Christmas 2011: Six days to go!!

Aiming for bed at 11PM, so it means I will be hopping back into my room after I type this up.  Just had my shower and now sitting here with some honey water.  Not honey lemon as it's too late for that, too late to make a fuss of cutting lemon slices etc so just honey water for now, to help soothe my throat.  Was coughing a lot this morning.  Coughed through the night.  It's weird how I could be sleeping one minute then the next moment my throat would itch so much I'd cough and wake myself up!  Argghh!  How annoying.  Phlegm has started coming up, which according to Cat is a good sign, because it's the bateria/ germs etc rising up with the mucus and it should be signs of recovery.  Should be.  Haha!  Hmm... I might say Haha! here, but having a coughing fit during this morning's driving lesson was NO laughing matter.  Was quite embarrassed at one point.  Have you ever had such bad cough where you felt your throat tickling a lot and every time you open you mouth you can't help but cough??  Well that was what happened this morning at one point during a lesson.  And I could not say anything whilst keeping my mouth closed and refraining from coughing and splurting.  My face turned rosy (not as bad as yesterday's chairing of EM service!) and could feel tears forming =S  Ah well, the pupil was understanding at least =)  I really hope I get better soon, better drink up my honey water and get to bed!!

Lacking

I know I lack two things: proper hydration and proper sleep.  I don't drink enough fluids through the day and this is mainly due to my work lifestyle.  If I drink too much water, I will constantly need to look for a toilet for comfort breaks, even during lessons.  This would cause too much disruption to the pupil's lesson and maybe even the lesson plan/ route itself.  If I were to hold it in and just carry on with the lesson until it finished, I would disrupt and possibly damage my own internal waterworks system.  Lol!  Believe me, holding in the urge for a "number one" is very uncomfortable and can get very risky!!  Haha!  I used to drink so much water when I worked in the office: constantly topping up my water tumbler from the kitchen and sitting down by the computer doing my tasks.  But now water intake is reduced to once every two hours on average and that's not much much either, something less than 200mls at a time (I know because my 750ml KOR water bottle) never comes back empty even after a full day of work =(  What can I do then...?  I guess I should try to drink more right after work, replen my fluid levels because I would lose fluids through sweat (hot days or scary situations), through my breath (my job involves talking a lot) and through natural excretion.  I hope my body has not "gotten used to" such low levels of water.  Must keep hydrating!!

I also lack sleep.  "We are a plane of sleep deprived people" - Scooby.  His definition of "sleep deprived" is when an alarm clock is needed to wake you from your sleep, then you are sleep deprived, because your body is not ready to awaken and has not finished it's essential 'housekeeping' to maintain itself and recharge for the next day.  It's quite an interesting way of looking at it.  Because I am one who often turns the alarm off in the morning and just roll back into bed, even though I know it would be time to get up for the gym, work or for other tasks.  I guess that's my body's natural response to telling me that it is not "fully recharged" for the day ahead.  A bit like my HTC Magic phone currently which takes like a looooong time to get "fully charged 100%" battery status despite being charged overnight.  Signs of age I think.  So yeah, I know not having enough sleep will affect a lot of things: black eye bags (panda eyes), dull skin, dry skin (also linked to hydration), lack of concentration and possible mood swings for some people.  In terms of health and fitness, lack of sleep is detrimental to muscle building.  You work hard at the gym where your muscle fibres break up and need to build and grow.  But it can only do this when you are sleeping.  It is during sleep that the muscle building work happens and your hormones are also regulated.  So... lesson to be learnt here... get to bed earlier Gordon!!  Gotta have more self control over Facebook.  Cannot be tempted to stay on longer to check out people's statuses, respond to comments, idolise over pictures etc haha!