July 18 - Mixed Bag Day

  I'm happy with my day overall.  It was definitely and mixed bag and tomorrow already feels daunting before it's arrived, but I'll let you each judge by your own perceptions.  First off a little happy happy joy joy moment!  I stepped on the scales last night, 123.7kg which means I've lost 3kg since I started 18 days ago.  Eeeee!
  It was very hard to get out of bed this morning.  It was warm and toasty all cocooned in my doona with no sneaky doona thief to wrest me from it.  But still, that persistent 'beep beep beep' every eight minutes couldn't be ignored forever.  So it was up and into my daily marathon hot shower where there are no beeps to spoil the illusion of a warm eternity.  By that time though, consciousness intruded and reminded me I was actually expected to turn up at work occasionally if I wished to continue receiving a salary.

  Naturally I had forgotten to defrost my berries, so it was a toasted muffin with Nutella for breakfast.  I'm pretty sure Nutella should be on the naughty list but while it's in the house it will gradually get eaten and assist in the prevention of chocolate binges.  The urge to eat chocolate and roll up into a ball will be particularly strong this week so it's probably not a bad thing that I have Nutella as a fall-back position.
  Work was more resumes from 9am - 11am and then the horrible realisation that today was the cut off date for submitting my comments on my team's performance reviews.  Argh!  So three staff reviews full of glowing praise later I finally had an hour left to actually do something productive!

  Lunch was in there somewhere.  I had a corn wrap with double smoked ham, a small tomato and one slice of Bega Tasty cheese (the last slice of the full fat, next box will be the light stuff).  I toasted it in the sandwich press and that improved the quality and flavour of the corn wrap somewhat so there may be some hope for them yet.  A small banana and a passionfruit were also enjoyed.
  I also went shopping at lunch time.  It was unbelievably cold in the office today!  Only 16°C at 11:22am.. I know that because my right-hand gal had snagged a thermometer by this point to monitor our misery.  This of course meant that I needed a better coat!  So three tops and two cardi-coats later I was back and warmer for it.  I bought 5 items of clothing and spent less than $50!  Thank you Millers!
  Straight after work I got changed into cat-safe clothes and headed to Mr Smart's.  I realised two things last night, 1) if I don't splurge once in a while I will just find this all to hard and quit and 2) tonight was the night I needed to splurge.  Fortunately, Mr Smart is very supportive and suggested a great little Indian place on High Street called Maharaja Tandoori Cuisine.  They start you with a poppadum each with some tangy mint chutney and sticky sweet tamarind sauce while you peruse the menu.  Their poppadums had caraway seeds in which was a lovely added flavour boost.  The rest of the meal follow photographically:

Chicken Tikka and Samosa

Daal Makhani, Lamb Rogan Josh, Butter Chicken, Raita and Mango Chutney

See Mr Heinz!  This is what delicious chunky Butter Chicken looks like!!

Scrumptious tiny hot sweet Gulab Jamun.

  Mr Smart, ever the charming dinner companion, saved me from myself on several occasions and limited my walk home to mere waddling, rather than rolling.  That's right folks, I may not have got on the cross trainer today, but I did walk to and from the restaurant.  Sure, it's only 600m each way, but it's the principle of the thing!
  I was grumpy of course at having to leave Mr Smart's company but regrettably I have an early morning tomorrow.  Surely 6am should not be allowed to exist!
  So as you can see, a mixed bag.  On the one hand, I pigged out and didn't exercise.  On the other hand, I pigged out and didn't exercise.  Tonight certainly squished the cravings I've been fighting off for a week so I do feel like it will be easier to get back to business tomorrow.
  Jess

PS: I should explain the cat-safe clothes yes?
Meet Pizza Cat.  Isn't she adorable!  She's also very funny and happily meows at me whenever I arrive.  I'm informed it's because I fuss over her with unlimited pats.