Friend of Julie: 10 Years in 100 days

Today marks my OFFICIAL 100 days on-program.

No sweets.

No bread.

No dunkin donuts. <---small miracle

No pasta. <---large miracle

No Never-Ending Pasta Bowls this year. <---divine intervention

Just me, my 1/2 lb. burgers, steaks, salmon, tilapia, lamb leg and every other tasty treat that has helped make slapping the cravings away easier.

Truth be told, I eat a LOT.

I have a huge appetite.

But my body is doing precisely what Julie said it would.

Sometimes I eat a 1/2 lb. burger and finish off what my son doesn't.

I eat twice the serving of fish you would be served in a restaurant. Sometimes more.

I can eat a LOT of steak.

I finished a whole crockpot of beanless chili in two days once.

Two pounds of hamburger inhaled in four sittings.

My wife had a little.

I ran a train on that @!$&#@.

Today I noticed that I could feel my cheekbones and my jawbone while applying shaving cream.

Yesterday I noticed that my belly doesn't overhang my belt anymore.

I have a muffin top now.

Granted, it's one of those massive blueberry muffins you get at a Vegas buffet, but it's a muffin top nonetheless.

That whole business got me curious.

Since I'm completely writer's blocked today (hence this diversion - trying to get the words flowing again), I decided to try on some clothes. Again.

I have these two snazzy-looking dress shirts I bought for work while I was still a wage slave. They were the right size, but I needed a tall and these were regular.

The only reason I needed a tall was the extra length in the tails that would accommodate the belly.

The good news is that the regular fits fine now.

The bad news is that I can now wrap those shirts around me like a sarong.

Or maybe that's good news...

The bad news is they were $80 each and I never wore either of them in public.

But it gets better...

The suit that I wore to my grandmother's funeral (before I gained ALL the weight... I was about 320-330 at that point, I think - 2010 was a stressful year) now wraps around me like a bathrobe.

I could never get it altered to fit right. It's just done.

$400 and I wore it twice.

But it gets even better...

I have a blazer that I bought in 2003. At that point in time my weight was holding perpetually steady at 300-305 all the time. My "over 40" switch had not been flipped into the ON position yet.

This was when I was drinking 2 32-ounce Mountain Dews or Coke Classics every day and eating McDonald's for lunch and D'Angelo subs for dinner every day.

And visiting the vending machines on my :15s. I did love my pastry...

By 2004 I was totally addicted to Hostess Banana Dream cakes. I would buy them two at a time from the vending machine at work.

I'm probably the reason they kept stocking them. They were selling 10 a week to me alone.

Who am I kidding... I STILL love pastry. I just love it from afar these days.

SLAP!

Now where was I?

The blazer is now at least two sizes too big. It is rapidly earning bathrobe status, too.

So, in 100 days I've turned back the clock by more than 10 years.

And I eat to my heart's content.

And I balance my veggies well.

And I drink a lot of seltzer with lime.

Seltzer with lime is the new Mountain Dew.

Not sure what I weigh now, obviously, but I do know it's been at least a decade since I've looked like this or was even close to this size.