5:2

So, today is a fast day and by that I do not mean that I am rushing around like the proverbial blue-bottomed winged insect. Neither does it mean, more's the pity, that the traffic on the country roads where I live in North Norfolk will be going at a reasonable speed. No, what it means is that in the next 24 hours I shall consume no more than 500 calories. If I was a man it would be 600. Thinking about it, perhaps it would be worth having some hormone therapy and 'the operation' just to get those extra 100 calories, I mean that's a whole chocolate biscuit for goodness' sake!
This madness is all part of the 5:2 diet where you eat normally 5 days a week and restrict your calorie intake to 500 on the other 2. I won't bore you with the details or the science, those are readily available from people much better qualified than I. All I know is that since I started this way of eating back in November I have felt better, lost/maintained my weight and started changing my general attitude to food.
It hasn't all been easy. The first couple of times I did a fast it was tough. By the time I got home after work I was grumpy (or grumpier than usual) and could quite happily have eaten my own hand. I remember looking longingly at the food in the cat's bowl and even my son's Turkey Twizzlers. Now, that was a low point.
There is always temptation around too. At the school where I work there is invariably a pile of biscuits in our staff room and people often bring in cakes and other treats. We definitely march on our stomachs and apparently one of the interview questions when applying for a job in our department used to be 'Can you make a decent meringue?'
Home isn't much better either. Having watched my husband munch his way through a packet of biscuits one evening I found myself wondering whether I would be able to enter a plea of  'diminished responsibility' if I smacked him round the head an extra large carrot baton.
I tend to do my 'fast days' during the week, but I know people who have gone hard-core and tried a weekend fast. I refer to this as 'extreme fasting'. Personally, after a tough week teaching teenagers I need a good glass of wine on a Friday and Saturday evening. As one of my favourite quotations goes 'I only work in order to afford the alcohol necessary to keep on working!'
Anyway, I must go now. Just off to munch on a few goji berries.