How Do You Lose Weight? Seriously. I Want to Know.

Losing weight is a weird thing. In the summer of 2010, I was the heaviest I’ve ever been. That fall, I started hanging out with a girl who lived a mile from my house. Every day, I’d walk her home. So every day, about four times a week, I was walking two miles. Without even trying, in a month and a half I’d lost 20 pounds. By accident.

That was the only time something like that happened to me. Since then, I’ll hear stories like this from other people and think, I could do that, too. Stories like “So-and-so lost 10 pounds in two weeks after she quit drinking soda.” I overheard a guy at work tell another co-worker he lost four pounds in a week from drinking green tea every night (I’ve been drinking ungodly amounts of green tea ever since – no weight loss yet.) But if everyone could do these things and they work for everyone, why haven’t we all lost the weight we want to lose?

There are several answers to that question. Some would probably start by discussing magazines and movie stars and the unrealistic expectations society puts on us about our bodies – remember when Kate Winslet, upon learning pictures of her were photoshopped, both on the cover and inside of the British GQ, was so irate she told the press, ““I do not look like that, and more importantly, I don’t desire to look like that?” If someone as good-looking as Kate Winslet gets photoshopped, what hope do the rest of us have?

Some would probably also answer the question with saying “people are lazy” or that “they don’t try hard enough.” It is certainly not the intention of this particular writer to offer an answer to this, except to say that after losing those 20 pounds by accident in the fall of 2010, I’ve stayed at the same weight for the last two years solid, with hardly any deviation, whether I tried to lose weight or not. In a certain light, maybe that’s a blessing – you’d think after I stopped walking so much the weight would return.

On the other hand, according to my BMI, I’m still overweight. I don’t particularly feel overweight, but sometimes I think it would be nice to look like Jake Gyllenhaal. BMI is this weird thing that people who are “serious” about weight loss discuss. I’d heard of it but never really looked into it until now. BMI stands for Body Mass Index and is basically a way to turn your weight and height into yet another number to make you feel bad about yourself. In case you’re curious, the math formula is this: weight in pounds times 700 divided by your height in inches squared. If your answer is between 19 and 24.9, you’re in the healthy range.

According to this whole BMI nonsense, to get into the “healthy” BMI range I have to lose about 35 pounds. How do you lose 35 pounds? How does that even happen to you? At work, I deal with a lot of people who are fussy about what they eat. How much sodium? How many calories? How many grams of fat? Is it sweetened? Do you have artificial sweetener? The whole hoopla makes my body ache.

Yet, I must venture into this madness – because I have a goal to become awesome before your very eyes, dear readers. So how do I lose 35 pounds? According to this article, these steps are a good start:

1. Eat vegetables to help you feel full
2. Drink plenty of water
3. Get tempting foods out of your home
4. Stay busy - you don't want to eat just because you're bored
5. Eat only from a plate, while seated a table. No grazing in front of the fridge.
6. Don't skip meals.

I can say with some confidence that I am not a food-grazer. I pretty much get my food and then sit in front of the television and watch something –I’ve read on a couple of sites that this is also bad news. While you’re distracted, you eat all this food you probably wouldn’t have eaten in the first place.

Other than that and the list, the most practical guides on the internet offer the same basic advice, regardless of whether it’s a fad or crash diet or just some practical information: eat less, exercise more. Can it be that easy?

But here’s the problem – there is so much information out there, that it is very hard to cut through the bullshit and find the actual information that you want. For instance, according to this poorly written but seemingly well-informed article, instead of trying to lose weight and gain muscle at the same time, you should focus on gaining muscle solely first and then move onto weight loss, because the extra muscle will help you burn the fat later. This article advises against overhauling your entire diet and exercise plan to lose weight and instead tells you 50 simple ways to make you healthier overall. And this one says that you should concentrate on weight loss, not as a diet, but as a wholesale lifestyle change.

I didn’t even venture into the arena of crash diets and fads – I clinked on no links offering the chance to “lose weight fast.” Yes, there are shakes and there are cleanses and maybe these things work just fine for some people, but honestly, it seems like a bad plan to this writer.

So where does that leave us? How do you lose weight? Dear readers, I think it may be a matter of choosing who to believe out there and giving it a try. I believe that weight loss should not be a math problem. There’s not a fix-all solution. And perhaps that’s the reason why so many people fail at dieting and weight loss – because they seek an answer that will magically fix their problems.

For me, I choose practicality. One hour of cardio, five times a week. More fruits and vegetables. Drink lots of water. Avoid sitting on the couch/bed for too long watching television. And the biggest one for me: significantly cut back, and ultimately quit, drinking soda. That’s 150 calories for each little can – and I drink about four a day. Also, according to this article, two or more a week can lead to pancreatic cancer. I mean, seriously, that’s some scary stuff.

Back to our question that started this thing – I cannot tell you how to lose weight. I tried. I did the research. But maybe if you bear with me, I can tell you how I lost it.

Can I lose 30 pounds by Jan. 1? I declared that on Nov. 9 and to be honest, it was a bit ambitious. I don’t know if I can. But my boy Plato says an unexamined life is not worth living and even though he wasn’t talking about weight loss, I am. Let’s give it a try, ramblers. Stay with me. Let’s see where this thing goes.

The First Two Lessons of Becoming Awesome

So it seems to me that if one is to become awesome, there are two very important rules (at least two...we'll call these "the first two") that one must abide by. What are those rules?

The First Rule: You Gotta Be Kind To Yourself

I dated this girl once. She called me B Digs (the origin of that particular name is lost to time and possibly never made any sense to begin with) and she'd say to me so often, "B Digs, you gotta be kind to yourself."

She'd say it at times when I would be talking about problems - you know, work problems, school problems, financial problems and every time she said it, I'd always wonder, what the hell are you talking about? 

Because, truly, I thought I was being kind to myself. This is how you handle a problem, according to me:

1. Define it
2. Figure out how to solve it
3. Solve it

Which, I'm pretty sure there is nothing wrong with that definition of "solving a problem." The trouble was, I was trying to define, figure out and solve every problem of my life, all at once. There was weight to lose and muscles to gain and papers to grade and grades to improve and papers to write and family to keep in touch with and friends to be there for and a girlfriend to please and guitar to improve on and short stories, poems and nonfiction pieces to write and dishes to do and carpets to vacuum and laundry to do and apartments to keep clean and...well, you understand.


So often we forget in the immensity of life that though we live in multitudes, we don't necessarily have to compartmentalize ourselves down into oblivion. Figure out what is important to you and do it in the most kind way - let the dishes slide if you must. Or the running. Or the bills. Do not drive yourself crazy with your definition of awesome.

You gotta be kind to yourself.

And sometimes, being kind to yourself may just mean a time out. Shut off the phone. Grab the red wine or beer or whatever and sit down and watch a movie by yourself. Or skip the alcohol and go for a long drive. Or walk. Do something for you. No one else will or can provide that kind of experience.

2: Be Your Worst Critic and Learn to Be Okay With That

At 26, there is no one to tell you, "Holy shit, why is your room so damn messy? Do you see how messy it is? Do you realize you've lived in this room for two weeks with a pizza box just chilling in the corner? Do you KNOW how disgusting that is?" except for you.

You are the watchman of your own life. Don't ever put that on someone else. Your life is the way it is because you choose it to be. You can say, yes, the economy, yes, your parents did that, yes, your spouse did this, but there comes a point when you must look at your room and say, yeah, okay, this pizza box has got to go.

Similarly, you can reassure your Great Aunt Sally who you see twice a year that yes, you are applying to jobs and no, you haven't found anything in your field yet - but if it's not true, what the heck are you even bothering to tell Great Aunt Sally for? Only you can push you. Get out there and get it, son.

A Promise to Become Awesome Before Your Very Eyes

            I spent my whole life listening to the advice my elders: I followed my passions, believed strongly in the so-called American Dream. If you set your mind to it and try hard enough, you can do whatever you want to do. So when I graduated with my M.A. in English last May, I thought I deserved one more summer as a kid.

            I took my old part-time job I’d been working on and off for five years, during summers and Christmas breaks. I hung out with friends from high school, friends from back home, many of whom I hadn’t spent a significant amount of time with in a long time. I made new friends, reconnected with people I met last summer. I rested my brain – no more Zizek, Donne, Althussar, Chekov, Plath. I paused the action.

            Then, about two months ago, I decided it was time to return to the path I was on. I made my part time job even more part time – just the weekends. Theoretically, I was going to become awesome – apply to jobs, get freelance gigs, finally get paid to do what I loved so dearly.

            Instead, I became addicted to the television show Criminal Minds. I broke out my old N64, tracked down Janus and became Wrestlemania champion. I wrote a little, but not enough. I spent a lot of time on the couch.

            I wrote an extremely personal creative nonfiction essay over the summer, which was recently picked up by the good folks over at Sundog Lit (which you should probably read every word there, since they have committed themselves to publishing work that burns the retinas - it's a true honor that they picked my essay up.) It’s going to be published in January. This has re-invigorated me.

            I’m tired of hearing stories of people who betrayed their passions to take jobs they hate. Recently I heard that even T.S. Eliot worked as a bank teller.

            No, my good friends, my loyal ramblers – no. Not this guy. I’m overeducated and until recently, I’ve been undercaffeinated. It’s time to reach out and take the world by storm, the best way I can, any way that I can.

            So this is my promise to you: by January 1^st, I will become awesome. And I will tell you about how I became awesome. You can read about it here, right here, on my ramblings blog. No more will the proverbial dishes stack up in the sink. No more will the laundry be left undone. 

            The goals: 

1.      Find a job that sustains me

2.      Lose 30 pounds

3.      Quit smoking

4.      Write and write and write

5.      Be awesome

Want to read and watch me become awesome? Well, then, my dear readers – read on.

Breaking Up is Hard To Do...But Maybe Only If You're A Man?

If you’ve ever worked in the back of a restaurant (doing dishes, slicing tomatoes, whatever) you probably know that one of the biggest perks is getting to listen to the radio. At my place of employment, the music played in the dining room is either jazz melodies of famous 90s pop songs or easy listening that even a grandmother can rock out to (the best song I ever heard was a female on acoustic guitar doing “Here Comes the Sun,” but that was a rarity.) But in the back of house, all bets are off.

             For most of summer, the music in the back came from a busted radio. Country, pop and rap stations came in really clear, but beyond that, it was kind of staticy and janky. I was coming off a break-up when I started back up at this restaurant back in May. It was my first adult break-up (it involved graduate school, “what I want to do with my life,” and “going different places.”) Even though the reasons behind it were perfectly understandable on a heady, I-see-your-point kind of way, essentially, I was pretty broken up about it.

            Luckily for me, the summer of 2012 was the Summer of Break-Up songs. So at work, I received lots of advice from pop songs. Gotye reminded me that she’s just somebody I used to know, even if it was an “ache I still remember” and warned me that “you can addicted to a certain kind of sadness.” I always (somewhat embarrassingly) belted out the part that said, “I don’t even need your love, but you treat me like a stranger and that feels so rough.” It’s comforting somehow that the people of the world of pop were on my side.  Maroon 5 told me that “all those fairytales are full of shit” and that “if happy ever did exist, I would still be holding you like this” while Wiz Khalifa reminded me, “Man, fuck that shit.” I also got really into Drake this summer, and Andre 3000’s advice on “The Real Her” also provided a hilarious comfort: “Please be careful. Bitches got the rabies.”

            Indeed, sir Andre. Indeed. So I was pretty much on my way to demonizing every woman, ever when Taylor Swift, out of nowhere, came out with her decidedly un-country sounding “We Are Never Ever Ever Getting Back Together.” The idea of a person being so done with a relationship that they wrote a song with the chorus “We are never ever, ever, ever getting back together” and even titling it that made me pause. Didn’t everyone have the recovery phase after a relationship? I mean, how can you be so over a relationship in this way?

            Given that Taylor Swift is notorious for writing songs that are about real things in her life (see: Dear John, about John Mayer, Innocent, about Kanye West’s “Imma let you finish!” and pretty much every other song she ever wrote) I took pause. Do men and women look at relationships fundamentally different? For every Maroon 5 and Gotye, hanging onto past relationships, unsure of what the hell to do with the whole thing and the emotions behind them, are there Taylor Swifts, gleefully over their relationships, throwing the past behind them with the greatest force they can muster?  Are these two sides of the same equation? If Gotye’s ex could write a song, would it be Taylor Swift’s “We Are Never Ever, Ever, Getting Back Together” (like, ever)?

            According to an article in Men's Health, men handle break-ups a lot worse than women. Why? The article says because men have fewer friends, idolize the dating game, mask their pain with alcohol or trying to appear awesome after a break-up and hate to start over. Even though those reasons make men sound like a bunch of idealistic assholes with a fifth of Jack in one hand and a weight in the other, it sounds true enough to me. The more I’ve looked at pop songs, the more I’ve seen a decided difference between the way women write break-up songs and the way men do.

            Consider Carrie Underwood’s “Before He Cheats.” She takes a Louisville Slugger to the poor dude’s car, destroys the interior AND the exterior and, in the music video, has a telekinetic vandalism spree across a city. Whereas in rough contemporary Jake Owen’s “Alone With You,” dealing with a girl who may or may not be cheating on him, depending on whether or not they actually are together (he seems to think they are? I guess?) he can’t stand the fact that she only gets physical when she’s drunk. He doesn’t want to be alone with her, but he can’t seem to stop himself. He says, “Don’t say you love me because I know you’re going to love me and leave.” Underwood would have him set fire to her house.

            Consider the year 2000, a year picked pretty much just because I wanted to talk about No Doubt. In the year 2000, they released the song “Ex-Girlfriend,” in which she says “I kind of always knew I’d end up your ex-girlfriend. I hope I hold a special place with the rest of them.” In the music video, an actual ex-boyfriend of singer Gwen Staffani (played by the bassist of the band) and a couple cronies are peeing in a men’s bathroom when Staffini comes in dressed as a man and beats them all up. Catharsis? It certainly seems like it. Meanwhile, in the same year, Pink’s “There You Go” said “There you go talkin’ bout you miss me so, that you love me, so I let you go.” You let him go because he loved you? What the heck? Alice Deejay asked that year “Do you think you’re better off alone?” and Britney Spears told us, “Oops, I did it again. I played with your heart, got lost in the game.” Girl power! Toni Braxton told the girl who is currently dating her old boyfriend that it was her who broke up with him, after all, and she couldn’t possibly care that he’s dating someone new because “He Wasn’t Man Enough.” Meanwhile, 98 Degrees released a song called “Give Me Just One More Night,” Backstreet Boys wanted to know the meaning of being lonely and English boy band BBMak said they wouldn’t do anything until “you’re back here, baby.”

Which makes one wonder, was LFO’s “Girl on TV” a throwback to the days of chivalry, a clever analysis of the current relationship landscape as depicted by pop music, a metaphor for the often-advertised unattainability of the women of 2000? Or was it just because he “met a fly girl and can’t relax.” Schooby doo-wop and Scooby snacks. But the fly girl in question was indeed a movie star, a girl on TV, a girl that, though he has met her in person, he couldn’t possibly even imagine himself being with, because she is so often on TV. The protagonist of this song wonders if his friends will even believe him. So does that mean men are left wishing on falling stars, as lost as the terrible pop boy band LFO? Are we all doomed to think it’s fly when girls stop by for the summer, but forced to see them as though they might as well be on the other side of the silver screen?

            Has there been some kind of gender swap in the dating arena? Cinema, music and television would have me believe that thirty years ago, even twenty, men were the ones saying goodbye in a hurry and women were the ones mourning. I mean, consider Jewel’s entire career. Maybe the swap all started when Dave Coulier famously dumped Alanis Morrisette, causing her to write Jagged Little Pill, an anthem for scorned lovers across the world. It seems like maybe from the moment she snarled into the microphone, “Are you thinking of me when you fuck her?” on “You Oughta Know,” the game was irrevocably changed.

            And yet.

Swift’s next single after “We Are Never Ever, Ever Getting Back Together” was a song called “Begin Again,” a decidedly more country-sounding song. Given how much the first single of her new as-yet-unreleased album made me think, I checked out the new song. It describes that odd and awkward feeling of going on a first date while still not completely over your ex. Swift said in an interview recently that the new album is about the toxic relationships she’s gotten into since the last album, so I think it’s safe (although not conclusive) to assume the relationship she’s not quite over here is the one discussed in “We Are Never, Ever, Ever Getting Back Together.” While the previous guy, we learn, didn’t like her to wear high heels, didn’t think she was funny and didn’t understand a song on the radio, Swift does seem to be having a lot of difficulty getting past it.

            Strangely, this comforted me in an odd way. Even though it will probably never be as popular as “We Are Never Ever, Ever Getting Back Together” was, it’s nice to know that even though Swift can write the guy off, she’s still trying to get past it. For a few months there during the summer, given all the pop music and all the relationships my male friends got into and out of, I really started to think maybe there was something to the idea that women have an easier time with break-ups than men do.

             But, no. Morrisette, while angry as hell on Jagged Little Pill, is still not over the past. Underwood, while destroying the car of her former boyfriend, is still hurting deeply. Staffani still acknowledges that even though she suspected she would become this guy’s ex-girlfriend, she should have thought about that before they kissed. And while “Girl on TV” was based on Jennifer Love Hewitt and none of the guys from LFO dated her, she did appear in the music video and John Mayer would later go on to write “Your Body is a Wonderland” about her, presumably writing from experience, although Hewitt herself said of the song, "My body is more like a pawn shop."

            The truth is, eventually, we all have a moment where maybe we want to say the things Alanis does on “You Oughta Know” and we all feel for a time that fairytales are full of shit like Maroon 5. Maybe we want to get out our baseball bats or sing anthems about how done we are with something. Maybe we all want to tell the new people dating our exes that our exes were terrible and they’re welcome to them, the way Toni Braxton did. But songs are the venues for this, because songs get to be larger than life. Songs get to destroy cars and interrupt exes at dinner with their new boyfriend/girlfriend. They are not a road map for life.

            Eventually, after a break-up, even if the girl or guy becomes somebody you used to know, you come to the realization Swift does on Begin Again: “What’s Past is Past.” Being a man, maybe statistically I have a worse chance of seeing that right away. Maybe I’m more likely to turn into another Maroon 5 song: This love has taken its toll on me. But even Adam Levine got over the Jane who the songs on Songs About Jane were about.

            Hell, even Alanis Morrisette moved on and had a string of relationships after Dave Coulier, even marrying a rapper named Mario “MC Souleye” Treadway in 2010. If the scorned lover that all other scorned lovers look to as a model can find love again, surely there is hope for the rest of us.

            In the meanwhile, left to my own devices, if I’m going to listen to popular singles, I’d much rather listen to Fun.’s “Some Nights.” Luckily, we got a new IPod dock at work, so my days of listening to pop music radio are over. No more Gotyes or Swifts to mess with my head while I’m scrapping pasta and black beans out of soup bowls.

            What are we left with here, dear reader? Men and women DO look at break-ups differently. But so what? This does not make one or the other better or worse at break-ups. Just different. In the end, it’s still over. You are never ever ever getting back together. Some nights you stay up cashing in your bad luck, some nights you call it a draw. My advice? Call it a draw and move on. Listen to songs about the destruction of cars or people getting beaten up in bathrooms if you have to. Then you gotta act like Jay-Z and move on to the next one.

10 Things That People Do to Seriously Enrage Cashiers

I heard once that the occupations with the highest suicide rate were dentists, toll booth employees and cashiers. Although none of my research found these jobs on the list of highest suicide rates, or even most stressful jobs, I do still contend that despite what you may think, being a cashier has a high level of suckitude.

Why does it suck so much? Because people are irrational, unobservant creatures who would often prefer to press buttons on a machine than talk to a cashier. Perhaps you yourself believe you are a very polite individual and often treat cashiers with the utmost respect, and you may even be such a person. However, everyone has an off day where they just want to get their food and go home and aren't interested in being polite. A cashier who talks to hundreds of people of day will encounter a lot of jerks and it is possible that some of those people are just having an off day. Or maybe that's wishful thinking about the vast majority of humanity.

In any case, here is a list of things that make cashiers mad, upset or annoyed. They are not necessarily the most annoying in this order, because I can never decide which is the worst infraction. Please do not be one of these people, ever:

1) People With Unreasonable Requests

"Hi, I would like a bagel, only half of it toasted, with exactly six tomatoes and four butters. I do not want the tomatoes to be too green or too red. I want the bagel toasted to the point right before it gets burnt, but dark enough that the butter instantly melts."

You are annoying. Go buy a bag of bagels, a tomato, a toaster and a can of butter. Spend an entire day making your order. Realize you are a terrible human being.

2) People who walk away without paying/without their change/without getting their shit

This is a TRANSACTION. Please do yourself and everyone else the favor of completing it before you go off to talk to your wife or Aunt Suzie about how the Lions are really going to do it this year (p.s., they aren't.) Don't make the poor guy behind the counter bring you your change, your bagel, or ask you to pay. It's just not right.

3) People who bring their dog into the store

Stores are for humans. I don't care who you are or what your pooch's deal is. Get a leash, tie ol' Scrappers outside.

4) People who do not say hi

Hello, sir. I'm a human being. Are you a human being? Let's all agree to act like humans, k?

5) People Who Talk on Their Cell Phone While Ordering

This one practically goes without saying. The worst part is when they do this and then APOLOGIZE like I'm going to forgive them. One lady once said to me, "I'm sorry, I'm very important," and then laughed like she'd made a joke. Maybe she was making a joke. But she clearly thought she was important otherwise she would've at least put the damn thing down.

6) People Who Talk in Unnatural Coffee Vernacular Borrowed from Starbucks

"Hi, I'd like a Venti Skinny No Caf Iced Macciato." Yes, I know what you're saying. You're still a douchebag.

7) People Who Make Five Year Olds Order

Little Timmy is terrified of strangers and unsure of his own decisions. Don't put him up to the register and expect him to be able to order. Order for him. Be a good parent, a good customer and conscientious to the people behind you.

8) People Who Pronounce Foods in Unnatural Accents

Person in Midwestern Accent: "Hi, I'd like a French Cwrissoooont." Do we pronounce Detroit "De Twa"? No. Unless you're French, don't do this.

9) People Who Greet Long Lost Friend in the Middle of Order

Okay, so you haven't seen Sally since that night in college when the two of you...you know. Or maybe it's your Uncle Jessie that you haven't talked to since Third Grade, the night the two of you watched the last episode of Full House together and cried and laughed about how his name is Uncle Jessie just like John Stamos, but he's been out of the country for the last 15 years and you really want to say hello. Please tell your cashier whether it is for here or to go FIRST and then pay FIRST and then go see if things between you and Sally are salvageable or whether Uncle Jessie missed you.

10) Couples Who Make Out/Cudde/Do Cutesy Things With Their Significant Other

Dudes. I remember when I was in high school, too. Do I want to reenact this while I'm telling the cashier to leave off the onions on my sandwich? No, I do not. Please take your tongues out of each other's mouths and order like big boys and girls. What's that? You are fifteen and still in high school? K, cool. Then either order or get out.




 Honorable Mentions:

People Who Throw Money on the Counter, Instead of Placing It In The Outstretched Hand Of The Cashier

Dude, why? If the cashier threw your change on the counter instead of handing it to you, you might ask to talk to their manager. Why would you do this to them?

People Who Say "That'll Do It"

Anyone of my generation who grew up watching "Babe" will be instantly reminded of the quote, "That'll do, Pig." I'm not a pig. And what will it do, exactly? This phrase is almost exclusively used by middle-aged men in dress clothes, leading me to suspect that if you are a man, once you hit 40, you spend your time wandering around wondering what will "do it" and analyzing exactly how much of whatever it is it will take to make sure "it" has been "done." Just don't say it, okay? Ever.