As we passed through a beautiful glade of bluebells, I thought, here is someone that is truely like me. Who likes adventure, energy, physical activity; to enjoy this fantastic world as much, and in as many ways, as you possibly can.

I was at training from 10am – 1pm, and he got more work done in those three hours than he has in the last two weeks, which I knew he would. He never does any work nowadays, because his television, the gym, or other people, are too much of a distraction. It gets on my nerves intensely, but it’s not my business, so I try to hold it inside as best I can (which isn’t very well).

My training made me feel good – it’s nice when a company invests in you – and when I got near home, I called my manager and asked if I could stop for lunch, and she said yes. So Phillip and I then had lunch together, before I dropped him home and whizzed back to work.

It just all felt so good!

Phillip constantly complains about money nowadays. Because he doesn’t risk enough. He sits there and timidly writes a few emails and makes a couple of phonecalls each day, then spends the rest of the day procrastinating and hanging out in the gym, depressed that he’s not the next Donald Trump.

And I’m the same. I work long, hard hours, but I could make double what I make in half the hours if I worked for myself. But I can’t work for myself, because I’m not yet able to risk it all. To throw everything into it, to know that if it fails, it’s all because of me. I failed. And use that aversion of failure to drive me forward, and give me nothing but 100% confidence in myself.

It’s all “all or nothing” kind of world.

So, onto week 2. I’m kicking off the week with a sore throat and mild exhaustion, which makes me only want chocolate even more. This evening I had to go to the gym – even though it’s probably not a wise idea when one is sick – just to stop myself from eating chocolate.

It worked, and now I’m off to bed.

So far in my life, in terms of relationships, I’ve always gone for the fun factor. I don’t really worry about whether he has a large bank balance, political ambitions, or an overwhelming IQ; I just want someone I can try new things with, explore life with, and have FUN with.

I also seem to have, thus far, gone for people a few years older than me. Perhaps because they have cool stories to tell, past adventures to relay, and so I think “he sounds like a lot of fun; being with him is sure to be interesting and lively!”

So what happens when they get with me? They change. They start telling me how great I am that I’m not like the other women they’ve dated, or like their friends, or like them. But what they mean is, “you’re so low-maintenance and boring, which is perfect for me, because I’ve had my fun, and now I just want to be lazy.” Well, guess what? I haven’t had my fill of fun yet. That’s why I’m dating you.

Lying in bed watching tv every night is lovely, but I’m sure there’ll be plenty of time for that when I am married, with a mortgage and kids. But for now, maybe it would be nice to be taken out once in a while? You’ve surely dated plenty of women before who would never pay a penny towards any bill, yet you probably took them out all the time. But now you’ve decided to become “sensible,” and picked me as the “sensible” choice of partner. Lucky me.

I get texts like:

“I hate my old lifestyle…. I am a different man… I want to be the perfect man for you… life is soooo shallow…. I sometimes wish I’d followed a different path earlier.”

… and promises to stop spending money, and stop drinking alcohol.

Screw that!

I guess I’m just bitter. Bitter that I worked Monday – Saturday this week, meaning that Saturday night is all I have in terms of a weekend, and my boyfriend has decided he’s not going to spend any money, go anywhere, or drink anything. Because he had his fun going out with his friends on Thursday, while I was lying in bed with my alarm clock set for 6.30am. It just seems like I always seem to be missing out on the fun, short-term and long-term. It’s always done prior to me, or without me. And every now and again, I’ll be given a little taste of it… and then it’ll all stop again. And if I complain, well, I’m just immature, and I’ll understand when I’m older.

But I already understand. Perfectly. And it sucks.

I had lunch with Phillip (quite unhealthy – carvery!), then went to the dentist and paid £75 to be told the good news that I have no cavaties (I’ve been avoiding the dentist for about five years now… apparently I was scared for nothing!), then got changed at home and whizzed off to the gym. Phillip was there, and we did an hour-long back workout together.

I am currently on day three of my eat-healthier diet. It’s been about a year since I first started gaining an interest in my body (I joined Gold’s Gym when I was living in the USA back in February of 2009), and I haven’t seen much of a visible difference in all that time. I think I can feel that my biceps are firmer, and I think I see that my calves are less fatty, but certainly no dramatic changes that I can see. This fact, combined with a holiday to Egypt only two months away, makes this a pretty good time to really give it 100% now that I’m starting to understand what I am doing.

I’m not making any huge changes. I’m not cutting out meat (I only eat lean meat anyway), and I’m not eating a bunch of extra vegetables, but I am cutting down on the chocolates and buscuits (my colleagues fill the office with so many packets of chocolate hobnobs, I was starting to get addicted to them). I’m currently on day three of no chocolate, and to be quite frank, it’s absolutely killing me. I really think I am a chocolate addict. I believe I get actual cravings. Right now, if I think about how much I want that twirl at the back of my desk, I feel I could cry.

I’m not going to cut chocolate out altogether. That would be torture. But I definitely do need to cut it down. Weekends are always quite unhealthy, as I spend them with Phillip, so we always eat out, and get dessert too. I can’t change that aspect of my life, but if I can control myself during weekdays, I think that could make a big difference.

I am also making a big effort to drink more water. 8 small bottles per day is my goal for now. It’s hard, and it makes me need to go to the toilet a lot (which sucks at work), but again, I hope it will prove with it in the long run.

I was also very surprised to check in with bodyrock.tv and find that Zuzana has started a one-month challenge only a week before me, so that’s nice to have that to accompany me. I also checked out the blog of a nice lady who commented on my blog a few months ago. Sounds like she is doing amazingly well, which is an added motivator! I really hope she uploads some before/after pictures so I can see what she has achieved.

I had my 3-month review on Tuesday with my manager. It wasn’t particularly inspiring (pretty much everything was “meets requirements”… in the past, I’ve always been rated as “exceeds requirements”), but it’s the first time she’s ever sat down and talked to me about anything other than something I’ve done wrong, so it was nice. Then yesterday she gave me half an hour of training on branch figures. So I suppose I feel like I am a human being with some value, as opposed to a drone. It’s got me feeling that if I manage my time correctly, I can start applying for a promotion by the summer.

In my other work, I’ve been getting some websites done (one of which Phillip has been helping be a model for!), and have come up with a new weight-loss website idea which will be up and running in the next few weeks!

Last weekend, Phillip and I had our first proper argument, I’d say. I had agreed to play football with my team on Sunday for the first time in about two months, and when I told Phillip, he flipped. He said we’d been planning to spend the weekend together and that I had just ditched him. I never thought he would react so strongly – I thought he understood that I was a member of a football team and, as such, may sometimes be absent on Sunday afternoons to play! He sulked for over 24 hours, which really got on my nerves, and reminded me a little of my ex-boyfriend who used to scream at me for leaving the house to play tennis and tell me not to go to “prove” that I loved him.

Phillip has so much free time (he works for himself, and perhaps not as hard as he should), he seems to forget what it is like for a person who doesn’t.

Ah, I wish I could continue, but it’s time to leave for work….

See what I mean?!

How different they are from men. People say women are superficial, but if they are, it’s only because they allow themselves to be made so paranoid by the most superficial and judgmental of all creatures – men. I am so fed up of their not-so-cleverly-disguised attempts to manipulate me into changing the way I look. From my old friend Danny’s constant criticisms of my appearance when I used to know him, to my ex-boyfriend’s “wow, look at you, you forgot to shave your legs today” (uh, no… I don’t shave my legs above the knee, ever), to now Phillip’s “are you trying to grow a moustache?”

Seriously, there are so many insults I could throw back, but I don’t. Why? Because I don’t care about such trivial nonsense. I thankfully have more to my life than worrying whether the tiny hairs on my face are showing in a particular light, or running a razor up and down the entire length of my legs every two days. And I also have more to my relationships with people than to be concerned about such things in them.

Hmm. Quite annoyed…