Poorly bear

I sick.

The cold which my colleagues have been racked with over the last fortnight finally caught up with me at work on Tuesday afternoon.  I could feel the exact moment it started: the scratchy throat, the achy shoulder and, an hour later on the drive home, the snot gathering.  Sigh.

Knowing that Wednesday was due to be a busy day for me and feeling rubbish, I cancelled training on Tuesday evening in an attempt to preserve my energy.  I agonised about it for a while as I have to be wary of my chimp seizing on any excuse to get out of exercise but I think I made the right choice.  There is no point in beasting your body when it's not well and there is no point in paying for personal training if you're not going to work really hard!

Yesterday (Wednesday) was, as I'd anticipated, an extremely busy day so I was glad of every extra ounce of energy.  I was playing golf first thing so departed from the plan to have breakfast first. 

Since I started the plan, I have played 2 rounds of golf without breakfast and both had played reasonably well but scored badly.  I had had severe episodes of lack of concentration and made a few silly errors which had cost me badly.  So, I decided to have a carb-free breakfast before I played in the hope that this would give me both energy and powers of concentration.  It worked as I played and scored much better.  If it hadn't been for bad luck and a silly mistake on the 16th and 18th I would have done really well, as it was I came third and played within my buffer zone for handicap purposes.

I did, however, stick to my cold shower despite waking up with a head full of cold.  My chimp was not happy about this decision but, because I turn the temperature down on the shower gradually, I was able to persuade her to stick it out.  Actually the cold shower was great.  It really perked me up and got rid of the lingering, achy stiffness which a night with a cold brings.  So much so that, despite feeling even worse this morning, I was able to have a full-on cold shower with no problems and feel better for it.

Anyway, back to yesterday.  Golf over, it was a salad lunch and over to my old house for gardening duties.  I have struggled to find a dry, free day so that lawn needed a cut and I had an empty green bin to fill with autumn clearout stuff.  I had a viewing midway through the afternoon (they liked it but have a house to sell so I'm not getting excited) but otherwise worked solidly from 1 until 5pm.  THAT tired me out but it was a satisfying tiredness.

My day was still not over.  I had still to collect the Marie Curie Cancer Care charity envelopes I had delivered over the weekend.  It was striking to note how organised older people are!  There is a row of  60s/70s house just up from ours which are all occupied by retired couples and every one had their envelopes ready and waiting!  Once I hit the more chaotic, younger homes and family homes it was much more a case of scrabbling through piles of stuff or handing me a handful of change!  There was only one woman who rudely blanked me, blatantly lying that she hadn't had the envelope which I could see on the counter behind her.  If she doesn't want to give, why doesn't she just say so?  I pointed out that I had delivered the envelope but it was no problem if she didn't want to donate and turned away.  Silly cow.

So, I was slightly surprised and heartened by the success rate; only a handful of houses with no answer or no donation and a total donation of £40.  That doesn't sound much but it is only one street and that is, apparently, the average collection and they all add up. 

It will cost me a fortune as I keep the cash and send Marie Curie a cheque for the amount collected.  Now, several envelopes were full of coppers (people obviously use their copper jars for this purpose) all of which will go into MY huge copper collecting piggie and, even worse, £6 of the cash collected came in the form of £2 coins which I also collect and which forms our holiday fund.  So, although I will write a cheque for the full amount, a tenner or so has gone straight into the bellies of the hungry piggies in my cupboard!!

Then, it's home, cook supper (liver and bacon with leek mash and rich onion gravy....mmmmm) and collapse on the couch at 7pm before the cold hit hard and turned me into a shivering, sneezing wreck.

I was pleased that I didn't turn to carbs or booze for comfort.  Craving something sweet after supper, I had an icecream bar (a Solero) but it is only 90 cals and 19g carbs and allowed for within my day.  The mash was very comforting but, bulked up by the leeks, was a smaller portion of potatoes than I would usually have so all good.  I'm not giving in peeps!!