Day 16

Heading back home after being in Baltimore and then Pittsburgh for 6 days.

I do not like traveling at all, especially if I have to fly to get there. I become discombobulated and out of balance, often forgetting something in my rush out of the house to go where I don’t really want to be.

(By the way, this is the first time I have ever typed out the word “discombobulated,” and spell check did not correct me. It’s one of those words you say, but are not quite clear if it is slang, made up or part of the English language.)

When I am packing I many times wait till the last second. I hurriedly throw things into a bag and speed to the airport. On this particular trip I was dangerously close to missing the plane and I cut my hand twice that morning, resulting in looking like O.J. Simpson after “getting his golf bag out of the car” in 1993.

I’m not sure what the deeper meaning is for putting off my schedule, but I would think it has something to do with a subtle wish that the plans will change and I get to stay home with my family instead.

There is nothing in the world better than being around my wife and 3 sons. Nothing comes close. There is no sleep number hotel bed or in-room Jacuzzi that could come close to the comfort and peace I feel when I am around my wife and kids, so I avoid road trips, even though (strangely) I am in a business that calls for being up in the air.

I never had stability as a child, as we moved from rental home to rental home. When I was young, I actually thought the word “evict” meant “move,” like “here comes the eviction truck mommy!”

We would pack our tattered and borrowed suitcases and go to another Philadelphia neighborhood, but did not settle anywhere for very long. I had another childlike perception that there was an advantage to changing locations – because in each residence came an envelope filled with “Welcome Wagon” coupons! These were deals from local businesses, offered to lure you in for a taste of their goods or services, hoping you will become a regular customer.

Two things remain in my subconscious today. One is that I still have a very warm feeling around discounts, and am a huge Groupon (or others like it) user. Upon seeing a deal from my area online deals dealer I seize the opportunity, convincing myself I must not miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to save money.

The irony is, nine times out of ten it is not something I would normally buy, meaning that I am not saving money at all! Did I really need to be exfoliated?

The other part of my childhood that won’t seem to go away is keeping a couple of cardboard boxes packed, just in case someone sends us a note telling us we must vacate the premises. It is not realistic thinking, considering I haven’t missed a payment in 2 decades, but I am insecure nonetheless.

I think childhood memories are like Mel Gibson. You can numb 'em, arrest 'em, lock 'em up or ignore 'em, but there will always be a comeback.

Since this blog is supposed to have an ongoing theme, let me take this opportunity to seize a segue and talk about my belly coming back. Well, more like moving towards my back, as the stomach is on a descent.

I may have lost some waistline on this trip. The reason I know this is due to another reason I hate flying – airport security. They now choose you “randomly” to step out of the normal x-ray line and into a machine that apparently can see what you had to eat that morning.

In this contraption is not used in many airports, thus meaning it makes no sense to have the tighter security in one airport, but not another. I am not a clever terrorist, yet if I were I certainly would fly out of a city that hasn’t purchased this big unit. It makes no sense, similar to when I tell them I can prove my liquids aren’t explosive by taking a gulp in front of them.

This morning the TSA guy (of course) points at me and tells me to remove my belt. I did, and my pants came down about 6 inches. I was no hip-hop artist (“Bust A Gut”), although my jeans were on their way to the ankles when I moved fast to save the line from seeing a flash slob.

On the other hand, I wish I mooned the guy who picked me for the special screening. My pimply ass might make him hesitate next time.

On the plane now and will get to our bathroom scale to confirm the progress. And then I will get some needed rest from my discombobulation, which is not a word that escapes the spell correction.

Day 15

Spent two days at home in LA after being back east with 2 sons, where we ate the best dough products on earth. They say the reason the east coast has the best rolls, bagels and soft pretzels is the water. It is shocking to me that some chemist, who creates like 10,000 new prescription drugs a year cannot come up with a replica H2O to be used nationwide, so I can cancel my 23 year good pizza search in Los Angeles.

I took my California raised sons to New York City, where we partook in some of the local foods. A stop at Ray’s for a slice of pepperoni did not solicit the rave from the kids I thought it would. I think they are content with a mall Sbarro plain piece, since that is what they are used to.

We started our journey 90 miles south of Manhattan, when I turned them on to a cheese steak at my friend Suzzane’s Deli in Wyndmoor, PA. Now, her sandwiches will never be in the same conversations most have when talking Philly cuisine, but that’s not because they are not delicious.

Usually most out-of-towners will ask when inquiring about my favorite, “Pat’s or Geno’s?,” referring to the popular south Philly spots where you can get a gut bomb 24/7 from them. They are located right across the street from one another in typical competitive fashion for the City of Brotherly Love.

Those places have good food, but I think some of the lore is based on the attitude that comes with your order, which you better have down, or suffer the consequences of a sweaty Italian guy serving up some annoyed sarcasm. “I’ll have one wid sauce & onions” will get you a good, meaty meal without the eye roll and head shake of shame.

Suzanne has a small place on Willow Grove Avenue in a village-like town, cooking for a steady clientele, half of who just walk in and say, “the usual.”

One thing our host/owner/chef does have in common with all the famous grilles is the confidence. Everywhere in the area, there is a claim that their hoagie or steak is the best in the Delaware Valley, accompanied by a brief reasoning as to why. “Dellasandro’s chops the meat too much” might be something you hear, but for my kids it is all new to them.

We took them to go and went over to the place where I myself learned how to cook when I was a teen, the Flourtown Country Club. Yes, it was there where an apparently clueless owner hired four close delinquent friends, Tommy (“Jack Benny”), George (Megaphone Mouth) and Dave (Wrong Way Feldman or El Whoppo).

I will save our escapades for another day (if requested), but needless to say, if something was sent back to the kitchen, it went back out a little more “moist.”

The place has hardly changed a bit in 30 years, and we all sat at the picnic tables to enjoy our food. I watched my boys take their first bites and paid close attention to their reactions.

Typical for the territory, as if he has been living there his entire 13 years, my son Justin says, “it’s really good, dad, but it’s not the same as Delesandro’s. I think their rolls are better.”

I guess the water is different 7 miles away in Roxborough than in Wyndmoor.

Or as Justin says to blend into his adopted hometown accent --  the “wooder.”

Day 13

I hope no one’s keeping accurate track of the days I’m into this weight project. If this was a television show, I have been on the equivalent of a hiatus. I've been “the biggest snoozer” when it comes to staying awake for this cruise to Thinville.

I’m thinking about shutting it down, not the desire to lose a few pounds and eat healthier, but the journaling of it. This has not caught on as I had hoped, and (frankly) I am so busy with numerous projects, it seems fruitless if no one is reading this. I am not as popular or interesting as I had hoped!

Maybe it’s the fact that I don’t look heavy enough to qualify for a challenge like this. The “steaks” are not high enough. When it comes to trends and ratings, the current societal system seems to be one of short attention span.

I am a storyteller, and I fear this art form is dying a slow death. A hundred and forty character tweet from a Kardashian sister telling the world what kind of Tampon she switched to is garnering 8 million times more attention than my musings about poundage.

Perhaps if I removed the lbs by making some sex tapes?? 

Day 12

I’m on my way to my childhood home of Philadelphia.

This is going to be my greatest dietary challenge thus far. Not only was it named the “fattest city” a few years ago, but add to that the fact that I am looking forward to putting a few favorite restaurants, delis and food stands on my historical tour, and methinks there could be a slight setback in the program.

To put a positive spin on it, my stomach will continue to have “forward” progress…

Philly is not known for producing alternative eating delicacies. It is mostly a town of tradition and repetition, and this is especially the case at mealtime. Recipes have been passed down for centuries, without so much as a blink to change an ingredient. They have no clue what is outside the normal patterns of a meat & potatoes meal, followed by sitting around the telly watching Channel Six Action News with a cold Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer you got at the local bar down the block.

There is not much awareness of much outside a 20-block radius, except for the Jersey Shore trips that fill every summer.

For instance, if you announced you were trying a vegan lifestyle, most would think you were just talking about vegging out on the couch for a while. Ketchup is considered an essential vitamin source there. And don’t tell them a tomato is not a vegetable, or prepare to have your fruity ass kicked back to the west coast!

There are local foods most of our country has never heard of, let alone tasted. I use the term “taste” loosely, because most food there is consumed without thought or touch of a taste bud. It is “wolfed,” “rifled” and “piled in,” but rarely eaten for its succulent culinary delight.  Sometimes teeth are more of an impediment to the rush to the stomach than an essential tool in digestion

Conscious eating in the City of Brotherly Love is practically non-existent. This is a place where one of the most celebrated events is the “Wing Bowl,” as 20 thousand fans gather to watch gluttons down as many chicken wings as possible before passing out.

I guess you could say it’s “unconscious” eating??

Grown men are horizontally strewn about a stadium boxing ring, wishing for a ring girl to give them mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and relieve them of their self induced misery.

When I wake up in the morning in my hometown, I begin with a breakfast “meat” called Scrapple. I put meat in quotes because I am not quite clear if or what meat is contained in this slab. The best guess I can give is that scrapple is one vowel away from what it probably is – a scrap pile. Yes, it is what’s left over AFTER they make sausage, which is oh-so-healthy for you!

I picture the sausage being made in a factory in rural Pennsylvania, and then a guy with a broom sweeps the leftover snouts, guts and innards into a mold. Perhaps there is some congealing fluid added (or glue), but then it is made into a 3 by 2 by 4-inch rectangular block and put into a hermetically sealed wrapper.

Okay. I am going to stop right there. I have eaten this since birth, and even I’m getting nauseous describing this day starter.

Sorry…

A helpful hint I picked up a long time ago when I am having a hard time with offensive food – put ketchup on it.

Day 11

I am indeed losing it. Down from 213 to 203 today. I don’t want to do the “goal weight” thing because it sounds like I will get some trophy at the end. For me, it also spells an end, when in this case, daily wellness is my destination.

I simply want to get into a (more) healthy program, and shed some extra pounds in the process. I guess that’s my goal, right?

I get my picture taken often, so I’d prefer to be less conscious of getting caught in the candid shot, where I am not doing the suck-in belly pose. I am smiling, but you can see that my teeth are actually being used to seal in the oxygen. If I opened my mouth slightly, you would hear a sound that resembles poking a hole in a tire.

I am doing these special shakes, which are really working. I still have energy, and feel satiated at breakfast, allowing me to have a full and refreshed morning. But once I see the lunchtime coming, I begin to obsess over my “reward” of a hearty meal. Gimme something to chew on, baby!

It is so hard to believe that I’m even thinking about losing pounds. Nostradomus would not have predicted this if he knew me as a boy.

I had four major food groups – candy, hot dogs, peanut butter and soft pretzels (with mustard). Ketchup was dumped on things like I was pouring motor oil into my car. And I always had to have Charles Potato Chips and Tasty Kakes with every meal.

I turned down so many foods. My mom had to cook on the down low, so she could hide certain ingredients. If I found an onion in something, that was the end of the meal right there on the spot! I turned into Ghandi on a fast against the British. Only my cause was not so noble…

The result of my picky eating was the body of a child Sally Struthers would raise money for. I recall thinking, when I would see her commercials with the starving kids by her side was my thought; “even those kids wouldn’t eat Lima Beans.” One time, I took my vegetables and put them in an envelope and told my mom to send them to the “starving kids across the sea,” as she called them.

My grandmother teased me about “seeing my ribs,” but nothing could get me to eat better. I was skinny to the point where I swallowed weight gain pills. In 9^th grade, I was the only wrestler who had to GAIN weight. I was my own class, below the minimum to be in a division. While the rest of the team was running in rubber suits to get down, I would be gobbling ice cream cones with sprinkles (although we called them “jimmies”).

So, I am now grown up and obviously do not have the metabolism of a field mouse anymore. I’ve been over 200 lbs for many years, which is still hard to comprehend, considering I was in high school trying to break the century mark as my “goal.”

It is sometimes hard for me to grow up, which ain’t helping with the growing “out”!

Day 10

Can’t believe how much golfing helps with the weight plan. Or maybe it’s the fact that I’m playing on the surface of the sun!

Damn, are we all getting the hint from the man upstairs yet?? By the way, if he really is upstairs, I’d hate to live in his place right now. Heat rises!

Well, I guess if you are the creator, you already know that…

I haven’t been announcing my weigh-ins, but I guess today is a good day to give the update, considering I’ve been sweating like Rupert Murdoch asked to tell the truth.

I started at 213 pounds and today I logged in at 204. Not too bad, especially since I have not officially worked out in that time span.

It is also due to these shakes I’ve been drinking in the morning. I notice the difference when I don’t bring them on the road with me. When I am on a consistent program at home, I do so much better in all ways. I center when I’m around my personal space, and that includes having my infomercial scores – the magic bullet blender and slap chop.

The comedy clubs aren’t known for having a menu created by Dr Oz. Most of the time the cook is the brother-in-law of the owner, who is 3 days out of drug rehab, dripping wet in front of a deep fryer, tossing breaded food items to their sizzling death.

I guess one can see how this wellness trip has had a few detours.

Off to golf again now. It is a foursome of business clients for a film I am developing, so I can justify my time “off” with a possibility of a future investment.

At least that’s what I tell my wife….

Day 9

Ok, true confession. This is more like “day 19,” not “9.” I have been lax in my blog writing, and even more so with my diet regimen.

I don’t like the term “diet.” First, the word “die” occupies three quarters of the word, and I have no interest in dying of starvation. Now, perhaps if the word was more like “live-et,” I might jump right in with both feet!

Yes, I want to LIVE. I want to have fun with my life and enjoy every moment I can. Whenever I feel I deprive myself of something, it takes some joy out of my day. It would be like hooking up with a super model, and mid preamble she says, “Well, you can only touch this tiny portion of my body. The rest you leave for somebody else.”

Then again, models I have known are worse than a Big Mac enema for my health, so maybe that wasn’t the best comparison. The temperamental ultra beautiful ladies I’ve known have the grace of Al Qaeda if they don’t get their way. Plus, I have long said that I find their bodies to be anything BUT attractive and healthy, and have no clue why girls aspire to look emaciated.

As my friend Carlos always said, “The bone is for the dog.”

Now that I have started the conversation about women who focus on scoring a magazine cover or a Milan runway, I think I will explore this further, relating to the blog I’m writing here about my weight loss.

To be honest, I arrived to the most wonderful place in my personal life journey a few years ago, and one thing I now know is that the folks who work on their thinness are not happy people. Even with fashion magazines the women look angry, as if they are saying, “somebody give me a lamb chop.”

My theory is that they have given into some societal myth, where “you can never be too rich or too thin.”

I disagree about the “too rich” part, but will save that for my blog about money! But as far as too thin is concerned, “concerned” is the operative word. I’d say skeletal remains of someone dead of malnutrition would be “too thin.” Because of a few supposedly hip experts in the fashion world have deemed it a good thing to be skinny, we now have a country- wide epidemic of anorexia and bulimia.

These are diseases caused exclusively by culture, and if anyone put this under further review, one would see its deceptive origins, as well as the fatal outcome. Also, whenever I exist in the energetic space of lack or less, it causes angst and a sense of loss, not a loss of pounds, but an incessant deficiency of abundance and good things. The mindset of deprivation manifests itself in a variety of ways, where I end up feeling unworthy of greatness. How can I be fulfilled, when I’m not filling myself with that which causes me to feel internally uplifted?

Basically, I have had the most pleasure in my life when I am being genuine. The more honesty and core integrity I ground in, the better the results.

I find diets to be just that – disingenuous. Why do I want to force a body type that is not natural? If I am dieting, usually it is for someone else (their view of what looks good on you), and people-pleasing is never a good starting point for anything. Also, despite the ads that claim delectable treats aplenty with their particular program, I have yet to see a regimen that includes my favorite – Girl Scout Cookies.

With a diet, I’ll be eating foods that do not have the taste I find to be the most satisfying. “Delicious” is my goal, not “deprivation.”

The other issue is that I have been taught to think that fats and sugars are the only way to please the palette, and that organic (natural) eating is for the hippies who smoked the taste buds off their tongues. It is stored in my mind that sweets and fats are a reward, and that greens will not give me strength, even though hay-eating horses would kick my ass in a fight or a race.

Now, good health is another story. Instead of allowing the script to be written by societal “norms,” I now choose to look elsewhere for my positive changes. Once I began committing to wellness, my world opened up. And I mean literally it showed me a way of being that is not exposed to us on a regular basis. What is shown to us on a mega scale is the quick and easy fare, and there are billions of dollars spent promoting something that is not organic to our digestive system. Actually, a lot of it is poison, but we would not know that, since the mainstream media cannot and will not reveal these secrets, or the sponsors who pay their salaries would shut them down.

Therefore, I had to explore alternative methods of healing and wellness, and I am damn glad I did! Sure, I don’t have perfect body/perfect health, and certainly a sleeve of thin mints would contradict myself, but in general I am far closer to great living than if I took the road of the masses.

The consumer mentality has consumed much of our psyche, but the bummer is, the things we want more of are harmful to us. 

The “more whores” have taken over our collective thought patterns, and I personally want to stay clear of that. There is no end to their foundationless desire to attain happiness by accumulation, and this includes devouring a Denny’s Grand Slam Breakfast or an all-you-can-eat 99-cent buffet in Reno.

Big quantities and small quality. What if we focused on re-labeling our ideas about good food, and put more importance into the octane of the fuel we put into our bodies? It’s one thing to put the 87test gasoline into a rental car, but I want to get more than a hundred thousand miles out of my vehicle!

I am digging the simplicity, depth and breadth of my current lifestyle, where I place importance on critical thinking and expanding my creative spirit. Limiting, as we do when we diet, does not serve that purpose of expanding my world.

More about this in days to come, but to sum it all up – it’s all about balance. The more I focus on the yin AND the yang, the better off I will be. The times I take a step back and look for core truth, is when I am most successful.

I will do just fine in this latest goal documentation. It will evolve into something unique and fun for me, and if I lose a few pounds in the process and can play with my family with a touch more bounce, then I done good!