Is it me or has the BBC been running the same news story all week?
It seems every time I switch onto the 6 o'clock news that ridiculous big blue graphic of the swine flu virus is sat there wobbling at me menacingly.
It is the signal for my brain to turn off until something more stimulating appears on the screen.
Don't get me wrong, I realise people are very ill and dying, and I'm not taking anything away from that, but I can't help feeling that the TV news in particular just love to get mentally overexcited about it. I can imagine the news conference 'We need big graphics, all reporters to be reporting live from places where somebody has sneezed to talk about how people haven't sneezed like this for a generation'. It's really like something out of The Day Today, they are literally standing in a news trench.
Then they seem to be running the same story about the row over helicopters for the armed forces in Afghanistan, each day it has a slightly different yet not very different angle. The underlying fact is our troops will never be as well equipped as the Americans because we simply don't spend the same amount on them.
When I had a proper job as a journalist I went to Afghanistan to spend a week with the Royal Marines. At Kandahar it was as if a small town in America had simply been airlifted thousands of miles across the world and plonked in the camp. There really is a Burger King, games arcades, ice hockey pitches and pretty much anything else you'd want in a huge Walmart-esque store.
Our boys were apparently happy shivering under their canvas tents with nothing but the sound of my snoring to entertain them. I'm amazed I didn't get shot, I must have deprived entire brigades of hours of sleep. But they were pretty tough looking chaps, probably had more fearsome foe to worry about.
But the sad fact is all governments since the 1970s have slashed defence budgets, Tory and Labour, and it's not likely to be reversed unless we all start paying more tax. Anybody?
Not much to do with running or weight loss I realise, but this is what happens when I spend too much time watching telly instead of doing stuff.
Haven't managed to actually get to the gym or do any running so far this week, which is pretty bad seeing as it's now Thursday, and very nearly Friday.
I even had an ice cream on Wednesday and lunch which included bread for the first time in weeks. Don't know why I'm rebelling as I would hate to put any weight on, but for some reason I've gone all petulant and sulky about the whole thing and I don't want to play any more.
I'm sure this won't last, I think it's good to have a week off sometimes.
What I really need is some more interesting ideas for healthy eating. I can never get bored of cheese and red meat and bread, they all taste great on their own and indeed combined, although not much good for the waistline. But the whole veg and salad thing is a little tedious after a while. I keep trying to liven it up with olive oil or mayonnaise, but I know that is just wrong and pointless.
What I really need is a cook book which has easy to cook every day meals you want to eat for your tea, not Michelin Star haute cuisine, which are ideal for unemployed layabouts on a tight or ever-dwindling budget, and are really healthy for you. In fact so healthy that the mere act of eating the dishes will make you more healthy and a better person.
I had a banana for breakfast, thinking I could get through to lunch on that, which I did. But then had a bowl of Special K for my lunch, followed by an apple. Big mistake and school boy error. By 3.30 I was starving, well not quite but couldn't concentrate on anything for feeling hungry. So I chopped up a load of fatty French sausage in a load of salad and drowned it in olive oil AND mayo. I consoled myself with the thought that at least I hadn't made a huge sarnie and snaffled a bag of Kettle chips and then had dinner. Tonight we had Chicken Supreme a la Colman's packet sauce, which did the job. We had a packet of Weight Watchers chocolate snack bars and I couldn't help having one for 'pudding'. But just as my hand reached into the cupboard to pick one out, I suddenly found two of them in my hand. Well, you have to have at least two to notice you've eaten anything at all, they're that small.
I feel a bit like I've had a blow out today, but actually compared to a few months ago it's nothing like as bad.
But I promise I will do some exercise tomorrow, and the weekend.
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