While heading out for coffee this morning we saw a really cool rainbow. What a great start to the week.

Beautiful day for a walk at lunch time today.  Ended up at the waterfront looking up at the Hilton Hotel, enjoying the fantastic view over the harbour across to Devonport.

Oh in case you are wondering… I’m still in the number 2 spot in the biggest loser competition at work, not long now, only 2 weeks to go and then I can eat chocolate & KFC.

The other morning on the way to work, I noticed this great reflection of the Sky Tower in the BNZ Tower windows.  The octagonal  building used to be called the BNZ Tower, but I have no idea what it’s called now.

I have a big long weekend planned this weekend, so after resisting the urge to weigh myself every morning this week I needed to know if I was ok and could relax a bit & enjoy the weekend or work really hard, coz it is weigh in on Wednesday.

I was extremely happy to see the scales had finally moved and not only that, I had reached my goal of losing 10 kg and making it to 70 kilos.  It has always been my goal throughout the biggest loser program at work, to make it to 70 kg by the end of June, so I’ve achieved it ahead of time and I may even lose some more before  final weigh in!

Another really happy thing is I’m going to get to spend some time with a wonderful special friend who has flown home for a couple of months from London.  I haven’t seen her for about 2 years, so I’m really excited PLUS… Glee is back on tonight, and I have Tuesday off as annual leave extending this Queen’s Birthday weekend, everything is so great I can’t stop smiling.

Yesterday was one of those days where the sky was cloudless and stunningly blue, with crisp clean air and slightly warm, the perfect weather.

This photo was taken from the 11th floor of an office block on Queen Street.  I was very impressed with the view.

I have been hoping every day to upload a photo of my scales telling you all I have reached my goal at long last.  But it just is not going to happen.  I’m only 200 grams away from my target of 70 kgs and no matter how hard I worked or how long I spent on the stepper and no matter how little I ate, I just couldn’t break through the barrier.  I read somewhere that sometimes when you increase your exercise regime and decrease your food intake, your body is forced to store fat, so I think that’s what happened.  So on the two day conference I just endured (Thursday & Friday) I ate EVERYTHING!  I ate all the filled rolls, sausage rolls, little pizzas, sandwiches, pasta, rice, creamy curry, cakes and even the scones with jam and heaps of cream.

Then the stepper machine started making very loud creaking noises (no not after eating all that food), it’s been creaking since I bought it and I think if I take that away with me next time I’m staying in a hotel the people next door will complain.  So I had to take it back on Saturday morning to get someone to look at it.  The nice guy said he couldn’t look at it right now, instead he asked me if I minded if he simply swapped it for a brand new one.  Awesome… that made me so happy I bought an exercycle (as you can see).

The stepper is actually not the only thing to not go well this week.  My phone started playing up and nobody can ring me, it cuts out after one ring.  I can however ring out no problem.  So Telecom have kindly given me a credit for the inconvenience and are currently diverting all my phone calls to my cell phone (at their expense), cool eh!

Then there was the no water issue on Saturday morning.  One big flush of the toilet and I had no water left in my pipes.  Thank goodness I had already made my coffee.  By Saturday lunch time I was almost too scared to leave the house in case something else went wrong – like with the CAR.

But it turned out the water problem was a burst pipe somewhere near my house and nobody in my neighbourhood had water, the phone and step machine were also not my fault and all has turned out great, plus I now own a brand new piece of exercise equipment.  So I better win the biggest loser competition, just so I can afford to pay for this stuff.

Visiting Mum & Dad and then to a friend’s new house.  The new house is fabulous, so many cool features including a fireplace which we tried out and enjoyed.  So many different places to sit and chat… I Loved It!!!

When I got home I did a huge workout.  Some how I got into the zone and just didn’t want to stop.  I can’t believe I just typed those words, that is just not me, but a song on my iPod playlist: Cher’s song “One By One” kept pushing me to do more and just when I thought I’d had enough the next song started and it’s called: “We Can Get There” which really pushed me along.  I ended up doing 2 x 5 minute warm up sessions & then 30 minutes non stop.  That’s never happened before, usually I do the 2 x 5 thing then a 10 minute session (or 12 when I’m really into it).

The glorious view from the bus this morning on the way to work:

Okay it may not look like much, but at night time it’s stunning and my phone just can’t do the view justice.  But that’s Auckland City in the distance.  Was having lunch at a friend’s place with a couple of people I used to work with, nice catch up, fun company and good food, topped off by the beautiful sunshine and warmth enabling us to sit outside on the deck in the middle of May… amazing.

Since it is now too dark to go walking through the bush after work (plus cold & wet) I decided to buy a Mini Stepper.  It’s really hard work but well worth it.  The funny thing is, when you see adverts for these things they make incredible claims like a fun way to keep fit OR read a book while working out.  What a load of rubbish… it’s NOT fun and if I tried to read a book while using the stepper I’d fall off and hurt myself.  I MUST hang on to something, or maybe it’s just me and I have terrible balance.

But I have discovered the joys of working out with my iPod cranked up loud and playing extended dance mixes.  That definitely helps me to go faster and for longer.  BUT it’s still not fun!  However that’s probably because all my life I have lived by the workout motto: “No Pain… No Pain”.