maybe I should try freezing the half of the avocado that I don’t use when I have large ones.
I got an amazing fish platter – smoked salmon, roast salmon, mackerel and some other fish I can’t remember, with something mayonaisy in the middle that I probably won’t use – it’s a big circular platter thing, so not fridge friendly, but a great way of buying small portions. Looking forward to that!
I had to buy more dishwasher tablets – the same brand and type varied between about 16p and 35p each, depending on pack size, so I got a large one too big, but the 16p end of the range. I then walked past a discount store that had even larger packs where they worked out at just under 10p each. I now have over 100 dishwasher tablets – probably about six months worth!

Frog – 10, 000 steps in 10 mins? either Lucky should be in Rio for one race or another or an attack of the typo 🙂

Gabi gets to lick out the yoghurt pot etc – but then no-one has told her certain foods are supposed to make her ill, over the years she has stolen a whole box of chocolates, packets of raisins and discovered the Christmas cake I brought back from parents, lets say I didn’t get any! But not a single sign of tummy upset in the dog…

whoops – well spotted, I wish (bet Lucky does too!) extra zero slipped in, I meant 1,000!
sorry Imogen

I’ve had my Blitzen about 5 years and he must be getting on for 7 now. He’s got problems with his hips and is over weight so it’s a steady plod for us both – 20 minutes in the morning wears him out for the day. He does like his mad 5 minutes when he runs very fast but as he’s mostly a greyhound crossed with a bull terrier, of some sort, he tires easily and just loves pottering around reading the ‘wee mail’ 😀

I didn’t drink much before starting the BSD so I’m a bit of a ‘light-weight’ any way when it comes to alcohol 😀

this is such a busy thread that by the time finish a post we are behind the curve!

Frog – you may have the dishwasher tablets for months, I have dog food for 4 months ahead! I started with online supermarket deliveries a while back when I fell down the stairs and broke my big toe and barred from driving. From that I got a pattern of a £10 off voucher for next 4 orders but needed to be over £50 – ordered the heavy things and any other bulk purchase that would last well.

So 5 bags of 15kg dog food and the 12 can packs… also have toilet rolls for the duration!

The dog food bags are my guide for weight loss – I need to lose one and a half of them to get to a healthy rate. My blood glucose is top of the ok level – bordering prediabetic but not there yet. However I have been on blood pressure meds for over 2 years at only 41 – weight and drinking is a key factor, though I have been on antidepressants that have blood pressure side effects too.

So I am on the BSD to avoid the prediabetic/diabetic risk but in the hope that the weight loss (that MM says is ok as a use for the BSD) will help my blood pressure and allow to reduce if not kick my BP meds

Lucky, you will enjoy your holiday without guilt or stress. I decree it. And even if you have a few treats, it is utterly impossible to put 2.5 stone on in a week!

a ” bikini” weekend made me laugh too frog !!
thought i had come onto the wrong thread with all the talk of dogs! weres janey and lucky tonight?
lucky say your not packing for your hols still??
janey i am not asking what your doing !!!

I’m here! Dog free

TIGGER That is so sad about the dogs at Christmas 🙁 wee mail made me smile tho!
we have a cat rescue place near where i live…always full..abandoned cats,old cats,young cats,ill cats,mums with babies,cats whose owners have died..its heartbreaking..some stay there years ..the woman who runs it is wonderful..theyve taken over her three storey house.
On a cheerier note…Glad you got yrself a little treat to go with dindins..we have to do these little things to make life as fun as poss.
LUCKY!Such bargains! 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻 nothing is more satisfying than a good bargain!
AVILA yes they are aware its a real problem taking on a romanian rescue..lots of the dogs are not used to humans at all, and need to a lot of training and patience,so theyre having to consider if they have enough free time to devote to this good cause….i am not sure if it will happen,or maybe DD will get a rescue locally X

nearing 3000 posts janey does lucky know i wonder ?

Lucky have a brill holiday!! 😘😘👙☀️🎈🌊👣

My wireless just packed up on my PC!!!! FGS!!!! I need to reboot but putting music on hubby’s iPod. Be back in 10!

Have a great holiday Lucky, i go next Monday to France hooray

I sympathise Lucky, it’s taken me 3 calls to very helpful folks at Virgin to get my new modem sorted properly!

Yay, Eps in the house! Where you been??

3000 posts! Thats awesome LUCKY! You’ve created a little home from home here,anyone can ring yr bell and the kettles always on for tea,sympathy and laughs along the way for your many visitors 😀😀😀😀 i dont know hwo you keep up!
Happy hols,we will look after the ranch for you while you holiday! 😎🍷💐🌞🌷xx

Don’t worry Lucky, we will be here when you get back. Although, with 64 posts to 3000, I may steal the honour 😍😍😍

My pussies wish you a great holiday!

what on earth is going on if its not dogs now its cats ?? have i missed something ??

I’m back! Must have been the husband’s ipod conflicting with my dongle. Which, unfortunately is nowhere near as exciting as it sounds. A quick reboot and pulling out the ipod worked in the end! It’s just sounding filthy so I’ll shut up. I’m back online, is all I needed to say.

Yes I see Tokyo 🙂 This last 1000 has flown hasn’t it?

Hey Eps, where have you been hiding? 🙂 You behaving yourself?

You have a great holiday too Josie, more exotic than mine lol.

I was stressing Tigger, even though it’s not the only means I have to get online, I was panicking lol. Thought it was the perfect end to the bloody perfect day lol.

Thanks Yowzer, that’s really sweet of you 🙂 I hope I won’t come back to complete carnage, writing on my walls and broken windows? :-p

Thank them for me Janey 🙂 You know how much I love cats.

Especially talking ones.

well you created this lunacy lucky you should get the 3000 post !! ha ha !!

You got the 1000th post, was it Janey got the 2000th?

Probably not as much fun as yours tho Lucky, just us two old people

not sure could have been lucky you would have to look back i guess !

Ooh youre giving us ideas now LUCKY…parties! Hmmmmm while the ( LUCKY) cat’s away. ..etc… 😀😀

GOODNIGHT everybody and don’t forget to …

http://i306.photobucket.com/albums/nn276/yowzer2008/image_zpsjxdnomxr.jpeg
XX

Wasn’t bloody me! Again! Hmmmmph.

Just kidding.

Don’t trash my pad. Night night Yowzer, sweet dreams 🙂

you will come back lucky and it will have gone to the dogs !! literally !!!