Today, one of the coldest days of the year, and in my infinite wisdom, I decided to have 3 tons of cold, wet, and semi-frozen soil delivered. Now I know it doesn’t look too much, but when you’ve only got a little spade, it’s huge.

It took me a little over 3 hours to move it into the raised beds, and what a difference it’s made. The beds just need topping off with compost/soil improver, and they’re be ready for planting.

I’ve just got to decide what to plant now

Stumble It!

I have lost a little more weight this week, another 2lb, that’s 16lbs (7.25kg) over the previous 5 weeks. It’s good to see that my weekly loss is not so dramatic and staying around 2lb a week.

I’ve also set myself a mini target to help motivate me into achieving my weight loss goal. It’s 212lbs that’s a 10% loss from my starting weight.

Weight Loss to date: 1st 2lb  (7.25kg)

This is the latest addition to the veggie garden, our first compost bin. It’s wooden and will hold about a cubic metre of compost when full. We’ve tucked it away at the back of the garden in a sunny spot to help it heat up. This will give just enough space for the waterbut to be installed behind the tree.

And if I say so myself, it doesn’t look to out of place in the garden. Once the shrubs grow in the foreground I doubt we’ll even see it.

I’ve done it, I’ve actually lost my first stone! I can really feel the benefits of losing this weight, training is not getting  easier, but I can do so much more, and do it better.

Loss to date: 14lbs

A quick update on the vegetable garden. The soakaways have been dug and filled with rubble ready for the slabs to be set on top. These will eventually become the footpaths between the planting beds. The soakaways are about 2 foot deep.

As you can see the heavy clay soil is very water logged and the soakaways are a much need accessory in the garden. The hard landscaping is nearly complete, and I’ve managed to use the rubble from the patio I lifted earlier in the week, so that saved a skip hire. The next job is to construct the raised beds, that’s a job for this weekend. Check back soon so see the progress.

In the words of my former upstanding and dependable role model, Homer Simpson, “Woohoo”, I’m so pleased, I’ve shed some more weight this week, 2lb!

I’m feeling much healthier and full of life.

Loss to date: 11lbs

Helen and I have decided it’s time to grow our own fruit and vegetables. We are turning a third of our garden into a vegetable plot. We are having 6 main raised beds (5 x 10 feet) and various smaller beds and pots for things like tomatoes, herbs, etc. So on a very wet and miserable day I started to lift the patio.

In the following pictures you can see that this was not an easy task. I would appear that Persimmon homes, the builders of our house) decided to use all the mortar in East Anglia to bed our patio slabs in! However, it’s not very good mortar, and breaks up quite easily. The big problem is how in the hell am I going to get rid of it . . . .?

I see a skip coming soon.

As the beds are going to be so large, we need to order in top soil, 6 tons of it! The soil will come on the back of a lorry and be tipped onto the driveway. The hard work comes when we start mixing in the compost and putting it into the raised beds.

It’s going to take a lot of work. Worse still, that means I’m going to have to teach Helen how to use a spade . . . . Oh my god!

I have read so many posts about resolutions. Should you make them? Are they a waste of time? After much consideration, I’ve decided that it is important to have goals in my life. Without goals, how do we know what to aim for? So for me, setting a goal, whether I make it or just make a good attempt is necessary.

I would like to live a healthier lifestyle including nutritious eating and becoming more physically active, clear out the clutter in my home and in my mind, save some money, spend more quality time with my kids, and do at least one thing a day, no matter how small, for myself.

Ok, I feel better now! Did you set goals for yourself or not? Let me know

I’ve tried many green teas but all of them are golden in colour for example Lipton green tea.

I follow the instructions, however, when green tea is ready to drink its colour is not green but more golden-brown. So I want to know is, how to make a green tea, in green colour, can you help?

Monday was the first day back training after the two week Christmas holiday. This is the part of Christmas that I don’t enjoy, because my body just does not understand “holiday”. My aged body needs a constant regime of stretching, and working out, or it causes me problems.

That said, I did manage to lose 5lb over the Christmas break. Now I’m sure you’re expecting me to tell you that I maintained strict training program and worked that weight of off. Truth be told, I was unwell and not eating for a few days, and Helen and I enjoyed a walking holiday in Northumberland’s Hadrian Wall country.

This year is so very important, I will be taking my first Kuk Sool Won Black Belt testing in May/June. So I’ve made a commitment to get myself back into shape, living a healthier lifestyle, achieving my very best at Kuk Sool Won, and being a worthy student.

I’m drinking green tea, without any sugar or milk or anything, just by itself, about 4 or 5 times a day. I love green tea, yum!!!

How do you drink your green tea?

From the beginning of the summer I have been feeling extremely impulsive and have cultivated a wide array of unhealthy food habits. So I’m pledging to get down to 175 lbs, and I’m going to do it.

Although I’m a keen martial artist, I’m just as susceptible to falling into bad habits as everyone else. I gained this weight mindlessly. I removed every single restriction that I have had on eating and indulged in breads, pastries, cookies, cakes, and ice cream and gorged on food until I couldn’t move. The way I’m going to lose this weight will be mindlessly as well. I’ll do it be setting up fool-proof restrictions and guidelines that will get me to my target weight, if I do nothing more than follow them.

I’m thinking clearly and have a definite and measurable goal in mind for this weight loss project. All the decisions have been made, now all I have to do is stick to them. Today is January 4th. My goal is to lose 60 lbs in 30 weeks days and weigh 175 lbs by the August 2nd. The reason I want to lose this weight is so that I can be healthier, more energetic and ready for my Black Belt testing.

I took my daughters, Becky and Katie Christmas shopping the other day, it was wonderful. I’d forgotten just how good it was being with my children, spending money, having a laugh and enjoying each other’s company.

We ambled around all the girly shops, under a blaze of Christmas lights, and brought all manner of Christmas presents, some quite wacky.

It’s been a difficult year for the three of us, lots of unpleasant things had happened as a result of the rather exigent divorce their mother and I endured. However, that’s been consigned to history now, and it’s good to know our lives have moved on to a happier place.

For me, just seeing my daughters for a few hours was the best thing in the world. An early Christmas present, the best any Dad could have.

Happy Christmas Becky and Katie Xx

If you are feeling suicidal now, please stop long enough to read this. It will only take about five minutes. I do not want to talk you out of your bad feelings. I am not a therapist or other mental health professional just only someone who knows what it is like to be in pain.

I don’t know who you are, or why you are reading this page. I only know that for the moment, you’re reading it, and that is good. I can assume that you are here because you are troubled and considering ending your life. If it were possible, I would prefer to be there with you at this moment, to sit with you and talk, face-to-face and heart to heart. However, since that is not possible, we will have to make do with this.

I have known a lot of people who have wanted to kill themselves, so I have some small idea of what you might be feeling. I know that you might not be up to reading a long book, so I am going to keep this short. While we are together here for the next five minutes, I have five simple, practical things I would like to share with you. I won’t argue with you about whether you should kill yourself. However, I assume that if you are thinking about it, you feel pretty bad.

Well, you’re still reading, and that’s very good. I’d like to ask you to stay with me for the rest of this page. I hope it means that you’re at least a tiny bit unsure, somewhere deep inside, about whether or not you really will end your life. Often people feel that, even in the deepest darkness of despair. Being unsure about dying is okay and normal. The fact that you are still alive at this minute means you are still a little bit unsure. It means that even while you want to die, at the same time some part of you still wants to live. So let’s hang on to that, and keep going for a few more minutes.

Start by considering this statement:

“Suicide is not chosen; it happens when pain exceeds resources for coping with pain.”

That’s all it’s about. You are not a bad person, or crazy, or weak, or flawed, because you feel suicidal. It doesn’t even mean that you really want to die – it only means that you have more pain than you can cope with right now. If I start piling weights on your shoulders, you will eventually collapse if I add enough weights. no matter how much you want to remain standing. Willpower has nothing to do with it. Of course, you would cheer yourself up, if you could.

Don’t accept it if someone tells you, “that’s not enough to be suicidal about.” There are many kinds of pain that may lead to suicide. Whether or not the pain is bearable may differ from person to person. What might be bearable to someone else may not be bearable to you. The point at which the pain becomes unbearable depends on what kinds of coping resources you have. Individuals vary greatly in their capacity to withstand pain.

When pain exceeds pain-coping resources, suicidal feelings are the result. Suicide is neither wrong nor right; it is not a defect of character; it is morally neutral. It is simply an imbalance of pain versus coping resources.

You can survive suicidal feelings if you do either of two things:  (1) find a way to reduce your pain, or (2) find a way to increase your coping resources. Both are possible.
Now I want to tell you five things to think about.

1. You need to hear that people do get through this — even people who feel as badly as you are feeling now. Statistically, there is a very good chance that you are going to live. I hope that this information gives you some sense of hope.
2. Give yourself some distance. Say to yourself, “I will wait 24 hours before I do anything.” Or a week. Remember that feelings and actions are two different things – just because you feel like killing yourself, doesn’t mean that you have to actually do it right this minute. Put some distance between your suicidal feelings and suicidal action. Even if it’s just 24 hours. You have already done it for 5 minutes, just by reading this page. You can do it for
3. People often turn to suicide because they are seeking relief from pain. Remember that relief is a feeling. And you have to be alive to feel it. You will not feel the relief you so desperately seek, if you are dead.
4. People often turn to suicide because they are seeking relief from pain. Remember that relief is a feeling. And you have to be alive to feel it. You will not feel the relief you so desperately seek, if you are dead. But there are people out there who can be with you in this horrible time, and will not judge you, or argue with you, or send you to a hospital, or try to talk you out of how badly you feel. They will simply care for you. Find one of them. Now. Use your 24 hours, or your week, and tell someone what’s going on with you. It is okay to ask for help.
5. Suicidal feelings are, in and of themselves, traumatic. After they subside, you need to continue caring for yourself. Therapy is a really good idea. So are the various self-help groups available both in your community and on the Internet.

Well, it’s been a few minutes and you’re still with me. I’m really glad.

Since you have made it this far, you deserve a reward. I think you should reward yourself by giving yourself a gift. The gift you will give yourself is a coping resource. Remember, back up near the top of the page, I said that the idea is to make sure you have more coping resources than you have pain. So let’s give you another coping resource, or two, or ten…! Until they outnumber your sources of pain.

Now, while this page may have given you some small relief, the best coping resource we can give you is another human being to talk with. If you find someone who wants to listen, and tell them how you are feeling and how you got to this point, you will have increased your coping resources by one. I hope that the first person you choose won’t be the last. There are many people out there who really want to hear from you. It’s time to start looking around for one of them.
Now: I’d like you to call someone.