I have a notebook. Small, spiral. When I go somewhere, it goes too. It has a lot of things in it, mostly mundane: iterations of the ever-changing shopping list and to-do list. Errands I'd like to run. Thoughts. Phone numbers to call. During trips away from home, lists of postcards to send and assortments of new addresses and driving directions tend to pop up.

Were my notebook just comprised of those lists, I'd have no hesitation in letting anyone see the contents. The problem is that there's always a little more in there, and that "little more" is personal enough for me that I just can't share the full contents with anyone else.

Those are my lists of things I want out of my life as my weight loss progresses. Some of them are overarching. Some are little. Some are just dumb. Every one of them represents something intensely personal that I've felt I've lost due to the extra weight I carried.

Upon showing Jody this photo of Tenzing… Jody: "Your cats are sluts." Me: "I know."

Colorado is, after all, a landlocked state. Perhaps I should have considered this before attempting the quest I did on that warm winter day, but then again, sometimes you don't get to pick your quests. Your quests pick you.

I'd realized the shaggy state of my exercise swimsuit while I was in Colorado, and thought that since it was the off-season, I might be able to find a reasonably-priced swimsuit while I was on vacation. This, of course, led to the uttering of the World's Worst Sentence, which I knew better than to say but said anyway:

We tiptoed out, the three of us, on the wrong side of midnight, between the last of the party conversations and the beginning of the out-of-town guests settling in for an abbreviated night's sleep.

Ever tried to climb naked into an unfamiliar hot tub in the dark while mistakenly attempting to preserve some semblance of modesty? Let me reassure you: it's just as difficult as you might think. Still, darkness sometimes breeds bravery, and I tumbled in with the words, "Well, I have two of everything I'm supposed to have two of, and one of everything else, so … screw it."

* * * * *

Every house should have a set of stairs, even if they're decorative, just so that the quiet folk have a secluded spot to retreat to during even the loudest of parties.

This way is as appropriate as any to make the introduction:

While we're at it, let's go for two in one day! Yahoo user aces_allnight14, a strong studly specimen hailing from Birmingham, Alabama, appears to be so absolutely desperate to get laid that he's trolling for nethoneys…and found (you guessed it!) me.

Tact, honey. It's about tact. Heard of it? It's that non-negotiable part between meeting a woman and clubbing her over the head for sex. Some people refer to it as "small talk." I like to think of it as an occasionally-useful part of the pre-coital process.