S’been a bit hot today, hasn’t it! I’ve more or less just come back from my afternoon walkies, and I was just so… exhausted from it all that I’ve just been sitting here, staring blankly into space. trying to recover my composure! I was dripping all over the treadmill by the time I finished (in fact I was dripping before I’d counted 30 steps!) even though I’d turned the air conditioner… er… quite a bit cooler (I never know whether you turn an air-conditioner “up” or “down” to make it cooler! Does anybody know? Which is it?!)

Anyway… This morning we set off to pick up my new shoes, and then, if it wasn’t too hot, we’d call in at a nice little Italian delicatessen (now a cafe with a different name) that we used to frequent many, many years ago, to see if they had any proper Panettone or Panforte – but I’m getting ahead of myself! We were supposed to collect my shoes at 11 o’clock, and by the time we got there it was really starting to hot up! So we went in (I don’t think the guy has an air conditioner!) and I tried on my shoes, I even had a bit of a paddle up and down his corridor in them, and they fit perfectly, and were even comfortable! (you’ve really got no idea how exceedingly hard it is for me to say that any shoes are “comfortable”!) But they were, and they did indeed fit me perfectly (then!) so we paid him, and off we went again. By the time I got to the car I was beginning to realise that I was in the process of developing two very nice, large, blisters! One on my left heel – I’m used to wearing sandal-type shoes, with only a strap around the back of my heels holding them on – and one on my left little toe, where the shoe was rubbing me raw. Oh well, at least they’ll match the treadmilling blister on my left big toe! I’m sure they’ll “wear-in” over the next few days, and if not, we’d better buy some shares in Band-Aids! 😉 I’m to give the shoemaker a call early in the New Year to give him the go-ahead to start making me some more “sandal-type” shoes – he also thinks he can modify my old shoes to fit better, so we might do that first…

Then we went on to our little Italian place in Burwood East – we started going there nearly 26 years ago, when it was called “Frank’s Deli” – they made the most delicious home-made pasta sauce that you’d quite often see glubbing quietly away on their minute stove tucked away in one corner. It was one of the only places outside of Carlton where you could still get good Parmigiano (parmesan) cheese, either grated or cut from a wheel, too. It’s now called Cafe Spizzico, but apart from some extra tables and chairs outside, it really hasn’t changed all that much. We don’t go there all that often now, but the people there still remember us, and they usually have mostly authentic Italian goods on display and for sale. I thought that if anyone had decent Panettone and Panforte outside of the old Agostino’s in Lygon Street, it’d have to be them – so we went to test out my theory. Well, they didn’t have any Panforte – the buxom young wench serving us told us that she’d forgotten to order any, and by the time she remembered, their supplier had run out of them! However they did have Panettone! And not only Panettone, they had our family preferred Motta brand Panettone! (what I was raving on about last night!) They didn’t have many – there were only eight of them (and one had a bit of a squished box, so we rejected that one… Father Christmas, who deposits them under the Christmas Tree for our Christmas Breakfasts would never squish one of the boxes – not even slightly! 😉 ) We took six of them! They’re a bit smaller than we usually get, and we would have preferred them to be a little larger (which was why I insisted on getting the six of them!) but they’re Motta Panettone, and that’s all that matters, as far as I’m concerned! 🙂 So… we’re now Panettone’d up, but I don’t know what we’re going to do about the Panforte – probably nothing – it’s just an itch of mine that could do with a bit of a scratch, but if I keep looking long enough, the right ones will eventually turn up – or, we can always go for our trip overseas, dart up to Siena, and buy a suitcase full of Panforte’s and bring them back with us! 😉 Can’t you just see the headlines? “Couple caught smuggling candy-fruit and spice cakes into Melbourne! Not worth the cost of their smuggling-suitcase!” with a fuzzy-looking black and white photo of yours-truly and Julian, shielding their faces from the media with a folded-up newspaper! Ahh! Shades of “Darth Carla and her Computer Space Invaders“! (go on, read it, I dare you! I’m notorious, you know! 😉  About the only part that’s true is the fact that I lived in an untidy suburban house!)

Food thingz: After the delicious marinated veal medallions that we had for dinner last night, there was a bit left over, which I had sliced up on two Ryvita crispbreads spread with low-fat ricotta for lunch today – no tomato this time, as we’d run out of them! Let me just say that the veal was just as delicious cold, as it was hot! Tonight I think we’re having a selection of cold meats and salads – as we’re still agonizing over whether I should have a small bowl of pasta or not. I haven’t had pasta for almost two years! Surely a small bowl wouldn’t hurt too much? But the grated cheese probably would… Oh, the carbs in the pasta! Oh the milk solids (i.e. fat!) in the grated cheese! So you can see why we’re agonizing over whether to eat pasta or not… I don’t want to make the decision, lest I prove myself to be the glutton I’m trying hard not to be – Julian doesn’t want to make the decision lest he be seen as trying to undermine my weight-loss and encouraging me to eat things that maybe I’d be better off not eating! What we need is someone impartial to either say “Eat it! It’s not that bad for you if you don’t eat it too often!”, or “Don’t touch it with a ten-foot barge pole! That pasta is the top of a very long and slippery slope, leading directly to obesity and eternal damnation! (do not pass Go, do not collect 200 dollars!)” So… cold cuts and salad it is, tonight….

Weigh-in this morning. Was not too bad! It seems that perhaps I should go shopping a lot more often, because apparently my body likes walking the length and breadth of a shopping center, even if I do have a mini mince tart with my cup of coffee! 🙂 I dropped one point this morning, going from 65.1kg to 65.0kg! I’m pleased – the longer I stay at any one particular weight, the more chance that it’ll decide to flatten out and “plateau” – in other words, “stabilising” around that weight. Well, that’s the theory of it, anyway! 🙂 Let’s see what tomorrow brings – I haven’t been parading around a shopping centre, but I did do a bit of outside walking (but only a teeny bit! It was too hot for any more!) and I’ve done both my treadmillings – this morning I “walked” (treadmilled) 1.58km, and this afternoon, I managed to get to 1.62km – that was the one that almost knocked me out – I was so terribly hot… 😦

Hey! Guess what! My bathroom is actually starting to look like a bathroom, now, and not just like a marble coated hole! The mirror is in, and it does make the room look so much bigger, and lighter! The toilet is in (but still not usable!) The shower screen is in, and the silicone is “curing” prior to the shower door being installed, the drawer handles are on the drawers in the vanity unit, and the towel rail is on the wall under the glass brick window… This afternoon Clarke went to pick up the caesarstone bench top, which will be put on tomorrow! Oh, the electrician was here again this afternoon, installing the concealed lights under the vanity unit, and they do look sooo very cool! They’re the same led’s as are in the ceiling lights, so it’ll all look “matching”, an’ all! So everything is still on-track to be finished by the end of Sunday, and I’ll finally have my gorgeous bathroom! 🙂 I’m not sure what I’m doing tomorrow – probably a whole lot of nothing much! I’m not sure what Julian’s doing, either, but you can bet your sweet bippy that it’ll be “business as usual” for him (in other words, he’ll be busy doing something!) And that, gentle readers, is about it from me again for tonight! 🙂 Please feel free to drop by again tomorrow night, to find out if my weight is going to hang around the 65.something mark for a while, or whether it’s going to go dramatically up (probably!)… or maybe down (unlikely!) Find out where my bathroom’s up to by tomorrow night, and what adventures – if any – have befallen us during the day! Until then, however, do remember to bee as good as you can bee, never forget to be mindful of what you throw away, to be careful of what you push away, and to think hard before you walk away, and always remember to drive carefully, to look after yourselves, and to keep cool – or warm – depending on our silly weather patterns – but most importantly of all, remember to stay safe! 🙂 ciao, all! 🙂