crankymonkeys in london

So the western world is in Valentine’s Day mode at the moment – shop windows are full of pink and red love hearts and every other marketing email I get is about the 14th of February.

I am the wrong audience for all of this – I don’t get Valentine’s Day.

Do men need the pressure of finding yet another PERFECT present for the lady in their lives? (they probably still haven’t recovered from Christmas)

And ladies – do we really think that men want a Valentine’s Day present? (well, they might, if it comes in a form of putting a ribbon on yourself, but THAT can be arranged at anytime, right? ;) [...]

I think the British are some kind of a mutant superior race when it comes to handling freezing temperatures.

It’s been hovering around 0°C for the past week or two and this is what I see on the streets:

• At least half of the people don’t wear hats
• 90% of women wear the same shoes they would wear in the summer – ballet flats, etc.
• 100% of men wear the same shoes they would wear in the summer
• Teenagers do not wear coats
• Teenagers do not wear scarves or god forbid – hats
• An occasional adult walks by wearing a skirt and BARE legs
• An occasional adult walks by wearing flip flops

The mind boggles. [...]

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Post updated at 19:45pm with proof to my Mutant Race Theory :)

I have really hit the ground running since 2012 arrived – I’ve clocked up 10 runs this month and a total of 137.80 km (85.6 miles). That is at least 20km (12miles) more a month than I’ve done so far during my best running months (mostly summer).

My average monthly pace is still hovering anywhere between 5.30 and 5.50 min per km, but I’ve always known that I’m more of a long distance/endurance runner than a Speedy Gonzales. [...]

For almost two years now I’ve been a runner. I’ve been slowly increasing my distance and am now doing two 15-18km runs a week.

I have found that running for more than an hour at a time requires some changes in what I eat:

a) To avoid getting runners diarrhea (lovely thing, let me tell you :), I absolutely cannot have any coffee before I run and I need to limit sugar and yeast in my diet.
b) To keep me from getting dizzy (which I tend to have a problem with) I need to drink a lot of water throughout the day, every day, and to avoid sugar.

I almost have my dizziness and digestion under control with a diet that doesn’t include any refined sugar, has limited wheat and yeast and lots of water.

However, in order to understand why I tend to have these issues in the first place, I sort of found an answer in the place I didn’t expect… [...]

I absolutely love having a self-hosted Wordpress blog. I have worked in web design&development for over a decade and I love getting my hands on the code and tweak the theme.

If you don’t know CSS or HTML or PHP that well, a self-hosted blog has other benefits – for example it opens up the whole world of plugins to you – little “programs” that make you site run more efficiently, and be more interactive and fun.

Here’s the list of the plugins that I currently use and am very happy with to recommend.

Top: Sainsbury’s
Trousers: Zara
Boots: Jones
New hair colour: Gina Aveda hair salon

Once in a blue moon I find something nice in the clothing department at Sainsbury’s. I never volunteer that information to my husband (he’s a bit posh like that :) but my latest buy is this top, which is super soft and a nice cut. [...]

Sometime after Oliver’s 3rd birthday in November I stopped lying next to him at bedtime and waiting until he fell asleep. Now I put him to bed, tell him a story, sing a few songs and if he starts screaming when I leave, my mom will go and pat him for a while until he calms down.

He’s started to scream less and less now when I leave, he’s used to the routine that nana will take over once I go. However, he really really does not seem to want to fall asleep on his own and … [...]