Tuesday and the woes that go with it!

It’s a lovely drizzling day and finally we have a break in the heat, however my hair is not enjoying this moist weather. I think I must be related to some Rastafarian because the hair just does its own thing. I most certainly did not get my hair from my dad as he did not have much hair in his later years. However as a young man he did have quite a nice mop of hair and was quite proud of it and I think his buddies were very aware of this.

I must have been about 6 years old when this man walked into our house and try as I might I could not accept that this was my dad. He had no hair at all. Shaved bald like a billiard cue! I promptly burst out crying an absolutely refused to go near him. I kept on telling him to put his hair back on. Bain was equally horrified but my mother was neither horrified nor terrified, she was livid to say the least. It turned out that my dad had lost a bet in a card game or some sports match bet and he had to forfeit his hair. Now not all of us are born with perfect shaped heads and Mr. Potato head would have been a better stand in dad as far as I was concerned at that time.

This vision of a shining head was more than my six year old heart could cope with and I know I was terrified of this person Called “BET” and asked my dad where he had “lost” him and if that is the punishment he got for losing him. It was only years later that I understood of course – but to this day I do not take on a bet with a friend or my children. I have seen the results of losing a bet and trust me I do not want to pay the price of losing one of those. So I will settle for my unruly hair and my bad hair days rather than scare the living day lights out of everyone I meet.

Now Bern told me about her nephew who went on a rugby tour and his initiation was to have his eye brows shaved off. We take our eye brows so much for granted but the way she describes it, Carl looked worse than “odd” without his eye brows. When he got off the bus to greet Anne his mother she stood there stunned and could not quite place what was wrong with her son, he looked decidedly odd almost horror movie odd. It took her a few seconds to work out he had no eye brows. For weeks after that Carl used an eye pencil to draw in eyebrows, and try as he might he could not get the shape right and he actually looked like a circus clown if you are to believe e his description of “painting his eye brows”. As result of his initiation he now has a mono-brow and still curses them for the humiliation he was put through and swears if he was not such a MAN he would get the mono waxed to be two eye brows but real men don’t wax. Oh Carl, yes they do, they just don’t advertise it.

I have done the tweezing thing with a bit more gusto that I should have and landed up with thin pencil shaped eyebrows. I have this surprised look on my face all the time and I watch the faces of the people I talk to change as they begin mimicking my expression. We both land up sitting there with this “OH” look of surprise on our faces. I find this very amusing as mine is a natural look of shock and amazement but theirs is one of “My face muscles have frozen” by the time we have finished talking… quite amusing and entertaining to say the least. I have also been desperate to get rid of a stray eye brow and pulled the hair out with my fingers only to find I have missed the rebel eyebrow totally and have been left with a bald spot…..Trust me not a good look! Speaking of good looks…..

The big Hair days. …… I cannot believe our family and friends allowed us to leave the house with this mad hairstyle of the 80’s. We were all trying to be Farah Fawcett and copy her hair style; wearing our Linda Evans and Joan Crawford shoulder pads in our tops and jackets from the Dynasty TV Series era.
Picture me - 5ft; 2 inches, I looked like a pineapple American Foot ball player. With shoulders way to wide and hair like I had been electrocuted and the “S” shaped stiletto heels. Boy we were cool! (Not!) And we also loved out stove pipe jeans; this generation calls the skinny jeans; we managed to perfect the art of looking like sausages in a sausage machine with our padded shoulders and wild; wild hair. I am surprised we ever landed up sane and ever found employment with this type of abuse we subjected ourselves to.….. Have you ever watched anyone putting these types of jeans on?

They dance themselves into the jeans. Jumping up and down on one spot hoping it will get gravity to help push the bumps and curves into the jeans. Dancing around, stumbling as the jeans are not even past the knees yet, stumbling over the furniture in our rooms and the cat or dog joining in on the fun and games. Then finally the jeans are pulled up to our waists ( some so high they sit just below the rib cage!) as we wore waist high jeans, not hipsters like today’s jeans - and no matter how hard you try to zip up the jeans while standing, Gravity just will not allow this major operation to take place.

So you lie down on the bed, take a deep breath and pull in your stomach and play tug of war with your zipper and pull. It moves a few centimeters. You then take a deep breath again and hold in your stomach AND THEN PULL THE ZIP AGAIN. Now I know I was not the only person who did this as my friends also wore these skin tight jeans and we did not have Stretch Jeans in the Dark Ages. So I was part of the insane era that wanted to look cool in out tight; tight jeans and padded shoulders!!

One day my sister Val; who is 10 years younger than me walked in on me and watched my struggle with the stove pipe jeans and I was huffing and puffing and trying to do the zip on these wonderfully “Sexy” jeans. She then looked at me and asked, “Shell how you are going to go to the Loo and then do the zip up again?” “Why don’t you just buy jeans that fit you?” For that she got a “I will kill you, get out of my room and don’t touch my stuff!” reply. Of course she was right, because going to the Ladies was a feat that l dreaded and I refused to participate in the drinking games; so the need would not arise. Now my parents thought it was because I was a goody two shoes, when in fact there was no place to lie down and do the damn jeans up again after a trip to the bathroom…. And fashion and being “IN” was very important when you were 16!

Oh I miss those days. Skinny jeans….. Oh my goodness, try track pants and takkies now. I would most certainly lose the battle of the jeans and land up having to go into traction if I tried to dance myself into tight jeans. And we know that at this age with a buggered knee I would land up needing a transplant of sorts and who ever may be a witness to this spectacle of me trying to get into the jeans would need serious therapy and stomach muscle replacements as they would most definitely have ripped them apart in the hilarity of my “Jean Dance”

No its comfort all the way for me now and I look back and pacify myself with the knowledge that I am comfortable, can breath and enjoy my meal and a glass of refreshment while these Skinny COWS – cannot! Well that is how I handle the envy… let me have that much please!

So this weekend I decided after reminiscing about the Good old days that it’s time to get back into some state of acceptable proportions and this does not mean the portion of food on my plate. So it’s the “Diet thing” Oh how I hate that word. It makes you instantly hungry thinking you are diet. I mean really you go for years without breakfast and miss lunch more often than not, but use the word diet and come 7.00am you are starving and want to eat everything in the fridge and you can smell food from a mile away.

It’s the Food Fairy I tell you - who comes and whispers into your ear. “You are on diet and can’t have the piece of cheese cake or that nice juicy burger” and on the other shoulder is the Celery Fairy who thinks she has the answers to all our woes! I swear if I catch her I will slaughter her and feed her to the fish because celery is no substitute for a good juicy steak or that lovely cheese sauce.

Ok; Ok I better stop, this dry piece of toast and black coffee I had for breakfast is telling me that I need to go to the nearest take away joint and just give in to my desire!!!!!!!! Not going to happen. Sorry “Food Fairy” and “Celery Fairy”, you two can battle it out, I have locked myself in my office and pushed the key out under the office door in the hopes that when it’s time for me to leave;

1. The 2 liter bottle of water will be finished
2. That I have no need to use the ladies
3. And there is someone to let me out of my office………….Oh dear, I did not give much thought to that part did I?

I have been barricaded in this office with boxes during the busy times and no one missed me. It took me phoning Bern to ask her to move the boxes for me to get out for them to realize I was locked in. See what food deprivation does to a person. You become irrational and tearful, well let me put it this way, the tears are streaming down my face and my fear is…… they will leave tonight and not even realize I am in my office. …. Well not really, I can phone them and ask them to let me out, but what if they decide not too? All because I have no will power and cannot say No to the “Food Fairy” The extremes I go too.

We all do silly things in the need for that perfect body - like Cait; she was determined to do something about firming up. She climbed onto the exercise bicycle and road for about half an hour flat. She said she could do another 10 minutes - so of course I encouraged her; being the supportive mother than I am, I always encourage them to strive for more, reach for that goal, be all that you can be…………..oh ok I admit it …... I have to get my giggles where I can. She dutifully did another 10 minutes and felt great. She took a sip of her water (Gulp) grabbed her towel from around her neck, wiped her brow, threw her leg over the seat to get off the bike and collapsed on the floor. She had no strength in her legs at all and just lay there and giggled and moaned. I of course got my exercise by joining in the raucous laughter and landed up sitting on the floor with her giggling like a school girl. Word of advice Cait….. Never listen to your mum when she says go another 10 minutes on the bike……….. I can’t even do 10 minutes so you should have known I had a hidden motive…… you skinny Brat! LOL. That will teach you.

The other day Sarah phoned me to tell me she had just found the perfect balanced way of life. She had been playing the wii game and did some exercises on the machine Thingy -ma- jiggy (Shows how technically advanced I am! I don’t know how this works...) She felt very pleased with herself for finally finding a way to enjoy exercise and decided to reward herself….she went to the cupboard and opened up a tin on condensed milk and enjoyed the sweet taste of working up a sweat. Very balanced diet…..lol my type of diet, ..That reminds me I have a tin of condensed milk in my fridge, I had better feed it to Matt before I give into the temptation to gorge myself.

Both Bern and I are on this new eating Plan (should be called torture) and we made sure not to do the monthly food shop so the cupboards are bare, but the fridge has carrots and lettuce and celery and cheese. The freezer is empty except for the designated meals. Mathew is not too happy at the new eating plan as he had green salads and a steak. Well he loved the steak and I mean who wouldn’t but there was no chips dripping in oil or fried eggs. Well suck it up Matt and deal with it – you will feel our pain even if you are one of those Skinny people who just makes me want to smack you. ……….Shew not handling this new eating programme well am I? LOL.

Just got a Skype from Bern:
[9:28:19 AM] Bernadette: Val and Tannith having toasted hot cross buns for breakfast. My stomach has just come up my throat and is strangling me!

I take it she is not handling this new plan too well either. Well I can pacify myself with the knowledge that maybe my bones won’t ache so much if I lose a few kilos and maybe I will feel better about myself as I die of the need to have that greasy pizza or burger, but until then I will be strong and I will get through this and while you sit there and read this while eating your Danish or Hot dog or plate of chips, spare a thought for those less fortunate, ..Kids are starving in Africa for goodness sake..…… words cannot describe my need to reach out the screen and throttle you too.

Reminds me of a story Sharon told me.. These people came to her house collecting clothes for the starving people and asked if she had any clothes to give them. She said she chased them off her property because if the people could fit in to her clothes they clearly were not starving!!!! In fact they need to join a gym or a health club or go to a fat farm!

Speaking of Fat farms, at the end of last year after two grueling months of long hours – bad eating and no sleep, I told my boss she would have to pay to send me to a Fat Farm. Her response was “Don’t be ridiculous, you are Fat enough!” Nice one…. Thanks for that. Ha, ha, ha! I was not amused at the time but yes I get the hint!!!

Ha ha, oh well enjoy your food and live long and I will be better tomorrow I am sure. They say the second day is the hardest. Oh hurry up 3rd day!

Oh and I need to explain the need to lose weight. Well Sarah came down for her 23rd Birthday and we had such a blast. On one of the days I decided it was too hot to sit in the hose, so I grabbed my costume, a two piece and didn’t bother with the shirts as it was just Sarah and I. I climbed into the pool and waded around and enjoyed the coolness of the pool, my Lilly white skin did not scare off the sun and I decided this was the life. After sitting on the step and trying to read my book, I decided to be brilliant and grabbed one of our beach chairs and put it on the second step and wallowed in the beach chair like a big fat beached whale. Well this was not very clever; I had put sun block on the face and chest and thought I was safe from the Durban sun…. NOT SO MUCH, I tanned by thighs and my knees as I sat there and the sight of these red thighs made me feel quite ill. They looked like two roast pork's.

Never mind the fact they hurt like hell and I walked like an idiot and moaned about the pain. But what horrified me the most was when I walked past the mirror in my room and thought, OH MY GOODNESS WHO IS THAT OLD FAT CHICK IN THE TWO PIECE COSTUME! I took a photo of me in the beach chair to show Bern what she was missing out on, being in the pool I mean, not me…., but deleted it in the event I caused the world to melt down with the sight of me.