Heartwarming

A combination of "Blue Monday" at the start of the week and various practical problems of life meant that my mood was very dark when I set off for my run on Tuesday morning and when I couldn't reach the beach due to flooding I thought the week may simply continue in that vein but a happy set of circumstances, along with the support of friends have dragged me up.

Milos and Gaynor worked so hard for the win yesterday and beating the competition was not just a testament to the hard work they put in but also, as becomes clear in Gaynor's blog, down to Milos's understanding of his dogs' needs. It was wonderful to see someone who does all the right things coming in first. Heartwarming.

The power of the internet came to the fore in another heartwarming moment. A friend with more creative talent in her little finger than most have in their entirety has always been very supportive of my Arctic endeavour, both financially and psychologically. Last week she mentioned that she had been making some bags out of off-cuts of furnishing fabrics and wondered if I'd be interested in selling them for the fundraising pot. As usual she was not convinced that anyone would want to buy them, and as usual I was convinced that she was putting herself down. Once she had sent me a shot of one of the bags it was confirmed, she's brilliant with colour and she'd made a delightful feminine bag, which looked not unlike the kind they sell in Liberty for about £200. She put the shot on Flickr and within moments a mutual friend in the US had seen it and asked if it was for sale! 24 hours later and our American friend had made a contribution to our fundraising and the bag is winging its way across the sea. Hopefully this will start a trend and she'll realise how fab the bags are (maybe she'll even read this...?)

The full story unfolds here.

Finally I had a call last night from the Village Hall Committee; always a bit scary when a committee of any kind calls you, especially when the lady who called used to coach the England Women's Hockey team. I was quaking in my boots. No need though. A couple of months ago all the lamps in the hall were replaced with new funky ones and they removed the old ones, which I loved. They are huge 60's/70's pendants with opaque glass shades so as an habitual recycler I asked in I could buy a set to split up and hang in my 60's/70's style house, and they obliged. It transpires that no-one else likes the style (perhaps this also applies to my house...) and so they were going to chuck them, but remembered our charity, so have offered them to me to sell to raise funds. I'm delighted. There is an auction of modern design coming up, which should be perfect for them and usually does well, so I'm off to pick them up on Saturday. More heartwarmingness.

So all in all I'm feeling somewhat better and what with Sheyne's tip on apps to help you do 100 press ups and 200 sit ups, things could be back on track soon. All I need now is an app that keeps a food diary for me, which adds up calories/protien/carbs etc. and tells me how much I need to eat if I've eaten too much or too little, whilst all the time encouraging me to eat fresh veg instead of Green and Blacks.

(Amusingly the disclaimer on this app says "the two hundred sit ups logo is not meant to be an indicator of how the exercise should be performed")