Woohoo- gym energy :)

I have been a gym member for the last three years, and I have to admit smugly that I am good at going a few times a week, consistently. Perhaps its a gay thing, but the benefits are huge. As one of my friends once said nobody ever says ‘ I wish I hadn’t done that workout’

I usually go in the evenings around 8, do a bit of a warm up and then weightlifting, followed occasionally by a nice visit to the jacuzzi, sauna and steamroom (if there is time). It is absolutely bliss after a hard workout.

The thing is, I have read often that the morning is the best time to do your workout. I can count on one hand the ammount of mornings I have arisen from my cosy bed at 6.30 to go to the gym before work, and Its only about 5 percent of the times I have intended to go.

The sleep button on my alarm is terribly appealing.

Last night when I went to the gym I was getting water when I happened to notice a small flyer about free classes for gym members. For spinning to be precise at 7.15 am for 45 minutes. I quickly calculated that this would kill three birds with one stone. getting me to the gym early, burning off that christmas spare tyre with intense cardio, and getting me out of bed early in the morning in time for work.

And it was hard getting up, believe me. By far the hardest part of the morning.

For those that are unsure, spinning classes involve a hall with a number of stationary bikes, and and instructor in the middle. Our Instructor was incredibly hot, really defined and you could see the muscles tensing all over his body as he did his instructing. (quite distracting actually when you think of it. He guides you along, telling you when to lean forward or to sit up, to go fast or slow down, to increase  or decrease the resistance throughout the workout. There are times of high resistance and spells of easier, slower pace. The change of pace and resistance had me sweating buckets within ten minutes and after 45 there were actual puddles of sweat on and around all the bikes. It was torturous.

A nice shower, 5 mins in the sauna, and home for breakfast by half past 8. In work for 9 o’clock and I’m feeling great.

Are you Proud of yourself today ?

It always surprises me how little time I seem to allocate to blogging. I get a mad burst of drive every so often, write a few posts then leave it years. Reading back on my blog to day I have to say that I am impressed with myself for the emotion and quality of the posts I have done. So why don’t I do it more often?

Its not like I am that busy. When I Consider my mother, working nights as a nurse. Looking after five kids and a husband, a house in the middle of nowhere at least half an hour drive from anything. I know that three of us have left the nest, including myself, but the youngest with Down Syndrome certainly makes up for it. The second youngest, hormonal, moody, lazy, teenager supposed to be studying for exams can only exacerbate the situation. Every so often I think of my mam and I am just awstruck at how she manages. When my mam says she doesn’t have time to piss she really means it.

Then there is me, Teaching dip completed last year, finishing work at three everyday. Huge periods of holidays enjoyed by teachers.  A miniscule 5 minute commuting time. Living in a bright bustling city with lots to see and do. I am quite amazed sometimes how good I have it, yet I never find the time to blog.

Although I read enough of them.

Today I read a short post on Lifehacker about keeping a Diary of three things you are thankful for. Strangely though I am thankful for so much more than three things. Three things today are that I am proud of myself for remembering to pack a nice lunch, as I’m usually starving. I am proud of myself for getting lots of work done with the children in my class today. And I am sure I will be proud of myself for something else by the end of the day.

What kind of things are you thankful for today- What three things could you say about yourself?

Impressed

I am delighted to announce that today seems to have been my busiest day on wordpress yet- with a whole 23 views, Yippee! (I’ve been dying to use that word, the senior infants were learning it this week)

Today I made a tart. First time making it- pastry a bit tastless plenty of sugar in the mix

Gutted

It is always so strange how things pan out. Yesterday I was giving a general update and encouraging myself to blog more regularly, and yesterday turned out to be quite the eventful day to start blogging again.

Yesterday I spoke to the auctioneer about the house beside the river, who told me that an offer had gone in exceeding mine, to which I responded by increasing my offer by nine thousand euro. Then the other buyer increased their offer by a further four thousand, at which stage I conceded, offering that if the sale falls through I will still be interested. I have felt gutted so many times this week that the word gutted is starting to lose its effect.

In similar news I had an inspector visit the school on Tuesday, who despite singing praises and encouraging me on my road to self evaluation and professional development, did not see fit to lift me out of probation as a teacher. I felt gutted, especially as I have never been as sure in my entire life that I am a great (not to mind competent) teacher. I don’t know whether it is part of some government initiative to lower the amount of permanent teaching staff, but nonetheless I felt the whole thing was very unfair.

Then, to top things off, the bf (the one I was cooking spagbol for yesterday) was being extra nice. He had offered to stay over at my place for once. We had a lovely dinner which I had raced down to aldi for. I had baked a lovely apple strudel that cost a fortune (and what do you know I ended up burning it) and icecream for desert. I felt content that even after a rough week I was going to be a great little housewife. While we were preparing the dinner and eating and stuff, things seemed to be going lovely. We talked about all the usual things. He empathised with me about the house and we even spent a good while looking at other potential homes.

Then out of nowhere he asked me about having a threesome with a guy that has recently moved to the city. The guy I have to say is relatively good looking. But he is also five years junior to the Bf, four years junior to me. At young guy might be relatively experienced, perhaps he might enjoy meeting two (ever so slightly) older guys. I would never have thought about it, to be honest, when I was that age. Anyway this post is not about that other guy…

I had watched Desperate Housewives this week, where there are a few scenes about the ‘mask’ that Brie puts on infront of men. It is a cheesy half smile that she uses to hide her emotions. I found my self doing the same thing yesterday. I couldnt help but think that all the Bf’s being nice to me was just a ploy to soften me up to meet this other guy. I said I might, and then asked him if he would prefer to meet this other guy on his own. He said maybe he would. I guess he could see me getting a bit upset so he quickly added that he still thinks I’m sexy.

It was all I could think about for the rest of the evening, an evening supposed to be for the two of us. We both checked out other guys on gaydar and grindr and were talking about who was hot and whatever. I even went to text another guy but to be honest I wasn’t really interested. I asked Bf for sure if he really wanted to go through with meeting this other guy and he said he did.

We decided to do something with our evening so we walked into town, but It was very quiet. We looked at some buildings on the way, talking our time, so it was fairly late by the time we got into town. It was raining and almost all the shops were closed. The BF was after asking this guy to go for tea but the guy didn’t want to go. We went into Costa and I had an expensive hazelnut latte. It was so thick and the frothy milk was like paint. However It was so thinck it was actually quite unpleasant, and the nutty flavour wasnt as nice as others I have had before. The bf had tea. I could see he was distressed by how long it was taking the other guy to respond to his messages and how idle we both seemed sitting here in this most cosmopolitian place in our city, waiting for something to happen.

In the end we just walked home. It started to rain lightly and we didnt say much, just kept on walking in the mist. I went to bed with my mask still on but on the inside I was gutted. We still spooned but I couldnt stop my mind going over and over the events of the evening. It took me ages to fall asleep. I guess it must have been the espresso in the latte. In the morning, he got up early, as he always does when he stays at mine, and left as fast as he could. I almost let the mask slip as I slammed the door behind him on his way out, before he had a chance to say, let alone kiss me, goodbye.

Yesterday I was just saying how happy I seem to be in this relationship. I think its quite funny how I said I had become happy in the mundane. In this my first long term relationship, In my first long term commitment to have lasted longer than a year (Despite a few slip ups but I’m not talking about them today either) After being so long together I was shocked! Especially when I am usually the one trying to push the boat out when it comes to sex. And I am sure this sound so obvious to people reading this blog but I cant help wondering.. Am I not enough?

yearly update

Today,

Today is the first word I have written in a diary or blog in almost two years.  It is also the first word that usually begins the daily news or diary entry for the children in my school.  You all know the type I mean, ‘ Today is Thursday. It is rainy. Jack got a new pet worm etc’

Its not that I haven’t tried to keep a record… or even that I haven’t had much to say..It has been a very eventful two years I have to say. I have bought no less than two beautiful diarys, one leather bound one from Zara for 10 euro in Rome. Everytime I see the diary I tell my self that today.. today will be the day that I start the diary. but don’t you know, I never quite got around to it.

 

I am over a year in a long term relationship. We spend every spare minute, and often minutes that are not to spare, together doing what I would have considered the mundane before, talking about the news, watching tv, people watching, going to the gym and of course…

cooking.

(were you expecting me to say something else??)

I have had my heartbroken by the Irish property market crash which continues to drag on, and I still don’t have a house of my own yet.  I have viewed many homes, each one more intriguing. Some marvellous houses that have more space than I need, but too far out of town.  I am currently in a struggle with another buyer for a beautiful two bedroomed house beside the river Suir, (and, it transpires, beside a murder scene this morning- nothing to do with me, but maybe it will lower the price, or maybe even scare the other buyer off. :0 )

I have travelled to many countries all over Europe, having done the interrail twice! I have been in Paris three times since my last blog update, Not to mention the amazing cities of Madrid, Venice, Rome, Manaco and so many more. So used to travelling I have become that I have now organised many more for friends and family. I have considered setting up my own travel agency, (not seriously) but it would be a better use of my time than teaching.

Today

today I did not want to get out of bed

Today I will be cooking spaghetti Bolognese for the bf, without mushrooms and with store bought tomato sauce, because he prefers the chemical infused goop in the jar to real tomatoes.  Then I imagine we will go to the gym, before bed and starting off the whole routine again.

But today is perhaps more eventful, if even because I have restarted my blog

What will you do today? xoxo

Swansea

After all the best intentions, I never really got around to writing in this blog everyday. Every city is so unbelievably exciting that I never really had a spare minute. Even on the trains and buses around the city of London (where I suppose retrospectively I could have done a few posts) is so interesting just looking at the peoples style, listening to the accents and feeling the genuine rock and roll that permeates London’s transport system. When I arrived on Thursday morning I really felt like being back home again. I have been In London so many times now (and I am writing this from Berlin) London is still my favourite. I really is the ultimate city the capital of the world and all that. and After travelling aroiund so long I really appreciate that they all speak English without hesitation. I arrived in London on the first great western, which is a far posher train than the one from Swansea to Fishguard. It was easy enough to sleep on too of course if you could sleep I was so excited. I will never forget arriving in Swansea feeling absolutely starving and I had about 40 Min’s to kill so I set of trying to find food. Those of ou who know Swansea know that there is nothing like nothing beside the rail station in Swansea. It was the middle of the night and around club closing time and there were so many young people in the area all completely wasted talking in the cutest welsh accents. then I spotted a girl with a McDonald’s bag and I just asked her where it was. She spent ages explaining it to me but I didn’t mind. and so I set off for Maccee dees. It was ages away about 2km at least and took ages. I was carrying all my heavy bags too. I finally arrived at McDonalds to see a queue miles long quite longer than anything I had ever seen before like stretching across the street. I queued up and I had actually almost got to the door of the restaurant but still had to abandon my plans and make a mad burst back to the train station, still hungry. I also thought a lot about my great aunt Margaret who used to live in Swansea but died just last year. I had been in Swansea twice before to see her. and despite all the rough image and garishness of the city it is actually a really nice city, full of energy and life. As I found out myself at 2am that Wednesday night.

People Watching on the train.

I am just after waiting at the station in Fishguard and I am writing this sitting on the train. I have to say that it absolutely stinks here. The train smells of piss and beer mixed with a bit of bleach for good measure. In fact the train ( it’s really only one car) is very grotty and shook looking. (Arriva trains wales) However Its not all bad, the ticket inspector was kind enough explaining the inter rail pass to me.

Did I mention that there were a lot of travelers on the ferry? Most of them were grand they were all dressed up real nice for the ferry. But anyway– as we disembarked the Stena Europe one if them (who had drank far too much) got in a fight with the terminal supervisor.

He claimed that he had been pinched in the arm which I suspect could have happened, in order to control the man -who was very drunk like-  The man and some other travelers waiting at the station roared their heads off really loud for the whole hour until the train came. There were children woken up by this.The police talked for ages to him before he boarded and right now he is sleeping two seats ahead of me. All the time he was arguing with other men who told him he was a fool and was drunk and told him to stop making a fool of himself an stuff and to act respectfully if he wanted to be treated with respect. I thought this was a rather poignantand appropriate way to let teh guy know the behaviour was not on.

The drunk guy told him to fuck off and went on about how the other man had betrayed him by not sticking up for him. How when he (the drunken guy ) was burying his ‘fador’ that the other guy said he would stick by him forever. This was seriously deep, but perhaps that’s just culture, or maybe it’s just alcohol. Anyway enough ramblings-   the train is moving.
We are off to Swansea!