The sea is a cruel and unpredictable mistress...

Here's something I wrote a little while ago whilst on holiday in Portugal and just never got round to posting.

The sea is a cruel and unpredictable mistress.

You know when the day starts off well and you're having fun until you find yourself in the middle of the ocean, in what can only be likened to a rubber dinghy....  

And you realise your fate, your life, your every movement from this point forward is in the hands of a guy who's name you don't know and who speaks very bad broken English as a 3rd language.... 

Other then you being in Portugal no-one knows exactly where you are. You gave them no resort name. No hotel name. And definitely no day to day itinerary. 

Shite!! The water's are pretty choppy, perfect for surfers, not so perfect for a barely 10metre swimmer with a very confident non-swimming 5 yr old. When, scratch that. If, you make it home swimming lessons are definitely on the agenda. The water is so choppy that your sprayed every time the stupid under equipped dinghy moves. 

You can feel the salt water drying and crusting on your skin. This was NOT a good idea. You did NOT think this through!! 

There comes a point when calm takes over, a resigned to your fate, (that fate being death) type calm. It settles easily. Calmly even. 

The ocean is beautiful. The colour like nothing you've ever seen. There could be worse ways to go then being claimed by the cool, salty, raging teal of the med. 

And then there is a rainbow. With every lift, splash, spray and additional salt crust a rainbow appears. Just as you are able to see again through the stinging of salt water in your eyes a rainbow lays just on the rift of the tide. Is it like an oasis in the desert? A mirage? Sent here to distract you from the imminent death? 

Sunglasses removed to double check? It is there.. Actually really there... With every rip curl (that's what surfers say right?) forcing you to hang on for dear life a rainbow appears. 

A sign? 

Rainbows promise gold... A happy ending... Life!!!

I put my life in the hands of the rainbow. 

Despite everything we made it back in one piece, Portugal is beautiful and I recommend it highly :-)

PR xx

5-a-day 21 day challenge…

A few months ago I set and completed a 21 day challenge which was inspired by iamluca. I decided to curb my lavish dessert eating and was quite successful (will be doing a follow up post shortly).

As Summer approaches although it’s getting sunny and bright, my energy levels are buried somewhere. I believe they may still be wrapped in 5 layers of clothes under a duvet in front of the fan heater, but in order to coax them out I shall attempt to change the way I eat. I’ve realised that I probably eat 5 pieces of fruit over the course of the whole week, probably a little bit more veg as I tend to have it with dinner most of the time, but I know for a fact that I don’t eat fruit everyday and don’t come anywhere near to 5 a day. So I challenge myself, and anyone who’d like to join me to eat 5 pieces of fruit or veg a day. Actually easier then it sounds… I’ve also added 2-3 trips to the gym and more water (haven’t given it a quota, but more can’t be bad right? Lol) my energy levels are seriously sucking and I’ve had a cold for nearly 2 weeks.

So I started today…

I got this portion size information from the NHS website:
Small-sized fruit One portion is two or more small fruit, for example two plums, two satsumas, two kiwi fruit, three apricots, six lychees, seven strawberries or 14 cherries.
Medium-sized fruit One portion is one piece of fruit, such as one apple, banana, pear, orange, nectarine or sharon fruit.
Large fruit One portion is half a grapefruit, one slice of papaya, one slice of melon (5cm slice), one large slice of pineapple or two slices of mango (5cm slices).
Dried fruit A portion of dried fruit is around 30g. This is about one heaped tablespoon of raisins, currants or sultanas, one tablespoon of mixed fruit, two figs, three prunes or one handful of dried banana chips.

Breakfast was oatmeal and raisin cookies and half a punnet of grapes. Lunch was sushi and an apple. Dinner was fish, butterbeans, avocado. Snacks - strawberry, mango, melon fruit pot. Mango, pineapple, passionfruit smoothie. Glasses of water 4.

Not a bad start. I think all of that adds up to 5 or at least very close to.

And once the 21 days are up I hope the ‘habit’ is instilled and I keep it going….