This year, I took the decision to engage in a 'yes' policy. So far, I've got inked by Love Hate Social Club, tried out Barre Core, and signed up to run 26 miles in Sierra Lione. So when I got asked to go on a surfing holiday, I was struck with a horrible dilemma. Because surfing and I have never got along.
It's not that I dislike surfing per se. I mean, I do - but the real reason is the cold/danger of it all. Sensible, practical concerns, really. To this day, I maintain that my body boarding debut (different, I know, but for the purposes of clarification it will do) very nearly killed me. Of course, Dad, who was boarding in my vicinity at the time, maintains that I floundered like a beached whale, snorted a load of sea water, and cried. Potato potato.
On a road trip down to Rock in Cornwall with my gap year boyfriend, the roof-rack system on his archaic Ford Fiesta (aka Blue Steel) failed and I was volunteered to spend the remaining journey with my arm out the window, clutching the damn board to the roof. Meanwhile, my right hand was repeatedly ejecting and inserting a cassette wired to Tom's phone, which somehow then got music playing out the car stereo. My relationship with that board was doomed from the outset.
Some years after that, I hosted a travel show for a channel called TravelXP (don't worry, you oughtn't have seen it - it is actually an Indian channel) in Ireland. It was July, therefore wet and freezing. As I suspect it almost always is in Ireland. We had just finished filming for the day when I saw to my horror that tomorrow's schedule had been altered, with fun things like horse riding (although this, too, turned out to be terrifying), and 'pub stories' shifted back to make way for... Surf Lesson.
The day dawned. Instructor Gareth (very lovely but also impossibly enthusiastic about the surfing) collected me from the warm, comfy minibus around 9am where I'd been sat in my alarmingly thin wetsuit mentally preparing myself for what was sure to be an absolutely freezing hour of filming. Then, I joined my crew on the sand.
My crew who were all wearing about fifteen layers, hats, gloves, scarves, the works. Assholes.
And from then began fifty minutes of merry hell. I learnt the basics of surfing, fell off my board a lot, and generally watched as my extremities turned increasingly blue. To add insult to (freezing cold) injury, the tools at my disposal for resurecting my drenched hair post-surf was one of those naff public swimming pool hair-dryers you have to put 20p in to operate. Woe was me.
Which might explain, I suppose, my conundrum in the latest proffered activity. Luckily, 28 years of skilful manipulation (I have a twin sister) has sharpened my cunning, so I saw their surf trip and raised them a ski trip. I am good at skiing - I won all sorts of medals when I was in the army - admittedly this was vastly helped by the overwhelming advantage I had in being one of very few in my category (young and female).
Technically, I am not saying no. I mean, I'm also not saying yes, but I choose to over-look this small detail. I've done my research, pitched the Club Med alteration, and await my friend's response. I even threw in a spa trip as a proffered apres activity (apparently that's a thing now) - I have high hopes...