Over the past 4 weeks I have been going balls to the wall mental trying to do this whole ‘healthy lifestyle’ thing. It hasn’t been easy and I have seriously thought about throwing in the towel and just succumbing to the fact that I’m a diabetic now and continuing on living the way I had been. Then I remembered a conversation that I had with my wife a few weeks ago. I asked her if our son Albie would remember me and remember all the cool things that we had done together, if I died soon. For example, his nickname is ‘monkey’, my daughters is ‘wolfie’ and mine is ‘draggy’ (short for Dragon) and we make little animal shapes with our hands and every single night before I put them to bed we tell a ‘Wolfie Monkey & Draggy’ story. It is the highlight of my day, telling that story with them and listening to the completely fabricated stories that my kids come up with. I let them drive the storylines because, well, because it’s adorable and thoroughly enjoyable. Last week Lucy and Albie told the story about how Wolfie, Monkey and Draggy had to get back some potions and some curtains from Mayor Dondinger who had stuffed them up his bum…..Hilarious. Now how could my son NOT remember that in his later years? My wife told me that he probably wouldn’t remember me and remember those kinds of things when he was older. She asked me
”What is your earliest memory”? She was spot on, too. I can’t remember anything before the age of 5 or 6. I don’t want to not be remembered by children, especially my son. So as far as throwing in the towel goes – The only towels I am going to throw are the ones that I have used from the gym and the only place I am going to throw them is into the fucking washing basket in the bathroom! I have joined the gym recently and have really enjoyed going. I have some new headphones (so no one can talk to me) and I just smash shit out. My programme is as follows………
“I HAVE LOST 5 KILOS IN THREE AND A HALF WEEKS” I am feeling really positive about the direction I am heading in and even better that it’s ME that is in control of it all. I mean, of course it’s me. Who else would it be? Anyway, this is a short blog and all I want to do is stress the importance of staying focussed and keeping on keeping on. The old saying ‘when life gives you lemons, make lemonade’ could be used here but I prefer this one. “Fuck lemons and fuck lemonade. Sometimes life is shitty. Deal with it and change it”.
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THE PUB. On Saturday night me and the Mrs. went out to Father Teds with some friends for a 'leaving do' of sorts. Our friends Sophie and Ryan have gone on their big OE and flew out today. They are also engaged to be married and it just so happens that the band that they were thinking of booking for their wedding were playing on Saturday evening at Teds (one of Auckland's finest Irish bars) and they wanted to go and check em out and have the opinions of their friends before they booked em. Sophie hadn't told me about it and when I heard it was going down, I messaged her asking what the haps was. She said that she had every intention of asking me to go but then decided that she didn't want to 'invite me out drinking' because she knew I was trying to stop and be healthier. What a good bitch, and she really is. She is one of the sweetest, most genuinely nice people I have ever met! We got to the pub after the All Blacks game to find the big screen pulled down in the bar and a bunch of pissed up Irish fans watching the Ireland/Aussie game. Sophie was gutted as she had told the 10-15 people that had come to watch the band that they were going to be playing at 10 pm (as was told to her by the band), I laughed and told her that there was no way that the band would even pick up their instruments until after the rugby. Irish people will choose to watch the Irish play (and win) at ANY sport. It could have been an international table tennis match between Ireland and Ethiopia and they would roll out the big screen and smash 15 pints whilst watching. I grabbed a glass of water, knocked it back and decided to rock into one of my favourite 'dives' in the AKL CBD, 'Munsters', or 'The Munster Inn' as it is actually known. It is right next to Teds down some stairs and it is by far the nicest basement I have ever drank in. While I wasn't drinking this particular night, I still had a big smile on my face just being in that place. They used to do $20 jugs of Snake Bite (Lager, Cider and Black Currant syrup) and my god how the memories came flooding back to me. Snake Bites are so easy to drink and apparently they got banned in a few Scottish town because too many people were getting fucked up on them, like seriously fucked up. If you ever get the chance to punch a few pints of Snake Bite - Give it a go. They're glorious. After the ruggers we headed back up the stairs and back into Father Teds, There just so happened to be a free booth for us to sit in. So as the band started to play, my pregnant sister in law and I grabbed a seat in the booth and sat there sober and quietly observing the drunk punters. This one guy was hooking into this chick and it was equally hilarious and terrifying at the same time. She was keen to dance and flick him a little bumpin' and grindin' (yeah, sorry. I thought I could get away using that term but it clearly hasn't gone down well) Anyway she was busy gyrating her pelvis on his groin and as soon as she'd stop or change up her moves (which wasn't that often), he'd grab her face and start slobbering. I do realise that this makes me sound like a total pervert but honestly, It was right in our faces and I was a little 'herbed out' and found it quite funny. The band was OK. They opened with some pop song I'd never heard of and then played Pharrell's 'Happy' and then a song about some dude wanting to have a 'cake in the ocean' or something. It was a weird set, I tell ya but they were a good band; you could tell that they had been together for a while and weren't just a bunch of session musicians who get together for a jam every now and then. After the cake/ocean song, we gassed it off home. My sister Shannon was sober driving and all in all it was a pretty good night. THE GYM I had my very first gym session today (Monday 18th June). With my newly made vest (I cut the sleeves off of my Rock Fm hoodie), I whacked on my new wireless Beats Solo 3's and hit shuffle on my ROCKPOD playlist and started pedaling on the Exercycle. I set it to level 15 and set the programme to 'random hills' and started going ape shit. My belly was jiggling all over the show as my knees hit it and within minutes, I was a sweaty mess. this was a different kind of 'exercise' to the daily walks I have been taking. This was some high intensity shit, man. Which is what I need to be doing, getting a sweat on. My pulse reached as high as 178 and as it did I am pretty sure that I went into the future, it was that intense. As I sat there pedaling like a maniac and breathing like Tony Soprano, one of my favourite songs came on, MUSE 'Plug In Baby'. The opening riffs in that song still do something to me, it's magical; music. It really is. anyway............ I rode 5 kilometers for a warm up at level 15 and tackled some 'hills' on the way, then smashed out a 1.5 kilometer row on the rowing machine and HOLY SHIT, that was something else...... It was fun sliding back and forth on the chair but pulling the chain got old pretty quick. I started fading and could see myself telling myself '"800 meters is pretty good for a first effort, Lee" . Then, just as I was thinking about throwing in the towel, my ipod piped up as if to say "Fuck off, Lee. You're not quitting on me, cunt". 'I'VE GOT ANOTHER CONFESSION TO MAKE'!!! (Don't act like you didn't just sing that line in your head, I know you did) On came 'Best of You' by the Foos and shit did my spirits pick up along with my energy levels. Music, man. It's a fucking beautiful thing. To quote the late great Tom Petty ~ "Music is probably the only real magic I have encountered in my life. There's not some trick involved with it. It's pure and it's real. It moves, it heals, it communicates and does all these incredible things". Fuck it sucks that Tom Petty is dead. That one REALLY hurt. He was at the top of my 'bands or artists to see before I die' list, so was Bowie........ If you haven't heard the song 'Wildflowers' by Tom Petty, go and give it a listen. It is beautiful. www.youtube.com/watch?v=AldoDm2bV04&list=PLphdlTz7uh1Go2H16V65XHRrC_E1IjmHi I finished off with some weights (arms, shoulders, legs etc) and then rocked out for a sauna. I only lasted 6 - 8 minutes in there, man that bitch is hot (duhh)! I left the gym feeling quite good about it all and I had a real good feeling about the fact that what I was doing was a huge positive step in the right direction for my health and for my family. I still miss the booze, though. I almost gave in and thought about smashing some piss last Saturday night but I didn't. I had a rather interesting conversation with a big GC the other day about healthier ways to smack booze. Vodka soda's and lime, Gin soda water and lime etc..... There are definitely healthier ways to drink to excess if you're going to do that. I'm not too sure about it though. I know that if I do I'll feel all shitty with myself and feel like a failure. Why though? I have cheat meals every week where I eat something that isn't that good for me and would have way more calories than a bunch of vodka soda's.....Maybe it's because it's not just affecting my diabetes, but my liver also. I'm confident that I'll drink again, and if I do decide to smack some sooner rather than later I need to not be so hard on myself. I have made a promise to myself and to my family that I'll never EVER drink the way that I used to, again. It won't be every week and it won't be a box of beers then a bottle of top shelf. I'm sure that once in a while, if there's something on that is worth having a few 'healthier drinks' at, then I'll do it and not feel shitty about it. I don't want to cut it out from my life completely, I just want to be better at it, if that makes any sense. I want to be in control of when and how much I drink without setting myself limits. I'll never go back to being a massive 'weekly' drinker, but as I said, if there is something on that is WORTH smashing some piss for (in a healthier way), then I'll do it. Because I'm an adult and I can make my own decisions. I'll consider it a cheat meal, like the cheat meals I am currently enjoying that are healthier options than McDonalds or Burger King or KFC - I'm rocking Subway Salads or wraps, Pita Pit wraps and Salads and Chinese chow meins etc. Thanks for reading and for your continued support. L My wife and I hosted a surprise 40th for a family friend last night. I had organised this party before all this Diabetes shit happened to me and instead of canning the whole thing I had this thought
“You’re going to have to go to this thing no matter where it is, Lee. SO why not keep it at your house and then you don’t have to go anywhere and if you get bored or sick of watching everyone else smash piss and have a good time, you can just slink off to your bedroom, lock the door and go to sleep”. So, I did just that. The ‘surprise’ part of the night went down a storm and our birthday boy was totally thrilled about it. Then me and all 8 of the guests retired to the back of the property where we had lit a fire and had the sounds cranking. A real westie kind of hang out. I do bloody love a good fire, what male doesn’t? In fact. Ladies do me a favour. Watch your mans face the next time he (or someone else) lights a fire. If there isn’t a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye, he’s not a real man and is probably some sort of futuristic organic cyborg that has been sent back in time to steal the eggs from your ovaries so that he can repopulate his once thriving intergalactic race of cybergenic organisms. Bloody love a good fire, me! I love how drunk people get repetitive…………I must have heard the same fucking story about fishing three or four times from my brother in law and it’s not a bad thing because he tells his stories with such intensity and flare that it’s hard not be captivated by his yarns. On the third listen though, it got a bit shit. This was the first situation where I was in a position with the people in my life that I’d usually drink with week in week out. I was quite surprised at how much people were drinking. I never noticed it before, drinking was always so effortless to me and I’d never keep track of how many drinks I had had. As I watched these slaves to the drink keep pouring this shit down their gullet I wondered just how many of these ginger beers (my choice of beverage for the evening) I could, no, I would WANT drink in one night and I arrived at my answer before I even finished the thought. One. Max. Now these guests of mine were smacking piss like it was going out of fashion I reckon that the biggest drinker there would have had at least 24 drinks in the evening. There’s no way I would drink 24 cans of Coke or Sprite or any other soft drink for that matter…. I only had one bottle of Ginger beer (Bundaberg 750 ml) throughout the whole night and towards the end of the bottle I was thinking “I’m only drinking this because I feel like I have to finish it otherwise it’ll be a waste”. My reasoning for having a carbonated sugary drink was simple. This must be better for me than the copious amounts of piss I’d usually drink on a night like this. And I was right. I woke up this morning without a hangover and feeling great. I have to tell you – Waking up without a hangover was such a great feeling. I did have a few toots on a doobie that was being passed around and ended up getting way too high. I didn’t like it. I have such a low tolerance for that stuff these days because I very rarely (and I do mean VERY RARELY) smoke. Like a once, maybe twice a year deal. I felt uneasy and less confident and quite fidgety and agitated. I do miss getting drunk. I don’t think that substituting one vice with the other is the answer, here. Though smoking Satan’s Silverbeet certainly did bring back some nostalgia for me. I used to smoke a shit tonne of weed in my teenage years. Good times. I slunk off to bed around 12:30am without announcing it to anyone and the partied continued to rage on. I had a great time. I do miss getting drunk, though. The following day (Sunday) I had my BIG DAD OUT catch up. I run a group for dads in Auckland called THE BIG DAD OUT. We meet up every Sunday at The Hangar bar in their upstairs function area, we take our kids along and have a quiet beer (not me anymore) and enjoy some half-priced bar snacks and each other’s company. It only dawned on me the other day that if you don’t get the ‘BIG DAY OUT’ festival reference, it just sounds like a bunch of gay dads getting together. It’s a lot of fun and we have a good group of around 12-15 dads that come every weekend with their kids. WHERE WERE YOU TODAY, LADS?!! It was only myself and my good friend Glen, today! This was great though. Glen is a man of medicine, well he’s not a man made of medicine like some obscure character from The Mighty Boosh or anything, he’s a paramedic and works for St Johns (bloody good cunts those St Johns fella’s). He was a breath of fresh air to be around and his two boys Zac and Beau were a pleasure to be with, too. He didn’t offer me any dieting advice or tell me what kinds of exercising I should be doing (like everyone else has been doing). Instead he took the time to explain to me in laymans terms, just what diabetes is and just what is going on inside my body because of this. I’m gonna attempt to regurgitate what he said to me today and Glen, and I KNOW you’re reading this; if I get it wrong – you’re a shit explainer and should have done better. Right, so here we go in bullet point format.
In a nutshell, my body isn’t using the sugar that I am putting into it correctly and so my body thinks that what it needs to do is have more sugar when in actual fact, there is a shit load of sugar in my body all up in my bloodstream but there is not enough insulin to give it access to the cells that need to use it for energy and as we all know – unused sugar turns into………………….Fat. Correct, well done class. The medicine I am on (Metformin) is acting as an insulin substitute and is helping the sugar that I put into my body (which is fuck all, nowadays) get turned into energy for my cells. I have already noticed a massive drop in my daily water intake and I am no longer feeling tired all the time. Someone said to me the other day “Wow Lee, you have a spring in your step” My steps have springless for the past 6 years or so, so to hear that made me feel great. I have also upped my daily goal on my Fitbit from 5000 steps to 8000 steps. This may not seem like much for you, but for me this is massive. I’ll be getting over 10,000 steps in no time. I’m gonna make this Fitbit my bitch! I went to the pools the other day with my son, Albie. It was pissing down with rain and I could tell that he was itching to get out of the house. Usually we’d go and pick up my mother in law Val and go to the mall for breakfast then take her to work. Did you know that ‘Mother in Law’ is an anagram for ‘WOMAN HITLER’? My MIL is anything but. She is an absolute sweetheart, a great woman and a terrific Nan to my two beautiful children. She is also incredibly fun to tease. That’s what I do (actually that’s what ALL families do) tease the people they love. With my new found quest for health, I have no time for the west city food court and its many vendors. I could always go for a continental breakfast option but what sort of cunt orders a continental breakfast?
It only cost me $7 to get into the pools with the boy. $5 for my entry, Albie was free but I had to fork out an extra $2 for a swimming nappy that Albs had to wear because he’s not yet reached the age of four. We put our bags down and hopped into the family spa; a haven for fatties and elderly Asian people. As I sat down with Albie, this monster of a man smiled at me and gave me the ‘what’s up’ eyebrows. This dude was huge, like can’t fit through the door huge. If I’m morbidly obese I’d hate to think what this guy was. He had his own climate, he was that big. I can talk about fat people like this because I’m a fatty fatty fat fat, too (Just like how black people can say the N word). He looked over at me and said……….. “You want to use this Jet? It’s really good for your lower back” “Nah mate I’m all good, thanks though” “I haven’t seen you in a while, man. What’s it been? Like three months”? “I don’t think we know each other actually, I’m Lee”? “I’m James” (not his real name but just in case the actual guy reads this I don’t want to face legal action for defamation of character. “You sure you don’t want to use this jet? It’ll be good for your sore shoulder”? “I don’t have a sore shoulder”………. “You’re the guy with the bung shoulder, right”? “Mate. We don’t know each other”…. “Oh. Sorry”. I got up with Albie and left. I could tell that the only reason he was talking to me was because I was fat, too. I don’t want that shit. It’s different getting a nod on the street when passing another dude with a big ginger beard (which happens ALL the time). Does that make me a bad person? Maybe that dude was just lonely and wanted to have a conversation with someone. He wasn’t going to get anywhere with the 90 year old ex Yakuza mafia boss next to him. Maybe I should have been the person with the sore shoulder that he hadn’t seen in over 90 days. I didn’t want to, though. It was so blatantly obvious that he was only talking to me because I was fat, too. Like there were people sitting right next to him that he could have spoken to but he insisted on yelling across the pool to me. Tomorrow I have an appointment at the gym with a personal trainer to suss out my GREEN prescription (which is cheaper gym membership for people with a physical disability (my clubbed foot) and to put a workout plan into action. I’m just going to say to this guy.... “Look I don’t need you to ride my ass and get on my tits about my exercise etc. I am motivated and all I need form you is to recommend a workout plan for me that will suit my clubbed foot”. I need to do a low impact - high intensity style of exercise, like an exercise bike or a rowing machine, then some weights etc. I’m totally up for water-walking too. The good thing about water-walking is that my joints aren’t going to get punished from having to deal with the impact of my body mass like they would if I were on a treadmill for example. I am really looking forward to hitting the gym 3 days a week. I have Albie home with me on Tuesday and Wednesday and he is day-care Mon, Thurs and Fri and Lucy is in school Mon – Fri. So on the days where I don’t have any kids at home – I’ll drop ‘em off to school and day-care then hit the gym for some hard-core sessions and when I do have kids home with me we’ll just head out on a family walk etc. I want to be exercising every day and I want to be smashing out some high intensity exercise on the days I’m at the gym. I also need to get some good headphones to wear while I’m I the gym so that people don’t talk to me. West Auckland is a small place and I know a LOT of people so the chances that I won’t have to stop and talk to someone I know at the gym are about as slim as me. I’m not looking forward to it at all. “Hey Lee, how’s it going”? “You can see how it’s fucking going. I’m sweating up a storm on a rowing machine”. I’m happy to give you a small nod and then meet up in the sauna for yarn after my session but please don’t approach me while I’m mid workout. I know that sounds a little pompous and arrogant but I really do know A LOT of people and I’m sure that there a whole bunch of people that I know or know by association at the West Wave gym. Those are the worst ones, too. “Hey, you’re Lee right. You know so & so. He’s my neighbour/cousin/workmate/ whatever-the-fuck”…… “Yeah bro – I’ll see you in the sauna”……. Moving on to something a little more positive, now. A progress report. I am able to do up a suit jacket that I was not able to do up two weeks ago. I’m a Marriage celebrant and I marry people ALL THE TIME! When I wear a suit – It’s the best I’ll ever look. EVER! So it was a nice feeling to be all buttoned up along with the other guests at the wedding. I haven’t re weighed myself or redone my measurements and I won’t until I finish this 90 day prescription of metformin that I’m on (my diabetes medicine) but it was nice to see a small difference. I am also drinking a hell of a lot less water than I usually would (which indicates that my medicine is working well). I’d usually punch 4-5 1.5 litre bottles of water a day and now I’m lucky if I get through 1. I’m looking forward to shopping day on Wednesday and I’m going to buy more than salad. Low Carb High Fat meals are the way to go apparently. Two weeks of salads for lunch have taken their toll and I’m up for something else. I can’t wait for Wednesday! Cheers for reading. Text ROG to 3333 |
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AuthorLee Weir - Radio Announcer, Marriage Celebrant and Guinness World Record Holder. Archives
January 2024
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