Day 15- I have nothing punchy?

I was sat there just thinking for 15 minutes, wondering what I should put on the title after 15 days. Could not think of anything relevant, funny or bitchy. Oh deary me.

Have had a great weekend, been real busy with day trip to Liverpool yesterday to see my therapy tutors for planning some future workshops. Was a great day, so lovely to see them and had lunch bought for me. I Also had my wrist slapped as they did teach me DDM (Dynamic Deep meditation) meditation few years back and I did practise for about a year but then little by little it just got faded in the background noise of busy lifestyle.  The crazy thing is that i don't know why as it makes me feel so good, see things so clearly and relaxes me a lot. So I had my mantra reintroduced, which I had funnily enough forgot so much that it was like really wrong. And this particular style meditation has to be reintroduced in a right way by the teacher to get you back on track. I am now determined for time being spending 10 mins in morning and same in the afternoon meditating. Since they re-introduced me with a session of part hypnosis and meditation, I feel SO GREAT! I am happy, bubbly, energetic...the benefits are great, so let me not forget it!

Came home from my road trip to spend an evening with a good friend who I had not seen for a while, we had one of them real proper chats for hours. Good to share.

Today I got up at noon. Yep. Was bit tired so slept for 12 hours without any distractions at all and woke up feeling fab, did my 10 min meditation and then proceeded with action for the next 10 hours with energy like there is no tomorrow, cleaned the whole house, did shopping, did all laundry, had 2 long walks with dogs, cooked some great food, did my friends nails and she did mine and they look great, made some important documents, had great time with a friend and finally, now, sat down to have a little chill out. If I could have this much energy every single day it would be totally amazing.

I love my little vaporator, I spent an evening on Friday at a friends house and she as well as her boyfriend smoked all evening and I stuck to my electronic version, no problems. And the friend that I have spent much time this weekend with is a smoker but again my electronic cig saved me. So I am glad I got it as it could have got hairy otherwise.

I do seem to get a real bad situation once a day past few days when I really, really want a cigarette, but it is not more than that, week ago it was once every 2 minutes so this is a vast improvement.

I have a nice busy 6 day working week ahead of me, but then after next weekend it will be a measly Monday to work and then Freedom and trip to Finland for 2 weeks. YAYAYY!

So all and all, cruising along pretty well... so far I have saved £90.00.

Have a great week ya all!

Random notes:
It is very difficult to open a pack of cereal, milk carton and have a toilet break when you have wet nails.

It is rather amusing when you search for good pictures for this blog and you put the words 'happy smoker' in google, you get lets of sweetly smiling ladies proper posing...you do get much more too...but that just tickled me, who saves their posing photo as 'happy smoker' ?

Day 12 - Vaporator

Today has been a pretty good day on all accounts. Yesterday I was just busy and shattered so shall skip that entirely.
We have had sunshine today, YAY! That alone in this flooding damp summer was something that bought a smile on my face from start.

I had my VAPORATOR (said with Arnie's Australian accent from his early movie career) delivered yesterday(to normal people this is the e-cig or electronic cigarette) It is fab, I went with stainless steel design which feels expensive and well made in hand, it works just as it should after I charged the batteries, that in itself was a surprise, it only took 20 minutes for full charge on first charging which is very impressive. It lasted all day yesterday and today as well. But to be fair I am not puffing on it much as I am now on day 12 so I would imagine the battery would have died much sooner if I was on my first day and if I hadn't any other aids. I got mine from company called Liberty Flights and can say I am happy with the quality, price and the testing so far. It is perfect for those moments that I struggle. So far I am having one or two puffs maybe 4-6 times a day.

Want to find out more?
Here...now remember I did all the hard work and spent 7 hours looking thru the hundreds of web pages and products in my nicotine withdrawal. This is the place and product I chose that I felt offered the best price vs quality vs comments made on different products. But there are tons more out there and some a lot cheaper initially but more expensive to keep vaping.
http://www.liberty-flights.co.uk/

It came with pre-filled cartridges and I thought the taste and the nicotine hit was very strong. I only realised today that those were pre-filled with the high nicotine stuff, so that's why. The liquids that I bought were medium strength and now having tried one of them, I think I need the light stuff.

I have so far only tried vanilla flavour and it is great, and you feel like you are having something as you get the vapour so you feel you are really sucking something like smoke in, altho it is harmless vapour with some nicotine. Not much different from the patches or gum or other replacement products.

And honestly, I really never ever need to have a real cigarette again.

Ok, I am off my soap box now, enough about that. I am sure you all get it, I have a new toy and I like it.

I did got to my SAS meeting today, it was really busy, must have been 12 of us in various stages of not smoking, ranging from 0 days to 16 weeks and was very motivating yet again to listen to it all.  Everyone was upbeat, few people had struggled, others were not having any problems, and everyone is eating loads. So I feel less guilty about scoffing my face at this moment in time. I have already noticed that I look like I am pregnant. I was overweight before I started and now I am even more overweight. But I have promised myself a month to do whatever as long as I don't smoke, but soon I must reign this flab in somehow.

Should anyone want to come and drag me to gym I would much appreciate it! Or a lomg walk, or badminton, anything at all!!! Pleaseeeee!!! I can only have willpower about one thing at the time.

I have now removed the annoying word approval thingy from the comments to this blog, which should make your comments so much easier. So hoping to get some more. And thanks Muikku for being one that keeps saying something, at least i know someone is reading for sure :)

Oh, big fat gypsy wedding is on telly....gotta dash! Ta Taa!

Cigarettes 0
Large Kebabs 1
Lollies 2
I don't think I have upset anybody today, but I am just about going to send a text message that just might change that :D Mjäh mjäh...

Day 10 - Reindeer Piss :)

In northern Finland (Lapland) they have this saying, reindeer piss away. What it means is that when the reindeer is on the move, migrating, that the reindeer piss is the farthest distance they can travel without having a pee.
So Reindeer piss  is a measure of distance, and in the case of this blog, a measure of time and distance. I have now got reindeer piss distance from my quit date. The Reindeer piss is considered a small distance, something one could walk quite easily. *maximum of 7.5 km in fact*

What I am trying to say is that it might feel like a reindeer piss is an awfully long time and a long way, and it really really isn't considering that they can travel miles upon miles more than that in a day, reindeer piss is just a fraction of that. Really nothing at all.

I feel like I have come a long way, but really every day still is a real battle. Today was considerably easier than yesterday. Yesterday was 5th Circle of Dantes infermo (wrath & sullenness) and today was merely 1st Circle (Limbo). Although if we need to find a positive note, I have not yet resorted to heresy, violence, fraud or treachery, levels 6-9. But I would say there is time yet.

On another note, I have not noticed (so far) any increased MI5 or MI6 activity around me, my blog, my house, or work as I was expecting few postings back, but then again those robots searching the naughty words on the tinterweb do take a little time. So it could happen any day now.

So yeah I have decided to order me an electronic cigarette type of thing for those days just like yesterday. Because if I am honest, I don't think I have the willpower left to handle many more of those.

So me being me, I goes searching the tinterweb. 7 hours later...I finally choose my product after looking thru ALL of them ever invented. Comparing prices and performance and reading hundreds of reviews.
Well what I have got coming is like the Ferrari of electronic smokes. Don't do half measures me. I like good stuff. This better be good! Or we have Dantes inferno level 7 coming right up!

In those 7 hours this is what I learnt...the people who use them tend to call it vaping instead of smoking as it is sheer harmless vapour that you are sucking into your lungs thru one of these things. Normal cigarette is called the analogue...the old fashioned, stinking, expensive analogue. That really cracked me up!
And you have nicotine in these things, either as ready to pop in little cartridges or liquid that you refill, depending on the vaping device. Now then, cigarettes come in various strengths and flavours. So you can have 3 different strengths and the forth is zero nicotine for those who reduce their nicotine intake gradually and still might have to puff on a vapour but don't need the nicotine anymore, have just got to rid of the final little habit side of things. So real cigarettes, they all do have that cigarette taste don't they? Well now for your enhanced vaping experience you can have just about any flavour you can imagine. I think only thing I didn't see was fish & chips flavour!

First of all you can have your Camel, Marlborough, cigar, etc flavours, but you can also have vanilla, coke, fruits of the Forrest, whiskey, chocolate, pear, apple, strawberry....you name it, they got it.

They did not, however have any diet coke ladies :D

As to how much of this flavour you can actually tell while 'vaping' I have no idea until mine is delivered. But I will be sure to tell you.

Now on some level I think I am cheating this quitting thing if I need Champix and nicotine on the tough moments. But to be honest, anything right now that will stop me from having the real deal analogue, stinking, cancer causing , expensive fag is considered a bonus. Every single minute, every single packet I am not buying is all good, no matter what it takes. Fuck it. This is how I am doing it this time. you gotta problem with it please feel free to write, in 3 copies of course to:

I don't really give a shit
999 Fekking avenue
666 Inferno

Your letter will be attended to by one of our every so cheerful customer service representatives as soon as they can spare time from torturing the poor souls trying to be good by quitting smoking. You will know when you receive one, it is signed in blood and has a faint smell of smoke and the edges of paper may be slightly burnt.

That's about all I have to say today. Apart from the fact that work was STUPID busy. I was gonna get real stressed and annoyed but kept saying Fuck it, relaxing and taking just one thing at a time, just like my latest mentor, yes The 'Fuck It' book tells me to.

Cigarettes 0
Wine - Yes, we had to have some (we??? me...as if the dogs shared!)
Upset co-workers 1
Training materials printed and organised 250 pages
Lodger contracts drafted for the next lodger 1 (yep, I got one going out and another coming in August time, yay!)
Aromatherapy orders for friends, family, training course chef and me: 1 (took me ages) this trading stuff that's cheap in England for favours or stuff in or from Finland is great even when it does set me back 100 pounds, it is still worth every single penny!
E-mails sent: 20
Text messages sent: 200 (most for work, yes that is how busy it was!) I think I sent 3 on personal level...rest on the 1 finger analogue piece of ancient history that is called my work phone and all work related and mainly consisting of numbers.
Breakdowns dealt with : around 20
Exercise: 2 walks, about an hour, what I had no more time
Alarms slept through: 1 I woke up WAY late this morning, the rest is history. I was late. Day was hell. Fuck it.
I think you re bored now, so I will stop.
We can just conclude I have had a busy day!

Oh, and I is NOT so impressed with the lack of comments, sharing or liking with them facebook buttons. Come on people, don't keep me all to yourself!

Day 9 - Hell

Morning was fine, during the day was little challenging at times, but got throught it. But since 4pm today all I have been thinking about is having a cigarette and really wanting one, permanently.
I have been doing so well, I don't know what the heck this is. I am really, really struggling. But I have not walked out to buy any. I am grinding teeth a lot, giving everything the 'Evil Eye' and since almost finishing the F**k It book I am repeating that an awfull lot. I am saying fuck it to just about eveything today, which supposedly will set me free. I am really rather peeved off and likely to shout and bite heads off it anyone even considered speaking to me.

I am thinking I need to go to bed just to make this day end.

They say smoking kills. Yep when someone is trying to quit they might just kill someone.

That's all I have to say :/

Cigarettes 0
Nothing else to report at all. Pah.Grrr. Räyh. Hmph.

*Shit, Poppy just ate inhaler No 2*

Mind, Body and Spirit Sunday

Well, well I am not sure how you will all cope with another positive-ish blog post from the moaning mini, but here goes:

Went to a Mind, Body and Spirit fair in Leeds today with a friend. I do go to around 4 of these things every year. Mainly to get some new cards, jewellery or books or a good massage. I like holistic therapies and this was one of the reasons why I became FreewayCER Meridian Energy Therapy Tutor some years back. I am training next bunch of therapists in Finland in 3 weeks time on a rural summer cottage by the ocean and can't wait, it will be fab!

Anyhow, I like these fairs as there is always something interesting, if nothing else, interesting people and conversations. And other times some new holistic techniques. This was one of those times. I was wondering if I should spend my remaining money on a cool OM necklace or a massage after we had wondered about, bought a few books and had lunch. Decided to go for the necklace but then someone had just bought it so I could not have it.

We then had a look around at the various stands offering various different massage techniques. Now my friend said that one would wind me up, this one group was massaging people while making a whooshing sound and it advertised as innersound.org and Qi energy treatment. Well my interest sparked immediately as I am very familiar with Qi and energy flow and such like matters so I decided to give it a try.
This is their website and they are based in Manchester for those who might have an interest:
http://www.innersound.org/index.php/qi-treatment

It was great, what was somewhat strange and not something I have had done before was massaging my tummy. And he spent what seemed like an eternity doing it and also went back to it later. Afterwards I told him that it was weird, and he told me that he felt I had various blockages around the stomach area and that stomach meridian is very closely connected to lung meridian and as he felt my lungs had problems as well, he gave that area extra #umph# of energy. Anyhow, the entire experience was fabulous and I feel GREAT!

They also do 3 hour little workshops one Saturday each month which has a similar but bit deeper massage, some meditation, movement of Qi exercises and lunch. This will go to one of those in September!

Anyhow, I have seen this book called F**k It- The ultimate Spiritual Way a number of times and I did in fact meet the author while back in a previous fair and yet haven't bought the book, been thinking about it. But somehow now, quitting smoking the title called to me. Might be my frame of mind, might be that I am now ready for the message. Whatever the reason, this time I bought it. I gulped 65 pages down as soon as I got home. It is sheer brilliance. It is a spiritual book, but for a western mind. And since I have taken the liberty or saying fuck when ever I feel like it in this blog for the obvious nicotine withdrawal reasons, this bloke, John C Parkin makes it quite literally a spiritual way of freeing yourself from stress and all the things that cause you pain. So would highly recommend the book to just about anyone. you can order it here:
http://www.thefuckitlife.com/shop.htm

What was very funny as well today...my friend is a smoker. She smokes roll ups. when we get to Leeds I ask her if she wants to have a cigarette before we go in and she says no. After our lunch she wants to go out for a cigarette and I decide to keep her company. There is nobody else outside having one. And she can't find her papers :D I was in hysterics! So she could not have one. There was no shop close by and nobody smoking outside so she could have asked for a cigarette or a paper. So she had to go without the entire trip.
She took it very well to be fair, but I just thought it was so funny.

So fantastic day, I have wanted cigarette approximately once an hour, which is a vast improvement from once a minute.

Cigarettes 0
Wine 2 glasses of Marlborough Savignon Blanc to go with my new Fuck It book
Music: Codega & George Michael
Exercises:  1.5 hours walking dogs, 2 hours walking around the fair
Food: Baked potato with chili and cheese, tacos, pear pie (same as apple pie but with pears) 1 lollipop, Crunchy Nut serial

1 week down - Eternity to go!

So there first week is drawing to and end. It has been hell if I am honest, especially for the first 4 days.
Yes there was few hickups but all and all, I have had 3 cigarettes instead of the 120 that I would have had in the last 7 days. So one can call that a victory for sure. I just need to find the will to keep going.

I went out last night to see some live bands and it was the first outing to the smoke filled world all week.
What was very nice was the fact that my friend who I went with decided to have electronic cigarette for the eveving so that I would not be left alone indoors while everyone else milled outside for cigarettes.

This of course caused me to try this electronic cigarette. It was fantastic! Tasted million times better than cigarettes, no smell and the best way I can describe the taste is that it was sweet waffles with maple syrup and of course gave you a nicotine buzz.

Next thing I noticed was 3 other people in the pub with electronic cigarettes. Now the funny thing to me was that they all were using it in a very coy way, like hiding it a little, slightly embarassed. I wonder why...afterall when we go out to smoke a smelly cancer stick we hold our head up high ad there is no embarassment what so ever!

Anyhow the bands were great, company and being social fantastic so really enjoyed myself.

And although I drank plenty of wine I got out of bed this morning full of energy. Went for an hours walk with the dogs, cleaned the house, did all laundry, did weekly shopping,gave one of the dogs a bath, spent 2 hours chatting to a possible new lodger, walked the dogs again, played with them, cooked great dinner.

It was nice to feel this level of energy after most of the week feeling lethargic and depressed!

However I have noticed I am talking to myself now, rather than laughing at my own thoughts, we have moved onto talking load of rubbish to myself out loud. Hmmm.

Ooh and I found megabag of sour fruit mini Chupa Chups lollies in Asda...stocked up with few bags!

Cigs 0
Money saved so far £39.50
Music: 3 Doors down
Food: ham & cheese toastie, tacos, pecan platt, bag of crisps. (Yeah I know I gotta do something about this! crap, crap and more crap!)

Random brain vomit

Still not had a cigarette...Seems I have to keep writing today to keep the cigarettes at bay!

But Ok now I have spent far too much time on my own, I am having entire conversations in my head and laughing at my own jokes. This is not something I normally do, but tonight I have quite literally been doing the LOL and the PMSL. Most of the time people use those to comment on stuff while they sit there stony faced. I was just doing it...all by myself, at random thougts in my head.
They did say that you get crazy dreams with Champix and I have to say the nightly showtime has been most awsome. But laughing at voices in your head? But I was having fun, so guess that counts? Right? RIGHT???

Once of the very randoms thoughts lately was about how this bloke got police storming into his house when he had posted something on his facebook about bombing everyone because he was having a bad day. At that point I told myself best be carefull about saying something stupid like planning on murdering the Queen or bombing the Olympics or I will have the Swat team here in no time. OMG. I have just said it. This nicotine withdrawal really makes me do stupid stuff!

So if the security in this country really is as good as it should be, then visits to my blog should now explode while various MI5 and/or MI6 agents read every single line I have published and check my entire life, friends, ex boyfriends and then within 24 hours I would be in some cell for some form of questioning. (hah, would not feel so lonesome then would I?) I should also get a very slow look from the passport control when I try to fly to Finland in few weeks for a holiday. And yet I am perfectly normal person talking loads of rubbish just because I have just stopped smoking. One of the laughing attacks was me thinking how god damn bored these MI5 agents would be after researching all that and realising how boring and normal my life really is, for example in comparison to theirs, or just about anybodys for that matter!

And how damn handy it would be to have MI5 keeping surveillance on my house for a while since someone did try and break into my very home this week as mentioned on a previous post!

All this thought process sort of started in my head from hearing from a dear friend who has been suddenly stormed by police this week in one scandinavian country and thrown in prison for 60 hours, bruised and mobile phone broken. Without going to any of the details further, this person had done absolutely nothing wrong whatsoever, was manhandled quite roughly and then was released once the police did realise their mistake. This incident and the behaviour of the police in question was totally disgusting and uneccessary considering the reason behind the arrest would not even have warranted any violence or rough handling whatsoever, and we are talking about a very petite, sophisticated lady here. Just hope she can get over the ordeal and put it behind her. But once you have a shock like that, it is not something you will very quickly forgive and forget.

And just to create some exitement in life, I will soon find out if I should receive similar sort of fate in the good old UK now that I have said things one should never say publicly, no matter how nicotine deprived one was!

Moving swiftly on, randomness of different kind... I have been watching some of these very young finnish teenagers posting all these 'Press like button and I will list 5 things I like about you, or I will list all the boys who press like in cuteness order, or I will tell you what I think about you' sort of things on facebook and they seem to be having great fun doing it and a big group of kids is taking part and so on and forth. And then I am looking at the statuses of some english teenagers around same age and it is all effin, blinding, drinking, calling people names, having arguments publicly on facebook and I am thinking my god what a totally 2 different planets the similar age teenagers live in. They should do teenage swap between the 2 countries for a week or two, now there's a reality show I would watch and it would be damn entertaining!

Also I was wondering what my dogs feel about this, now that I can smell how bad smokers really stink again, makes me wonder what the dogs with sense of smell so much keener than a normal human being are thinking of me now that I stink far less. Are they worried as their companion smells completely different, are they glad I smell better? If they could talk what would they say?

So as you see, some real random stupid thoughts, either down to my withdrawal or Champix or just vivid imagination, not sure which yet.

I am looking forward meeting some new people and some old friends this coming weekend tho, maybe socialising a bit will get me out of this bubble called my head.