my fat diaries

 Hi there

I was cleaning out the garage, and came across decades of my old diaries.  I started a diary when I was about twelve.  I kept diaries till I was 40.  

What I can't get over is that practically in every entry in all the diaries, over all those years, I mention my weight and how I want to lose it, and I'm too big, and "I put on a lb today, oh no!".   Umpteen times, I write that I bought, say, a doughnut (that's how we spelt it in the 1960's) and felt so guilty after a mouthful that I threw the rest in the rubbish bin.  I rarely succeeded with any long-term dieting, putting on the pounds extremely quickly.

In a photo taken of my cousin and me at the beach - me, aged 13 - I tore off the bottom half of the photo, at the time, because it showed my "big fat thighs". 

When I retired I made a decision.  I threw out my measuring tape, my scales, and diet books.  I'd never eaten carrot cake in my life, never bought a block of chocolate, hadn't scoffed down a pie since I'd been at the Winter Show in 1960.  I didn't know what a brownie tasted like,  But everything was going to change.  I was going to taste forbidden fruits...  And I have done!

And that brings me to Judith Collins, leader of the National Party, and up for election this Saturday.  She intimated this week that fat people should use discipline when eating.  I tried discipline for forty years and was sad, hungry, and let watching-my-weight all but ruin me.  Sure, I'm fat now but I go to the gym every week, I walk almost every day, I swim in the sea in the middle of winter, I can bound up 40 steps with hardly a puff.  And how many other senior citizens can do one-arm push-ups?

  

Evans Bay Marina

 Hi there

I often walk around the Evans Bay Marina.  There's an overnight motor home park there now.  I think the drivers can only park for a couple of nights, but the carpark is near bus stop to town, short walk to Kilbirnie or Miramar shops, there are new toilets.  Oh, and on a wall, there's a mural of the cheekiest little Orca -

  

below: you can see the masts of the yachts in the background of the motor home park.

Swimming

 Hi there

A friend joined me swimming last Sunday.  Glorious.  I've been swimming solo since June but for various reasons, my friends couldn't join me this winter (first time in eleven years).

The water had been extremely cold over winter but with my friend last weekend beside me I didn't really notice the freezing seas.  it was because we were laughing and splashing and once my friend reacquainted herself with  the cold ("OMG, this is  FREEZING!!") we had fun.

What don't we know?

 Hi there

I often wonder if there's something I should know that I don't know -

A couple of years ago, a friend of mine told me about tying a double bow on shoelaces.

"I told the guy in the shoe store," she said, "that my laces were always coming undone and trailing on the ground.  He showed me how to tie a double bow.  Do you know how to tie a double bow?"

Of course I knew how to tie a double  bow.  I'd known how to do that, well, forever.  I'd often wondered how dozens of teen males managed with shoelaces dripping around their feet.  Did these guys not know how to tie a double bow?  Guess not.

Which leads me on to wondering what I don't know.  Is there some significant piece of information out there that could make my life more enjoyable?  Help me easily overcome some immense difficulty?  Get me around a problem that's been bugging me for years?

I wish I knew what I don't know...

Ohope Beach... Again

 Hi there.

All of last week, I was up north at Ohope Beach for a holiday.  Not a sign of anyone wearing masks. 

 I swam in the sea.  I went to the movies ("23 walks").  I went to cafes.  I bought two paintings (an indulgence, oh dear...).  I walked a lot.  I had fun finding little kiwi statues hidden away in Whakatane township (4 km away from Ohope Beach).  And I had a dozen fried oysters - yum, yum,  yum - from the Ohiwa Oyster Farm.  

above: Ohope Beach with White Island  in background.  With naked eye, I could see a huge plume of smoke coming from volcano. Scary.

above:  some years ago I had a photo of me in front of 'kiwi wandering" notice in Ohope.  Someone has since taken the 'k' off which now makes the sign 'iwi wandering' which I think is fantastic ("iwi" in Maori culture can mean tribe , or people, or nation. 

see above:  another little kiwi statue.  This one on the 

Whakatane foreshore.

Drawing a Cube

 Hi there

Most of my friends are learning to draw cubes.  The message has been relayed, via an older persons' secret network, that doctors are requiring patients to draw cubes to see how with-it these patients are.  Whether it's for an older person renewing a driving licence or for a medical assessment, it's the same thing : draw a cube.

I couldn't draw a cube to save myself, but now I think I've conquered it.  Okay, doctors. Bring it on!

THE HAT'S THE THING

In winter, I like to wear cosy woollen hats that lay close around the head.  Well-meaning knitting volunteers at charity shops must all work from the same pattern because I find such hats at OpShops all around the country.  I've bought half a dozen over the past couple of years.

It was a cold day a few weeks ago and wearing my latest little red number, I sailed into the SPCA charity shop in Petone. 

Success! -  I spotted a whole case full of the little woollen hats.  After I'd tried on most of the stock, and chosen one, I plonked my own hat back on my head and went up to the counter -

"I'll have this blue hat please."  I handed it over.

The guy put the hat in a recycled bag - good on him - and handed the bag to me.  "Don't forget to pay for the hat you're wearing" he said.

"What, no!  It's my own hat.  I wore it when I came in.  I bought it at the art-craft shop in Raumati.  I'm not a thief- "

I'm sure the guy didn't believe me.  I worried all the way home that he'd called the cops.  I visualised my face on wanted posters and all-points bulletins put out about me.  I would have to chase up a  statement from those arty crafty knitters in Raumati.

I'm innocent I tell you.  Innocent.