SHUGGAH LOG: Warning not even trace amounts of the delicious sweet stuff.

On 31 December 2016, in a moment one can only describe as complete, utter irrationality, I decided to stop eating sugar for an undefined period of time, or until your head exploded from hearing about it. I started with refined but have kind of gone hardcore with it all.

I've always appreciated sugarific treats, for example delicious, delicious donuts. There's something that just makes sense about selling a product that has 20 grams of sugar in a pack of ten.

I figured out pretty early on that the shuggah desertation process was going to be a psychological battle of wills with the sweet stuff. The first two days were a bloody treat I tell ya, but I woke up on day three with an iron will sort of situation and figured I could live this sugarfree life until February. Oh how young and naive Liz was. I've captured some of my thoughts throughout this long, arduous process.

SHUGGAH LOG DAY 6:

During a work afternoon tea, while everyone was enjoying glorious chocolate cupcakes, I spent my time alternating between some crackers and hommus and snorting an empty paper donut bag for a gram of sugar. I was also alternating between the inhale and exhale of a plastic bag that formerly contained Haigh's Berry Choc chocolates. 

I don't even like Haigh's chocolates but it smelt like my sweet, sweet sugar so who cares. Apparently I didn't get the suffocation memo. If there are any two-year-olds reading this - only inhale/exhale plastic bags when you need a sugar hit, kids. 

In summation, the cravings are driving me crazy. I made zucchini cheesecake yesterday, except halved the truckload of ricotta and feta it asked for. It is delicious and nutritious but clearly NOT SUGAR because zucchini.

10 MINUTES LATER AND EVERY 10 MINUTES...

I am desperate for sugar. 

SUGAR LOG DAY 10:

I am no longer viewing people’s heads as donuts that need to be consumed, but rather as balls of skin and skull that contain nothing but crumbs and candy wrappers; nothing that I can really work with. Your head is now safe from friendly fire, but this most definitely will not last.

For the most part, I have a sugar force field that gives me superpowers against the biggest, baddest, dirtiest carbohydrate. Although at various times of the day a hole appears in my sugar ozone layer, so to speak, and I'm completely vulnerable to any unexposed sugar kryptonite, and that's when I have to break out the almonds! I hate almonds.

Don't have that 3pm slump anymore. I like this new ruling. No slumptime. Now that I'm not slumpy, then high, then slumpy again I realise how sugar controls my mood and emotions. It really takes the reins some days.

10 MINUTES LATER AND EVERY 10 MINUTES...

I am desperate for sugar. 

SUGAR LOG DAY 19:

I don't know how I have gotten this far, but I'm just rolling with the punches at this stage. And sugar certainly packs a punch. It's like Rhonda Rousey. It does not let you go without a fight. And then it'll KO you with a knee to the body. 

Sometimes the iron will that I developed on DAY 2 slips up and I have to shoot down those rogue donuts that fly at my head, so I still have to wear my anti-sugar shield strapped to my back like a backpack every day. But, for the most part, not having sugar has mostly become mainstream for me. 

10 MINUTES LATER AND EVERY 10 MINUTES...

I am desperate for sugar. 

SUGAR LOG DAY 25:

I'm at a point where I've formed a new habit of not turning to sugar in my time of need. But, alas, the old brain is still craving sugar, although it doesn't really know what it wants or how to go about getting it because it's not habit anymore to eat it, so confusing.

10 MINUTES LATER AND EVERY 10 MINUTES...

I am desperate for sugar. 

New Year's Resolution #1 - Quit sugar until your head explodes

There’s a first time for everything. So, in the spirit of ‘trying new things’, I’m going to give 2017 a shot and see how it pans out.

I never do new year’s resolutions, but this year I’ve inanely decided to quit sugar. When I say quit I mean lower intake, because what sort of monster desserts (I can haz LOLs) sugar? I believe I have exactly two resolutions, but I can’t quite remember the other one. Probably because my brain refuses to move a muscle without sugar. I hope I’ve started my back-up resolution though.

I’m fully aware that no-one cares about my new year’s resolutions and even less so about my sugar intake but, like I have mentioned many, many times on here, this is my blog, and I’ll cry about sugar whenever I want to. 

Part of my problem, I'm sure, is those jerks at Krispy Kreme. They base their business model on the notion that if something has 400 calories then it should be made available in a box of 12. That's just really offensive and delicious.

I know my quittingness will last for exactly a period of time that will promptly end when I slay another human being for their donut. What I have recently learnt - but always knew - is that, without sugar, I turn into a Neanderthal.

We know that early humans lived in caves and drew on walls, similar to the wall on your Facebook page.  The only difference being there was no function to ‘like’ pages, so they were in the dark about whether anyone actually read their cave messages. They were also in the dark in general. With no likes. Just a terribly sad situation for everybody involved.

Like me, cavemen were fine until about 3 or 4pm, when they ignored their smart watch telling them to refuel on animal carcass and their desire for sugar became otherworldly, and you better have stayed out of their way. Unfortunately, ice-cream grew on trees back then so they had no chance to keep that pesky sugar out of their diet. 

My sugar situation is going fine, thankyou. I appreciate you asking. Except for the pile up of bodies behind me, but that is the past and I'm looking to the future. 

2016 Edinburgh Military Tattoo

I'm watching the Edinburgh Military Tattoo, being held in Australia. It's kind of a cross between a mardi gras, a proper military band ceremony and that elusive something else that I can’t quite put my finger on. But let’s not to be so quick to label it the X Factor.

Proceed, proceedings:

Oh good. Straight off the bat is a lady I can’t understand. These people are from Shetland. A whole island of people whose accent is completely incomprehensible to the average western ear.  Where are the damn subtitles. All these ladies who are saying sentences I can’t understand are fiddlers from the isle of Shetland. They call themselves The Shetland Fiddlers. Makes sense. Darn it, I can’t dis them because they are quite clever and play catchy tunes. The crowd goes wild.

Ooh a toaster ad or something, which reminds me that I don’t need one of those. Another ad for a guy who pins a donut against a pole with a bow an arrow. What fresh hell parallel advertising universe have we entered.

Next up is the Highland Dancers.  A whole lot of girls dressed in kilts and long socks fashioned out of six different coloured types of tartan tea towels. I’m sure one of them just did a blue steel down the camera.

The South Australian Police Band. They walk in all sorts of patterns while playing some cliched but great Australian classics. Locomotion. When my baby goes to Rio. I come from the land Down Under. I’m liking it.

Damn it. I’m liking the bloody Military Tattoo.