Gosh Sarah I am sorry my text about Dirty Dancing and Grease must have been a bit cryptic, they are all very much open to everyone, I just hoping people will telepathically hear my invitations. Anyway, Mama Mia was a hit, with a big crowd and an awful lot of alcohol and awful presents being swapped. Top Gun - had to get it from Blockbusters in the end - was just our housegroup femmes, and apart from Emma we talked throughout. Libby turned out to be our 'Top Gun' being a bit of a swot on the plot and finer details like that. Why was it a 15? It is so tame by today's standards! Not often you hear me questioning a BBFC decision in that direction! On a graph, the trend in numbers attending is taking a steady downward turn, so if I carried on until the end of Feb I would have to be slicing people into fractions and putting one fraction in front of the telly. Anna and Kelly joined me for Grease, a great film and an interesting combo of friends who would never have met were it not for their shared passions for me and John Travolta. So I am expecting about half a person next week for Dirty Dancing. Not one of my own personal favourites, it was voted for by our housegroup women over my preference of Moulin Rouge, deemed ' too sad'. So, Dirty Dancing it is. And all ladies are very welcome.

I would like to point out that, unlike Ang's upcoming women's quiet day, my girls' cinema nights really are what it says on the packet - NO MALES ALLOWED! So, I can only apologise if you are disappointed, gentlemen. But you can always come on the quiet day which is next Saturday, as long as you cover your head and don't speak in public. Seeing as none of us will be talking and its cold so I'll be wearing a hat, you'll not stand out.

On to the weightier issues. As an athlete, I train with rigour and determination in all weathers. Yesterday morning it was raining as we walked to school and I was gutted that I would have a good excuse not to go on my planned training ride. I was going to get the bus into town instead to get some triathlon books out of the library. Hardly the same, but I think it counts. But, when I came out from the family breakfast that Amy's class have once a fortnight, I found that the rain had stopped and I had no excuse for not getting out on the new 'slick' tyres R had lovingly spent Thursday evening putting on my cross training bike, or whatever you call it. Hybrid.

So, I zoomed through Hedge End to Botley, and armed with a very high spec map from Danny, on which the roads are nearly as big as in real life, I turned off down a farm track and across a stile to some lanes, and then via a main road and Curdridge to a lane towards Bishops Waltham. There was a flood and although Lou would have given it a go, I don't trust my undercarriage when its wet so I retraced my pedals, and cut off, intending to get to Wickham (in fact I thought I was nearly there) and found myself back at Botley station. So I headed past the YMCA and along a discouragingly major road to Curbridge, and then Burridge, then down to Swanick and up Tescos Hill to Burseldon and home. All in just over 2 hours, with many many map stops which did me no good at all. I was temptingly close to Whiteley but with my slick tyres I thought I was not best kitted out for a bridleway through woods on a day when roads were flooded, but will give that a go another day when I have my bobbles on.

So, that was a cheap morning of entertainment! Just a banana for company. Today with H and A, plus Joe and Bethanie in tow, we went to the central library, for me to get the aforementioned books to help me in my pursuit of a four minute mile. I also got out Paula Radcliffe's autobiography in the hope of some of her speed rubbing off the pages, I'm reading it with my feet. Interesting, isn't it, that defecating in public has entered the language as 'doing a Paula'? Or is that just me and Ang? Not that we do it regularly, you understand! After the library, the sports centre, where J and B gallantly fell off bikes many times in the pursuit of each other while A and H sweated it out on the ski slopes for their penultimate lesson before the big white trip! Exciting! Not long now! Then to the park at the sports centre, and more riding round a boating pond which would have had Kelly in palpatations as Joe skidded up to the edge. Lunch, then some fiddling around at home and then they all took off for a tour of the parks of Hedge End while I RAN to the gym, swam 20 lenghts front crawl in the outside pool, died in the sauna and then RAN home. Well, I ran the flat bits on the way home, but walked up the big hill of Telegraph road. But, even running there is a big achievement, its 1.5 miles and my first run outside apart from running club at school. I was invoking the power of postive thinking with my mantra 'I can do this!' which seems to work so far. When you swim in the outdoor pool with goggles on you get a much clearer view, the indoor pool is quite murky, and I was initially freaked by seeing so much underwater, and had to scan for dead bodies after watching that Jonathan Creek at Christmas. Luckily for them, no one else ventured outside so didn't have to share the pool with my flailing arms and panting. I have realised that with front crawl it is really important to get the breathing right, ie breathe in when your head is up in the air, not when its submerged. Could see myself floating around down there for years with a few mistimed inhales.
and as not many people head outside in January I could have been there till Easter! Actually, it seems that there is a relationship between percentage body fat and likelihood of going in the outside pool, I rarely see men heading out there, more stout ladies over 50 with plenty of buoyancy and insulation. The men are all in the sauna, I had to huddle in there with 5 of them, and none of them whippet shaped so it was a bit cosy.

Last week Ang and I did one of our bike rides, near Broughton which is west of Romsey. We got badly lost in the car finding the start, and then Ang was really struggling, even on the flat tarmac. After a few miles we swapped bikes, as mine is good ( insurance claim when the old one got nicked from the shed) and her's is a handmedown from a neighbour (probably my old one nicked from my shed!). Immediately I got on her bike I went from heart at resting to serious aerobic activity, but it meant we were better matched, so I carried on, through some serious mud and big hills, only to find out on our return from bike mechanic extraordinaire that the hub was done up too tight, so the wheel did not spin freely, so effectively I did 7 miles with the brakes on.

I am realising the reality of the situation with this being a triathlete - there's no going back, and at the moment in one go I can swim just about the distance without dying and wrap that around with half the running. But how the hell am I going to swim, then get on a bike and do a big ride, and then, and then, oh damn it, go for a run? Just going for a run of 5k is beyond me at present, let alone doing it after the other bits! I need Daley Thompson or George Foreman and his grill or someone to turn up and give me a piggy back!

As you know, from my previous entries if no other more reliable source, our mother ship church are doing a Jubilee year, and particularly in February, are inviting each other to commit to spending the amount of money they would have if they were on benefits, and gfiving the surplus away. On lots of different levels we have had reactions to this, not less because we are no longer around the church, we have had everything second hand and its been a bit of a puzzle. But, we have talked about it at housegroup and actually this week's housegroup was FUN!!!! Haven't heard me say that for a while. The point of this exercise, as I understand it, is to have more money to give away, and to be able to empathise more with people who live on benefits. So, I have had SKY installed and been down the Coop 4 times today for Lucky Dips. HA HA! No, what I have done is look at all our incomes and outgoings and worked out some clever maths which says we have £84 a week to live on, after bills and costs associated with working, and current giving and a few other things. Which is a challenge for me, as I love frugal living anyway and am always eating leftovers. Things we will have to cut down on, bizzarely, include having people round for meals, which is one of the other objectives of the month - but I can't afford to feed 4 mouths, let alone some extras - or can I? The food always seems to stretch. It's made me think about giving, and how if R charged for his time as a bike mechanic and trainer at the bike project, and I charged as a tutor for Emma, we would see that as work, but actually it's kind of part of our giving, as we do it for free. Seeing what we can live on has made me think about all kinds of things about working less and being at home more, and how for me, work is a choice and not a necessity, and there are very few women in the world who are in the priveledged position of having a choice other than reproduction and domestic chores. I work for the my self esteem and happiness, not for the money.

Watching less TV is one of the things that is suggested as a way of redistributing our time. I only watched 1 hour this week anyway, which was Big Chef meets Little Chef, ( plus Grease) but the girls end up watching too much Cbeebies, so I am going to limit them to one pre chosen programme a day for the month. I talked about the reasons, for being together more as a family and playing games and stuff, and they were suprisingly up for it. Taught Hannah rudimentary rummy tonight.

Being members of the Hampshire Club, although its a big extravagance compared to Bitterne Leisure Centre, is actually going to come into its own in this month. Already I rarely shower at home, and the girls and I have not washed our hair anywhere other than at the Club for months, so our hot water bill won't show much of a dip, we could spend more time in the cafe, eating sneakily packed lunches and drinking tea from a thermos, thus using their heating and being able to turn ours off! Also, they take all the daily papers, so I can read there and save on the one I generally buy a week ( £1.50 - all helps!) and the girls can play in their soft play bit while I do the sudoku. And they have a big tv, which mainly shows sports and is wasted on me, but they have a smaller kids TV area and if we time it right we could watch the girls prechosen programme there! And we can cycle there, so free travel and entertainment. One of my neighbours, who is on benefits, was a member for several years, and I wondered at how these facts squared up, but now I know, its actually a money saving device to get all your entertainment, exercise, family time, hand cream, shower gel, hot water and heating in one lump payment. I could even start checking teapots left behind for residue to add to my thermos, but now I AM starting to sound like a character from The Streets of London - a song which is guaranteed to make me cry when I hear it sung in assembly. Gosh, what a humbling exercise this will be for those who choose to have a go and see how much we rely on money. Just to remind you, its a choice and not a cult. No one is telling us to do this or telling us what we do with our money we save - its just to help us think about how addicted we are to our culture, which tells us that we need more, and now! R and I are talking about banning internet purchases during this time too, well, we will have to as £84 will not leave much spare after food. This is a bit mean of me as nearly all our internet purchases are R buying nipples for wheels or spoke adjustors or little gear tweakers or new tyres for my bike(s) - he is doing well with building my road bike from scratch, last night he made the wheels. I am hideously ungrateful, feel like a twerp on a racer and would have a good excuse for coming last if I was doing the race on my normal bike, but as it is with the proper kit I can only blame my own body. Will have to stock up on fake tan if doing it in bikini is de rigeur. Will have to get that Avon order in and back and paid for quick!

Gosh, what a lot of challenges we face this year, but positive challenges for growth and development of us as a family, and me as I quest towards being BBC Sports personality of the year and a team leader on a Question of Sport. I was sad to see that the Jan Rik POOLievet guy had left Saints, I know nothing about football or Saints, except that they are always doing badly, but he seemed like a sweet guy and was making an effort. That's purely from seeing his face on the back of the Echo, I have no idea other than literal face value.