Mmm... Tasty

To kick off this entry, here's the clip I'm about to tell you about:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZuV1LJxtJk
Skip to 1.45 for the important bit by the way. I was watching Disney (forcibly by James) and this scene came up. I cracked up; this Jerry guy is me! It was hilarious. Watch the video to find out what I'm talking about! (PS I don't mean that I saw my grandmother in a bikini one day).

On a slightly different note, I bought some lamb's tongue at the butcher a few days ago because it was the cheapest cut of meat (no surprises there). I had a quick look up at how to cook it and even though I only found beef tongue, it seemed pretty simple: poach for a while, peel the skin, slice thin, panfry if wanted. There was speculation over whether to let it cool or not before peeling, so I did half half.

I popped the tongues (five of them) in a pot with some rosemary, oregano and chilli...

Pull ups

Last year we had to find a book for English that was an autobiography, and I picked out Anthony Field (the Blue Wiggle) and read it realising that it was half about his health struggle, half a guidebook to the sorts of exercises he does. He's 50 and ripped, so whatever he did must be fantastic. What he DID do was discover the magic of barefootedness, but also of inverted workouts. Basically all his workout moves are done on a pull up bar. I was pretty mystified by this style of workouts and really liked the idea of it, but didn't like the idea of getting a pull up bar.

I've been reading recently about pull ups (especially on Al Kavadlo's site) and about how amazing they are, so I got dad to screw in a makeshift bar. It's from a hair washing basin and it's a funny shape so it's a bit strange to hang off. I can't pull myself up yet. Not even a chin up. So I'm gonna hang until my back muscles get used to it.

And while I do that, I'll do all funny stuff with my legs. On the beach we stayed at for the week, they had a boardwalk and I hung off the bottom of it sometimes, like this morning. I can only hold a really bad L for 6 seconds but the tucks are a little easier. I'll just have to practice when I get home.

Egglessness

I'm sick of my eczema. It's one of the main problems I have that's gotten worse with my adoption of a paleo diet. I've had it for a couple of years now (apart from childhood), and it popped back up when I started getting super stressed about school. So my eczema is mainly due to all the stress I go through but I sometimes like to blame foods for it.

I looked up dietary options for 'fixing' eczema that go with paleo-ness, and I've found a few options, but I decided to go with an egg allergy first. Eggs are my hero. They're my staple breakfast, and they're probably the only things I make sure I get good quality of. I go nuts for them. But last October, when I started eating more eggs (and more carrots), I noticed that my skin was getting more orange, so I thought it was the eggs (but I cut out carrots for a bit and I'm much better now).

I don't know why the hell I decided to cut out eggs on EASTER. I was just sick of my eczema so much (it had gotten worse with my four or so assessments in the same week) that I decided that a month to cut out something. So I cut out eggs, because it was a single food, even though it's one of the only foods I couldn't imagine giving up.

It's been 2 weeks - actually, nearly 3 - since I stopped eating them, and unless it's a die off reaction, my body needs eggs. But let's just see how I go.

Next Thursday I'm driving out to the country to get some free range eggs to celebrate :) I don't think I'll be able to go egg free for much longer.

I Did It Again

Well, let's just say it's been a looooong time since I even thought about blogging, but here I am again. I think I need a strategy for this. That works.

I'm thinking really ultra short entries. Things that take me two seconds to write. Because I can write a hell of a lot when I get going, so I think my entries should just be short and sweet.

I was hoping to rekindle the fire of my blogging by making them more like Facebook updates and short things that happen, such as:

"I went to dad's, and since he buys EVERYTHING when they're on special, he branched out of his usual jams and bought a St Dalfour's Fig Jam. Not only is the jar super pretty (can't wait to ferment some asparagus in there!) and it's from France (I've been a little obsessed with France since I read the beginning of 'French Kids Eat Everything'), but it's PALEO!! Oh yes, there is a god. All of their jams. All they have is the fruit, fruit juice concentrate (ok, so maybe Grok didn't have access to that), some citric acid - normally just lemon juicey type of stuff - and some have pectin (from fruit). Ahhh! So I had a spoonful of it with my persimmon. I know, I'm weird, ok?"

That would be the entire entry, maybe with an additional photo or two.

Or, if it's more lengthy, it'd only be like this:

"Today I took my time to volunteer at the Tough Mudder that I had signed up for. I wanted to do it myself but 20km? In mud? With all those horrific(ally awesome) obstacles? Not with this bendy boney body. So I turned up hopeful to make a possible friend or two, and see how difficult this challenge was.

I turned up and after looking anorexic and not eating much of the free lunch I was given (a veggie burger, a bag of chips, a cookie, and an apple - which I ate slowly), I was sent out to man the mohawk and mullet area, and I only shaved two guys' heads since everyone else shaved theirs before (I got there at midday). Then one of the head volunteer guys came over and dropped me at the finish line to put the glorified orange headbands on everyone.

I was there for a while. I, along with a girl called Dana who had volunteered over her hours, and an American couple of which the guy was the winner this morning, stretched the headbands around the wet and muddy heads. A few people asked us to 'crown' them, a couple of guys got down on one knee (the guy knighted him), and I even got a lovely sloppy muddy hug. A few dainty girls came out the other side of the electric shocky thing crying. But I think that if I was to do it, I'd give the poor volunteer a messy hug and make sure they got muddy. Hehehe.

And when it was over, I followed David, one of the main volunteer guys, around like a lost puppy and he got me to cut all the zip cords on the banners. That was not fun, I can tell you. But after doing it for a while, I came out of the portaloo with him an some other main volunteer guy telling me that they wanted me to sign up to do paid volunteer-style work. I could be paid for this sort of stuff! So we exchanged details and I took leftover bananas and solo cans home.

But getting a possible job wasn't the only amazing thing today. I learnt how to quickly lever zip cords out, I learnt that you don't have to be ripped (or even have any nice physique) to be a Tough Mudder, and I learnt that doing good gets you places."
And sometimes it might just be:

"I MADE MYSELF A BEANIE! It's hot pink and ribbed and the perfect size for my head and I'm actually going to wear it places. Yaaay!"

I'll see if I can keep entries up once a week (I'm thinking Thursdays), but let's just see what exciting happenings happen.

:)