Manchester, Illness and everything inbetween

Well it's been a while, I have been crazy busy for the last few weeks and then developed a chest infection that I am just recovering from so my blog has been the last thing on my mind!!

Work has been manic busy, I had my first two events (that I was leading on) in back to back weeks both in London, which I was really excited about until that is I woke up on the second day of my first event feeling like HELL!!  I have not felt that poorly in a looooong time (mainly because I don't really get poorly less the occasional migraine!) and still had to get through not only the second day of the event - with my boss but also the dreaded journey back from London to Birmingham.  The event was fine, in fact it was the journey that nearly killed me.  It turned out that not only did I have a chest infection but I also had an inflamed osoph(?) breathing tube!  Therefore, walking meant I couldn't catch my breath so I had to do everything at half speed, took me nearly 6 hours to get home and by the time I got home I felt so rough and worse still I had to go into work on the Friday to prepare for my event this week.  Needless to say, after having to get my chauffeur (Dad) to drive me to work because I couldn't stop shivering due to my fever and walking into work and sobbing like a child because I couldn't catch my breath, I was not in any position to go to the second event.  Therefore, since Friday lunch time I have been on anti-biotics and curled up in bed feeling very sorry for myself :-(  I dread going back to 400 odd e-mails but it's got to be done!

Anyway, in lighter and less poorly news!  I took my trip to Manchester to visit my cousin Tom and had a fab time.  He lives in a converted Sorting Office and its such an incredible space with all the fancy mod-cons you can imagine.  I fell in love with the place.  First, we went to a lovely little Tea Shop called the TeaCup where they have around 6 million types of tea and it comes in a teapot and a timer so you leave it to brew for the correct time.  It's very quaint and they do a lovely breakfast, I had scrambled egg on sourdough toast with chives and it was LOVELY!!

Then we went to the Science and Industry Museum for the day followed by a dinner party back at the apartment.  Tom served the most amazing lamb dish with anchovies and capers (which I didn't know I liked!) with celeriac mash and braised red cabbage.  A recipe I would definitely recommend: BBC Good Food - Roast Lamb

Before I went home, Tom took me to see Ancoat Peeps which is quite incredible.  An artist called Dan Dubowitz who installed brass peepholes throughout Ancoat in Manchester that show what things would have looked like in the times when industry was huge in the area.  There is more information on them here: Ancoat Peeps  They are really interesting and it's a lovely little place to walk around to find them all, particularly at the weekend as the buildings are mostly offices now so its really quiet at the weekend.

All in all it was a cracking weekend but exhausting, Tom walks everywhere so we did all weekend.  I'm just not used to that much walking - I was shattered and nearly ran out of petrol stuck in traffic on the M6!!  Oh the drama!!

Finally, on the Monday before my event last week I was reminded that I had ordered a ticket to the Rocky Horror Picture Show with the girls from my old work.  Which was quite an experience, I have not seen it before and I really enjoyed it until I stood up to do the Timewarp to discover this chap sitting in front of me and Jackie.  He might I add got very into dancing to the Timewarp which is a sight I NEVER want to see again!!!

Well that't pretty much an update on the last two weeks.  I haven't weighed in due to being away for work so I have no update on 'Operation Skinny' but I will update on Wednesday after I weigh in!

TTFN