Day 80:French fries are off the menu...

Wow. My daughter wanted Del Taco for supper tonight and I ordered the tacos del carbon with steak. The tacos came with a thoroughly unpalatable salsa and I couldn't eat them, so I decided to have some of the fries. Bad call. Bobo went immediately into rejection mode and rejected them outright. Not fun. Then I got hiccups for 5 minutes straight. Definitely not fun.

More [foxtrot]ing overtime today. Sick sick sick of overtime. On the bright side, It's a crap load of money for my next check.

I have never shied away from talking about me or my body except for warning those who may be easily offended by frank discussions of a personal nature. This is one of those warnings.

Step away now...

Abandon all shame, ye who enter here...

Last chance...

Moving on, then...

I have previously discussed the medical phenomenon of how heavy men can regain inches in their penis by losing weight. The ratio is 35 pounds to the inch, i.e., for every 35 pounds a man loses, he will regain an inch of length from the stomach and groin pad shrinking from the lost weight. Well, I have lost 106 pounds total and my measurement has regained 3 inches. I never really thought this particular bit of medical knowledge was real until I experienced it (pardon the pun) first-hand. Doing some calculations, with my goal weight of 200 pounds against my starting weight of 420 pounds, that's a difference of 220 pounds.

220/35 = 6.28etc.

If the ratio holds true, I could conceivably regain 6+ inches of my penis when this whole thing is done. Talk about regaining your life! Between that and my body better able to fit against my partner, I can see some seriously fun times approaching quickly. Yes, I avoided the obvious sexual joke I could have put into that statement. But I like where your mind is! I've never really been afraid to try positions or really much of anything with a partner, but this is going to be a whole new world for me and my partner...well, for me, anyway. If a certain someone is reading this...just keep it in mind.

I guess I've just gotten to the point in my life where I refuse to let what other people think of me influence my decisions. I'm going to live my life the way I want to live it, with who I want to live it with. Some people think I'm wasting my life waiting for something that might not happen, some (most) think that if I'm patient, I'll get what I want. I guess when they hear me talk about things, they pick up on the the depth of my devotion and love and they believe that things will change for me. At least, they want to believe in it as much as I do. What I know right now is that I'm willing to wait to see what happens rather than bounce through meaningless relationships that don't fulfill what I want that will end up hurting more than one person. It's not worth it to me. I'd rather wait and be able to look at myself in the morning than start something that I can't finish. Maybe that will change in the future, but it's not changing right now.

See y'all later!

Day 79: [FOXTROT]ing OVERTIME!!!

AAAAAAAAAAAARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now that's out of the way. More MO tomorrow and Friday. I'm...less than pleased with this development. It's a [FOXTROT]ing waste of time, especially for the online techs. Calls don't start until 8 am and they end at 5 pm, so we're useless before 8 or after 5. We don't get the training the offlines get, so we can't work their tickets. I really hate how short-sighted our upper management members are about this. Making us work OT doesn't solve the problem if we can't close the tickets.

Rant over, on with our regularly scheduled blog.

I noticed today that I have almost no dunlap on these slacks and jeans I've been wearing of late. I figure another couple of weeks and I'll be in a smaller size of pants, which suits me just fine. I may not have lost a lot of weight this last week, but I'm starting to melt the inches off and that works as well. My face is really starting to change with the weight loss, as well. Lose over a hundred pounds and things will change.

I get the feeling that something else is changing too. It feels like the dynamic between me and a certain person is undergoing a shift. That maybe, just maybe, there's a real possibility of a future for us in the future. Not back the way we were, but in a new way . Maybe the physical change is showing that things in the mind can change as well. Again, seeing each other in a new light. I don't have any sort of absolute certainty of this, but my faith is filled right now and again, things just feel different now.

A lyric from My Darkest Days' "Still Worth Fighting For" comes to mind:

Now that we know just who we are
Now that we’ve finally come this far
I’m ready for one more battle scar
‘Cause this is still worth fighting for

We'll see. We'll wait and see.

Ciao!

Day 78: Sometimes the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing...

That sounds the beginning of a really dirty joke, doesn't it? Our management at work gave us no indication of whether we would have overtime today or not, so I erred on the side of caution and went in early this morning only to have my manager inform me that there was no overtime today. This does not mean I get off work early for coming in early, it means I have to work an extra hour. Not fun. Just once I wish they would come out and actually say "Hey, no overtime tomorrow." instead of making us guess and second guess. Argh.

Oh well, what doesn't kill us make us stronger. Or in this case, a little richer for the OT.

I still went and worked out tonight, the first time in a week. Felt good, but I took it easy and I'll ease my way back into my full on workout by the end of the week. Got all my protein in and I'm working on my water now. The water is the hardest part. When you can only hold 4 ounces at a time and you can't drink for a half hour before or after eating it makes getting that 80-100 ounces of water in a chore. [sigh]

Had a little flash of melancholy, but I let it go and focused on something else. I got a pre-invitation to my youngest niece's upcoming wedding. I can't really claim to be close to either of my nieces. I joined the service when they were very young and I really wasn't around to see them grow up except in the occasional picture from my sister. But she and I are very much alike, according to my sister. We're both Aries and we're both smart and sarcastic. We're also the toughest in the family as well as being the risk takers. I joined the service and went off to war when I was called. She met her fiancé playing an online game and when his family invited her to come to Wales to actually meet, she took a chance and went off. With my sister in tow, of course. The wedding is in September, so I have a few months to keep losing weight so I'll look good at the wedding. If I can keep up my current weight loss, I might actually be at my goal weight by then. I'm within 4 pounds of my 50 percent mark. If I can do 4 pounds per week between now and then, I could be at my goal weight or close to it by September. The only concern I have is do I plan to go Stag or do I ask someone along. If I ask someone...well, I know who I want to ask, but I don't think that would work so well, at least not right now. I could ask my ex-wife, she wouldn't mind going, but...no, bad idea. I'm thinking Stag is the only option right now. Ah well.

More things to consider for later. I'm going to just let things go for now and let them simmer.

Do Svidanja!

Day 77: Then and Now...

I post these kinds of pics on my facebook support group every few weeks. Kind of a comparison of then and now so I can what everyone else is seeing. This particular pic really got my attention, though. I compared the pics and thought, "I can't believe those pics are both me. I can't believe those pics are the same person."

On further contemplation, I guess I'm not the same person anymore. Things in my life have changed. Major, life changing events have occurred that I had no choice but to change. Change or give up on myself. Those were the choices I had. I look at then and consider what was in my head then. I was smiling, but I don't think I was truly happy. I know I didn't make that costume look good, my weight had me worried for my health and I was always scared of losing that special someone in my life, that she would find someone thinner and better looking. That I couldn't live up to everything she wanted, so whenever she wanted something, I would say, "Whatever you want, baby. It's ok.". I deluded myself into thinking that giving her those things would keep her with me. Foolish me, all she wanted was for me to think of her as an equal and act like a partner in the relationship. To share time with her and build memories together. I know now that I didn't do that. Not enough, anyway.

I look at the now and I'm rapidly losing weight, I feel better than I have in a long time, I'm fitting into smaller clothes now, and while I lost that special someone as my partner, she's still a friend and a good friend. A best friend. I care about her and love her with all my heart and soul, and I'm doing this as much as for her as for myself. I want to really succeed at this so she can see that it works and it will work for her as well as it has for me. And as friends, I can't lose her. Not as long as we want to be friends. Boyfriends come and go, but friends are forever. Maybe from that as a basis, we can make a new beginning in the future. When we're both ready to see each other in a new light. It's not going to be trying to regain what we lost the first go around. It's going to be building from all new. It's not going to be a try. As a wise old alien once said, "Do, or do not. There is no try."

This ends our broadcasting day for today.

Min tian jian!

Day 76: Never volunteering again...

Walked into a total shitstorm at work today at 7am. Yet another major outage on our system and it had started at 10pm Saturday night. Not fun. I worked my 4 hours and hauled ass for safety. I couldn't take another 4 hours of pissed off customers screaming at me for something I can't fix and didn't have anything to do with. The extra money is not worth the stress.

Then I got delayed at Walmart by getting in a line with a lady buying her stuff with WIC and Walmart has to process each damn thing by hand. Not her fault, and not the cashier's fault. you would think that they would scan the card in and then run each item through without all of the bs, but NOOOOO! I had to wait in line 20 minutes to buy my stuff. AARGH!

By the time I got home, I was more than ready to log on to chat and send a pick me up to a friend. She's been having a bad time of it this week and I send little things to her to get her mind off of it. Movie quotes for her to try to identify or little jokes to make her smile. Just about anything to distract her from what's bringing her down. It always seems to work and she's appreciative of the efforts. My sister says, "Acts of Kindness are greatly repaid." I hope she's right.

I'm signing off for now, the transmission will continue tomorrow.

Ciao!

Day 75: Prepping for more overtime tomorrow...

Much as I hate OT during the week...well, anytime, really...the management asked for volunteers for OT this weekend so I volunteered for a 4 hour shift tomorrow that will probably turn into 8 hours. I figured based on last week's 10 hours of OT plus 8 tomorrow and then another 2 on Monday, I'll be sitting on 20 hours of OT minimum on my next paycheck, which is worth about 500 extra dollars. I only volunteered for 4 in case I get fed up and walk out after 4 hours.

Today was busy from the time I got up. I had to make sure my daughter was ready to go because we were meeting her mom to get their passports taken care of for a trip in July. We had to go to three different places to get the damn pictures and then to the post office for the passports. The wait time there was too long so we went to lunch, then to my daughter's music lesson , then back to the post office. I ended up spending too much time with my ex-wife today. It always stresses me out to be around her too long. We start talking about things that I want left in the past and she insists on bringing up. I have enough drama in my life right now without dredging up more from the past, TYVM! But we got the passports taken care of, so that's one thing I don't have to worry about.

On a brighter note, I had no bouts of melancholy this week and no doubts about anything going on, so that was good. I started making plans for my 42nd birthday which is rapidly approaching. As in less than three weeks rapidly approaching. Before I always hoped someone else would plan a party for me, but when I realized that I can make my own plans and have the kind of party I want, I decided to make my own list and invite the people I want there. Those that make it, great. If they don't make it or don't even acknowledge the invitation, I know who I can just drop from my list of friends and not worry about them anymore. I figure if they can't acknowledge my birthday, I don't need to acknowledge them at all. Time for new friends to go along with my new life. In the geek world I normally frequent, the number 42 is the answer to everything, so I'm viewing my 42nd birthday as a new beginning. I've lost a lot of weight in the last couple of months and I figure that's a great start to a new life. I change my body, I change my mindset, I change my life for the better. From now on, I'm going to do things that I want to do. If I have someone in my life, then it will be we will do what we want to do. In that case, we will decide as equals what we will do. Not just one or the other decides. We will decide. No more just sitting back and letting someone else decide for me. From now on, I take an active part in my life, instead of reactive.

Adios!

Day 74: Sucker Punched!

I took my daughter to go see Sucker Punch tonight. It's a decent flick, but on further reflection had I known more about it, I would have waited for DVD. The story shifts and changes pretty quickly. The timeline and storyline don't change up, but the sudden juxtapositions of the realities of the movie kind make you go "What the Hell?" But there was enough action and the story was easy enough for my daughter to follow, so we enjoyed our trip to the movies.

Prior to going in the theater, we had about an hour to kill so we went over to the arcade. We played a little air hockey and then she went to play the driving and dance games while I focused on one particular shooting game. She went through ten dollars worth of tokens where I only used 5 in the same time frame. But all that really matters is that we had a good time and spent some quality time together. After the arcade, we got some stuff from the concession stand. I got a hot dog and she got nachos and an Icee. I found out that Bobo does not like the concession hot dogs. It was too greasy and too salty. I ate maybe a quarter of it and then Bobo just said, "That's enough of that, boss. Yuck!" Not that I'm overly concerned about the whole thing. Just one more thing to learn.

There was one line in the movie that particularly stuck with me, it was this:

You will need to find five items. The first is a map. Then fire. Then a knife. And a key. The fifth thing is a mystery. Begin your journey. It will set you free.

The reason it stuck with me is because it reminded me of the journey we take as a sleever. The map is our plan to get to the surgery and life beyond the sleeve. The fire is the desire to get the sleeve and truly lose the weight for good. The knife I tend to think of as the surgery itself. The key to the whole thing is our will to do this and do everything we have to do to succeed (I tend to think to this as the will to conquer, which is the first condition of victory). The mystery, as revealed at the end of the movie is simple. The mystery is me. I'm the mystery. Everything else can be maintained and controlled to a great extent, but I am the random factor in the equation. If I eat the right things and do everything I need to do then I have to lose weight doing this. But if I skip working out or eat the wrong things, then things can go biblically pear-shaped very quickly. The last phrase is probably the most important. By starting my journey, I have set myself free from the bondage of my weight. All journeys take time, and the journey of weight loss is no different. It will take a while, but I will reach my destination of my goal weight.

To reach your own paradise. Just let go.