Hat-trick

No nothing to do with football or millinery, but rather a note to the fact that I actually dragged my self out of bed 3 times this week to go swimming before work. Well, on Thursday Flâneur tried to drag me, literally by the ankles, but I was getting up anyway, so it doesn’t count as coercion.

I failed to go at all last week while off on leave, despite us setting the alarm early one morning… I just couldn’t do it! Thankfully Flâneur didn’t try to make me and let me just drift off back to sleep. I did manage to put about 3 or 4 pounds on over the course of the week (1 week!!), but it seems to be edging off again. Why does it never come off as quickly as it goes on??

That’s the problem with weeks off though, you loose your routine and all your good intentions go out the window (well, mine do). Although we walked quite a lot during the week, it just wasn’t enough to counteract all the extra eating I seemed to be doing… And having done well with my Easter chocolate (not getting much and then making it last over a few days, rather than scoffing it in one go), this was then scuppered by the future sisters-in-law giving us more!! I tried to let Flâneur eat most of it, but still managed about 100 grams in one day. Urgh.

We did manage a good day on Sunday to try and make up for it though. The weather was beautiful and we decided that we should be out and about in it, rather than stuck inside in our dark flat. We had wanted to picnic during our week off, but the weather stopped us, so it was nice to have an opportunity to pack some sandwiches into our picnic bag and head into the park. We had fruit kicking about that we hadn’t been eating too, so we put that in to make it a more virtuous lunch. We had been intending to walk in the park anyway, but decided that rather than going our usual route through the valley between Arthur’s Seat and the Crags, we’d go up, and (taking frequent breaks for me to catch my breath, Flâneur is something of a mountain goat when it comes to this stuff) we got up there in not too bad a time. We were so near the top that I declared that it would be rude to come all that way and not get to the top of the Seat so up we went! It was a glorious view (through all the other folk up there) and very satisfying to get to the top. The picnic was eaten half way back down and a thoroughly good day it was.

And then back down to Earth with a bump on Monday as I was back up at 6:30 to go to the pool and then back at work. Man I was grumpy that morning!! Still, I managed a fast swim (very surprising as I felt like a lead weight for the first 10 lengths), which I kept up on Tuesday and Thursday of this week too! There were some annoying people in the pool, but it didn’t seem to make any difference to my times. There was one girl whose breast-stroke technique was really lovely, text book stuff, but boy did she swim sllloooooowwwwwllly…. I ended up nearly swimming on top of her twice and eventually ended up swapping to the other slow lane (the one with the scary faster people in it!) to stop myself getting truly infuriated! I think that’s why my time was so good on Monday – I was forced to swim harder and faster for the last 8-10 lengths by the pressure of other people!! She was back on Tuesday, but we managed to keep enough of a distance between us that she didn’t bother me so much. Yesterday was fantastic though. A really great swim. By the middle of my 40 lengths I really felt ‘in the zone’ and it was just me and the water and I was just cutting through it without much real thought. Beautiful. Another annoying person (who didn’t know what stick to the right of the lane meant and nearly crashed into both me and another swimmer), but it didn’t seem to matter. Just me and the water. Bliss. Rather than bore you with all the stats (which I buggered up on Monday anyway) here are my over all times for the three swims:

Monday: 31.54.82
Tuesday: 32.20.15
Wednesday: 31.52.53

Top quality stuff. Very happy. :o)

Easter Weekend

Easter Monday and the pool is shut. And yet I felt a bit listless this morning - I think I actually missed it! Heavens! Am off this week, so getting out to swim might be something of a challenge, but Flâneur is determined that I should head out at least one morning this week, if only so he doesn't have to put up with my tetchiness from lack of a good swim!!  ;o)

I'll need to do it though - I'm sooo close now to falling on to the other side of a stone number, sitting as I am around X-1 stone and 0-1 lb for the last week or so...  So frustrating!!  I really really want to get to that next number down.  Not sure I can afford a treat for getting there this time, but I'm so close now that maybe an incentive is needed!  Especially as I'm back on the chocolate now.

For the last 9 years I have given chocolate and sweets up for Lent.  Not for a particularly religious reason, but I like the opportunity it gives me to test my will power over a six week period!  Temptation is often put in my way (the year I was in Dublin the girls on my course tried to persuade me the St Patrick's day didn't count...), but it's important to me to not let any small slither of the sweet stuff to pass my lips regardless of the excuse for a 'day off' it.  We're talking will power here.  And every year it's quite hard, but I do manage it.  

I am determined this year, however, not to fall off the wagon with the huge whump that I usually do once Lent is over. So no cheap chocolate for me now... or something...  I don't miss chocolate so much after the first couple of weeks, especially as most of it is just so sweet and sickly. But what I like is some good quality chocolate and all that I really need is a little of the good stuff every now and again. So out with the Cadbury's and in with the specialised stuff!  Particularly Amedi. Yum! Flâneur was given the instruction just to get me a small Easter egg, preferably not one of the sickly usual ones. He always tries to get me a nice one anyway, so my little Charbonel and Walker egg with three of their champagne truffles was just superb!  I did eat it all yesterday, so maybe that stone marker will be a little further off yet...

I got him some mini eggs from Coco de Bruntsfield, a lovely little Edinburgh chocolate shop.  They do some lovely lovely interesting flavours in good quality chocolate, and I picked us up a bar of their rose and cracked black pepper 64% chocolate too, which was tasty. It's nice to just have a couple of squares of something really nice rather than stuff my face with something that is largely unsatisfying! But I'm sure there are readers out there who will disagree with me...

Chocolate is not the only food that has been consumed lately though (and I've still not finished all my Coco champane truffle mini eggs that Flâneur also bought me, so spoiled!). On Friday we had HAL and BC over for dinner, where I cooked (for once!). Knowing that we wouldn't have an Easter dinner on Sunday, I did roast lamb, cooked to the recommendation of the Butcher, who was much nicer than the last one I dealt with. He suggested rather than stuffing it, which had been my intention with the lovely piece of shoulder than I bought, I marinaded it over night with fresh garlic and rosemary and salt and pepper and a little oil. So simple, so tasty! And a really lovely piece of meat... Did the good old roast spuds, with asparagus and green beans...

Hmm... making myself hungry here!  It all worked very well and we finished it off with a Lemon and Prosecco cake that Flâneur had made (and will make again! God it was good... and light!) and some dessert wine that I had been given as a birthday present last year (Quady Elusium Black Muscat, just delicious!). We had good chats on a variety of topics and had an all round good evening! HAL and BC left after midnight, so I think they had a good time too!  

On Saturday we were out at RL's for dinner - and it was a proper dinner party! With people we didn't know so well and everything!  As well as meeting the fabled G, RL's boyfriend of 6 months, we were joined by two other of her friends, one whom I had met before briefly when living with her and the other who I had not. We'd not been to R's flat either, which I really liked.  It's not massive but has good character. Loved the living room (which will be R's bedroom when the flat's owner comes back from NZ next month, which is almost a shame as it's a great living room) and it's nice to see her somewhere with central heating again!!  We'd been expecting a heavy dinner again (hence no plans for a big Easter Sunday dinner), and were pleasantly surprised to be served fish! Both as a starter and as a main. It was all so good. She'd gone to so much effort, and we had a really good time. The company was great, the conversation flowed and so did the wine.

God my head was fuggy on Sunday morning. I really just can't drink more than a couple of glasses of wine anymore... Especially not white! I can't remember how much I had, but I wasn't much use to anyone on Sunday!  We didn't get home until after 2 either - can't do those sort of late nights either! urgh... Still, it was a great evening and we really should do it more often...

Swim little fishie, swim…

Yes, I’m still doing it, I’m still getting up early and heading out to the pool to get my kilometre of breast stroke in before work. Phew, but it’s hard sometimes I can tell you. Not necessarily the getting up, I’m getting used to that and going to bed earlier certainly helps, but, oh, ok the getting up… Some mornings it’s just impossible. But thankfully, I seem to do ok on enough mornings to make a difference at the moment…

Last week I managed to get my backside out of bed and go to the pool twice. Monday I already blogged about, but I went on Thursday as well. This was not such a good swim time wise (I’ll put all the stats at the end so as not to bore you), doing the km in 34.00.97. But the important thing was I went. Flâneur was back on Friday morning and I went to meet him at the airport at the hideous hour that his flight got in, so Thursday morning worked as training for getting up early too… ;o)

As well as having missed him tremendously and wanting to see him as soon as possible, I always like to be met at airports when I travel alone and therefore believe that other people might also want a friendly face waiting for them when they’ve just come off a long and boring flight on their own. He’d also had a nasty twist to the ankle while away, so I thought it might cheer him up to see me at the airport when he got back and I could also help him with any bags if the ankle was still bad.

We had a nice relaxing weekend, chilling out on Friday (gave me a chance to get started on his washing), until he fell asleep on me around 8:30pm… Saturday started out relaxed and then we headed out to LS’s wedding in the afternoon. They had decided on a Humanist ceremony, which I must say I had had my reservations about. Stories of hand holding, hippy type affairs (God that makes me sounds old) had me wondering what to expect, but it was actually really quite lovely. The celebrant was very charming and warm and it was frankly miles better than the dreadful civil weddings I’ve been to in Scotland which can be extremely unromantic and legal (By this particular law of Scotland of this particular date blah blah blah). Maybe it’s just one bad experience, but they always seem short and sharp and just a bit of a let down to the romantic in me. There were two readings and we all said a Celtic blessing to them at the end and it was all about mutual trust and respect. The bride looked beautiful in a very classic style sparkly gown and very simple hair arrangement and both were beaming the whole day (which you’d hope!). There was plenty of bubbly sploshing about and the food at dinner was much better than I had either expected or it looked! We did spend most of dinner just talking to each other though, as everyone else at the table knew each other and didn’t seem to want to engage us in conversation, even though we did try. Ah well, it’s often the way when you don’t know so many people at weddings… but a bit of an effort from the other people at our table would have been nice.

Poor Flâneur’s ankle had swollen quite considerably with all the standing around before and after dinner so he was unable to join in the dancing, but I had a good boogy with TS and a couple of other collegues before we sloped off home around 11… It seemed a shame not to stay later but some of the other people we knew had left and poor Flâneur was still jetlagged and sore.

Quite a busy end to a busy week. As well as my swims I went out for dinner to The Kitchin with Wastrel and SAM, a lovely lovely treat from Wastrel. Tom Kitchin was in the kitchen too, which seemed like a special treat, and the food did not disappoint! I had new season asparagus wrapped in parma ham with scallops, followed by saddle of rabbit with stuff…. and then an apple sorbet with champagne sauce. Hmmm….all sooo sooo tasty! Good food, good chat and a good time had by all. Thursday night I was out again this time with all The Girls to La Favourita, which is a nice Italian restaurant, when it isn’t full of lots of very loud people. Which is was on Thursday. Lovely company, nice food, but a shame I couldn’t hear most of the conversation. I was also bloody knackered, so happy to sit and listen to what I could hear and join in when I wanted to. I sloped off home when they all went for a drink after dinner as I needed to do a few bits and pieces before bed and then get an early night for the early start on Friday.

And so on to this week and back to the swimming. I managed to get out of bed both yesterday and today for my morning swim, today being randomly easier than yesterday. Going to bed around 10 last night probably helped… I have now joined the university sports centre too, so don’t need to worry about having enough swims left on my voucher (got Thursday’s last week free as the girl didn’t check my card when I went it, result!). I certainly am still enjoying it and was delighted yesterday to see my quickest time yet (33.07.81, nearly the same as the first swim of the year, which was in a smaller pool, you will recall).

The pool is a little quieter as the university is on holiday and I managed to get into a nice rhythm with another girl in my lane so that neither of us was bothering the other. I like it most when it’s like that. Today was a little different as it was mostly me and this bloke who swims at about the same pace until we were joined by this deeply irritating guy who I’ve seen there before who swims with a float and just kicks his legs. He is the most inefficient swimmer I have seen in a while – rather than neat, steady kicks he almost thrashes in the water which means that he not only goes quite slowly, but if you come up behind him you get tons of spray in your face. Which is what happened this morning. Most of the time he’s ok because he’ll wait and let you turn and go off ahead because he knows you are quicker, but on at least two lengths I was trapped behind him, forced to go a bit slower and to tilt my head away from the massive splashes. Sigh. I ended up swapping lanes to the other slow one, which was a bit quieter, and finished my lengths in peace. I don’t usually like to use that lane as it tends to attract faster slow swimmers than me, but it was just one other girl who was not so fast, so it wasn’t so bad.

I was a bit sore this morning and seemed to be going quite slowly so I was extremely surprised when I looked at the final time on the SportsCount and saw 32.47.81! That’s the first time I’ve been under 33 minutes in this pool and coming close to the times I chalked up in the local one. Woo hoo! I had been trying to improve my technique a bit this morning, having found a few tips online yesterday and maybe it actually paid off! Goddamn, get down to 30 mins and I’ll have to add another 10 lengths… Knackering!!

So the tedious stats for the last three swims are:

Date: 02.04.2009 / 06.04.2009 / 07.04.2009
Lengths: 40 (1000m) / 40 (1000m) / 40 (1000m)
Time: 34.00.97 / 33.07.81 / 32.47.81
Average: 51.02 / 49.70 / 49.20
Fastest: (1) 40.11 / (1) 38.88 / (1) 39.30
Slowest: (32) 54.77 / (14) 53.94 / (10) 53.27

It’s not quite the table I would have liked (quite difficult to make out sorry) but if you squint you can really see the progress over the last three swims. Very excited about getting my first lap in at under 40 seconds now, but I should probably aim at consistency over the 40 rather than a very speedy first lap and then slowing down through overexertion! Something to work on…

Hmm… I really ought to blog more frequently, then you wont be stuck with massive posts like this!! Ah well...

Busy, busy, busy

Phew. So starting with the exercise, which is the boring bit. I'm still going to the pool, which is good, but I still haven't got above twice a week. And last week I only managed to go once. This isn't necessarily a bad thing as I only got a five swim voucher for the pool and want to join the Sports Center when I get paid in April. So no point in getting another one really when pay day is tomorrow! So, I went last Monday and was pleased with my times. Quicker than before and I even overtook someone in my slow lane. Not ideal as I'm not fast enough for the other lanes, but the other people in my lane kept stopping at the shallow end and then setting off just as I was about to turn! Grr... So, the stats for last Monday:

40 lengths (1000m)
34.13.74 (nearly a whole minute faster!!)
Average time for length: 51.34
Fastest Length: 1 at 43.12 (the slowest for a while, but it didn't seem to matter)
Slowest Length: 28 at 55.38

So not too bad. My Flâneur went off to Jakarta on Tuesday so I didn't want to get up early and bugger off to the pool when we could spend a bit more quality time together on Tuesday morning before going to work. I meant to go on Thursday instead, but when the alarm went of at 6:30 I just curled up in bed and refused to get up. There being no-one to either make me get up or lure me out of bed with breakfast, I just stayed there until I had to get up to get ready for work. On Friday I was a bit hungover so that was definitely out!!

But I managed to get my backside out of bed today and head off to the pool this morning, which was pretty impressive as Flâneur isn't back yet... I think a little habit may be forming, which is no bad thing. The pool was really quiet this morning, which was nice. Just me and one other girl in my lane for most of the time, with most of the other lanes pretty much the same. Usually there are between 20 and 30 people in the pool, but today it was probably 12-15... Must be University holidays or something.

And today was my best day yet at this pool. It didn't seem like it was going to be when I started off. I felt slow and the swimming felt hard work. Well it is hard work I suppose. I felt so good when I finished and checked the time on the SportsCount for my total. That's partly why I do it, I must say. So (just to bore you some more) today's stats:

40 lengths (1000m)
33.35.28 (that's nearly at the time of my first swim in the local pool at the start of the year! Yeah man!)
Average time for length: 50.38
Fastest Length: 1 at 40.84
Slowest Length: 10 at 53.24 (nearly my fastest slow length of the year!)

So really really pleased.

Other than not swimming this past week has been pretty busy as I try desperately not to miss Flâneur too much (didn't quite work). Everyone has been very sweet at making sure I'm ok and not too bored without him! Very lovely... He left on Tuesday last week and that evening I was out having dinner with TS who I teach palaeography with. We had a great time, but I'm not used to drinking half a bottle of wine on a Tuesday and it went right to my head!

On Wednesday it was the last of my Japanese classes of this term. It's gone really well and I can't believe how much we can now do! It was Japanese 1, Course 2, so we're talking beginners stuff here, but I don't think that at this stage in any other language that I have learnt have I been able to say what I have done/will be doing/am doing using past and not past tenses. It helps make me feel like I'm getting somewhere! I was even able to construct the fairly complex sentences of: "Yesterday, R-san went to Jakarta by plane. He is doing research work there. He comes home on Friday next week." I'm not sure if this will work but:


きの　ラエイさんは　ジャカタに　ひこきで　いきました。レセチャの　しごとを　します。　ラいしゅ　きにょび　うちに　かえります。

Cool. I think I might have got 'Jakarta' wrong, but otherwise it's not bad!! Impressive, no?? ;o)

Thursday I was out again, this time at HMcM's for dinner and chat. We were joined by RF and HAL and talked about all sorts of grown up things that made us feel very old... Again, too much wine was drunk and my head was sore on Friday morning. I'm lucky if I have a few glasses of wine on a Friday/Saturday these days, but at H's I had two glasses of Prosecco and then the best part of half a bottle of white! Urgh... Made me feel totally out of it on Friday and I ended up leaving work early because of the stinking headache. That'll teach me. I was very glad of a night in to myself on Friday night. It's lovely seeing people and having company (eating alone is miserable), but it was good to have a night off!!

Saturday saw me in Glasgow with RF trying on actual bonafide wedding dresses! God, it was terrifying... Mostly the hideous monstrosities that these places sell (we saw one girl trying on a Jordan-esque poofy thing that had a sky blue top and too much netting on the bottom. Eek!). It was all very eye opening and confirmed that that is definitely NOT what I want. I just didn't look right in them. So we came up with a good list of dos and don't to take to a dress maker and I'll get what I want, not what someone else thinks I should wear. So there. ;o) Two things though that the woman said that had me raising my eyebrows:

'when you find your dress, you'll know' - hmmm...
'Is your mum coming up to help you dress shop at all?' (answer: 'no') 'so she trusts you then...' Err? sorry? I love my mother and respect her opinion but wtf? Did she think I wasn't able to chose a frock without mummy?? That she had any say in what I wear on my wedding day?? Anyway, I know there are plenty of mothers out there who do hold that kind of sway over their daughters, but mine aint one of them. I would take her opinion (at a pinch), but other than that, she'd be the first to say that it's my choice not hers.

Anyway... it was a great day with RF and it was really nice to go back to her gaff in the country for the night so I didn't have to spend the weekend at home on my own. AB made us dinner, which was yummy and 'all organic, all local' as he'd been at the farmer's market in Edinburgh that morning. Hmm... It was a lovely chilled evening and much appreciated. RF dropped me back in Edinburgh on Sunday around lunch time, which gave me loads of time to get the (much needed) housework done. Phew. All this stuff going on though and I've not yet finished the quilt!

It's been great while Flâneur's been away. I've missing him like crazy, but my lovely friends have made sure it's not made me too crazy. ;o) Thanks guys!! More to come this week...

Quilt update

The cinema having failed us this afternoon, I spent part of the time working on my quilt. Where I left it last time was:

I had sewn up the pieces in strips and then sewn all the strips together. This took me pretty much a whole day, but part of that was all the ironing that I had to do. Iron all the seams of the long strips down the way and then all the long seams to one side. God it was tedious. So what you see above is the result of all that effort, laid out on our King Sized bed! Raw like that it was bloody massive! Not that it's much smaller now...

So, having done that bit I just need to get some fabric for the backing and some wadding for the middle. My favourite fabric shop is Mandors in Glasgow, which I drag my Flâneur to whenever we're through. It's fab, full of loads of great upholstery fabrics as well as a massive amount of 'crafting' fabrics. It's where I got all the fabrics for the front side of the quilt. Joyously from my point of view they also had cotton wadding (Warm and Natural, an American needled cotton batting that is soft and warm and crucially comes in big enough amounts for my project!). So I got a lovely red cotton for the backing and a huge amount of the cotton wadding. And I'm talking huge! Here they all are laid out on our floor ready to be cut to size:

Bear in mind that the quilted bit will fit on top of our king sized bed... This was a tricky stage as it turned out. As you can see from all the wrinkles the fabrics kept sticking to each other and it was very difficult to get them flattened enough to be able to pin and cut them. But I managed it, and then just had to sew up the edges. Phew! Like most bits of long straight stitching that didn't take me that long, so here is the (nearly) finished quilt!!

That's it being held up by my 6ft Flâneur, just so you get some idea of scale!! It's not quite finished yet as I have still to sew up the hole at the top where I turned it and then quilt down the gutters, but I must say I'm really pleased with it so far. :o) Until next time...

The last few days...

Well, I did pretty well this week - I was up and at the pool again on Tuesday morning, which is pretty impressive after going on Monday...  This could be the start of something!!  Getting up was a bit easier but the swimming was still tough.  I think I still ached a bit from Monday.  I should probably build up to doing it more often... On the plus side I'm clearly using my legs properly in the new pool as my thighs and gluteus maximus were really quite sore on Wednesday/Thursday.  In that, using muscles you don't usually, kind of way.  It was good, but hard on Tuesday and for most of the time quite satisfying as it was just me and this one other girl in the lane and we appeared to swim at roughly the same pace, passing each other in the middle of the lane and turning at roughly the same time.  Then she left and I was joined by this big Polish guy.  I saw him come in as I thought - gosh, he looks like he swims aaaallllll the time, all muscly and stretching himself out quite thoroughly.  All professional like.  And then he got in to my lane!  Not the fast one at the other end of the pool, mine.  And I was quite surprised as he wasn't that fast at all.  Faster than me, which isn't difficult in that pool, but not the super swimmer I took him to be.  Just goes to show you shouldn't judge people based on what they look like!!

So, the stats, the stats... Slightly slower overall on Tuesday, but not that much and I went which was the important thing:

40 lengths (1000m)

35.09.10 (only 26 seconds slower than Monday)

Average time for length: 52.73 (the reason for the above)

Fastest Length: 1 at 40.80 (quicker by 15 milliseconds!)

Slowest Length: 26 at 56.52 (also quicker)

It's funny, my fastest length is always number 1, which makes sense, but the slowest one changes every time!  No consistency what so ever...

Anyway, didn't go again this week as have Japanese classes on a Wednesday evening, which makes for a long day anyway, and I was off work on Thursday/Friday for a bit of leave.  This new regime isn't crazy enough to get me up to go for a swim early on days when I'm not then going to work...  Not yet, anyway...  ;o)

Had a very lovely lazy day on Thursday, sleeping in, picking up a car for the weekend and pottering about.  We dropped some old electrical bits that still work off with the Bethany charity shop on Leith Walk, and then headed to Portobello for a stroll along the prom.  It was a beautiful day and nice to be out and about enjoying the sunshine.  

Friday we headed up to St As for a look around and to stay in the Guest House that I want to use as a base for the wedding next year.  Decided that it was better to try it out before booking it.  Had only seen it on the web, and while it looks lovely, you never know until you try it out...  We were not disappointed at all.  Brooksby House is a lovely little house set away from any noisy streets, tucked away near my old hall of residence from my Uni days.  We were met by the proprietess Caryn, who greeted me by name.  It probably helped that they didn't have many other guests staying, but it was a nice touch.  We had picked Friday night to stay there as it marked a year to the day before the wedding, and it was nice that she also remembered that I had mentioned that when booking back in November.  We stayed in the Nicklaus room, their luxury room and it was just lovely.  Very clean, great sized bathroom (with long bath), super comfy king sized brass bed and a view over the garden.  We were very pleased.  

It was another beautiful day on Friday so after checking in we went for a wander round St As.  We popped in to the Chapel and found ourselves in there spookily at the exact time at which the wedding is booked for next year!  I found my heart racing with the anticipation and we've still got a whole year to go!!  We also took a nice long stroll with ice cream from Janettas (essential) and enjoyed the late afternoon sunshine.  It really was just lovely.  To the point where I was getting a bit fed up with people saying 'oh, I hope it's like this for you next year'.  Honestly.  It's not going to be.  It will rain.  Guaranteed!  But having been there on a 20th March will beautiful weather, it's difficult not to hope...  ;o)

We dined in Pizza Express that night, both of us feeling the pinch by all the saving for the wedding and honeymoon that meant a more pricey meal somewhere else was not really an option.  But we didn't care.  We like PE and the most important thing was spending a nice evening together.  It was a bit cold after dinner for a walk, so we headed back to Brooksby where I practically fell asleep as soon as getting in!  All these early morning are getting to me I think!

Had a good nights sleep in the comfy bed and woke early as usual.  Breakfast was between 8 and 9, so we headed downstairs around 8:30.  It was another beautiful sunny day and we chose to sit in at the window in the dining room, thus roasting ourselves in the sunlight!  This is Scotland in March, for goodness sake....  Breakfast was served up by Chris, the proprietor, who was just as nice and friendly as his wife.  They have a good range of items on their menu and both deciding that a full fry would just be a little too much, we both plumped for tattie scone and bacon.  With a fried egg added at the suggestion of Chris!  Hmmm... it was great.  The tattie scones (2) were great and the bacon (2 large rashers) cooked perfectly.  Not overdone with lovely crispy edges.  And a perfect fried egg too.  Yum!  

You can tell we liked the place, yes?!  Well on leaving I asked if it would be possible to book it in it's entirety for next year.   For the bridal party.  I could think of no better place away from home to have as my base when getting ready etc.  Chris said he'd confirm in an e-mail, but that he didn't think it would be a problem.  They do exclusive bookings quite often I think, and can cater to your requirements when doing so.  They have a golfing group coming in the week before we want it, but he was pretty sure they were staying only til the 18th.  Finger crossed, crossed, crossed!  It will just be too disappointing if he comes back and says it's not possible...  As they only had one other couple staying he was able to give us a tour of the rest of the guest house and show us the rest of the rooms (other than the one in use).  They are all finished to a really high standard and I can't see any of the party being disappointed with any of the rooms.  They look even better than they do on the web.

Seriously people, I thought this place was great!  Pricier than you would expect from a B&B, but I think it was worth it.

We pootled back to Edinburgh after a long walk along West Sands, enjoying the morning sun.  We decided to take the coastal route through Crail, Anstruther etc, to enjoy the best of the day.  We stopped in Anstruther to stretch the legs and have a chippy lunch.  You can't pass through without going to the Anstruther Fish Bar...  Hmm...  We're not very good with the grease of f&c anymore, but it was good.  One fish and a portion and a half of chips between us was quite enough!  So nice to be able to enjoy the sunshine while we have it.  Great to have a car too, even if the Ford Fusion is basically quite an ugly car.  ;o)  

Good to be home and we still have one whole day of the weekend left.  Phew.  Need to recover from all this galavanting!  

A new pool and a new regime...

Well, I did it. I got up at 6:30 this morning (or thereabouts) and was out the house by about quarter past 7!! And when I say I got up I should be clear that this was after much protesting and whinging and whining… If it wasn’t for my Flâneur I would have very easily gone back to sleep. But he’s a real trouper and a real motivator and just a truly wonderful person (pass the bucket. ;o) ).

It didn’t help that I had a terrible night’s sleep last night (again…). Tossing and turning, periods of being awake, periods where I’m fighting between being awake and asleep (the only way I can describe these episodes) just generally rubbish! And I had been really tired yesterday owing to a similar period of sleep on Saturday night. That was entirely caused by alcohol (not even that much), which always disturbs my sleep, but I could think of no reason for it last night. Humph.

Anyway, despite all that I got up when my Flâneur made me, ate my breakfast (poached egg on a muffin, prepared by himself), sorted my lunch and swimming gear and was out the door before I would normally be thinking about stirring! Well, when I’d be creeping under the duvet pretending the radio wasn’t on and I didn’t have to get up…

The early start meant I could finally try out Edinburgh Uni pool. And I must say I liked it. There were a reasonable number of other crazy people there, but enough lanes (6) variously marked out that I could just pootle at my own speed up and down the slow lane without feeling I was keeping anyone back, and certainly with no chance of overtaking anyone! There was one girl in our lane who clearly didn’t realise the lanes were marked by slow, medium and fast, as she was way quicker than the rest of us, but mostly it was just me and these two guys, swimming up and down.

It is a larger pool the Uni one, at 25 meters, rather than 25 yards. I still made myself do my 40 lengths, but owing to the extra 85 meters or so I was a bit slower and a reasonable bit more knackered!! Feel the burn, oh yes. Still feeling it in my thighs I think! But it was great. Despite it being hard I enjoyed it and felt great coming out. Meant that I could face the readers at work without too much pain and with a smile, which was good because we were really very busy today! Normally I’d be practically slumped at my desk, but not this morning. I’ll be slumped on the couch later, but that’s ok, I’ll be at home then…

So pretty pleased with my times, considering I was doing the equivalent of an extra 3.7 (or so) lengths of the municipal pool, and here are the stats:

40 lengths (1000m)
34.43.99
Average time for length: 52.10 (not that much slower really)
Fastest length: 1 at 40.95
Slowest length: 6 at 56.76 (but I paused at the end of it to demist my goggles)

Pretty pleased, all things considered and love the fact that I swam 1km! Cool.