September 30, 2007 (Wherein I slip a bit...)

Yesterday was good and bad then decent then worse... Ah well.

Started out good. Breakfast was a banana, lunch was a bowl of soup. Then, I went for a hike up Runyon with the pup and my friend Alex. Betweeen hiking and going out to another birthday party, I was supposed to relax and shower and watch a little TV, and instead I ate a frozen pizza and a small hunk of cheese. Ugh. Then I showered. Then I went to a birthday party, where I resisted the urge to eat any of the appetizers out, but totally scarffed down dinner (a fantastic shrimp creole with black beans and rice). That would have been fine in and of itself, but I slathered on about a half stick of butter onto the corn bread, and... the rest is history. Oh, and I topped it off with birthday cake. Ugh.

Oh well. I can't let it derail me. And I thought very seriously about derailing myself last night. I came home and had the thought, "since I've already crapped all over this day, may as well top it off with some cookies or ice cream," but... mercifully, fought off the urge. Well, okay, I took a sleeping pill so I didn't have the energy to pursue the urge... but it worked nevertheless.

Today, hopefully, will be better. I'm off to hike Runyon, then eat some Chipotle for lunch, then get my eyes examed, then... maybe eat sherbert for dinner... or who knows what else.

Thanks for reading.

September 29, 2007 (And I'm feeling good...)

Yesterday wasn't that bad. I had a banana for breakfast, soup for lunch, some sherbert (I think I'm close to breaking that habit!) around dinner-time, and then a late dinner of Chinese food for a friends birthday. I probably ate too much Chinese food, and too much bad stuff, but I at least stopped eating when I was full, rather than diving back in. Also, we ate famiy style, so while I had a bunch of everything, I don't think I totally devoured too much. I also had birthday cake, but just ate the cake part, and left the outer frosting on the plate.

I only got in three walks with the pup, and no run or hike, but today I'll change that with a hike up Runyon with my friend Alex.

Also, yesterday, I had therapy. It was my last therapy session for some time, as my health insurance expires tomorrow. The last time I stopped seeing him (when I toured this summer) I felt a bit like a ship at sea with a broken motor, but I'm hopeful this time that I will maintain some sense of stability.

Right now, I'm feeling good.

My friend Courtney and I have talked about the craft of directing, and I think she'll agree with me when I say that good directing is about making good choices. For the most part, life is a series of yes and no questions. Some of them big-picture, others small. Should I go for a walk? Yes or no. Should I have pizza for dinner? Or a salad? Small choices. And, if you make more good and correct choices than bad and incorrect choices, with any luck, you'll end up on top.

So here goes. I'm going to try and make an abundance of good choices, with a smattering of bad choices thrown in just to remind myself that I'm human.

Thanks for reading.

September 28, 2007 (It's a glandular problem!!)

Good morning blog-o-sphere!! Entering Day 3. So far, so mediocre. I have managed to not eat any cookies, cake, cheese, or other seemingly lard-y substance for two days. I have, though, managed to eat a boat-load of sherbert. In my mind, the sherbert is a bridge, a crutch, a final vestige of my past transgressions. As methadone is to heroin, so too is my sherbert to nutter butters and Ben and Jerry's.

I did not run yesterday. Instead, I took the pup up for a hike on Runyon Canyon, about a 3 mile walk door-do-door, with some pretty tough hiking thrown into the middle. Once again, I felt like I was on deaths door at the peak, but felt great about doing it (albeit sweaty).

And aside from massive quantities fo sherbert, I did manage to eat well. Soup for lunch, and rice, chicken, salsa and guacamole (from Chipotle) for dinner.

I also hit the grocery store, and now have some fruit in the house as well. Yum.

So that's that. Day three is underway. I will do my best to avoid the trappings, but might fail later tonight as I will be attending a birthday party. First we're going to a movie (no popcorn due to all the dental work I'm having done), then off to Chinese food at 10:30 p.m. Oh, yumm. I will do my best to discipline myself.

Wish me luck!

(Oh, regarding the paranthetical above... My doctor has determined that I have a sluggish thyroid, so I start this morning taking a pill for it. Whoo-hoo! One of the side effects of the pill is "weight loss." Sign me up.)

September 27, 2007 (Day 2...)

Yesterday wasn't miserable, which is good. I did, though, try and run. Holy shit, I'm so amazingly out of shape. I did a half mile and felt like I was going to die right then and there. But, that's how it goes. Today hopefully I'll add a bit to the half-mile, and keep at this.

I skipped breakfast, had soup for lunch, a banana mid-afternoon, and chicken teriyaki and an avacado roll for dinner. I wolfed down some rainbow sherbert for dessert.

More tomorrow!

September 26, 2007 (Let's try that again...)

So I'm back to posting shirtless pictures of me, in the hopes of getting the weight loss thing going again. I've got to. I feel like I dodged a bullet this week when I had my annual physical (though, honestly, it's the first one I've had in about three years). Even the doctor seemed a bit surprised that my tests weren't as bad as a person with my physical attributes should be. So, bullet dodged. But, I've got to start living healthy again. Yes, it got pretty miserable, eating healthy. But that's the way it goes, I guess. My therapist has encouraged me to recognize that making the right choices is just as easy as making the wrong ones. That it's not as difficult as one might expect to simply choose correctly. We'll see.

In the meantime, I need to shed some pounds, start to feel better about myself, not eat so uncontrollably, and get back some of the self-confidence I was feeling when my weight was down considerably.

As ever, wish me luck...

So, here are a few pictures of me taken this morning. I weighed in at 275 lbs. Tomorrow I'll report on my eating habits for today.

Thanks for reading.