My January fitness things were hit and miss. I have been doing
the daily exercises but tailed off towards the end as I got busier/more
stressed/exhausted with work. It is very easy for me to find an excuse not to
do something! I had already decided in January that I was going to continue
with a base level number of squats and push ups so that I didn’t completely
lose the ability to do them. I also decided to add other things into the fitness
regime to target other muscles, such as side leg lifts (lie on your side and
lift the top leg 10 times, then swap).
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| Not related to exercise or anything actually in this blog post, but I like snowdrops and I like this photo |
I realised also on the first of February that I had decided
to aim to walk 10,000 steps a day during February. I managed 6,525 on the
first, so a little bit short! I think this is going to be quite challenging for
me as although I move a lot at work, I don’t actually walk very much. All of my
manual handling training tells me to keep the journey as short as possible,
which means as few steps as possible. Last year I was going to get up at 7am,
go for a brisk walk at 7:30am, and be back home by 8am to get ready for work. I
never did it. Maybe when the weather is better…
As well as this, last year I took my skipping rope to my
Selly Oak work site. I have had it for years but no longer have anywhere to use
it where I’m not going to rip up clods of grass or flick pebbles into car
windows, so I took it to work where I have room to use it. I also didn’t use it
last year. At all. I have however used it once this year (and it fecking killed
me), so I am going to do some jump rope every time I am at my Selly Oak site,
which sometimes is twice a week! Initial experiments tells me that although I wear
a sports bra for work, I might want to consider investing in a better one.
Gotta keep them titties down.
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| Sunny morning through the trees at the back of the office |
Aside from fitness and trying to not be out of breath every
time I walk up a flight of stairs, other challenges I have set myself include:
·
No personal social media on the weekends. I already
don’t use work social media unless I am at work for a weekend event, but I don’t
work many weekends so this isn’t too much of an issue. I spend so much time
aimlessly scrolling and it is just mind-numbing, it feeds my anxiety, it makes
my eyes hurt, and it’s just a massive sign of boredom. So I’m trying to stop it
and do other things with my time. Like playing Sims 3.
·
I am going to start a pilates class! I have
found one at a time that I can do at a local venue, so this month I am going to
start weekly pilates. It is also fairly cheap! This does mean budgeting more money
towards exercise but it’ll be worth it, especially as I am doing hula hooping,
skipping and other small routines at home. I really need to improve the flexibility
of my hips and the strength in my back.
·
I am going to make a lunch plan for work. There have
been lots of trips to Greggs of late and I need to stop this. I do like a
Greggs donut though! And a tuna crunch baguette. And the new fake steak bakes. I
am going to plan my lunches based on where I am, ie either at site or in the
office, and also the days of the week, as I get a free lunch at some of the
sites.
·
I will finish one outstanding crochet project
this month! I have lots of amigurumi on the go that needs finishing, and so
many squares to finish, and bunting to make, and… and... and...
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| Rudy's Pizza. Huge. Yummy. |
In other news, I have Done An Adulting and have completely switched my bank account allegiance after almost twenty years! Everything about it is good, except I feel like I’ve cheated on HSBC and have abandoned them. However, lots of reasons make it better in pretty much every way possible, so I’ve gone and dunnit. I’ve consolidated debts which has reduced my repayments considerably which will save me money in the long term.
I think this month I am also going to try and get up the plot
and paint the new batch of wood, and start removing the bean bed. I have
decided to completely redo the corner where the bean bed is so it needs to come
up, be dismantled, and then be rebuilt a different way. As it is at the top of
the plot it shouldn’t be too wet and quagmire-y up there. I have plans for a
long, tall, skinny raised bed along the boundary of the plot (going up and
down, rather than across the plot) and filling it with flowers and bulbs. It will
be a boundary marker, a windbreak, a wall of flowers, and generally just look
nice.
