Grit and Green Gloop

I've just made and drunk the most startling green drink. I won't bore you with the ingredients, except to say, you'd want to approach it gingerly, the Incredible Hulk would be attracted to it, and it would repel vampires. My children screamed and ran away when they saw me drinking it. My middle son looked as though he was going to chuck up his dinner when he saw what is supposed to make me thinner - not really, that just rhymed. It's good health I'm after, after all that surgery and chemo cocktails, that are really mocktails as in mockingtales not sans alcohol cocktails, that are all tail and no ****. A crock basically. They really call those chemo bags chemo cocktails, on account of them being mixed just for you. Besides, the road marked Care What You Weigh is peopled with crazies and guarded by the hounds of hell.

That's not all. I also did a Grit class today. No, I did not learn how to remodel a driveway. I am on a mission to remodel myself, given I am miles away from what I looked like when I was an actual model. Truth be told, all that cancerous not being able to move much over 2019/20, plus (size) the eye-popping, hip expanding, family frightening, steroids, have left some heft. And so it was that I turned up at the desk at my local gym today, where I was asked by an amused staff member whether I'd ever done Grit before. I thought of some of the folks I've had to deal with this week and almost replied, "Yes, I do it most days," but I figured he'd take that kind of quip as a fib. The staff member continued to grin like a loon. "Are you being friendly or smiling because of what I'm in for?" I asked. "Both," he said. "Do you have any issues with blood pressure?"

Before long I was pumping iron, as my heart pumped harder than a whole house party from 1993. I wielded a weighted barbell and just, well, weight, and also swung weighted discs between my legs, as if I was going to shotput at any moment. Leaping lunges and sideways press-ups were also de rigeur. Or irregular, in my case. I also had to make like a beetle with a two-second memory - hand and foot going forward, centre, backwards manoeuvre. Most people in the class were young and fit. I just looked like I was having a fit. I emerged with a face the hue of beetroot. Everyone else looked normal. The instructor looked amused, but at least he wasn't grinning like a nutter.

I now feel crap, and seem to have a cold coming on. Thus the green gloop. I shall have to retire for bed with a stack of books and a hot toddy. Darn, I've foresworn alcohol for Lent. Can the rules be bent? It's medicine right? I'll put lots of ginger and honey and...

Here's a painting I did last week. Lots of green there too.