Month: January 2012

Morning bike ride. Top of the climb (sort of).

Near HonoLua, Maui.

Welcome back to those of you who may have been scared away by Google’s warning that the Alter Ego was an “Attack Site”. This is like flagging Mother Theresa as a terrorist.

I removed various malware, and submitted a formal request to Google for a new review of the site, in order to have it removed from the “no surf” list.

Sheesh.

Meanwhile, we waited in the Anchorage airport for our plane to Maui. The latter being ninety degrees warmer than the former.

Later, free decadence in first class at thirty six thousand feet above the Pacific. “Would you like another Mai Tai Mr. Nibbe?” Yes, plz. Bring one every fifteen minutes until I doze off, then bring one every thirty minutes.

An inconvenient truth.

I want to lose 185 pounds and get back to my original weight. Fat chance. Ha!

When you’re young it’s all about growing up, getting bigger, clean your plate, etc. Somewhere around your thirties the great reversal arrives. Someone notes your Milwaukee tumor – “Dude, you’re getting a paunch.” You resolve to slim down, exercise more, eat less and less often. Beaches and skinny jeans terrify you.

Here in Alaska in winter we battle another urge, the ceaseless voice inside imploring you to eat! eat! eat! Hard times are coming. Time to store fat. Yaddy ya. You feel helpless to resist. A bag of Lays and a pint of French Onion dip disappears in under an hour. Before you realize it you can barely bend over your tumor to tie your shoes.

And it has been cold. And snowy beyond usual. Look.

Ugh. Time for another bag of Lays. Krinkle cut.

I had the perfect email ready to go. No body, merely a subject line: “Say Cheese, Baby!”

The recipients had been carefully selected. Hitting the send key was going to feel like opiates flooding my brain. My pregame giddiness was almost pathological.

No mail was sent. I feel today as if I need a treatment center. There may be nothing so difficult as coming down. Reassurances from loved ones help but do not heal.

What the hell happened? I do not know. Who wants to bear witness to a train wreck. It was like the contradiction of a near death experience: It happened so fast yet seemed to unfold in slow motion.

Tomorrow will come. When it does, I will be here, a Cheesehead for life.