April 16: Skipping, a nice surprise and day two of fasting on the 5:2 Diet

While outside this afternoon, putting seed into the bird feeder, I heard the sound of alphorns from a neighbouring village wafting on the breeze. I love the sound of those horns – it’s so melodic and calming. Swissrose, are you often surprised by such sweet sounds too?

To make the most of it, I abandoned my plans to do yoga and grabbed my skipping rope for 15 minutes. Luckily, the constant (and sometimes sporadic!) thwack on the concrete terrace didn’t drown out their songs. A huge falcon was circling over the forest as well, so right now, after listening, exercising and nature spotting, I feel very relaxed.

A day with no plans meant a day of fasting. After the success of the first fast day on Monday, where I almost gave myself lockjaw eating a massive salad, I knew today was going to be more than achievable. So here’s how I broke down the 500 calories allowed on the 5:2 Diet:

  • Breakfast: 100g natural yoghurt with 5g goji berries – 64 and 16 calories
  • Lunch: 63g boiled egg – 102 calories
  • Snack: 104g kiwi fruit – 63 calories
  • Dinner: Stir fry thingy: 54g carrot – 22 calories, 214g zucchini – 36 calories, 50g bacon – 157 calories, tspn olive oil – 40 calories
  • Grand total: 500 calories exactly

By not having Monday’s glass of milk with protein powder, there was room to make a more appealing dinner. But I’ve promised I won’t waffle on too much about the 5:2 Diet, so here endeth my talk of food.

It’s been a day spent on the computer. I wrote another book review, sent a job application and sorted out my iPad’s detachable keyboard, so I now know what the function, alt and command keys actually do. And no, I didn’t find the exclamation mark. (Oh no, I hear you say!) I did find an upside down exclamation mark and a lot of Greek-looking symbols so I think this keyboard isn’t set up for English typing! Not to worry! (Can you tell I’m using my normal computer?! … !!!)

For giggles, I also looked at my stats for posts on fitfor15in15. By far the most popular story I’ve written is “The KonMari Method, with gusto!” Published on February 2, the story has been read every day without fail, and as of this afternoon, it’s been viewed 478 times. I have no idea how readers are being led to it, but I’m guessing most traffic comes from searching the internet for information about decluttering expert Marie Kondo and her KonMari Method (read my review of her book here).

Living with less is a very popular topic, which has been gaining momentum for years. And this month it cracked the bastion of buy buy buy consumerism – Vogue Magazine. I originally read the story of Prerna and Parag Gupta on LifeEdited.com and went to the Vogue website to read the whole story, here. All these kinds of stories make my eyes widen and my pulse race. I love hearing about people who’ve packed it all up and in, so to speak, to downsize, de-stress and hit the road.

Sometimes I wish I’d sold or given away all my things in Australia. They’re all currently stored in mum’s unit block, and I pay for the privilege of keeping memories. Every time I visit, I check to see it hasn’t flooded or isn’t infested with cockroaches and occasionally search for something I think I’ll need (like a trench coat, which I didn’t wear once this winter). I know, in the future, I’m going to wonder why I kept this stuff. I’m beginning to wonder about it now.

  • Physically Fit: Skipping for 15 minutes
  • Mentally Fit: Sorting out my iPad keyboard; applying for a job in Zurich; alphorns and the falcon
  • Nutritionally Fit: Fasting on the 5:2 Diet, 500 calories
  • Minimalism: Reading about Prerna and Parag Gupta; thinking about storage woes

Wishing you a wonderful day.

April 13: 4km run, 40 minute walk and day one of the 5:2 Diet

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Sunshine, garden lights and purple blooms

What a glorious day! Best day of spring so far. A light, warm breeze, 20 degrees Celsius and plenty of sunshine – perfect conditions for a run.

Because I’ve been eating like a queen the past week, I decided to do the 4km circuit rather than the new 5km track, to ease myself back into the running swing. It all felt good – I was powering through the course and did the second kilometre in under 6 minutes which is a first for me. I actually felt like I was running today, rather than shuffling.

Then at 2.5km, I saw a friend of Liliane and Rene’s in her garden with her grandchildren, so stopped for a decent chat.

Then at the 3km mark, the cows from my favourite farmhouse were being taken from the sheds into the little field across the road, so I watched and waited as they made their way into the sunshine.

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Achtung! Cows crossing

Thinking I was home and hosed for a good sprint to the finish, I ran into the neighbour from the big farmhouse who has two small children. She was pushing them in a pram, so I walked the final 500m with them.

Even though it was a stop-start run, it was still great to be outside and I’m happy with the way I was feeling. Maybe another day this week I’ll try the circuit again and see what time I can manage. Today, I would have been on track for my best time, I think.

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How’s that for a view? Taken on the run home

Once home, I put on a wider brimmed hat and walked down to the local supermarket to buy some dinner things. That round trip is 40 minutes. I waved to a friendly farmer and felt my toodles (wobbly fat on the upper arm) swing in the breeze, but I’m pretty confident there’s less than the beginning of the year!

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This friendly farmer gave a wave, so I gave him a doubly enthusiastic one back, toodles and all!

Today is the first day of the 5:2 Diet. I’ve been planning it in my head for a little while. So far so good.

  • Breakfast – a medium grapefruit – 80 calories
  • Lunch – a boiled egg, 50g – 78 calories
  • Two cups of peppermint tea – 0 calories
  • After-run snack – vanilla protein powder in a 200ml glass of milk – 71 calories and 136 calories respectively (the milk needed to be used. Normally I don’t drink cows milk but didn’t want to waste it!)

That totals 365 calories. Dinner is going to be a mixed salad:

  • 100g lettuce leaves – 7 calories
  • Two medium tomatoes – 44 calories
  • Half a cucumber – 32 calories
  • A spring onion – 12 calories
  • Two small carrots – 41 calories

That totals 136 calories (no dressing – a teaspoon of olive oil has 40 calories!), for a grand total of 501 calories. So that’s that! If you can see anything wrong with my calculations, please let me know – being a novice calorie counter means I’m bound to make some mistakes. But hopefully not.

I was dreading the whole calorie counting rubbish but found an excellent service on Google. We have a small set of kitchen scales which made the measurements very easy. In Google search, I typed in “how many calories in a tomato” etc and this came up – how convenient! You can put in any food and it will tell you. My friend Bec also sent me a list of veggies and calories she compiled when she did the 5:2 Diet a while ago, which is a great help.

So there you go. Hopefully I can make it through another few episodes of “The Killing” tonight without getting the munchies, because there’s nothing left for today (that milk was a doozy!). How many calories are in 100g of oil-popped popcorn? The whole day’s allowance! Damn. Maybe tomorrow 🙂

Wishing you a wonderful day.