Fish, Films & Over Indulgence

The fish that I cooked for our Friday lunch, as anticipated, was a right disaster; Phil found bones even though I had it filleted in the supermarket and the parsley sauce made with Soya milk tasted seriously weird. Phil was not happy, but Delia I ain’t and the laws of probability mean that I am going to have a disaster every now and again. So that I could have the weekend away from the stove, on Friday afternoon, I cooked a cauliflower and potato curry and a liver and onion casserole, recipes both from the prostrate diet book. They both came out okay but I am going to have to explore some prostrate desserts this week that allows for Phil's diabetes because he does like something sweet. He is allowed every now and then but it can't be every day especially as he is doing so well with the diet. On weigh in this morning he was done to 17 stone 2 pounds. So a loss of 9 pounds in just under 2 weeks which is excellent.

Steve Pem popped round after work on Friday night for a beer and a catchup, this is the first time we've seen him since New Year. After his illness before Christmas, he is still on medication and is going to be for some time. He suspects that the virus he had was actually Swine flu and I think this is quite likely, especially after seeing the state he was in when I visited him in MK General. Anyway, he looked well, he's back at work and has managed to keep the weight off that he lost when he was ill.

As usual Phil was up to the loo and in the wide awake club very early on Saturday morning, he managed to go back to sleep but yours truly didn't. We went to the gym where Phil managed a reasonable workout but nowhere near the 2 hour session that he told me he was going to do last weekend. Still at least he went and it's better to break in slowly and work up. I think I have solved the exercise during the week problem for Phil and on Friday I ordered I Reebok exercise bike from Argos which is being delivered on Thursday morning sometime between 7 am and midday. It was a real bargain, £249 reduced down to 99 quid. I can't wait for it to arrive although it will come boxed and will need assembling so may not be until the weekend that we're up and biking.

Phil went to do the VAT online after lunch on Saturday only to find that the accounts spreadsheet was in a right mess. I keep this up to date on a daily basis and can only think that the data got messed up when I transferred it from my old laptop on to Phil's desktop because he had a newer version of excel. I dunno but it took me nearly 2 hours of re-entering figures going right back to September. Lots of swearing in the kitchen but eventually I got it done and Phil was able to file our return. Accounts or indeed anything to do with figures is really not my bag, I am useless in this department.

After sorting out finances, we decided to park up at Willen Park south, just at the back of Lovat Fields Retirement Village and walk by the canal up to Campbell Bridge and up the hill to Cineworld. Unfortunately we couldn't find a canal bride at Willen so ended up going to the Campbell Park bridge and then had to go back on ourselves. Phil had the bright idea of walking through Campbell Park because he thought it would give us a change of scenery and would be quicker. It was a change I suppose to walk through the park but it certainly wasn't any quicker and we ended up getting out of the park and walking the last bit on the path by the road. Time was running out and we only just made the start of the film after getting scooby snacks in Waitrose and queueing what seemed like ages for tickets. The cinema was packed and we ended up having to seat right at the front but at least we didn’t miss the beginning. The film we choose to see was 'Hereafter' directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Matt Damon. It wasn't very joined up in parts but still, we both like Matt Damon and thoroughly enjoyed the film. I'm not sure you need to see it on a big screen so perhaps one to rent out on DVD.

The walk back to car in the dark in the freezing cold was not much fun but the exercise did us good and it was a joy to get back to our lovely warm house. The plan was to open a bottle of red and watch a film but just as I cracked open the wine Harriet asked Phil to give her a lift to Newport. Before going out she came down stairs into the kitchen to pose for a photo. She was showing off her new high heeled shoes heeled and how she towered above me. We had to laugh as the shoes were a little big and she was struggling to walk and that was before any vodka! After Phil dropped HH off we snuggled on the sofa with the heating turned up high and watched 'A Good Year'.

Unfortunately Harriet woke us up when she staggered in at 4am. I have to say normally she is very quiet but not on Saturday night. We did manage to go back to sleep until 7.30am but I have to say, I had to laugh to myself because as I passed her bedroom door as I was going downstairs to make tea I noticed that her light was on. I went into her room only to find Harriet, still in her black dress, sprawled on top of her duvet with her telly going full blast and the remnants of some unrecognisable fast food on her bedside table. The joys of being 21! Don't think it was much joy yesterday though, she was really suffering and stayed in bed all day.

I confess that Sunday was very a indulgent day for me. Phil left at half nine, he picked up G and they went to Melton to spend the day with his mum and dad. After he left, I did my ironing whilst watching Embarrassing Bodies and then moved the cars in the front and got the hedge trimmer and cut back the hedge. It badly needed doing and actually I quite enjoyed doing it, the sun was shining and it wasn't too cold. I put all the hedge branches and the leaves I'd swept up in the green bin. After a quick shower and change, I then went to the Toby Inn at Shenley Lodge and treated myself to a carvery. I was naughty and had the roast beef because Phil wasn't there and very nice it was too. Some of you may think its sad to dine alone but I really don't mind at all. It was nice to eat a meal that I hadn't had to cook for a change.

After lunch I took myself to the city centre, parked up and went to the cinema to see 'The Dilemma', it wasn't a film that I particularly wanted to see but my choice was governed by the timings. It was okay. It had a likeable cast and an interesting premise but I thought it was dark at times, even depressing and although funny in places, it didn't make me laugh and I wouldn't have called it a comedy; still I was happy enough with my miniature bottle of J.P. Chenet and my straw and a bag of minstrels. God, I do sound sad but I like watching movies and I have to make my annual cinema ticket pay for itself.

Last week I read 2 really good books. The first was one lent to me by Vanessa, a booked by Lisa Lynch entitled 'The C-Word'. It's all about a 28 year old woman diagnosed with breast cancer and her book came about by her blog which she started when first diagnosed. I admit to being somewhat cancer obsessed at the moment but this personal account of breast cancer was inspiring, simply truly amazing and I couldn't put it down. You might noticed that I have added Lisa's blog to my blog links www.alrighttit.com ha, love the title.

The other book which arrived in the post on Thursday was not quite as amazing 'The Plant Programme' by Professor Jane Plant & Gill Tidy but still I was glad I ordered it. Its basically a diet designed to fight breast and prostrate cancer. Now I do have similar books and one by the same author but this book has some really good and different recipes. If I am to keep Phil on the straight and narrow I am going to have to keep this diet as diversified as possible and this book has given me plenty of ideas especially in the sweet department.

I will have to pay for my over indulgence yesterday and have a big gym session planned today so after posting this, I'm grabbing my gym kit and heading out the door. It's a big week in the Krause household because of course Phil gets the results of his MRI scan on Wednesday. Our appointment with Dr Andrew is at 9.45am; normally I would blog on Wednesday morning but this week I am going to leave it until we get back from the hospital because I know lots of you will be wanting to know how we got on. Fingers crossed those bast**d cancer cells have stayed in the prostrate and not drifted anywhere else hey. At the moment I am positive that they haven't and as Jill said, if they'd have found anything serious the hospital would have called us in before now. So no call is a good sign but I'll update everyone with results on Wednesday afternoon. Right now, its time to start the week.