I wanna be Nicole Scherzinger.

Have you seen the video for Wet? Oh mate. She's hot. She's got a kick-ass dancer's body and I want it so much it hurts. Which is unfair as I dance all the time too but no one would ever believe I'm a dancer at the sight of me! The only clue is muscles at the back of your thighs, which I'm relieved to have, but a flabby waist? No way jose.

This week has been baaad. You know at Christmas, you just eat loads because there's food everywhere? We seem to be in some sort of birthday peak-period, and at work we've been having cakes galore (that isn't even including my birthday.) Plus it's my birthday weekend, so I'm going out and getting hammered tonight, and Mum's planning some sort of special meal tomorrow. FOOD EVERYWHERE. I wouldn't be surprised if I hadn't lost this week, but I'm praying I will have anyway.

Still haven't got round to any choreography. I need to kick myself up the arse right now.

I turn 20 in two days, and I'm so ready for a fresh start. New resolutions! This feels like a big one, as well, as I'm entering a brand new decade of my life. It's not technically a milestone age, but it still feels like a big one. Goodbye teenage years... hello adulthood!

Q x

Weigh day no. 2

Well, yesterday.

Drum roll please...



9 stone 5!



Dammit.



Well, at least I haven't gained. And I took it so easy last week. The harder I work, the more I'll lose in a week. I'm not worried!



Still, I really hope I DO hit this target, as I'm absolutely dying to cut all my hair off - it gets so frizzy and unmanageable so easily! Very frustrating - I just want it all gone. I think even if my hairdresser botches it up and I end up with a super super short pixie cut, I wouldn't even mind that much as it'd still be such a relief to have it all gone. Er, touch wood.



So Pineapple yesterday was amazing - they keep the dance studios fairly warm intentionally, I think, so your muscles stay warm - either that or they simply don't have air con and as there's no windows, there's no way it can cool down between classes - but it basically means you SWEAT to death while you're dancing. My friend (who I went with) reckons you could literally sweat away obesity. I'm not sure I believe him, but it'd be fantastic if that actually helped me lose weight...



Something weird has happened to my thigh, though. After the Thighs, Bums and Tums class, my legs were very sore, as I told you all in a previous post, but yesterday the exercise helped them feel a bit better. However, after my second dance class, I came out and my thighs were bright red and very hot to touch. It looked like they'd been sunburnt. The heat and redness went away, but today I've woken up to purplish spots all over the areas. Typically I consulted Google first, leading me to believe I've got all sorts of diseases, but I wasn't very inclined to take it too seriously. One, it said this sort of thing happens when you don't exercise enough (yeah, that's gotta be it, eh.) and two, it said it could be a result of poor circulation, and I know I don't have poor circulation, or my feet wouldn't be so uncomfortably hot all the time. So I consulted my father, the next available source for advice (I'd normally go to my mum first as she's a nurse, but she's at work) and he reckons I've broken some blood vessels in the skin and it'll heal up soon enough. Whew. That's all I needed to know, really, that these spots won't stick around forever, as they're not very sightly. Ah yes, vanity prevails!



I'm with you all about Internet Explorer. It seems so slow and laborious compared to Firefox. Truth be told, I'm only using it as I'm trying to be super clever - as I'm so secretive about this blog, whenever I go on it on Firefox I clear it on my history, but if I go on it on IE it doesn't show up on my Firefox internet history, so I don't have to suspiciously clear my whole history but can still allow family members on the laptop. Clever, eh! I'm going to give up on the plan, though, as I cannot for the life of me get rid of these massive gaps between paragraphs.



Over and out!



Q x

Aching like a bitch

So, Thighs, Bums and Tums nearly killed me. Which is good, but today I am in PAIN. My quads, abs and glutes (haha, thighs, bum and tum) are hurting so much I can barely walk. I'm gonna stretch all day then pray that I won't be in pain tomorrow, or Pineapple's gonna be a bit trickier than I'd like. Luckily my ligaments and calf muscles feel fine, so my flexibility won't be obstructed.

Didn't go for a morning jog this morning due to the aches and a much-needed lie-in, but I'm hoping that won't have too much of an impact on my weight tomorrow. It's the standard Sunday Roast today, but I won't eat after that and then fingers crossed... god, just one pound would be fantastic. Please let me have this.

Still can't decide about the birthday. Such petty troubles, I know, but the pressure's on as it gets closer.

That's pretty much it, then! Short one today. I'm writing this on Internet Explorer instead of Firefox and I've forgotten how frustrating it is - does anyone else get their format all buggered up as soon as they add a picture? I have to click the edit button about 3 times to sort it out. But anyway. Signing out,

Q x

Birthday dilemmas

So I take what I said back about my job - yesterday I was literally sweating I was running around the place so much. I passed one of my colleagues and she jokingly said 'you do seem to be up and down - that's better than the gym!' Oh man, I hope that has some grain of truth in it - obviously not that it's better than the gym, but just might have some small contribution to my exercise. Which has been slacking.

No 7am jog for me today, as myself and the sister are going to 2 exercise classes - one of those Thighs, Bums and Tums ones, and then a street dance workout afterwards. I quite need the street dance one as choreography for the next semester of teaching is going horribly. As in, I have choreographer's block. And I'd like some sort of inspiration. I'm also going to Pineapple Dance Studios in London on Monday with a couple of friends, and I'm making sure we do some sort of street or commerical street class whilst we're there, as Pineapple classes are always really awesome. I haven't properly danced for so long, and last time I was at Pineapple, the warm-ups plus the pressure of being surrounded by incredible dancers made me really push myself; I think at the time I reached the peak of my dancing ability. I suppose it helps that I always have to stand at the front of a dance class (I'm claustrophobic when I dance!) and in a class with semi-pros, come on, I had to put out properly.

So Monday should be great.

Not sure what to expect with weigh-day, but I'd be happy just to see one pound gone. I'm hoping I can burn quite a lot of calories with this morning's classes. Haven't got round to buying any green tea yet, but I'm thinking I'll start it when I go on my mega shopping trip by myself after payday. With money! And for once I can forget I am a poor student and simply pretend I am normal and can afford to shop in normal places. Hopefully the birthday will bring a little bit of money, too.

Sigh. Speaking of the birthday, it's stressing me out. It's in 9 days, and I sort of wish it wasn't happening. I have no idea what to do for it - a) because I'm poor, and b) it's difficult to know who to invite. At home, I have a lot of close friends, but they're all from separate groups and it's hard to do something where I can involve all of them without it being massively awkward. I want my birthday to have SOME sort of climax, you know? Like a big night out. But it's so much harder back here than it is at uni. I know the easiest thing is 'well, just don't do anything for it' but that seems so lame. Like I said, it'd all be easier if it just wasn't happening.

What a depressing thing to say about one's 20th birthday! Ho hum.

B's insisting on taking me out to dinner for it. I'm hesitant. One, because she wants to take me to an awful restaurant that she thinks is good, and two, because I'm starting to wonder how much I like being around B these days. Even without her diet boasting, I'm starting to suspect we're drifting apart. I'm going to try and keep being around her on the minimum right now, as I don't want our friendship to crumble completely, but I know it will if we spend too much time together and I end up snapping at her out of irritation. I have a friend I only see once every few months, and we always have the most amazing time together because it's such a treat to see each other. I hope my friendship with B will blossom into something like that.

Doesn't it seem sort of... coupley for one person to take you out for dinner for your birthday? It's no secret that B's bisexual, and whilst I know for a fact that she has no feelings for me (any more) I'd prefer to split the bill or something. It'd feel more like friends going out to dinner then, and not so much me being courted.

Still dreaming of when I can run away on my own post-uni. Preferably to somewhere like New York. I watched a tv show about interns at Elle magazine and half of the magazine staff (including the Editor) were British, so that gives me hope! I've always heard it's incredibly difficult if not impossible to find work like that in the States when you have to do visa rubbish, but then again, Anna Wintour's British too. I think my dream life would be working my way up to a Features Director or Associate Editor or something like that in New York, and then coming home to London and being the Editor of a magazine. I'm going to work my arse off to make sure something like that happens, I swear.

Anyway, enough! I must go and prep myself for Thighs, Bums and Tums.

Ta-ra!

Q x

Weigh day

Ok Ricky, show me what you got.

9 stone 5. Ok, not good, but not bad! So that means I've got 12 lbs to burn in 19 weeks. Still do-able. I can handle this.

Had another embarrassing 7am jog. I had this drum'n'bass music blaring and it was building up for a crescendo and I was ready to sprint and I said to myself 'imagine you're being chased' and the song got loud and hardcore and I WAS GOING FOR IT I WAS RUNNING FOR MY LIFE and then a minute later I was almost dead with exhaustion. I hope I never do have to genuinely run for my life, as things won't be looking good. But never mind. I'll keep working at it.

Annoyingly I have work every other morning until Saturday, and I hate jogging in the afternoon. So I'll have to hit the workout DVDs until then, and just have a long weekend of jogging whenever I can do it. Which is frustrating as I want to build up my jogging stamina. Unless I get up even earlier and go jogging at 6?? Hmm... I'll have to think about that one.

Food today hasn't been great, I was trying to eat small but mid-afternoon I ended up eating a packet of crisps. But at the moment I'm just concentrating on not eating anything after dinner, which we have pretty early, so it's basically not eating after 6pm. Baby steps.

I've planned out how I'm going to eat when I'm at uni: I'm thinking a decent bowl of cereal in the morning (with skimmed milk, naturally), a cup of green tea mid-morning (might have to take it to uni in a flask, or drink it cold), some sort of healthy lunch (cold for when I have to pack it and take it in to uni, like a salad or cold pasta, and hot when I can eat it at home, like home-made soup or grilled fish with veg), a coffee mid-afternoon, and then just a yoghurt and a cup of green tea in the evening. Lunch will be my main meal of the day. If my housemates question why I don't eat a proper meal in the evening, I'll just say my digestive system plays up if I eat a heavy meal too late in the day, and this is something that's been getting worse over summer. They shouldn't question it - to be honest, my digestive system messes me around enough. If a social situation desperately requires it I will eat in the evening, but if not I genuinely think a yoghurt will sustain me. I find them very filling. I'll try to put chilli sauce or powder on my lunch, and I'll snack on chillies before I exercise and sort of regularly throughout the day. Come on, metabolism!

And every time I've got a morning spare, a morning jog. I might get up even earlier once I'm at uni, as I live in a very urban area and there's a big risk of running into people I know on their way to lectures and lots of cars being everywhere. Ah well, at least M's into super-early-morning jogging too.

I'm so ready to do this. I can't wait! Bring on the 19th December! The end of my 19-week challenge, when I hope to have lost 12 lbs. I'll try and bring some of this stuff into my diet already, like drinking green tea and planning lunches that are nourishing which I'll be able to take into uni with me. And then a fast day every first Sunday of the month. This'll be ace, and with any luck I'll be saving money too if I won't be eating much.

Fingers crossed,

Q x

Progress...

I was depressed by the idea of setting my alarm for 7am for a jog, so turned it off, but to my delight I woke up naturally at 7 anyway, so went for a jog by myself. My sister always wants to go jogging at about 10am, but I absolutely hate jogging at that time. Jogging in the morning is so peaceful; as it was a Sunday today, there weren't even any cars around. Of course, I was still rubbish. It's kind of annoying - I can jog for half an hour on a treadmill but 10 minutes in the outdoors absolutely kills me? I guess it's the wind resistance and the hilly areas around my home. I don't feel like I'm working out properly, either - my legs feel fine and I'm not sweating, but my heart is pounding so hard I feel like throwing up in my mouth. I'm going to have to fight against nature and get through that, and things should improve.

Food today hasn't been brilliant because of the weekly Sunday roast, but at least it was fairly early: 4 o' clock, and I don't plan on eating anything else today (it's now 6). Should leave me nice and empty for weigh day tomorrow morning. Erk. I'm not sure whether to weigh myself after the jog or before, not that it'd make much difference. Either way, I've got my fingers crossed. Tomorrow begins the 19-week challenge, and I'm so ready for that right now.

I've been toying with making some sort of attempt at the Dukan diet - I can't be bothered to pay for it properly, but I might look at some of the tips. The French love it (and they're skinny as hell) and K-Middy supposedly used it to get small before the big day, and we all know how hot she looked at Westminster. The only problem is, the verdict is that you just put the weight back on as soon as you stop, and I want something to lift off me permanently! Hmm. I can incorporate some of it, but I'll need to find something that works that is manageable for me every day - I'm talking for months or years.

Maybe this will be good old-fashioned trial and error. Well, it's been pretty much error for the last year, but quitters don't win!

Q x

Rev the metabolism

Foods that boost metabolism which I will now be incorporating into my diet as often as I can:

- Oily fish - this is a tricky one. I don't really know how to cook fish, but I'm fortunate enough to live very close to a fishmonger, so I can ask for tips. My mum cooks sardines a lot, but she pulls their heads off and guts them with her bare hands in the sink, and I don't know if I'm ready for that!
- Chillies. Easy - I'll add chilli powder/sauce to my food, and snack on them from a jar when I find the time. Maybe before exercising. Luckily I'm good with spicy food. Supposedly they can help you burn up to 1000 extra calories a day!
- Oranges, or other fruit ridden with tons of Vitamin C. Could help burn 100 extra cals a day. I won't do this every day, though, as the acidicity won't be great for my teeth.
- Coffee - 1 cup a day is best. Hooray!
- Green tea - supposedly 2 cups a day helps rev up the metabolism. I might have to force myself to drink this one, but I did that with coffee and in the long run it worked!

I'm starting a different blog, a blog I can sign my name to, as I'm conscious that going into a writing career without a blog to speak of (ahem) is risky. It's all about creating Brand Q, as my dad's always on about. Future employers will be impressed. I wish I could post the blog here, but I'm so paranoid of identity crossovers. Even though I doubt any of you on this blog would know who I am in real life, it's a risk I'd rather not take. But don't worry - I won't be giving up this one! You lucky readers, you...

Signing off,

Q x