Snow trip part I

Hi everyone,

first of all my apologies for disappearing for such a long time, but first was the troubles with the moving into my new place together with the last days before going on holiday, you know to go on holiday means to leave a lot of work done and things organized such that my absence will not be that much noticed.. and that didnt give me time to post here and say goodbye before leaving on holiday. I didnt even told most of the people I know that I was going on holiday.. Anyway holiday was the main cause of my absence for such a long time. One of the most important things about this holiday was that it was my birthday present, a bit early but very convenient, my awesome great boyfriend offer me this lovely amazing time and I am really deeply thankful!

Picture of us as a tribute (I love you :))

DETAILS: The holiday was spent in France, in the Pyrenees, most precisely in Saint Lary soulain and it was awesome, as you might already be thinking I went skiing and I found it genial!! I am so sorry that just with 24 I found my favourite sportive activity and I am even more sorry that it is very restrictive, since, for obvious reasons it cannot be done in a regular basis.. Never mind, that musT be the reason why I liked it so much, you know, or you must know that I am not a sportive person at all, therefore this is my sport! Thrilling as I like (I love emotions and adrenaline, I am sort of addicted to it), and I love mountains therefore this combination could not be more perfect! It is awesome!

Map of my location:

Map of the trails

Click to enlarge

I called this post the part I because I am still missing the photos and the videos so I will come back to this topic soon, nevertheless I wanted to say hello to the readers and up date to the latest news :)

As I said this was my first time skiing ever so it was the real adventure, since standing up in the skis to come down the hill without falling over or crushing with other people everything was challenging! This sport demands a lot of energy, to be fit helps a lot and whether you did some skating in the past it also helps! I didnt have much problems learning how to ski, but I found myself very exhausted and I have a lot of muscle aches coming for muscles that I didnt even know they existed! In the end it appeared that I am apparently skilled for skiing, I managed to evolved quite fast, but I think that was probably because I was forced to go into the blue slopes before I even tasted the greens! After all I feel I am quite brave!

Unfortunately almost in the end I had a little accident that gave me a little trouble, basically cut my forehead by crushing with a friend (the story is a little bit more complicated, but I will detail it later one day)... I am good now, just a few stitches but its fine ;)

Little tip for skiing: I found that if I was listening to music while coming down the hill my performance was 10 times improved because I was feeling much more confident!

And there you go my favourite. That made part of my skiing soundtrack! It was so much fun!!!




And at last I am settling down in Nottingham, so it means parties are coming!! Get ready, I will announce soon :)))

One year of PhD life and a funny song

I did not have time to write this post yesterday but the 3rd of March deserves some attention and since my blog is somehow based on my PhD experience and life and could not forget this topic.

Indeed, yesterday I completed one year of PhD life. 365 days ago I moved from Portugal, most precisely from Almada to Nottingham to do a PhD in the University of Nottingham, School of Biomedical Sciences. Since then, a lot of things changed, I changed, but most of the things changed for better and I cannot deny I am very happy here and happy with my "job". Of course, as I am always complaining, this is not easy life but it has its rewards! I love science, I am passionate with discoveries and I like to work. Additionally, I have got a very nice life (dont get jealous ;)) ), now with my very nice new home, it is so comfortable and me and Pedro we are making it really nice and beautiful. I have holidays planned, I am going to skiing in two weeks, and I have got the perfect man, I am so happy :)))

Of course nothing is entirely perfect, I miss my parents and family and sometimes I feel really sad I cant hug them or my friends in Portugal, I miss our coffee times, our nights out, our funny moments or even the most serious ones..

But after all it seems that is being worth the effort!!


Not directly related to my sentimental-like post I leave this video below, just for fun and the sake of science showing that it can be funny too ;)



And thanks to Cati, that actually posted this video in the BCM communal blog: Sexy Hotte!

Twilight

I actually didn't post anything about valentine's day, what is actually a shame because it was awesome! I am not going into detail, of course, but thanks to my awesome boyfriend I got a very nice time, as always, but we did some special stuff for that day and I got some presents :)

One was an incredible massive bunch of flowers, beautiful, awesome, that still lasts beautifully in my room; another present was what gives title to this post, three books, the Twilight saga by Stephenie Meyer.

We had watched the movie some time ago during our holiday in Portugal, and I loved it and loved the story. I quite fancy vampire stories and the romance is very enchantingly beautiful. I became very curious about the books and the story that doesnt end in the movie giving space for a few more.

Therefore, Pedro took my wish for reading as an idea for a present and bought me the Twilight and other two, the new moon and the eclipse. The Twilight is now 10 cm from me, I am reading it and enjoying very much, reads very well, I'm reading english version, the story is great but not much added to what I saw in the screen. I want to finish this and go reading the others, they must be good.

Love story for an in love person, a hidden and shy romantic girl (blush).

The sad story of a pair of trainers and the incompetency of certain human beings

Once upon the time…

…The story I am going to tell you is a true story. It is almost unbelievable how could a pair of shoes be so desired and then so difficult to get rid of...

And the story begins...


Filipa and Pedro were talking about Pedro buying some trainers since his "collection" was getting old. Suddenly they thought there were those trainers with rollers, called Heelys, very appreciated amongst the kids and all generations I think, with an exception for the very old ones, I hope, but everyone knows what I am talking about, trainers with rollers, really nice to slide on a mall's floor or here in my department they would just work perfectly!

Me and Pedro we got quite excited about getting some shoes like that, for both, but since they are expensive I decided to offer Pedro a pair as a present for him being so nice; and because I didn’t get him many Xmas presents ;)

So I told Pedro I was gonna buy the shoes, we did some internet checking for him to decide which ones look better, we went for some black ones (very expected, Pedro wears in darkish colours usually)..
So I knew what to do.

Next day I came to work and went to the Amazon’s web site to buy the shoes, they had them in a few sizes and I got the size 8 (Pedro's size), paid and ordered. And it is here where the shoes' story begins.... the funny part!

Ok, as usual, Amazon works quite well, so in 2 or 3 days the shoes arrived, free of charged, very nice though. I decided to get them from Amazon because any shop I know so far here wouldn't have adult Heelys therefore I could only get them from Amazon or eventually from the Heelys web site. Moreover, I did order some stuff from Amazon before, like Pedro did and we have good impression from them besides Pedro had to return things before and it worked out fine for him. Thus, I thought Amazon would be, and I still think it is, the most reliable source for these sort of things (read unusual things).
Resuming.. The shoes arrived and Pedro tried them up, but unfortunately they didn’t fit him. Apparently the size 8 on those shoes is shorter than usual, so they were too small. Ok, decision was immediately made, the shoes had to be returned..

I haven’t returned any item before, so I didn’t know how it would be, I had to go to Amazon's web site and read the returning policies, and that was what I did the next morning when I got to work..

Amazon works with DHL for retuning purposes, I did work with DHL before too and everything was fine so I thought that was good to have DHL to do that. However, it happened that DHL works differently for different costumers..
So, as an Amazon costumer I couldn’t ring them to arrange the date for collection, I had to do it online by filling out a form and giving them an address and a date. Because I work in a quite complicated building (it is a hospital) I thought that would be better to ask them to go to my home. Pedro told me once, they would come in the morning almost for sure so I thought that wouldn’t be a problem to stay at home during the morning and wait.

On the arranged date, I stayed at home waiting for them.. the day passed and nobody showed up so far. The DHL people didn’t come, I rang them, 2 or 3 times during the day but I have been told that there is no costumer service for Amazon returning services and I just had to wait and wait and wait. The last time I rang them up, that was after 5pm, so after the time they were expected to come to me, and just by that time, never before, someone told me that the DHL driver had come by 11am!! I can promise you that no one came and knocked the door at all!! From their side no one said I was wrong, what makes me think that it happens that sometimes they don’t come but say they do, and in the end I just had to arrange another date... Of course I got very pissed off with both Amazon and DHL they made me stay at home the whole day, even doing some work but still very unpleasant to be waiting for nothing..

At this stage I already knew this was gonna be a complicated story..

And the shoes were still sitting there, waiting for some attention.. something to happen...

No chance to stay another day at home waiting, I thought, so I had to make them come to my working place. I had people collecting items from my lab before, but that’s true they rang me before asking for instructions how to get here. I wrote an email to DHL asking them to pick up the trainers from my work and additionally I left them some clues how to get here and not to get lost. I came to work with the trainers, asked everyone in the lab to be attentive on someone from DHL looking for me and told them the story too... (embarrassing)

Another day passed and no one came again... This time I wasn’t so pissed off since I didnt even realize the time passing as usually when I am working but still, when the day was done and I realized the trainers were still there, sitting in one of my lab’s chairs, waiting for me to take them home again, or to do something about them, that made me cry, grrrrrrrrrrr!! that’s irritating, bloody hell!

Ok, I went home took the trainers back again, understood that no one would ever come to fetch them and I would have to look for an alternative way of getting rid of them. Pedro suggested calling Amazon on their costumer call centre asking for help.

That was then the most logic thing to do.. Next day, and notice that since the trainers arrived has now been more than 2 weeks, trying to arrange dates for collection and bla bla bla, and the trainers were still there..

Ok, so I rang Amazon on the next morning, fortunately their call centre works pretty well didn’t get on hold for a long waiting time, and the person who I talked to seemed very useful. I told them my story and the problems with getting DHL to collect the trainers and they said that would be ok to go to the post office and send them back to them just by telling the post office the story because according to that person I was talking to, the Amazon and the post office had an agreement and the post office knew what to do.

Following these hopeful instructions on the next morning before going to work I went to the post office which is fortunately just on the way from my home to the bus stop. I popped in the post office and talked to the people there. They told me that they couldn’t return the item like that, because I had the labels for DHL, that the Amazon call centre supporter said would be ok, but it turned up that the post office cannot take Amazon items with those labels and require a special one done for them...

Ok again (grrrrrrrr) I rang Amazon again, actually from the post office to disclose the truth about that and indeed the post office woman was right and this time the Amazon person said I couldn’t return it like that.. but well I then asked to be sent another proper label (that should have been sent before of course), and the women on the phone (from Amazon) said she would do so.. So I took the trainers back again, home..

Once I got to work I went to see my email expecting a new label but NOOOO... the labels I had got were AGAIN the DHL ones.... OH NOOOO, such a pain coming all over, no one deserves that, like could everyone be so incompetent???? like DHL people incompetent. Amazon people incompetent.. bloody hell, I just wanted to return the bloody trainers and another week was going to pass... Ok...

Breath in, breath out (just as like a friend of mine uses to say :) and call them again.. Explain my ridiculous story once again by the fourth??? time and this time a guy told me to take the bloody packet to the post office, pay myself to post it to Amazon and then ring Amazon to tell them the postage expenses that they would pay me that and he also told me not to use any labels and to send it back to another address different than what I had before.

Ok, it seemed promising then, since I was going to pay there was no reason why the posit office would refuse to take the item, and I saw the light in the end of the tunnel :))) finally I would get rid of the trainers and most important get my money back! That I could then use to buy another pair of trainers to Pedro and give him a present he could wear!

Ok, next morning, this was Friday, so maybe 4 weeks since I had got the shoes and I consequently started trying to get rid of them, I went to the post office, and sent the trainers to Amazon, paid something like 6pounds but I was happy to pay that and didnt even think about getting the money back from Amazon.. I was happy just by solving the whole story !!

And then was Friday and I got to work and the story could just end here, but no!!

On Saturday morning… me and Pedro had slept at my place, since we still haven’t moved out :( we end up staying at mine or his and that night we slept at mine. I woke up earlier than usual for a Saturday morning but it just happened that because we had spent the week looking for our new place I didn’t manage to get much work done so I decided to go work just like in a normal day, so I got to the lab by 10am.

At about 11.30am Pedro rang me (I left him asleep in my room, that he didn’t have to wake up so early), and he rings me with very surprising voice tone and his first saying was "The trainers are just outside your room"!!!!

WOW I was wondering, "which trainers???", I asked, and he said that the box containing THE TRAINERS... those trainers, yes the ones I had just paid 6 pounds to send back to Amazon, the ones that I had just got rid off, and the story had just been finished had just started over again!! Can you believe this.. it was like a curse, apparently I couldn’t get rid of those trainers!!!!
That would be just perfect if they would had fit Pedro at the first place, but instead they took me and even Pedro through a long journey of how to get rid of a pair of shoes and get your money back!!

Ok I couldn’t really believe the shoes were there, I laughed for a while but since I was at work I couldn’t do anything but wait until Monday to go back to the post office and ask why did they send me the trainers, basically why did they send the post to the sender???? How stupid is that??? (there was my address as the sender with a "FROM" before to mention that I was the sender not the destiny!!!, how could someone be so dumb??? like I go to the Beeston post office 1 yard next to my home to pay 6pounds to post something to myself???? it is incredible again the incompetence that I was talking about, so to add another incompetent person to those already officially incompetents from Amazon and specially from DHL!!!)

It was with some calm and relax that I popped in the post office on Monday morning to slightly complain about the mistake done by them. The cashier was a bit ashamed, apologized and took the pack without even asking for the receipt.

A few days later I got an email from Amazon acknowledging the trainers and promising the refunding soon.
In the meantime, I got the money in my account. I bought Pedro an ordinary pair of trainers, Adidas in sale, but of course that was not what I wanted to buy..
Before that I still bought another pair of trainers that were this time, too big for him, so then we went to the shop (but this time it was in a shop ... uffff), and he exchanged them.

I am still looking forward to buying some nice looking trainers eventually with some funny feature like wheels but certainly I am not getting anything like that from Amazon, not anything that it is likely that I am going to return.

And that is a very big story, but it is a story not a little post, is the story of a sad pair of Heelys trainers that were looking for a home but I could’t shelter them, and they insisted to stay and they became my nightmare, they made people arguing, but they made people know each other better, they reinforce the idea about how the world is full of incompetent workers and how that can affect single people's life’s and ultimately the world's economy, in a world wide perspective!

Friends

I cant believe I left a horrible photo on top of my blog for such a long time.. I have been no time at all and not much inspiration too, but since I have got some photos from the time I was in Portugal with my friends (One of my friends just posted me a cd with very nice moments from my christmas holiday in Portugal, where me and my best friends and very much loved boyfriend went to a place called Vila Nova de Mil Fontes. I went there once before for a lunch with my family but didnt much realized how nice it is. And this holiday there, well, just three short days, with these people were so much fun!!! Cant wait to repeat something like that! And thank you for the photos, Margarida :)).

A tribute to my best friends :)

Ilha do Pessegueiro on the Background, Rui, Pedro, Boavida and Motinha.

Ilha do Pessegueiro and the shore

The girls, framed, Joana, Margarida, Raquel and Me.

Me and Pedro running down the dune to the sea

Me, Joana, Boavida, Raquel and Margarida, "The old friends"

Pedro, Boavida and Mota ("the very new friends.. or the boyfriends and the friend")

Two girls and a boy, a threesome and a friend reading the garfield apparently in french, this was waiting time

Me and you, with love:)

New year's

The chocolate eaters

A sight by the sea, cold winterful sea :)

Flight mood

Dear readers and friends, I am sorry I have been absence for a while but I promise I still didnt give up writing my blog. It happens that I just haven't been sitting in front of the computer enough time for it as before. Christmas is time for shopping but apparently also for academic meetings and symposiums.. Therefore there has been a lot more to do beyond writing :) and thats just cool because as you may have followed the last two months I spent sitting on my own writing that report.. Thats all done now and a new era has begun! Today is just the last 2008 night in Nottingham. I didnt count how many nights I have spent here, they were quite a lot, but certainly none was as special as the one coming. I am going home for Christmas and New year, and I am just so happy!! Also I have got quite nice holiday time to enjoy, nearly three weeks, which are promising to be really nice, a lot of nice plans though!
I am so much looking forward, and now these are the last minutes in the office, already said goodbye to my supervisor and to the members of the lab. And I want to bugger off here and go packing and try to sleep, I might no be able to as I am too excited!!
I will keep you posted with regard to my holiday and holiday thoughts, so no PhD stuff for the next couple of weeks, ok?? ;)

And just because is Christmas time everywhere one goes are those Xmas songs all over (very irritating sometimes, because they play the same songs all the time and all the places bought the same CD, so the same songs all the time everywhere, just drives you crazy!!).. You can listen to one of those (ridiculously irritating) songs below. The lyrics are nice and romantic but there is something in the song that pisses me off.. I also found some variants.. see whether you like some of them ;)

Mariah Carrey sings:



My chemical romance does a rock version:



Olivia Olson in Love Actually:



Lisa Lavie(I dont know this person.. unknown version)



Miley Cyrus



etc...

LOOOL, all pretty much the same ..

I don't want a lot for Christmas
There's just one thing I need
I don't care about the presents
Underneath the Christmas tree
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
All I want for Christmas is...
You

I don't want a lot for Christmas
There's just one thing I need
I don't care about the presents
Underneath the Christmas tree
I don't need to hang my stocking
There upon the fireplace
Santa Claus won't make me happy
With a toy on Christmas day
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
All I want for Christmas is you
You baby

I won't ask for much this Christmas
I don't even wish for snow
I'm just gonna keep on waiting
Underneath the mistletoe
I won't make a list and send it
To the North Pole for Saint Nick
I won't even stay awake to
Hear those magic reindeers click
'Cause I just want you here tonight
Holding on to me so tight
What more can I do
Baby all I want for Christmas is you
Ooh baby
All the lights are shining
So brightly everywhere
And the sound of children's
Laughter fills the air
And everyone is singing
I hear those sleigh bells ringing
Santa won't you bring me the one I really need
Won't you please bring my baby to me...

Oh I don't want a lot for Christmas
This is all I'm asking for
I just want to see my baby
Standing right outside my door
Oh I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
Baby all I want for Christmas is...
You

All I want for Christmas is you... baby (repeat and fade)

How to be the perfect girlfriend

I couldn’t resist putting this video on my blog and thats dedicated to all my male friends! You guys are a bit of a pre-historical beings right? Look at the amount and sort of things that make men happy and self realised... Its unbelievable how can you use the brain sometimes..




PS: Women still love men.
PS1:Women will always love men.
PS2: Men cannot live without women.
PS3: there are perfect girlfriends but not perfect men!

Thought of the day (Two thoughts of the day actually)! (.....) The desert, the crisps and the monkey shows off!

First thought of the day:
While working after 11 hours with no breaks at all, even lunch I had sitting in front of the lap top while analysig my FRAP data (FRAP stands for fluorescence recover after photobleaching.. a very boring technique by the way although quite useful and the results turned to be interesting but to sit in front of the computer acquiring the data is very painful and analysing the data is another pain.. therefore it suits the rhyme "FRAP is CRAP".. thats what always comes to my mind.. sorry!), but ok, today I just came here to complain, bahh,

The (first) thought of the day ..

I did know the PhD would be a lonely jouney but I didnt know I was going to do it in the desert!

Second thought of the day:
The english food (in my opinion! sorry by the second time) has serious problems and in general is hard to find something nice to eat - I dedicated a post, some time ago, to the english culture where I expanded my thoughts about english food but today I have got to know that for christmas, therefore a seasonal speciallità, one of the crisps companys here in the UK, will sell a new flavour dedicated to the Christmas season which seems to be a cocktail of christmas flavours in a pack of crips!! It is reasonable to say WOW! How far are crisps taking us? Crips are becoming like meal tablets nowadays! There are every flavour for crisps, everything you can imagine, almost every day I find a different flavour! You have salty, cheese and onion, salt and vinegar and these are what I consider the NORMAL flavours but then it starts to becoming really creative coming with prawn cocktail, followed by greek kebab, feta cheese, sweet chili, roasted turkey with bla bla bla, roasted beef, dark souce whatever, tomato ketchup... four cheese and red onion (which is apparently different than cheese and onion!), bacon on toast.. sausage bla bla bla, turkey and thyme, etc etc etc, its ridiculous! It never ends!

SO.. some time ago every one would think that one day there would come some sort of tablets with flavours to replace the food in a plate taking much less time to eat and less effort as well and also could be helpful in a diet BUT instead of light tablets full of nutrients and with food tastes we have got plenty of tasty crisps possible to make a four or five course meal with all the flavours on it, (and a lot of calories though!)

Thus, concerning this reality, the second thought of the day is:

Even the monkey loves them!

and in a Jose Cid style.. the monkey loves crisps as I love you - even though it didn't improve.. Oh poor Jose Cid, you've got no chance! And who is Jose Cid? It's a must see ! ... (google it!)

And just a brief third thought of the day:

I ate three packs of crips today and they were nice and they are more or less the best thing I can eat in the desert...

In the meantime I try to have fun and hope you also do!

The sides of people's life (are their choices)

It is incredible how social dependent we are, human beings and how important is for us to be loved by the others and have a good network of friends and people in general. And whether you think otherwise you must see a doctor. Healthy minds need other minds and alive hearts need other hearts, and just such like ants and bees, humans live happy in societies sharing experiences and thoughts towards a building up of what is meant to be a nice life there is a place on top of Maslows’ pyramid that I posted some days ago! That’s self satisfaction that makes us smile in a way that is possible for the others to see that we are confident of ourselves and that makes us recommendable people. People dont neither want nor like to co-live with people lacking self confidence, surrounded by problems and expressing sadness and pains unless they are their friends (and even though must be truly friends.). Nevertheless in the social routinely environment meeting people everyday one will always approach a positive looking person rather than a problematic obscure one hiding behind what seems to be a black curtain full of troubles within.

Overall, this in part useless conversation that is actually my post for you today is to state that my moody days are gone for now and that I feel good again. Not gonna go into details of what happened but Im simply summarizing the reasons for these changes as changes in perspectives and general overviews of my current life and life style. Such as like the moon, everything has a light and a dark side ("Star wars" additionally explains it pretty well: when you are in the light side you look good and people like you but if you turn to the dark side you will become ugly and everyone will avoid you). Basically after a fairly long reflection I concluded that whatever happened was because I couldnt, for a while, see the light side of my life despite all the good, positive points present everywhere! And thats why people one loves is so important here, because they are patient enough to listen to you when you are good and also where you are down and it just helps you so much changing sides, improving and recovering!
I am happy I have got the right people to talk to, and I am happy because I have got the right people to be with. I feel I am growing up really fast at the moment and my life becoming full of challenging situations where I have to manage to respond to them and keep going and for one spoiled girl like me, I may say, it was difficult to cope with it in the beginning but I do believe that things will be alright.

When it comes to time to decide and make decisions it is really striking whatever you choose because it might change your life forever either for good or for hell! I feel I went through that way a few months ago when I decided to completely change my life coming to Nottingham and leave a lot of people I love behind me and face a totally new world where I only knew a very few people. But nowadays I feel that my decisions are even more compromising. I grew up, evolved and belong now to an adult life where I don’t eventually find myself but indeed I have to, forced by the circumstances. I didn’t think it would be so quick and when I look 10 years back I was fourteen and had started thinking a lot more than before with questions raising everyday about life and stuff and now mostly all those questions seem very simple while a several more turn to be flashing around waiting answers that I will not probably ever have time to answer unless I live forever!!

Since I don’t believe I will live forever, except I get a special power such as one of those from Heroes (really enjoyed watching it), I am content with what I have now whereas being challenged and facing the demanding s of life from where I try to squeeze the best out of it! Therefore I am telling you: Have fun, I do!

How to quit smoking and learn a foreign language in a short period of time and other stories..

Some time ago I wrote about celebrations which were not actually that important, but today I am writing about a very important one: Tomorrow I am celebrating one month smoke free what literally means that I spent one month, 30 days no smoking at all! I am such a brave girl!!

But no, I am not that brave and now you wondering what the hell has quitting cigarettes to do with learning languages and bla bla bla..

Easy and simple:

MOTIVATION!

In fact this post is more about motivation and which kind of things makes a person undergo a certain effort to change her/his life! In my language we have a popular saying: QUERER E PODER, that means that wishing something is the way to get it!

And now the bridge to learn a foreign language... this makes sense here!

Amongst my group of friends we conclude some time ago that there are two major sources of motivation to learn a foreign language: either one learns it when a kid, in the cradle, or as an adult, in "bed". Of course, once a kid, the motivation is innate and comes from the need to understand the others and talk/express therefore communicate as a human being. From the adult perspective, that motivation is about LOVE! Ok, who says love, says something love-like and I just know so many people who are currently learning a language that they would never thought to learn as a way to impress their beloveds, or to make them happy, or to seduce them, or to date them, of simply to go to bed with them.. whatever the wills it entails motivation from the presence of a person who speaks a language one does not know.

So now I opened another bridge.. The bridge from MOTIVATION to FEELINGS!
The feelings are the other stories, that is so much about feelings and so many feelings in our human world and it is sometimes so difficult to control them: to understand them, to deal with them, to hide them, to show them!
But one thing one should bear in mind: feelings are a source of motivation! Motivation to learn a language, motivation to quit smoking, motivation to change life, motivation to travel, motivation to settle down, motivation to start again, to climb, to fight, to built, to stay or to go, to party and dance, to watch TV, to not watch TV, to change habits, to do sports, to smile and to cry and even to die for! And we can't deny our feelings, we can barely control them and they trap us sometimes taking us to situations that we think they could never happen! That’s so complex..

But not to make this post much longer because actually I just wanted to let you know I stopped smoking and I want as much people to know about this as possible people that I don’t want to let down and I think that will help me think twice before I lit up a next cigarette!
For those who read this and think about stop smoking or not and what would really change whether they would stop in terms of health benefits I leave you a list of What Happens to Your body if you stop smoking Right now?
by Wade Meredith on July 19th, 2006


This little timeline below is about some of the more immediate effects of quitting smoking and how that will affect your body RIGHT NOW (http://www.healthbolt.net/2006/07/19/what-happens-to-your-body-if-you-stop-smoking-right-now/)

• In 20 minutes your blood pressure will drop back down to normal.


• In 8 hours the carbon monoxide (a toxic gas) levels in your blood stream will drop by half, and oxygen levels will return to normal.


• In 48 hours your chance of having a heart attack will have decreased. All nicotine will have left your body. Your sense of taste and smell will return to a normal level.


• In 72 hours your bronchial tubes will relax, and your energy levels will increase.
  In 2 weeks your circulation will increase, and it will continue to improve for the next 10 weeks.


• In three to nine months coughs, wheezing and breathing problems will dissipate as your lung capacity improves by 10%.


• In 1 year your risk of having a heart attack will have dropped by half.


• In 5 years your risk of having a stroke returns to that of a non-smoker.


• In 10 years your risk of lung cancer will have returned to that of a non-smoker.


• In 15 years your risk of heart attack will have returned to that of a non-smoker.
  So, you have more immediate things to look forward to if you quit now besides just freaking out about not being able to smoke.

But above all, smoking is not popular anymore, its not fashion, it is not cool! It is very expensive, smelly and useless!
I quite enjoyed smoking and for me the most difficult part of it was because I wasn’t doing it for addiction but it was the pleasure of holding a cigarette and drinking a beer while talking to people, etc etc, I got rid of the nicotine addiction a long time ago, the real hard part of the quitting procedure are the social meetings. I don’t want to fail this time; tried a few times before with no success; but NOW I have got a lot of motivators! And I don’t even have to learn another language!! :)))