Dressing For Dinner

Blood this morning was 4.4 - blood control still being good, clearly, despite the rest of me being bad (neither of us could be arsed with the 'eating at home' thing last night, so popped out to the Chinese Buffet again). Today has been largely sedentary (bike cord still in hiding, dammit!), but on the upside - PAYDAY!!!

Payday meant we were able to take our GP referral forms over to the gym tonight.
"Right," said the chunky lad behind the counter. "What this means is you'll go on the programme..."
He said this with the kind of emphasis that meant it should have been "The Programme" - some vast govenrment conspiracy to wipe out Fat Fucks or chemically sterilise us or somesuch.
"The Programme?" I asked, unconsciously capitalising.
"Yeah," he said. "The Programme," he acknowledged my emphasis. "That means you agree to attend two classes a week for sixteen weeks. At the end of the sixteen weeks, you'll be assessed, and if you're accepted, you'll get your membership for half price."
"Rrrright," we said, hanging on to comprehension by our fingernails.
""Here's a list of our classes," he said. "All the ones for GP Referral are marked."
Again, he kind of made that sound like we'd have special third-hand State-owned gym clothes with embroided burger-badges on them to mark us out for death by aerobics, or at the very least social ridicule. Not so much "Unclean!" as "Unfittttt!"

"OK," we said. "And, erm..."
"They'll call you next week," he explained. "They'll arrange your classes with you."
"Right," we said. It was only as we were walking out the door, having gotten so close to the gym and yet remaining so far from its exercisey goodness, that the questions arose in us.
"After sixteen weeks, is the assesment to find out if we're fit enough to be allowed in the gym, or unfit enough to qualify for government assistance?" I asked d. She shrugged.
"Guess we'll find out in sixteen weeks," she said.
"Dinner?" I asked - as it happens, the gym/leisure centre is surrounded by restaurants, and we have a payday tradition of going for a celebratory meal, in honour of having survived for another month(!).
"Dinner," d agreed. We decided on a local Harvester, and went in. d's vaguely in love with the Harvester, because they have an unlimited salad bar and an apparently unending supply of dressings. Equally, she's irritated with Pizza Hut, because they have an apparently killer honey mustard dressing, but are always out of the damn stuff.
We had our meal - including several mini bowlfuls of salad for d - and then she brought me a plate.

An almost entirely empty plate.

Now, those of you who've been with this blog from the start will remember my anti-mayo rant. This was actually merely symptomatic of a loathing for all dressings. Blue cheese - I don't think so. Honey mustard - nice enough in their own worlds, but why you'd mess with them and add the stuff of dressings is beyond me. Thousand Island - get to fuck!

There was dressing on the plate.
"Try it," she said. "I think you'll like it..."
Now, as it happens, there's probably never been a better time to try a line like that on me. I'm undergoing a bizarre period of personal growth, determined to shake off some of my own cynicism, my own pre-conceptions of 'what I do', and 'what I like'. I sprung this on d last night at the Chinese Buffet - she's had a long-standing aim to get me to go horse riding and I'v refused because a) I was officially too heavy for most riding schools, and b) horses are the devil's children, and they know what they're about. But as part of this new spirit of finding new Stuff to be into, I said I'd go riding with her if she wanted. What was probably more - what, in fact, made her clamp her hand to her mouth and say "Really??" three times, as if I was ill, I agreed to go golfing with her. Golf, here in the UK, is the pursuit of the middle-class and higher, and I'm resolutely working class (or even slacker class, given half a chance), so I've categorically said I will never 'betray my roots' and play golf. I say shit like that, hoping to come off all Che Guevarra, and instead coming off all 'wanky tosspiece'. So last night, I told her if she wanted to play golf, I would play golf with her.

The dressing sat on the plate - all red and suspicious. I looked into d's eyes, and figured "Ah, screw it," and dipped in a finger.

"Yum!" I said.
"Yay!" said d. "Now if I could just get you to have some on a bit of lettuce..."
I'm not about to let a challenge like that go unanswered. I got up, got a single piece of lettuce, a single miniscule cube of beetroot, some onion flakes, and a dribble of dressing on a plate, came back and consumed them in one bite.
"Yay!" said d again. "The first salad of 2012!"
Hadn't thought of it like that, but she's right. Look at me, I eat dressing now...

Part of this whole new spirit is to Do More Stuff Together - this being a crucial part of the work-from-Wales plan, and so, dear reader, you find me perched on a stool in my darling's kitchen, as she prepares a chicken and leek pie for tomorrow, and as, together, we've pootled about with our brand new, seriously kick-ass soup maker, making leek and potato soup. Seems to work. Seems to promise the potential to make my own freakin' lunch in future. Seems like a good new plan...