Despite having a lot of worked planed for today, the were a few things that scuppered my work through the entire day plan, though I did get a substantial amount done on my research project despite the interruptions.

First off was a phone call from the fridge repair company saying that they were 40 minutes away and will someone be home. News to me as I've got them in my diary for visiting on Thursday, not today, but since I'm at home working it isn't really a problem. Besides, it'd be nice to have the fridge dispensing ice and water as soon as possible again.

Next I get a surprise email from my friend Nic who is going through a bit of a time of it a work who was wondering if I could do a late lunch at The Fishes @ Hinksey this afternoon. It'll be nice to see her since she's either holed up at home working or stuck in Birmingham or Banbury depending on where her current project takes her so I jump at the chance to have a catch up and see that she's doing ok.

So whilst the fridge man is tinkering and for the rest of the morning and part of the afternoon I knuckled down to do some serious work so that I can escape later on for my lunch date. The hard work pays off and by the time I'm due to leave the house I'm at a point where I've got lots of information and have started to document it all in a cohesive manner. Not that it's rocket science to understand what is the most popular device in use at the moment, take a bow Apple, your iPhone is streets ahead of the competition by all accounts.

I have a very lovely lunch with Nic and manage to "put myself back in my box" (it's a SMINDE thing) when it comes to deciding what to order, though I think I spent the entire time staring at Nic's chips longingly which may have freaked her out a bit :) We also had a long chat about most things, but in particular the freedom the contracting offers and how permanent positions get less and less attractive the more you work for yourself. Its true of course, but there are downsides to contracting as anyone who's done it before will know.

Interestingly the waiter was chatting to us and asking what we did for a living. I explained my occupation and he asked for my details as he may have some work to put my way. I REALLY REALLY need to get my business cards sorted out as a priority next week, writing details on the back of a receipt isn't kosher.

When I get back home I do more work on the project which takes me right into the evening but I do manage to sneak an hour or so to myself to watch some TV and eat dinner.

It's been a busy day for sure, but busy is good!

First thing this morning it looked like it was shaping up to be a quiet enough day so I decided to sort out these elusive long reach hot glow plugs that Phil needed for his plane to keep the engine ticking over nicely. The place that we've discovered in Oxford that furnishes such items has been closed for a week or so and then after that I've not had time to go and visit, but since today is looking peachy my mission is to get what we need so the bloody plane can finally take flight.

So, not to be disappointed I ring the shop first to a) make sure they're open and b) make sure they've got what we need. Positive results on both counts luckily. The only downside is that I had to endure a 30 minutes conversation to establish fact A and fact B. It wasn't even a particularly constructive conversation either for that matter, because I don't know anything about why the plane engine is running lean nor do I know the reason why a hot glow plug might be the resolution. And no, I'm not sure why the plane came with the engine it did, or indeed that the engine we have might have a carburettor issue or the dynamics of engine size to wing span etc etc. Groan. Finally I gave up and said I'd ask our neighbour who's fixing the plane for Phil to ring the shop owner to ensure what I'm going to his shop for is in fact the right thing for the job.

I do that, and not long after Chris pops back around and said he's sorted it and yes it is definitely the hot glow plugs we need if I'd be so good to go pick them up.

Off I go then in the grasps of the Oxford ring road and down to Cowley where I'm fighting against the ensuing lunch hour traffic and possibility of the shop being shut for lunch, but I make it in time after a short jog down the high street. That was quite cool in fact as it was the first time in many years that I've been able to jog anywhere because of my knee - so 1 point to the Nuffield for that achievement.

Whilst I'm in the shop I also get the elastic bands need to attach the wings to the plane, several of the hot glow plugs and a pat on the back for being the dutiful lady providing for her husband *scowl* that comment didn't go down well as you can imagine!

On the way home I nip to the supermarket and get a super deal on some whole chickens, 3 for 10 quid. Not bad and cheap for a good couple of meals for sure.

Back at the residence and I drop off my goodies next door and then get down to doing some work I've been tasked to do by one of my clients - this particular piece is to do with researching mobile website and mobile device compatibility, and it'll be interesting since I've not looked at mobile development for close to 8 years when WAP was still in it's infancy.

I can only imagine things have moved on somewhat...

... and it tastes like Fudge!

No, seriously it does. And the angels that have bought this little slice of the good life to our miserable existence on the mortal plane? The Fudge Kitchen.

And how have I stumbled upon this divine delicacy? Well, Phil and I headed into Oxford today after a long discussion last night about the advantages of buying a mac mini to do iPhone application development on, the conclusion of which was to go ahead and get one and see what we can come up with.

That decision involved us going into town to purchase said mac product, which also involved us walking past this tiny window in Oxford which when glancing through was like Willy Wonka had set up shop. Big copper pans everywhere, bubbling pots and layers of lavish fudge being gently manipulated into very fine fudge rolls ready to slice up and purchase.

So what are you suppose to do? Easy. Spend 600 quid on an apple and then spend another 10 on fudge. It's a food fest I tell you!

Seriously though, I am NOT a fudge fan in the slightest, all the fudge I've ever eaten has been nasty congealed grimness but this stuff is like velvet on your tongue, it melts away in your mouth leaving you more contented that the best Belgium chocolate you can think of, so much so you'll want more and more and more. But you can eat as much as you like because although it's rich it is not at all heavy. I can't recommend it enough, you simply must try it to believe it.

Back home and Phil sets about setting up the mac which is surprisingly painless. He's struggling a bit with the UI but that's to be expected after years of windows usage, just got to download the SDK pack now and I'll be sorted.

Whilst Phil is doing that I play some Fable 2 and download the See the Future pack which is pretty cool, even though it did take 2 hours to download.

So, I had a call from Cara yesterday wondering if today would be a good day to do that day out after we had to abandon our arrangements earlier in the week. As it happens, Phil is working so I've little to do so I think that yes, in fact today would be a good day to go out and get an airing.

First things first though and in the morning I have some work to be getting on with but after I've done that I've just enough time to go to the gym, get back home and have some lunch and a bath before Cara arrives with Charlie and we head off into Oxford.

The prime intention is to have a wander around the covered market as it's full of nice stuff and we manage that too. Charlie it seems though wasn't so happy about the idea. It appears that at 5 years old he has reached the point that all men get to when shopping with women in that it just isn't fun any more, even more so if it doesn't involve cinnamon apple candies! Nonetheless we soldiered on amidst much protesting and I did pick up a few of Ben's Cookies for Phil along with a new t-shirt from a cool little shop called next to nothing. I avoided the one that said "sex, drugs and sausage rolls" on it, though that did make me laugh and opted for a much more sedate one that had a spectrum zx keyboard plastered all over the front. Probably more fitting for someone as interested in computers as Phil :)

We then make our way back home (much to Charlies relief!) and after a quick stop Cara and Charlie head back to theirs and I get on with nipping to the supermarket for a few things I need for tea. Tonight's delicacy is lamb marinated in yoghurt and garlic served with aubergine bake. Very nice too!

I did however manage to keep to my lunch meet up with ex-work friends which was very nice indeed. Probably shouldn't have eaten the nachos, but you know what I made a concious decision to eat them so that's ok. I also made another decision at the same time to go to the gym this weekend to burn them off, so that is also ok, but not nearly as pleasurable.

Back at home in the afternoon and I've plenty of work to keep me busy, including the challenge of explaining resolution (display, digital and print) to someone. It's not an easy concept to grasp so I can see why people get so confused with it, but I tried my best.

I also had some harassing to do in terms of the fridge repair people. I can see this whole thing becoming a saga so I've started logging down everything I do in relation to the whole charade in case I have to get really shitting with LG.

Round 2 of low carb dinners tonight and I opt for king prawn stir fry. It seems that those south beach cook books I bought several years ago are being useful again. I am still however unconvinced that what I'm being asked to do is just a form of calorie reduction which in itself will result in weight loss, rather than the type and time of food being consumed acting as the catalyst losing weight. I'm not particularly numerate, but the argument for just eating less than you burn still seems to be the simplest solution so far... You'll have to excuse the scepticism here, but as somewhat of a diet tart I've yet to find any solution that works LONGTERM other than eating less and exercising more (and that includes low carb diets).

Well, only a tiny bit :) I was suppose to be going to visit Cara today and we were going to have a girly trip to Cirencester, but just as I was getting my crap together and heading out of the door I got a phone call to take a rain check.. booo! Not to worry though, it was for a valid reason as they'd been offered a house viewing that they'd been waiting to go and see and thought it'd be a good time to do it whilst Charlie was at school.

So that left my day a little bit blank. I did however manage to parcel up one of our gadgets which is going back to the manufacturer as its apparently got an unfixable problem and they want to give it a post mortem to see where it all went wrong. That's fine, except the bloody thing has an inbuilt battery to keep it going and so kept making odd noises and talking to itself all the way to the post office. I did have to assure the woman at the desk that it wasn't in fact a bomb or anything, but that it was probably going to annoy her all day - how nice I am!

After doing that job I went down to the gym and got sweaty. Not a bad way to waste an hour and I also included some more work on my withering knee muscles.

When I got back I decided to luxuriate in a nice hot bath with considering it was early afternoon was quite flamboyant for me, but very relaxing all the same :)

Not quite sure what I did for the rest of the day, but it did involve cooking my first "no rice, pasta, bread or potatoes" dinner as according to SMINDE. Got to admit, I ate it and was promptly hungry thereafter, but had some fruit for dessert and a big drink which got me through it. I also finished off my sampler square of four stitch check, so that's 3 squares done, just another 100 or so to go :)

Ordinarily I wouldn't mind, but today I've offered to help out my neighbour delivering sandwiches to local businesses as she's got personal stuff to get done which is important and she's short staffed and I volunteered. Meh. And now it's snowing. The thrill of standing out in the snow pimping bread and meat isn't enthralling me in the slightest, but you know I said I'd do it, so I'll just get on with it. If anything it'll give me something to complain about later.

And it did. It was cold and wet (yes wet because the snow was wet, not fluffy like you'd see on an idyllic Christmas card) and the punters weren't all that interested. Also, interestingly and not surprisingly the smell of hot bacon rolls does little when one is trying to be virtuous and sticking to not gorging out when the mood takes.

Wet and sodden I came home, had some lunch and thought better of going to the gym since I thought it'd be nice for my knee to recover a bit more, after all I have just got in and out of a car 20 times which as you can imagine doesn't do wonders for a dodgy right leg with no cartilage on the outside of it (don't forget, I'm british, we drive on the right!). Besides, I'm going to the gym later on today for my SMINDE meeting, I don't want to appear to be over-enthusiastic.

Talking of which, the meeting itself was hmm, well I'm going to reserve judgement for now. I will produce a full summary at the end of the 12 week course. Plus points however is the challenge of a weekly weigh in. Negatives, I was easily the fattest person there with I would guess a good 6 stone on each and every other participant. That in itself is demoralizing.

Anyway, onwards and upwards (or preferably downwards if you relate this to weight).

So, today has been one of those days where I've not managed to muster the enthusiasm to do anything of consequence. Don't know why, but I suspect "winter" has got something to do with it. I hate short days, I hate cold weather, and joy, more snow has been forecast. Great! Bah Humbug.

Some excitement however in the form of a parcel arriving from France which contained the cute little knitted sweater that Phil's mum had made for Rupert from a pattern in my doggie knits knitting book. No sooner was it through the door it was on Rupert (see Photo). Not sure entirely what he made of it, but I think it looks cool, and the aim of it is to keep him warm when he gets his monthly crew cuts (though he's not been cut for 2 months now so he's a probably a bit woolly to be donning a further layer of insulation just at the moment, but is due a cut and blow dry in a week or so. Anyway, a big thank you to Sylvia for making it for him, one day I hope my knitting will be up to par so I can create something as complicated!

Other exciting news in the form of me actually getting to the gym for the second day on the trot, and I signed up to the "Sminde" meetings they run which are suppose to help with weight management. Phil aptly came up with a funnier name being the "pork & mindy meeting" which in truth brought a smile to my face so that's what I'll call it from now on :) The first meeting is tomorrow so we shall see what that brings.

**UPDATE**: second trip to gym without a break probably not a great idea, knee now swollen. Fantastic!

Up early this morning as I've got to be at the Nuffield for 10AM for my 6 week check up on my knee, so after rushing around like a fool and then realising I was an hour ahead of myself I actually had plenty of time to get there even though that involved hitting Oxford just past the rush hour which meant there was quite a bit of traffic.

I wasn't kept waiting long at all at the hospital where I saw a physio who explained what had happened to my knee quite thoroughly. I had a bucket handle tear to the lateral meniscus which had managed to completely detach itself, flip over and wedge itself in the space where the anterior crucial ligament and posterior crucial ligament are usually found at the centre of the knee. So it's no wonder I was in agony with it. Needless to say there wasn't a cats chance that the surgeon would have been able to reattach it as everything was mullered in there.

Aftercare? Well the usual really, try to lose weight (which I'm already trying to do), sensible well cushioned shoes from now on and just be a little careful with what I do with it. Pretty sensible stuff I suppose.

When I'm finished at the clinic I then make my way to the model shop to get Phil's glow plugs that he wanted but the shop is shut despite the telephone message stating that they were re-opening today after having a short break away. Oh well. So I make my way back home where I've a nice load of work waiting for me.

Once the work was done I then decide to take Rupert out for a walk as I can't remember the last time I did that and I took the neighbours dog with us so he could have a bit of company. I also strapped myself up to my heart rate monitor to see how many calories I could burn, and for the 45 minutes we were out I shed 175 calories so not too bad at all :)

When Phil gets home we then head out to the gym - something we've been threatening to do for a while, but with the all clear from the doctor to start going back again today seems as good a day as any to make a fresh start. We've decided that instead of flogging ourselves twice a week with 2 hour sessions we're going to try and go more often but only for 45 minutes at a time, and tonight that worked as we both felt we'd had a good work out but were not unfathomably knackered. I also spoke to the owner on our way out to explain our absence and she was very supportive, also she mentioned her weight loss support group she runs *again*, so maybe I'll sign up for this round of meetings.

Back home and its veggie sausages, mash and veg for tea. Hmmm. A veggie sausage whilst interesting is not a cut above one rammed with meat. Nonetheless, it was nice to have something rather than nothing!

I say this because today I've had a conversation with my Mum, after a conversation with my sister who informed me that Mum was desperately miserable over in Greece and as a result my parents have reached the conclusion to sell up and ship back to the UK. I can to a degree understand the decision - the island that they moved to whilst lovely hasn't a lot to offer on the old mental stimulus scale and since my parents are not ones to get all tally-ho with the expats have made a few greek friends but without fully understanding the language that's been tough too. I'm sure there are lots of other reasons I'm not privvy to at the moment but the long and short of it is that whilst it's been nice for 18 months, long term it's not for my Mum, and if Mum isn't happy, Dad isn't happy. I'm just pleased that they have had the balls to make the decision, because it's a big one. I'm sure the thought of the "I told you so's" and the perceived degree of failure are difficult to overcome, but you know that means very little coming from people who haven't had the guts to give it a go, and they should be utterly ignored.

And this isn't the only story I've heard of the faithfully departed either returning to our shores or wondering if in fact they made the right decision to go in the first place... you know who you are.

So I have to conclude then that whilst I may bitch about the UK, and complain about the weather and how expensive it all is, it is the very fabric of our little island that makes it indisputably difficult to leave, it's almost as if it's native inhabitants are inbreed with a boomerang gene - you can throw them as far as you like to all the corners of the world, but one day they'll want to come back. And you know what? It'll probably still be raining, and Labour will still be in power when they do, but they'll be back home in good old blighty.

Wow, I almost sound patriotic...

... of anything going on today, in fact both Phil and I have been positively vegetative for the best part of several hours.

The only flurry of activity was this morning when we caught up on lots of paper work, namely our personal tax returns, and we also go around to booking our short break away to Prague which is shaping up to be quite a nice little break away.

We have booked into one of the SLH accredited hotels, part of the same group that the Lindos Blu is a member of that we stayed in when we went to Rhodes for Phil's sister's wedding back last year. Were so impressed by the standard needed to be SLH accredited we thought we'd treat ourselves to another stay in one of their recommendations and so have booked the Pachtuv Palace for our accommodation. Fingers crossed it will be lovely!

As for the rest of the day? We it was eaten up with more Fable 2 and finishing watching Watchmen which left me a bit "meh" - glad I didn't go to the cinema to see it. Not to say it was bad, just could have been better...

Tea tonight is a Linda McCartney lasagne for me (as I continue to eat my way through the stock of vegetarian food that I'd got for Phil's mum when they visited at christmas) which was actually quite nice in fairness. Phil had Mac Cheese, his favourite.

More marvellous work today, well, that intermingled with trying to find a contact lens specialist optician for Phil, but the closest I can manage is Birmingham. I think I might put a call into our local one to see if he has any advice.

So, whilst not researching eye topics and scaring myself silly (google images can be an eye opener, no, really quite literally!) I also get on with some more of our company website design. I've done the home page, but what is now required is how the internal pages will operate as they need some kind of sub navigation incorporating into them. It took me quite a while to figure out what that should be and how it should look, but I'm pretty happy with the result.

What I'm not happy with is the fact the istockphoto are charging ridiculous prices for their stock photography, in particular vector graphics. I would say on average the vector files are between 10 and 15 credits, and on istock's pay as you go scheme this equates to about £1 a credit. So an image file will cost you around £10-15. Ridiculous! You might say I should change to their subscription scheme, but their "daily" credit allowance just doesn't make sense for me financially. I think I may have to look else where for my stock photography and imagery. One thing is for sure though, it's forced me to improve my photoshop skills no end, which is a boom, because when you're pretty close to the bone on charges for projects if you can save money, all the more better for your pocket.

I have Phil for company today as he's got an appointment with the eye specialist this afternoon after his last visit to his optician earned him a referral to the hospital because the pressures in his eyes was just above the normal limit. I need to play taxi for him as some of the tests they may do could render him temporarily blind and he wouldn't be able to drive himself home, so we head out around lunch time to leave plenty of time for arrival as we didn't really know what the roads and traffic would be like.

When we arrive at the hospital we have to wait around for a while, but Phil eventually gets taken in for a quick eye test and then another wait later he is called in to see the specialist. Now, I wasn't in the room but Phil tells me afterwards that the woman he'd seen had told him that his eyes were in the most terrible state and he was suffering from a bad case of Corneal Neovascularization due to the type of contacts he was wearing. Nothing wrong with the pressures, but he was about to go blind because he'd been stupid enough to take the advice of an optician who had prescribed 30 day continuous use contacts, something that only people with 3 fingers and no opposable thumb should be allowed to use. The remedy? No more contacts for a month, and if he does go back to them he has to use daily ones instead.

So, we've got two extreme opinions here, Boots say "use the contacts for 30 days, after all they're approved by the governmental health authority to sell over here and we check your eyes every 6 months and haven't noticed this particular problem with your eyes, plus we don't really want you to stop paying us £16 quid a month". The Doctor says "Contacts are the spawn of the devil. You are either too stupid or incapable of changing them daily. Begone!!".

As you can imagine this has left Phil a bit shell-shocked. It took him ages to get the hang of contacts and now as he's reaping the rewards for all his hard work someone either wants to take the prize completely away or leave him play with it even though his eyes might drop out. So, we decided to go and see our doctor who recommended we get an opinion from an optician who has a special interest in contacts, and if that doesn't work go private to seek a second opinion.

Phil and I both think that there is a middle ground to be had here, it's just a case of finding it and perhaps rendering the services of a more experienced eye care professional regularly to keep those capillaries at bay.

So, can you guess what my mission is for tomorrow?

A day full of wintry delights today as I have to go into to town to do some banking, which involves me firstly getting all the snow off the car that has fallen over night - a good couple of inches - and then getting the car into town. I have to say that I'm impressed that Phil decided to go to London today because I'm not entirely sure it's the best weather for him to be braving the roads considering the chaos I had to get through to drive just a mile. It was as if the council just hadn't bothered doing anything! The story was much the same when I managed to get into the town centre and was walking around, the pavements were death traps and really slippy. I wouldn't be surprised if there was a multitude of personal injury claims going into the district council at this rate, a really poor show on their behalf of trying to keep public areas safe. And they can't use the diminishing salt situation as an excuse, as all it'd take would be a man and a shovel to fix the problem in the town. I do wonder why we bother paying council tax I really do!

Anyway, I gingerly make it around to the bank, get done what I need to do and then pick up a few items from the super market and make my way home again.

Whilst I'm having my lunch I get a call from Phil to say that he's leaving early and will be home in an hour or so, so whilst I'm waiting for him I continue battling with my company website that I'm trying to build and researching some 3d flash carousel options.

I down tools at around 5.30 PM and after some more Fable 2 activity set about making tea. A real mish mash tonight as I'm trying to get all the old stuff eaten up out of the freezer.

After food I then do a bit more knitting but don't get very far and have to unravel about 6 of the rows I'd knitted - a real pain! Talk about 8 rows forward 6 rows back....meh! Maybe I'll pay more attention tomorrow!

Not really much to post about today other than the fact I spent the majority of the day reworking the design I'd done for the company website - I have to say it was time worth spending as it now looks a lot better than it did with a few more details added in. Now I've just got to build it!

Our new mouse arrives since the old one's battery has died and you can't replace it. We got a logitech darkfield performance mouse as it's successor. A few teething problems when it was installed like causing the system to hang when it rebooted, but a reshuffle of the USB port the receiver was plugged into sorted that out.

Phil comes home and is in a grump as he's tired, but soon snaps out of it thankfully, we have a quiet evening and early bed. More snow predicted overnight. Joy.