A bit of a low...

I had a great weekend.

Saturday was spent relaxing a little.  A walk to the shops to get (a) the things that we forgot from shopping the previous day and I managed to find a new pair of running shoes (more on that another time) as mine were getting a little old and no longer cushioning as they should.

Sunday was busy, but good.  We are both exhausted at the weekend from working and whilst the house is always kept clean, it is normally far from tidy.  And I hate that!  So the morning was spent clearing the living room, beeswaxing the two oak tables (they always looks so amazing when they are done), taking all of the glass bottles and paper to the recycling bins down the street and generally having a living room that we could be proud of again!

After that a run, in my new shoes :), along my normal route and trying to keep the pace down.  Yes, down.  You see I found out that the pace I was running at was, as well as being exhausting, not the right pace for what I wanted.  I've been running in a way that builds stamina, and hopefully at some point pace.  And I have not been losing weight or size which was my main idea.

So I have slowed right down.  From 160 to 165 bpm down to 140 to 150 (averaging 145).  This means I'm running longer, but I am enjoying it more and I am not collapsing when I get home.  I've also heard that this doesn't help with the weight loss, but the way I see it is that trying it for a month can't hurt.  I'm still getting my pulse going and burning calories so hopefully it's a no lose option!

After that run, and after cleaning all day, I dived in the bath - with a laptop set-up to watch the Ground hog day.

And then I made the best vegetarian Spaghetti Bolognese I have ever tasted (I know you are not supposed to say that about your own cooking - but I really enjoyed it!).  Red onion, garlic and chestnut mushroom base.  Add a chopped sweet paprika and a coarsely chopped courgette and allow to soften. Chop a handfull of green asparagus and throw into the mix.  Salt, pepper and add Italian herbs to taste.  Stir regularly to make sure that nothing sticks and once everything has softened to your liking add a pack of sieved tomatoes to complete the sauce.  Allow to reduce for 10 minutes and server hot over fresh tagliatelle.  Wonderful with a refreshing white wine.

So why the low?

Well the bath.  I've said for a while that now I have transitioned it's going well for me.  So well in fact that except for bathroom breaks and taking a shower I don't think about it too often.

Well...  I shower in ten minutes, and spend much less time on bathroom breaks.  Sitting in the bath for 90 minutes was a bad idea.  The first 45 - warm water, lots of bubbles - was really OK.  Enjoy the film and the cider that was there with me.

The second 45 minutes just seemed to get more and more depressing and heavy. The bubbles were gone, making everything 'there', and the longer I stayed there the more I moved.  And when you move in a deep bath things float and move in the water.  Before the film was over I was in tears and stressed to hell.

In the end I very quickly got out of the bath, dried and dressed without doing any body lotion that I was planning on.  I just wanted to be covered.  Mrs Stace came in too see what the problem was and I broke down and could not speak to her (which got her quite worried as you can imagine) for some time.

In the end I calmed down and started to feel the evil crying headache that had put itself into my head.

The rest of the weekend was wonderful, and I'm glad I listed it here as I had forgotten the good bits until I did, but it was all ruined in those 90 minutes.

 I am *not* taking a bath until after I have been in hospital for a week :( Which I hate - we spent some money on bathroom furniture to be able to squeeze the bath into the bathroom when we remodelled a few years ago and it's now going to be semi wasted for I don't know how long.  Phooey.