A New Problem

Dorothy felt trapped on the farm. She knew there must be more to life than counting chicken eggs and hanging out with Hunk, Zeke, and Hickory. There was a wonderful world out there somewhere over the rainbow. A life with meaning. A life of happiness. Heck, a life in color.

Taking a page out of Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt’s book, she hopped a twister and before she could say foreshadowing, she got her wish. She made it over the rainbow, all right. There’s one problem solved.

Unfortunately, she inadvertently whacked a witch in the process. This in and of itself wasn’t so bad, given the positive reception by the witch’s newly-liberated subjects. But it really ticked off the witch’s sister, who showed up in no time, seeking both revenge and a new pair of designer pumps. So now we have a new problem.

Some weeks ago I discovered a new fool-proof diet. I called it the Go To Bed As Soon As You Hit Your Calorie Intake For The Day plan. Whether that’s eleven in the morning or eleven at night, too bad. Go to bed. It was in response to my own problem of “doing good” all day, then losing it sometime after seven o’clock. I don’t think I’d be going out on a limb saying we’ve all experienced this.

Somehow, though—and I can only call it magic—I’ve gotten past this. I don’t know if it’s because I’ve been tracking daily calories like a fiend, or it’s because I have to report my progress to the interwebs once a week, but I’m not heading back to the fridge every night like I used to. There’s one problem solved.

Instead, I seem to save it all up for Saturday night. Without fail, I hop on the scale Saturday morning, find I’ve reached my lowest weight for the week, then swear I won’t screw it up. Come Saturday evening, though, I end up surrounded by chips, fries, pizza, queso, burgers, chicken planks, or enchiladas and Sunday morning, I end up two pounds heavier. So now we have a new problem.

In the grand scheme of things, though, it’s probably not really a problem. I’d rather fall apart once a week than once a day. And even though I was 207 on Saturday, in all reality I’m probably still 207 deep down. (I didn’t honestly expect to eat a half a bag of potato chips, drink two beers, down a large cheeseburger, and take a bath in cookie dough, then somehow weigh less a mere ten hours later.) Besides, the plan that doesn’t let you enjoy yourself once in a while is the plan doomed to stay in Oz forever.

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