Day 43 - Wednesday, April 22

Previous night's sleep - on track - 7 hours - start/stop - terrible

Consumption - good at work, terrible after.

Breakfast - fat free vanilla yogurt w/ Triple Berry Crunch Bear Naked Granola - Dannon low fat yogurt
Lunch - Son of a Gun beef stew with a couple of croutons
Snack - Caesar salad - romaine, light caesar dressing, parmesan cheese, and some croutons
Dinner - two foot long hot dogs w/ chili, mustard, and onion + onion rings + french fries w/ ketchup and mayo - from Jak'n Jill's and a rib that Visa made. Craptastically good and tumultuous for my so called healthier living experimental phase.

So, after running errands today, which included picking up a 25lb bag of charcoal at the Mexican grocery store along w/ a bag of bay leaves for $1.69 and a bag of Zaffron for $1.99, I ended up driving home around 9:30pm. I hadn't eaten since around 3:30pm, when I ate that salad. My mind raced toward food. I definitely had the intention of eating ice cream tonight, but didn't. Not because I am so grounded in my healthy habits, but because after my massive consumption, the thought of eating ice cream was very unappealing.

I am definitely, a creature of habit. Those habits are hard to change, hence the whole 90 day committment. I have come to realize in my more than quarter century of a lifetime that it requires pain for me to change. Sure, after an oil change or a car accident I will drive more safely, more conservatively. But given enough time, I forget that misery or that cost paid, and resume my inclinations of driving quickly and with disregard for gas conservation.

I want to turn the corner. I want to look back and think, wow, I used to look like that. I used to eat like that. And I have. I look back at pictures, not even two years ago. I used to look like that? I can't remember what it feels like to weigh less than 200lbs. Maybe, I am not self-conscious enough about my body. Both a pro and a con. Every good quality that I have, taken to the extreme, is a fault. Read - wanting to help others - good - white knight syndrome - bad.

So, re-committing and making promises is bunk. An empty exercise based in the absurd premise that I will keep them and that my will power at this very moment, sated, not even 4 hours ago by mounds of fried, unhealthy food, will carry me through a lifetime. It is simply time to start taking action. Ultimately, it's about accountability, and there aren't many people out there that I am accountable to in the world when it comes to my eating habits and level of fitness. You can't get arrested for being obese. You don't get fired for being fat (jobs I would have anyway). When it's just you and the drive-through, it's just you and the drive-through.

But who do I want to be? Do I want to grow up and be a firefighter? An astronaut? I don't know. But I do know, that I don't want to grow into my 30s and 40s as a chubby guy eventually dying at an absurdly young age due to high cholesterol, diabetes, heart disease, or something else I could have helped to prevent.

It's not that I don't want to be fat. It's that I want to be healthy.

We'll see what tomorrow brings.