One Step Forward, Seven Steps Back

"It's like falling off a 30-storey building. For the first 20, it doesn't seem so bad.'' - an economist talking the US deficits

Am I a bad person if my actions sometimes don't go in line with my grandest intentions? If I had all of this year planned and strived to be healthier and lighter, but am cursed with the inability to leave a decent single-malt alone? Five glorious single-malts, to be exact. Ahem, plus two unidentified shots. All within an hour, at Friday's party. The bad/good news: it is the first of many year-end industry bashes to come.

Arggh, I should have known: if you are hell-bent on not spending money, stay a mile away from a shoe shop.

In Helga's weight-watcher terms, one drink is equal in fatty points to one meal. Which means, to undo the FPs I've chalked up, I'd have to starve for more than two days just to get on an even keel.

Yesterday was spent in fitness penance. After huffing and puffing lap after lap with Boy, the truth sort of marched up to me and slapped me in the face: it was one step forward, seven steps back, darling.

The funny thing is, I'm the last person I'd expect to be gormlessly adding up and subtracting calories on a beautiful Saturday morning, having spent most of my life being warned on how freakishly stick-thin I was. But now, it's like all those suppers-past are coming to get me.

One day, absolute discipline will come - when I'm sick and tired of running laps, and realise it's far less painful to just have one tiny drink, period.

Bugged and Bothered

Thank goodness I can still write. Because I've just about lost my voice, after battling a particularly stubborn cough for a week. Housed-in and feeling floaty/woozy with cough mixture ... Hmm, that's is not something I've felt for years. Kind of matches the grey and drab weather this week, don't you think?

Frankly, sweethearts, there's nothing to take the wind out of your sails, the cheer out of your day, like illness. Voiceless, breathless, germy. No one, but no one, can stand up to it.

I tried to call its bluff, of course, doing ""normal" things like my usual stadium laps and bingeing with a baby-and-husband-free SK at, ahem, The Line. Ok, those two extreme activities probably did me in, on hindsight. But hey, who can resist the fabulous chocolate fountain and sublime cold lobsters? (Cough, cough).

Champagne, out. Choccies, out. What's a girl to do? Ah, there's nothing I enjoy more, when being housed-in, than reading. And there's nothing I adore reading than Lonely Planet books. I'm probably the only person who reads travel guides for fun, rather than with the aim of setting foot on the said locale. Thanks to the abundant resources at Fisher library, I reckon I've covered more than 30 countries. Sometimes, it is the reading that ignites in me that desire to go to a certain place, not the other way around, Turkey being a case. So, it's the super-thick China guide for me these couple of days.

How ironic, to be mentally most adventurous when you're physically most feeble and inactive.

Another turkey-related read I find utterly absorbing now is the new Cold Storage Christmas catalogue, which Boy's mom brought back. It conjures an image of warmth and plenty. So full of pictures of Chrissie delicacies, t'is good bedtime reading, no? All the better if you can dream of it afterwards. Mm, I so want the salmon terrine pack.

Embrace the day, y'all who are out and about. I am a vivid shade of aquamarine: green with envy and blue with my form.