A thank you and the "Before" Pictures...

I wanted to take the time to thank everyone I have heard from in the past few days concerning both my finally proposing to Silverfox and my sudden seriousness about losing my extra poundage. Everyone has been very positive and encouraging about both matters, and I thank you all for all the warm fuzzies. One of the funnier E-mails I got was from the "prodigal son" Fratnip, who realized that he only knows about Silverfox from my blog, and as such has no idea what her real name is.

Anyhow, the other e-mails were mostly about the weight loss, and inquiring about my plan for such.

Brouhahhah went so far as to issue his own "Not so celebrity fit club" challenge on his blog as a direct response to my post, but I regret to say that I ain't interested in turning it into a competition. There are two reasons for this... one, I'm way more likely to just give up if I think I'm in danger of losing (Italian pride is a very finicky thing) and Two, one of the terms of his challenge involves knowing your current weight, which I have no clue about, nor do I really feel is relevant to weight loss.

Some of you are scratching your heads... it's okay... allow me to explain. (No... is too much... allow me to sum up...). Scales aren't built with guys my size in mind. Even most doctors office scales top out at about 350 lbs. I easily weigh more than 390. Silverfox has a brand new digital scale that I refuse to get on because I couldn't bear to hear the sickening crunch of it breaking into a million little digital pieces. I would get one of those nifty talking ones from Brookstone, (which go up to 500 lbs I've been told) but I have this odd feeling that the guys who programmed it made it to say snarky things to people over 350lbs... like "one at a time folks" or "hey, not designed to weigh cows here!"

It's what I would do anyway...

So, as I was saying, my weight is largely irrelevant to me, and always has been. I will instead judge my progress by how I look and feel. This is how I looked last august:On the beach... lookin and feelin pretty good, but way tubby. This is me (and Pint Size) as of good friday, wearing basically the same clothes, still lookin good and feelin fine, if slightly more worried about Pint Size taking an unscheduled bath in his Granduncle's fish pond:Now maybe I'm deluding myself, but I think I look slightly thinner in the second photo... Which was taken after I had been living with Silverfox and the kids for a few months.

The difference? Physical activity. I went from a mostly vertical, sedentary lifestyle to having to walk up two flights of stairs every day and chasing Short Stuff around the playground. I've noticed this effect before, when I was ghost hunting on a regular basis (just before Katrina) I was in some of the best shape of my life then because I was walking up a huge flight of stairs 10 times a night, three nights a week. I even remember Stacey remarking how much thinner I looked when she picked me up from the train station when I evacuated for the storm.

I have never been on a diet that worked for me, but every time I have gotten more physical activity going, I have wound up looking and feeling better for it. I also recognize that there are minor changes in my eating habits which would have huge effects on my health, like cutting out soft drinks in favor of water.

In short, my plan for weight loss is simple and time honored: Eat less, exercise more. It's really just the smartest way to go. Furthermore, by not killing myself about my sticking to or not sticking to a diet, my mind will be free to concentrate on simply making smarter choices about what I eat.

Any questions?