Diets

Human nature being what it is I have managed to work round the lack of bread and also seem to have avoided losing weight. This is not what the bread ban was intended to do, but it is a tribute to the ability of my body to avoid salad and weight loss.

It's a tricky one. The only answer I can see is to use more self-control and less calories.

I sit here. I read the words.

They don't actually seem to mean anything.

If you mention cake I know immediately what the words mean.

Mention salad and I merely shudder.

This morning I went into town to do some errands. These included checking mobile phone prices because mine died on me this morning. It's had a hard life in the last four and a half years so I can't really complain, though I wasn't too impressed by the way the salesman sniggered after asking "May I have a look at your current phone?"

Anyway, as I was looking in shop windows I started looking at watches. I don't know if you've noticed the growing trend but it amazes me how many yards of watch display now feature watches by non-watch companies.

If I wanted a suit I wouldn't buy one off Timex, or designer wear off Citizen or Sekonda, so why would I want to buy a Hugo Boss watch, or one by D&G or DKNY?

I haven't decided on a new phone yet, and I certainly haven't solved the puzzle of why people would pay to have a watch made a clothes designer.

It's just one of those 21st century days when I find myself wishing for a sudden flash of insight.

Or a machine gun. A Heckler & Koch as used by the SAS. That should do the trick, I thought.

Then I checked on their website.

They make bloody watches!

My personal trainer has told me to stop eating bread.

There are some words you wouldn't expect to hear from a dedicated salad dodger like me aren't there?

I'm not paying him, you understand. He owns the gym I go to and he's adopted me. It isn't that he really wants to train me, it's just that the sight of me gradually turning purple on the treadmill before breathing my last sprawled across a Swiss Ball is likely to put people off. It could even be that he isn't trying to get me fit - just to scare me off.

Anyway, it's seven days since I last ate bread. Almost. It's actually six days and twenty hours since the instruction was delivered. My response was to come home, eat three slices of toast with beans for tea and then top up with a couple more with marmalade. It wasn't greed, it was part of a mourning process. So it's really six days and nineteen hours since life was worth living. It seems longer. Since then I have eaten just half a slice of bread and one panini, despite the many offers of sandwiches and toast from the Spawn of Satan that masquerade as my children.

And there we have it, the crux of the matter - sandwiches. Without bread you can't make sandwiches. And without sandwiches...

...you are forced to eat salad.

I hate it. It's one step too far in getting in touch with my feminine side. Besides that, there's something so unBritish about salad. The French and Californians, to name but two expendable groups of people, eat salad. Until I can come up with an alternative, so do I. And I don't like it.

Think about it. Agincourt, Trafalgar, Rorke's Drift, Zeebrugge, D-Day - does salad enter your mind? No, I thought not. That, I think, proves my point.

A Guardian Angel?

Acting under advice from my wife I'm going to let the subject of the parking vigilante drop. She says it's bad for my blood pressure, and also rightly points out that the activities of a self-appointed traffic warden telling people they can't park in his street don't really matter as I've only been down that road twice in the last five years. Once I went to the climbing centre, once to the sport pavilion. Neither of them are my natural habitat so she's probably right. Anyway, hassling motorists is probably the only thing giving meaning to his life. Without this hobby he may die, she says. Personally I don't have a problem with that.

Talking about death, I met a man who has died three times today. Or, to be more accurate - I met a man today who has died three times. I was eating a scone, talking to my wife and minding my own business in Tesco. Somebody tapped me on the shoulder. I turned, scone halfway to my mouth, expecting to see an acquaintance. A friend would not have interfered with my eating.

"I've got diabetes." a complete stranger said. What do you say to that. "Congratulations" didn't seem appropriate. That was the start of a long story of diabetes, pain, death, how he used to be overweight (he kept looking at me for some reason when he discussed weight). Anyway, he eventually left.

Now, at this point I have to confess that I don't sit comfortably within the confines of the standard NHS Body Mass Index chart. The "X" that marks my spot on the chart misses the dark red "Life Threateningly Obese" zone and finds a convenient space in the margin to call its own. I am, I confess, about two feet too short for my height. But I don't need a passing stranger to tell me this. I have noticed.

Then blow me, he came back for another go, in case I had missed the point earlier on, or in case I was in danger of enjoying my scone.

My wife thinks he was a guardian angel sent to warn me about my health.

Me, I think I'm going to stop eating at Tesco.

Is it really a week?

I didn't mean to leave it this long. As it is, I have nothing to say at the moment. I'm thinking of a rant about car parking vigilantes but have to go and a mend a fence now so will be back to this later. (That's a real fence, not a metaphorical one in case you are wondering. I long ago reached the point of tactlessness where it would take all day if I wanted to be nice to people I have upset.)

Data Protection

Just had an interesting email from someone I will refer to as "a national charity" because it sounds grand. They have sent me details of someone I can ask for money (which sounds less grand). They sent me his name, address and email address but told me that due to data protection legislation they can't give out personal phone numbers.

Interesting law...

It allows me to knock on the door and ask for money. I can burgle the house (an avenue of find-raising that we haven't fully explored yet, though it would fit in well with the car boot sales we do). I can even stalk him.

But I can't ring him.

Unless I have a phone book and the ability to read.

An antidote to depression

I had a depressing day on Sunday. However, I had a look at this site and it cheered me up. Not too keen on the event that seems to consist of jumping on the stomach of a fat man (for reasons obvious to those who know me) but the others look fun. Apart from the ones I can't understand. This clip is even better.