Conspiracy Theory

Okay, so according to the scales at last night's cult meeting, I'm down nine million two hundred ninety-eight thousand six hundred forty three and a half milligrams total [sorry, I know that joke is old... it's 20.5 pounds for you non-metric types] since this exercise in public humiliation and constant hunger began about 7 weeks ago.

This would be cause for much celebration, the likes of which Kool and even his Gang would be sickened by, for my celebrations usually involve using a forklift to put food into my pie hole -- but that's not happening. For two reasons. First, eating twice my body weight negates the whole "loosing weight" paradigm I'm trying to shift here (sadly), and secondly, it’s a crock.

Last week I was up by half a pound. Understandable. I haven't exactly been careful. I went to this week's weigh in expecting to see much the same result. It was, after all, a week wherein I ate half a pizza in one sitting. A week where popcorn and butter, again, met. A week where I didn't drink my prerequisite 13 gallons of water each day. In other words, I did not follow the program to the letter.

And yet I was, according to their scales, down by six pounds.

(Full disclosure: Unlike other weeks, I took my wallet and keys out of my pocket before being weighed, so that probably accounts for something. This is pretty conservative however, as I've seen some women practically strip down to their bikini briefs before getting on that scale just to eek out every last drop of weight loss the the scale can show, all the better to manage their frail psyches.)

Six pounds. I wasn't able to focus on the meeting at all as I thought about it. I likely missed a charming number of prosaic platitudes and trite banalities that might have changed my life. But all I could ponder was that WW is a complete and utter scam filled with charlatans bent on taking my money and making me think I'm yo-yoing like crazy on the scales, likely doing myself untold amounts of physiological damage.... or they calibrate their scales perfectly. And Bush is clamoring for a DVD of the first season of Boy Meets Boy, too.

After my first pronounced loss last month I checked the WW results against my own bathroom scale and the difference was around 10 full pounds -- and my home scale was in my favor. As of last night, with the same accoutrements on (sans keys & wallet), the difference was only THREE pounds.

A fast Right Wing diet-industry conspiracy? Simple technical malfunction? Or do my keys really weigh that much?

She's a Lady

There's a new woman in my life.

One who'll I'll lovingly caress every day... my fingers will play over her, coaxing her to do my bidding. She wears dark black, but with silver highlights, and she know that a bit of translucency just adds to the allure. She'll deliver to me all I could ask, and more. She'll do it loudly, or silently, as I decree. I know what buttons to push on her, oh yes.

My time with her may make my wife jealous, but I can't keep my hands off of her. In fact, I'd go so far as to say I have to touch her to live.

And she only cost me $73.93 from Buy.com. (Free shipping, too.)

This beauty is the Microsoft's Natural Keyboard done wireless, and including a wireless mouse (neither of which are Bluetooth, so no conflicts with my wireless network). I'll be honest: I've been obsessed with getting this keyboard because I really, really need a mute button with instant access. I'm sick of being on the phone with vendors and them suddenly knowing I'm getting IMs and mail when my speaker -- right next to my speaker phone -- lets loose with a stray boing, beep, or bloop. Now I can shut down the sound just as the phone rings.

So yes, this keyboard wasn't necessary -- it’s effectively a 70 dollar mute button. But damn, say what you want about the folks in Redmond, they have always made nice hardware. If they made a full PC this good, I might buy it.

You Throw Me the Chapeau and I'll Throw You the Whip

Little known secret: I like to wear an Indiana Jones fedora when I'm working around the house.

Sorry to disappoint you if you thought I was going to say women's underwear. That's strictly for the bedroom. And only on those special nights. *WINK*

It's not just a cap that looks like Harrison's -- it's actually branded "Indiana Jones" inside and with a little pin on the band outside. It's a little less beat up than in the films tho, having never been worn in the ocean, in a snake pit, or while being dragged behind horses in the desert -- though I have worn it while facing melting Nazis.

Sorry, wait, those were just my relatives.

It makes me feel like a journalist wearing a hat like this. All I need is a little card sticking out saying "PRESS."

I just think all young men should go back two the days of wearing hats... I say young because obviously there's many an old gentleman wearing hats. It's probably to distract people from looking at the waist band of their pants up around nipple level.

Back in the 60's and before, a hat on a guy wasn't just an affectation -- it was fashion. Everyone had one. Yet if I wore this hat out in the real world -- even if I could remove the geeky Indiana Jones pin on the side -- I'd be incredibly self-conscious. Not to mention paranoid that I'd forget it some place. An $80 is not something you want to forget in a coat room. And you don't want to be accidentally switching them with someone. If you switch jackets at least you can find interesting things in the pockets. ("Hey! How did a blood covered switch blade get in my pocket?") But if you switch hats, well, you're sharing nothing but forehead flop-sweat stains.

Which I guess explains why guys no longer wear hats.

Learn to Fight Procrastination... Tomorrow

That title doesn't have anything to do with anything. I just saw the first part listed as a book title and thought it was funny. See, this is where ideas come from. You see stuff, you add a word, you laugh in your head, you share it with the world. Genius.

The Road to Hairlessness

The problem with a male getting a massage goes back to the "When Harry Met Sally" principle: "no man can be friends with a woman that he finds attractive."

I don't think that’s 100% true, as I have many, many attractive friends, oh my, yes. But if they were to start rubbing their oiled hands up and down my back, arms and legs, it would be a different matter. Hell, if they knew what they were doing with those oiled hands, some of my truly ugly friends might even get lucky. Yes, I'm talking to you. *WINK*

The point of this is, when the wife gave me the gift certificate for my massage, she said I should go to her usual masseuse, who she described as, well, let's just say attractiveness probably wasn't an option. And it probably wouldn't have been... if I'd ended up with her. Instead, despite my request on the phone, I ended up with a different masseuse, who's name I promptly forgot the split second she uttered it. That happens when I am concentrating very hard at not looking at the very, very tight t-shirt on a young woman who's about to be in a room with me while I'm naked under a sheet and she'll proceed to kneading my back muscles with her oiled hands. And elbows.

Dear god, the elbows.

I managed to get through the one hour session with nary a give away, if you know what I mean. As for the massage, well, I had one once before, about seven years ago, during a company retreat to a hotel/spa in Vermont. After that piece of shiatsu, I felt like I'd been hit by a high speed bus. In a good way. After this week's hot-rock rub down, well, it felt good, but not smacked-by-a-mac-truck good. I was mildly disappointed.

The next day, self-improvement week continued. I got a haircut in the morning, which I had to drive 20 miles for. The woman who cuts my hair used to work two miles up the road, but then opened her own salon over in Groton. I continue to go to her because she only charges 10 bucks a cut and she's so god damn cheerful even at 8:30 in the morning, and sometimes I need that. Every couple of months.

At my lunch hour, it was time for the big event though. I went back to the same spa where I'd had the massage and managed to get lost in their silly ass building, going to the wrong area and sitting for 10 minutes while a woman there puzzled over why I wasn't in her schedule book. My wife had neglected to explain to me that despite the presence of a front desk, the various businesses in this building don't really interact. How handy.

I was greeted by another new face, again, I forgot her name instantly, and this had nothing to do with tight t-shirts (though she was kinda cute) -- I just really suck at remembering names. I have read all the tricks -- repeat the name as you greet the person, compliment the name, make a comment aloud to them that cements the damn name in your head -- but I always forget the tricks until after the name has escaped my feeble gray cells. I know I can always ask them, "sorry, what did you say your name was again," but I figured in this case especially, I'd wait to see how it all turned out.

I was in the same room as the previous day's massage, same table, same donut to rest my face in. She told me to take off everything down to my boxers (why she would assume boxers I don't know) and get under the blanket face down. I took off everything but my boxer-briefs (My boys need a home! -- Cosmo Kramer) and my wool socks, as it was cold in there.

When the waxer/de-hairer/sadist returned, she started engaging me in conversation. She was very nice, but I was astounded at this exchange:

Her: So what was it that made you want to get your back waxed?

Me:

Her: Or really? What TV show?

Me: That one on Bravo? The Queer Eye for the Straight Guy?

Her: Huh. Really. I've never heard of that one.

There's really someone out there untouched by the Fab 5? Amazing. And she's in their industry. That's like British spies having never heard of James Bond. Turns out though, she doesn’t have a television.

What she did have, was hot wax, strips of muslin, and a wiling participant for her sadistic games of torture.

I admit, the first couple of yanks of hair weren't bad. I've had worse pain with pulled off bandages.

Then she got to the edges, which I define as the sides of my back, my shoulders, and just above my ass. We are taking pain that felt like I had a vicious sunburn and someone decided to slap it really hard. With a cat-o-nine-tails.

As she's slather on the bees wax (mixed with honey I was told) she'd chat away (I heard all about the water tower with the hole in it in her home town, and how lucky she was to have a well (but no frickin' TV!)). But as she put down the strip into the hardening wax, she'd say "Take a deep breath -- and exhale."

And during the exhale, she's yank.

It turns out that despite what you would expect, I only wanted to scream when inhaling during a yank. The exhaling was the way to go. But she was inconsistent with telling me when to expect the pain, so I spent most of the time concentrating on my breathing, trying to anticipate her moves, so that when she pulled, I'd be blowing out. Good mental exercises to remember should I ever be strapped to the rack or locked McCain-like in a box in the jungle.

In the end, she gushed over how nice my skin looked after the fur layer was gone. She probably tells that to all her victims.

And now, to share it with the world, here's some pictures of me, before and after. (I told Bon to not make me look fat when she took these, but she failed, so I cropped them. One shot she took of just my back looked to me like a giant ass cheek. Horrifying. I should go on a diet or something.)

Christ, that's disgusting, with or without hair. My back looks like the face of a 14 year old on a chocolate binge. I'm sorry you had to see that.

The waxer had said people who do this kind of thing regularly find the hair grows back much finer and that doing it three or four times a year is about the norm.

I expect she'll see me again around 2010.

Five Weeks In...

And i'm down by 1.07142857 stone. Woo. Hoo.

Get Off My Back

My wife loves Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. I think if she could be best friends with Carson (the fashion guy) and go to lunch every day with him and be catty about the people that walk by, I think she would be in her glory. (And I think she'd like to convert Kyan, the skin/hair guy, if you know what I'm saying. But that's a whole other thing.)

While I find the Fab 5 quite comical myself, I'm far more into their message of overall self-improvement -- especially that of removing excessive body hair. Ever since the wife thought it would be funny to tickle me via my nose hairs, I've been on a regular regimen of cutting, snipping and tucking all the follicle-based nasties I can. (I even gave my whole family nose/ear hair clippers for Xmas one year. Just the men.)

But lets face it, I'm not a Nazi about this self-improvement stuff, or I'd be a 160 lbs, have a six pace that didn't say "Mike's Hard Lemonade on it, and have done some crazy move like bicycled across the Atlantic. That's why the move I'm taking this week is a huge step forward in my metro-sexuality: I'm getting my back waxed.

For a guy who didn't develop any appreciable chest hair until long after high school, it has become more and more apparent that all the fuzz went on the reverse side. It certainly doesn't bother me, and I don't think it’s a real relationship deal-breaker, but why take chances? The wife splurged and bought me a one-hour hot rock massage as a Valentine's gift, so when I called to make the appointment, I asked about the possibility of peeling off the pelt.

So, tonight I get my massage. Tomorrow morning, I've got a hair cut. And tomorrow at lunch, instead of eating a delicious low-calorie soup to lose weight with, I plain to shed a few pounds by having someone slough off the ol' wool on the epidermis.

Darth Vader, The Gay Blade

The nightly ritual in the house is for the dogs to be told to "go to bed!" usually several times as their minds shut down at the site of my hands at the cookie jar. Once they get up there, I follow and give them each a treat, not so much because they deserve it, as to prevent our eldest from vomiting before morning -- she's the inverse-upchucker, throwing up only when her stomach is empty.

Last night I did this as I was coming up the stairs, Siren and Kylie at different points poked their head out of the door to check on me.

"Hey!" I'd yell and they'd do a quick 180, hoping I hadn't actually noticed.

"You know," I yelled to Bon who was sitting in her office up stairs, checking her e-mail or reading Internet porn or something, "These dogs never trust that I'm coming up with the cookies!" I threw each mutt the meaty crackers and said to them, "I find your lack of faith disturbing." Not that they cared.

Occasionally I like to quiz my wife to make sure my inherent geekness has seeped into her consciousness as thoroughly as possible. I decide this was one of those times.

"Who said that, do you know?" I yelled to her in the other room.

"Said what?"

"I find your lack of faith disturbing," I repeated.

She gave it a millisecond of thought and said "I dunno."

"I'll give you a hint," I said. "He had a respiratory problem."

"Uh… I still don't know."

"Really. C'mon. You know this… he also had a sword. Respiratory problem an a sword."

"Honey, I really don't know," she said.

"How can you not know this? Okay, one more hint: he wore all black."

She gave this another few seconds of thought and finally blurted out: "Zorro?"

I laughed at the same time as I convulsed. "Dear god woman! Zorro?? Respiratory problem? Sword? All in black?"

She just looked at me blankly, plainly hoping I'd go so she could get back to the spams about herbal v*agra.

"One more hint: He turned out to be someone's father?"

"Oh," she said laughing, finally getting it.

I went to bed, mutter and laughing. "Zorro. Jesus Christ."