February 4th, 2012: I have no weight to report today because I’m stuck in the middle of the desert with about 6 hours to go on this marathon shift. I believe I’m getting a second wind, though, and I moved two belt loops tighter! Those are the hard facts, now the color commentary and brief summary of what I thought about:
11:00 pm – Should I take my contacts out or not?
12:00 am – Well, I’m here, and I’ve had 3 cups of coffee and I wonder if that’s going to be enough.
1:00 am – Why do all the restaurants in my town start out as fine dining and end up as a Los Albertos all night Mexican food chain within two years.
1:30 am – Los Albertos must cook their food in pure fat because, damn, it tastes good.
1:31 am – A Los Albertos breakfast burrito. Hmmm. Make that 3 Los Albertos breakfast burritos. That would sure taste good right now. REAL GOOD.
1:32 am – I forgot to pack a vegetable to eat. Dammit.
1:33 am – I don’t get to eat again until my break at 8 am.
1:33am – 4 am – Los Albertos Breakfast Burritos, Los Albertos Breakfast Burritos, Los Albertos Breakfast Burritos . . .
4 am – Stop it you weak fool! Thank God there are no Los Albertos within 30 miles of where I am standing right now. I will never give in!
4:30 am – I sure do wish I was in Las Vegas right now at a Blackjack table with a 15-beer buzz and $2,000 in my pocket. Plus there’s that all-night cafe at Treasure Island. I passed out, face into food, in one of the booths there one time.
5:00 am – I have made it past the midnight munchies. Now I just long for a king-size bed.
5:01 am – king-size bed, king-size bed, king-size bed, king-size bed . . .
5:30 am – I will not break my plans, I can’t and I won’t. I am not exercising today, though.
5:30 am – present – Laugh hysterically at every stupid thing I see and say and no longer think about food or sleep. I am a work robot now. I ate my breakfast and my lunch (minus a vegetable) at the same time. It took about 49 seconds to consume the food. Work Robot, Work robot, Work Robot . . .
February 4th, 2020 (retrospective): And then it’s back to thoughts on narcissism. I’d mentioned back in my 2012 writing about how you just about had to put everyone on hold if you want to succeed at this weight-loss thing. I still feel that way, except that I think instead of putting everyone on hold, it’s actually better to try to involve them. I even bought one of those jogging strollers so William could always go with me. I showed Juliana my written goals and my written plans (I say written because just talking about it keeps it in the realm of talking shit, whereas at least writing it down is a firing up the train engine), and we tried to learn to like the same healthy food. My wife took this to the level of getting her National Physique Committee (NPC) card and competed in her first show in the Women’s Figure division at age 40. You never know how your family will respond, but I suspect after some initial resistance, they’ll see the all the places it might take them too.
A support system, I learned, was absolutely critical to the process. I intended to show and tell all that it would do for the greater good of our family if I could just have a couple months to appear to disappear inside of myself. However, I was also prepared to say “so be it, Jedi”, and transition into the process all by myself if I couldn’t sell it to those closest to me. I knew because I believed. And because I believed, I had to make something happen.
You put on the blinders and you go for that shit. What I do know occurs is that when you go hard for something long enough results happen. That may mean you run it until the wheels fall off, but even then, or especially then, you’ll know it was real.
