Beware Greeks bearing gifts...

I knew exercise was bad for you!  The natural running workshop was very interesting but painful and ever so slightly humiliating.  I should have known really that it would attract "proper" runners rather than those of the asthmatic and greedy labrador persuasion so I arrived at the RV at the water tower on Clifton Down a very VERY long time after the rest of the group, having tottered at a snail's pace up Whiteladies Road.  I hate hills, hills are stupid!  After a short(ish) break to recover my breathe we started some drills to get us into the habit of running naturally which basically means planting your foot beneath your hip, landing mainly on the forefoot and then pushing back instead of planting your heel out in front of you and pushing your body over the top of it.  So lots of lifting the knees and flicking the heels (sound familiar? - I felt like I was warming up for Army PT and I was already knackered from running up the bloody hill!)  Lots of the theory makes sense but I have never been a natural runner and so trying to run naturally felt weird and while it's supposed to be more efficient it certainly felt as if it took lots of energy to maintain.  Having been running twice in one day my achilles was complaining loudly so after the session I jogged slowly and painfully back down the hill to embrace a wine bottle to alleviate the pain. Not in the usual way unfortunately but as an alternative to a foam roller to attempt to massage out the niggles.
Saturday was supposed to bring a run or swim but I was knocked down by a massive apathy attack and an invitation to a barbecue by my lovely Greek neighbour.  Hmm exercise and diet scuppered in one fell swoop.  I went with such good intentions but was shanghai'd by some spinach and feta filo pastries.  Now don't even pretend that you would have been able to withstand their siren call!  I was however very proud that I managed to only have one small piece of cake and 2 small glasses of wine and then ripped myself away before I went crazy and was found in the kitchen smeared in chocolate and drinking wine out of the bottle.  I reassured myself that at least I hadn't been tempted to go and bake chocolate bacon cupcakes (yeah you heard me right - I saw them on facebook the other day and all I could think was how something so wrong could sound so bloody delicious!)


You'll note however that I have stopped talking about diet chef and that's because I am back on real food!!!  I couldn't help it ....once I made the move to go back to proper porridge it was too easy to decide to move on to real soup and then to spinach and feta filo pastries  healthy chicken stiry fries.  Sunday resulted in another apathy attack and so yet again I failed to get my bike fixed so I could go for a long cycle or get down to the pool.  I spent the day with the wine bottle and some more pastries (as my lovely Greek neighbour brought some down to say thank you for letting them use my garden for the barbecue) it would have been terribly rude to say no! (wouldn't it??) - if I havent't lost weight by Tuesday I may well cry (or be found in someone's kitchen smeared in chocolate, drinking wine out of the bottle)