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It has taken 17 days but the 5min plank has finally been surpassed. It’s amazing how by simply repeating the same exercise you can get better and stronger. I took the decision yesterday to give myself the day off – I felt like it was needed.

Not sure how far this can go, the last minute or so of these planks are full on. We keep going…

‘The Girl who broke the Sea’ by A. Connors

This was a World Book Day purchase from school – teenage fiction – the blurb sounded interesting!

It was a good book (although it does only get 3 stars on 2023’s harsher ratings system).

It follows Lily, a troubled teenager, who goes with her mum to an underwater mining thing. The feeling of tension and claustrophobia was a constant in the novel.

Worth a read, as long as intelligent floaty bacterial life forms and slightly implausible and incredible underwater rescues don’t bother you too much.

After seven days of daily planking I can report progress.

So, in one week I have improved by just over a minute – that’s not bad going. It’s amazing what your body can do just by regular exercise. I’ve done nothing to get better at planking, I’ve just done one a day.

After much deliberation, and following a rather relaxing February challenge of completing a puzzle, March’s challenge is…

A Daily Plank.

The plan is to plank every day, hopefully increasing the time I can hold the position throughout the month. No real target in mind, but hoping to get to at least 5 minutes.

Day one:

Right, solid opener. Let’s see how this goes!!!

February’s monthly challenge of completing a 2000 piece puzzle is complete. The last piece was actually placed today, at 10.45am on 1st March, but what’s an extra day between friends!?

It was quite a challenge in the end. Not as easy as I thought it would be.

Here are a few thoughts:

• 2000 pieces is a lot of pieces – most of the time is spent sorting through them all.
• It’s very difficult to do it in the evening – the light reflects off all the pieces – so you need the natural daylight – which means most is done at the weekends.
• Space – you need plenty of room and to put up with it sitting there for the entire time – this puzzle was 38in x 26in – luckily there was a board in the garage it would fit on.
• The actual puzzle, forgetting it was 2000 pieces, was quite difficult – lots of similar blocks of colour: sky, trees, mountains, water, and all spread across the image.

And a few lessons I have learned through the process:

• Sort pieces into the various colours at the beginning, it will save you lots of time.
• The shapes of the pieces are key, when completing big blocks of colour, sort pieces into the different shapes, makes to loads easier.
• Take care of your back! Lots of leaning – take breaks and stretch the back out regularly!
• And finally, the most important lesson I’ve learned, don’t do puzzles.

‘The Great Gatsby’ by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Not impressed. Can’t understand what makes it a ‘classic’. Didn’t really get the character of Gatsby – he seemed to flit in and out of the book – not what I was expecting. Even the 1920s American jazz setting wasn’t as prominent as I thought it would be. Disappointing.

2.5 stars.

Just two days to go. Currently around 350 pieces to go.

Not sure if it will be completed within the month – busy couple of days ahead.

Big weekend on the challenge this week.

A busy Monday and Tuesday next week means it MUST be finished this weekend.

Probably around 800 pieces to go!

‘The Bones of You’ by Debbie Howells

Found a pack of three Debbie Howells’ novels in the cupboard that I didn’t realise I had.

This was her debut novel. A pretty standard thriller: four suspects. Who did it?