I took a break from Atkins last night and had some red wine. Instead of feeling like a warm incoming tide spreading out through my central nervous system, it felt like I’d eaten fifteen pixie sticks – granted it was three-buck chuck from Trader Joe’s so you can’t expect ambrosia.

I guess that would be an example of the insulin cycle they talk about in the literature. I picked Atkins because I already eat a lot of vegetables, and I don’t really eat much fruit or pasta anyway, so I would really only be cutting out bread, potatoes, and alcohol. People have started asking me what the inspiration is for the weight loss and I’m going to fess up about a health issue. I monitor my blood pressure because way back at the start of grad school I had a scary spike in pressure.

I was working long hours at a bar that is defined by cigarette smoke so thick that you need to clean off the mirror at almost every shift. If you have ten people sitting in front of you chaining for eight hours five days a week there is going to be a health impact. So my doctor told me to quit the bar to get away from the smoke and drop a little weight – which I did - no problem. Ever since then I keep an eye on it, those grocery store arm cuffs are actually pretty accurate if you’re in the market for a reading, and post November both it and my weight were in a hand and hand assent. I guess some unemployed people just sit on their computers all day. Even with my dog walks I was netting less motion than when I was working. Anyway, I had a reading that worried me so here we are on the road to health.

This week both my weight and my BP are already dropping back down to acceptable levels. I don’t own a scale so I’m just going by the mirror on weight loss – let’s call it circumference loss. This diet worked wonders for Tyler and Bree, who used it to slim down for their wedding. John used a modified version and he looks younger now than he did when we were undergraduates. So now I am thinking why stop at acceptable when what I’m doing is working? Why not really go for a healthier lifestyle, as S said in one of his comments, it certainly is time.

In honor of Elvis' birthday I'm going to get down to my Sun Studio weight of 158 cause at 145 I was way too skinny.

Taken after the Memphis Philosophy conference in either 96 or 97.

(Travel gang, when all my dust settles we're going to Graceland, Graceland, Memphis Tennessee)