B276 – THE LAST RESORT

Day four illness and I was well am truely in the eye of the storm, I literally didnt get out of bed till 1830 and even then it was cook some food for amy and myself, I had tried to spend the day working from bed and it was kind of successful, I managed to get some stuff done and only ended up watching one movie. in the end I sat down and did a bit of research on meals that I should cook to beat the flu and found this really good recipe on Toms Kitchen, at first when I saw it I really didnt think that any of the ingredients would go together and that dinner would be a complete failure and we would end up getting a take away, which because its now 2018 we will not do. this year is about getting healthy and fit just like 2016. I still haven’t run a marathon in under 3 hours, thats like my life time goal, I really really want to run a marathon un three hours.

well anyway back to dinner, if you are feeling under the weather at the moment, trust me go out and cook this meal, I have woken up at 7am this morning feeling tones better and even think Im going to go out and take some photos. The whole meal was really easy to cook and didnt really take that long. all the ingredients you need are.

1 medium onion, chopped*

Olive oil for sauteing

1 head garlic, cloves separated and chopped fine

4 small hot chile peppers, chopped (fresh are best, but dried ones like chipotles and chiles de arbol work great, too. Just rehydrate them in hot water for a few minutes before chopping. )

1  tablespoon dried oregano and/or thyme*

1 28-32 oz can or jar of organic whole tomatoes or tomato puree (I use home-canned tomatoes)

1 can garbanzo beans (chic Peas). cook them from scratch by all means; but if you’re feeling sick, don’t be shy about opening a can. drained*

Sea salt ( I salted to taste so put in quite alot as I hadnt really moved all day so wanted to get my salt levels back up)

you can also have some nice little add ons aswell.

Limes—enough for half a lime for each serving

Some good but not fancy melting cheese—I use Organic Valley Sharp Cheddar—grated, about ¼ cup per bowl of soup. (some people say you shouldnt have dairy, ignore those people. in this situation cheese is something to pick your sprites up)

1 bunch of something green—preferably cilantro, but parsley works well too—chopped

Chopped red cabbage, about 1 cup ( I put the red cabbage in the soup to cook for like 2 minutes at the end)

Directions.

Put a large, heavy-bottomed pot over medium heat, and coat bottom with olive oil. Add the chopped onions (if using) and let them saute, stirring occasionally, until they’re translucent.

Add the garlic and the chiles and saute them, stirring to avoid burning, for a minute or two.

Now add the tomatoes and a good pinch of salt. If you are using whole canned tomatoes, use a wooden spoon to break them up as they cook.

Add the beans, and let the tomato mixture cook and reduce for a few minutes, stirring occasionally to avoid any sticking to the bottom and burning.

Now, take the same container the tomatoes came in—whether store-bought can or home jar—and fill it with water.

Add the water to the pot, and bring to a boil and add the Red Cabbage.

Turn heat to low, correct for salt

To serve: Add grated cheese (if using) to an empty soup bowl. Ladle a good amount of hot soup into the bowl, making sure that the cheese is completely covered (this will ensure it melts). Cover top with final garnishes—chopped greens. in the recipe it says squeeze a lime over the top, we forgot todo this so if you cook this dish try the lime and let me know.

After I cooked this I really wanted to see what the outside world was like so we travelled to the local sainsburys to grab two muller corner, which was an amazing idea! here are my photos from yesterday, I hope you like them. and please if you do cook this meal, send me a photo I want to see if!

(oh and yes you really need to add that much garlic)

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– this is the soup im not sure what its called so im going to make up a name for it. im going to call it ” The Last Resort”
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– on my adventure to get fresh air and a muller corner –
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– I HAVE THE GOODS –

B275 – I CANT MOVE

Day three of being ill and im no better to feeling normal, i really think I need to spent some time watching Netflix and doing nothing. i thinking about it ive kind of been ill for the past month or so on and off, and then last night I ended up trekking out to a 24 tescos to try and get hold of some medicine at 2am, so right now I’m trying not to do anything to much and just chill in bed and watch some junk tv. Its days like this when doing this photo challenge becomes even harder, I wanted to get up and go swimming but then I didn’t think it would be fair on all the other swimmers if my boogies where all in the pool.

I do want to have a little goal for today though, I want to try and find a dish that I can cook which will help me get better, is there any recipes out there that I should try and cook that will help me get back on my feet? will spice help? garlic? ginger? that kind of thing.

On a different note yesterday while at tescos getting some food, (literally tescos has been the only place ive been too in the past few days). I had to pick up some random fruits for an idea that Amy and me have come up with, its kind of like a mini 2018 project that we want to work on, I cant say any more than that at the moment, and as soon as I can then ill let you know what we are up to.

I really hope this blog post isnt too boring and my photos are amazing today, but this time in bed should really help me plan a few blog posts and get some better material out there too you. I might just spent this time writing up ideas. who knows.

Anyway heres my photos from today, i hope you like them.

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– a photo from my 2:30 am trip to tescos –
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– trying to find the weirdest fruit I can –
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– checked a local off license too, thought I picked up a dragon fruit, it was actually a pomegranate –

 

B273 – ONE OF THE COOLEST HOTEL ROOMS – THE BERKELEY SUITES. BRISTOL

After the craziness of New Years eve, it was only right that instead of driving straight home and back to reality and Amy and me booked ourselves into a good hotel room and just mong out on the sofa. the perfect place is a hotel called the Berkeley Suites, located next to Bristol British Museum and Art Gallery  and in the area of Brandon, the suites are like three rooms, including a living room (projector screen), A bedroom and then the obvious bathroom. it just seems like this place has thought of everything you might need without over doing it with those chairs that no one ever sits on and what has also set this place as one of my favourite is the face that it has a light in the ceiling!

No joke but most of those posh hotels or places like the radisson Blu, don’t have a light in the ceiling, I love a Radisson Blu if I’m working and end up in one of those ill be over the moon, its perfect for working but when you want to have a proper break you want more of an apartment rather than just your normal hotel room with a coffee machine and a kettle. I want what the Berkeley Suites have done, they have given us a little kitchen thing, with a proper coffee machine and even some small hobbs, so if we want to cook then we could.

Ive also have to talk about my favourite part of the suite, the projector Screen. its perfect, its like having an invisible TV that when you want it to be part of the room its there and I would day is about 80 inches wide, and comes with two DLS Sweden speakers on each side, that really ramp up the home cinema feel. my new goal for 2018 is to finish the year with a mini home cinema of my own. It’s not all perfect though, we did have a small issue of you HDMI cable they supply to plug my laptop in to the projector not working, so we couldn’t watch the one film we wanted to watch, Gladiator. After a quick phone call to reception someone was on their way round, but as it was 8pm on New Years Day there wasn’t much any of us could do. Luckily there was Christmas films on TV so we just watched those instead.

if I wasn’t also doing dry January they have these small bottle of Complementary Sherry for everyone to dig in and enjoy and if you book through them they even offer you a free hamper. but if that kind of thing is going to fill you up then you have a bunch of good restaurants right next door including Byron Burger, Wagamamma’s, Wahacca, Choa and Thai Tapas. theres also a Waitrose and Sainsbury’s if you would rather cook in the kitchen thing.

Heres a link to their website, check them out.

https://berkeleysuites.co.uk/

Its fair to say that both of us really don’t want to leave this room, and have already talked about coming back for another stay, the plan for today was to explore Bristol a bit more but we both feel really ill so I think were just going to jump on the train and get back to London.

Thank you Berkley Suites and I’ll see you soon!

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– the home cinema made took this place from a solid 7/10 to a straight 9/10
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– you have to love a good front door –
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– Ive never had a kitchen area like this in a hotel room before, I have to say it is working for me –
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– sitting down this morning to write my blog post with a proper coffee has made starting 2018 pretty easy –

 

B272 – WHAT A WAY TO FINISH THE YEAR

Im not really sure where to start with this one, new years eve was probably one of the best nights in a long long time. these last three days have been pretty incredible and spent with some pretty incredible friends. this blog post wont have anything from the actual party as all of that stuff is on a Go Pro, we put a Go pro up in the corner of the room and filmed the whole party so expect a highlights reel soon.

before the antics of last night some of us decided that we needed to get up and go for a country walk even though it was completely tipping it down but that wasn’t going to stop us, fresh country air was worth it. after walking through a few fields, making friends with some horses and eventually finding a road which lead us straight to two of proper country pubs, the type of places where you have that one local who doesn’t speak words but more bumbles and mumbles his way through sentences. nothing is better than coming across and local pub which looks like its been there for the past 100 years and every item of photo on the wall feels like it could tell a story, thats the type of pubs we were in. but after a short live disaster of not being able to get a roast dinner, the kitchen had stopped serving, we sat down and just kind of forgot to get up and order food, but we did managed to get some left over roast potatoes which only showed us what we could of had. About 100 meters down the road was a different pub call the Fox, it was half pub half Italian restaurant so that was our back up choice and to be honest pizza is always a good option in my eyes, so that put us back on track.

I also just want to say sorry this post is late today but to be honest when I woke up this morning I wasn’t sure if I would be able to move of the day, but now Amy and me have just checked into an amazing Hotel in Bristol of the night and currently just trying to decided what move to watch on the projector screen that we literally have in our room! that was my number one reason of booking this place.

Heres some photos from the walk yesterday!

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– two boys one pint –
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– Rob trying to convince the sheep he’s their leader –
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– this is Ellis trying to find the pub –
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– making freinds with horses –
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– pub found –

 

 

 

 

B270 – IITS FINALLY THAT TIME.

So I’m going to have to do this whole post a bit different I think, Neither Amy or me brought the correct charger so I cant have a look at the photos I want to post till my phone turns out and then I cant upload this blog till I find out what we do about wifi? We are in the middle of no where with our mates for New Years eve so there’s no chance of me getting time to do this post till later on. That’s the situation right about now, because Ive woken at like 7:50 and it doesn’t sound like anyone else is up now is a good time to crack on and get this done so when I do eventually find some decent wifi I can go ahead and post this.

Yesterday we arrived at our house of the next 3 days in Bristol, well more like the Cotswolds, im not too good with location but I know there is a sign at the end of the road that says Dunkirk. So if you look on google maps you’ll probably know more than me. The next three days are going to be tough to put together a decent sentence let a lone a blog post but ill do my best to make sure that these are informative and interesting to read, I suppose ill use this blog to just giving you guys the heads up and prepare you for what might come.

Today is our first full day at this place and im looking forward to see my friends and having a proper catch up with the ones I haven’t seen in ages, these kind of trips are always the best for that reason. Oh and we have a swimming pool in our house, literally a full on swimming pool so maybe get prepared for one of the photos tomorrow to be underwater?

Theres my photos from today, Bon appetite.

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– Something keeping me occupied while everyone plays a game in the car. I obviously lost the game and was the first one out –
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– this isnt my bottle of Jack Daniels but it looks good in a picture –
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– these two were looking after “Baby Jesus”  before I left yesterday. Flo the younger one has just learnt about Jesus so now everything is Baby Jesus including the dumbell that phoebe is holding like a baby –

B269 – AMY HAS REPLACED ME FOR A PUPPY

Yesterday was a jammed pack day of Dog walking, car cleaning and more dog stuff. nothings better than having a productive day of doing things that aren’t really work related. but right now I’m trying to get this post done in 10 minutes before a hurricane walks through the door in the shape of my little cousin.

but back to yesterday, it all started when we ended up going on a bit of a group dog walk around Biggin hill, my dog Mooney isn’t really that keen on other dogs at the moment, she recently got bitten on the her my an bigger dog so she’s a bit scared of anything with four legs at the moment. it was good to get outside and do a bit of walking though I haven’t walked mooney in ages so that was fun and its also good to get her used to other dogs again.

After the dog walk it was time to clean some cars, my mums car was unacceptable dirty so now it was time to attack that with everything I had but before that I offered to clean my mums hairdressers car, its nice todo nice things right? Clean cars is actually pretty rewarding, you can see something that was dirty and once your finished it looks totally different in a way.

Last night we also had our mate Jocobs annual Christmas Party where people sing songs and play beer pong, but the highlight of the evening was by are my Beer pong skills and also the fact Jacob has recently got to new puppies which amy refused to put down the whole night

Sorry todays post is a bit rushed but Amy and me thought we were waking up early but we are going to have family to entertain before we then have to jump in a taxi and head over to a friends and drive down to Bristol where 20 of us have hired a house of New Years eve.

anyway I hope everyone is enjoy the christmas break and looking forward to 2018, heres my photos from yesterday! I hope you like them!

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– starting the day with a dog walk is always a good idea –
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– me trying to take a photo walk cleaning the car –
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– Amy has now replaced me with a puppy –

 

B268 – RUNNING AROUND LIKE A CHRISTMAS CRACK HEAD!

Its that weird time of year between christmas and new years where you still have to run around like some sort of christmas crack head trying to get your fix of family and chocolate and that exactly what amy and me have been doing, yesterday after waking up at Anders house I was on the move back to my flat for a 10 minute pit stop to meet amy and grab some clothes before heading back to see Flo so Amy can give her, her christmas presents. so naturally we stayed for a bit and played hide and seek and all those other games that a 3 year old likes to play. Flo was typically took control of my camera and decided to take a photo of us, so as you can expect I have included that photo below.

its now 10:37 on the 28th of December and we are sitting on my parents sofa getting ready to have a productive day of dog walking, car cleaning and hairdressing. a lot of activities but Im ready to rock n roll and get this show on the move.

theres something I want to write about on this blog today to make it final and then I have no excuse if I fail and that is a bet that I have put together my a good chum anders, we are going to be doing Dry January, No drinking alcohol for the whole of January and if we do then we have to give the other person £30. Im determined to fail and get back to track with my running, this time last year I was training for an ultra marathon and now I want to put those running shoes back on and start training of another race, my leg is in a good place and I’m sure with a bit of swimming and my a gym session or two I can get back to a good place and start running fast times.

Here are my photos from yesterday. Enjoy.

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– just flo sorting out Amy’s hair –
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– my arty shot from a coffee shop in crystal palace –
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– flos photo of amy and me – 

 

 

B267 – NEXT YEAR IS ALL ABOUT LETTUCE

Recently Ive started slacking with my 5d and been using my phone quite a lot to take photos and have really started to rely on that to get my three photos a day. the whole posting thing has kind of got easy in a away, I just take 3 ok photos each day and then do a bit of writing, where as at the start of the posting I was really excited to take like 200 photos each day on 3 different cameras and then spend a few hours going through them, but recently Ive got a bit complacent.

So now im New Years Resolution is to bring my game up a level so at the end of the 365 days Ive not only got a blog thats I’ve posted on each day but Ive got something which has photos that I can be proud of and something to show off.

Thats my hump day through process this morning, I also need to start doing exercise again because yesterday I had a burger and chip and then later on I did something I haven’t done for 24 years of my life. I had my first Morleys, for those of you that don’t know about Morleys let me explain to you what that is.

Morleys is a food chain or more of a cheap chicken shop based in South London in places like Croydon, Crystal Palace and Lewisham and in this food establishments they sell 7 pieces of spicy chicken wings and chips for the grand price of £2.99. its literally drunk food at its finest and now all I want to eat for the next year lettuce thats how the Morleys has made me feel.

But its not all doom and gloom its now snowing in London so hopefully it will stick around and we can all have a snow day!

heres my photos from yesterday.

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– The view of London this morning before the snow came –
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– how cool are this wall paper at the Westtow pub in Crystal Palace –
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– the Burger last night, next year is all about lettuce –

B264 – UP AND DOWN THE COUNTRY

Well… where to start. I just wrote a whole post and then pressed delete by accident, well done josh. 

I’m writing this post as I navigate my way around London with a million bags and just try to get to my cousins in one piece. I don’t really know how to write this post, but I suppose I’ve just got to give it ago and see where we end up. 

Yesterday I had a Christmas meal in Norfolk with all of Amy’s family and friends, as per usual they put out an absolute spread and a good amount of cheese, but by that time I’d had a few beers so forgot to take any photos, but I did get one of the pre dinner snacks. I don’t think I embarrassed myself at all last night and pretty sure I was sensible, so that’s also a pulse. 

As I said I’m now on the train to My cousins on the other side of London, I’m a place called Petts wood to see my family. It’ll be good to see everyone, Christmas is a good time of year to catch up with people you haven’t seen in ages so that’s what I’m most looking forward to and also giving flo all the presents I got her. 

I’m also going to a pub tonight with my mates, so I’ll try and take some photos of that but I’m not sure if they’ll be any good. 

also for some reason WordPress won’t let me add captions to these photos. So the top one is from a dog walk yesterday afternoon along the beach park cliff bit. 

2nd picture is of the pre dinner snacks, Christmas food is the best food. 

3rd photo is from a quick pub drink we had after the dog walk. I love country pubs. 

And also I want to say thanks to Amy Family and co. It was a really good food and an pretty fun evening. 

B258 – IT WAS PERFECT

If after 258 days of these posts you havent realised that my favourite day is Sunday then please understand that sunday has to be the best day of the week. Its all about good food, naps movies and the odd adventure out. Well yesterday was all of those things, after a pretty heavy Saturday night sunday was perfect, we woke up and hit the cafe for some good old breakfast but on out way over there we came across this really cool little market which sold those foods that you don’t really find in a super market, like sause saus and really fresh tomato’s.

After some good old food it was back to the flat to clean up and watch some movies with the odd Nap here and there, what more do you want. at one point I thought I had food poising which is never good but amy reminded me that is must have been the hang over.

As our Swiss friends havent been to Winter Wonderland before and thats unacceptable, everyone needs to see Winter Wonderland, so after our naps and everyone was feeling tip top again we put on some warm clothes and head over in the afternoon, we literally walk round looking at food and eating all the good stuff, I don’t think any of us could have had a drink which made life a lot easier, I really didn’t want to even look at a drink.

its now Monday morning and as I write this post I’m trying to stay productive but my bed is just calling me, christmas has officially started for me but I really don’t want to spend the next few weeks doing nothing, so my plan is not to sit and watch all the christmas films but to get up get dressed and start taking photos or something.

Here are my photos from yesterday, enjoy.

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– the spinning bar at Winter Wonderland –
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– how good does this look, I wonder how easy it is to make the stuff –
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– tomato’s look perfect –