Those of you who’ve known me for a while know that I’ve lost a lot of weight – at my lowest point, I’d lost 86 pounds. I am literally a different person than I was when this all started President’s day weekend of 2007.

But in the last couple of months since school started, I’ve gained about ten pounds back, and that realization has been extremely frustrating.

I can tell you exactly why: I’ve eaten like crap. Being back in school, exercising a lot, and bike commuting have made me feel like I had a license to eat whatever the hell I want.

The problem is, eating whatever the hell *I* want means eating about 30-50% more than I actually should eat. I’ve always been terrible at portion control unless I’m really, really concentrating on how much I’m eating.

And if you’re eating that much, unless you’re Michael Phelps swimming 10,000+ meters a day, you’re not going to burn all that shit off.

I always felt when I was working and trying to lose the weight that I would treat the weight loss as my second job. I think I need to get back to that mentality, because I’d slipped away from it for the last 3-4 months and that’s when things started to fall apart.

The thing that’s probably going to help me the most in getting back into physical shape is the fact that I am a complete tightwad: Most of the additional calories I’ve been taking in have been purchased in restaurants or off Twittering food trucks and not in grocery stores, and are thus expensive in both cash money and fat-assery.

So I’m getting back on the Public Declarations of Nutritional Intent bandwagon with a few resolutions to get this shit back under control, because I can already tell if I don’t it’s going bad, bad places which will require much larger pants:

- I will no longer count my bike commute as part of my exercise for the day. Either I actually work out or I have to really watch what I eat – I must choose one. It’s only about 2 miles each way anyway, and it’ll be a lot less strenuous in the uphill direction once I buy a bike that’s not a completely rusted out piece of shit (more to come on that in a couple weeks, hopefully).

- For larger platters, I need to stop stop eating halfway through, wait 15 minutes, and then decide if I am actually hungry for more or just wanting to finish it for the sake of finishing it. I have always been the “I must finish everything on my plate” type, often to my detriment. I need to be a lot better about stopping when I’m physically full.

- I will order healthier stuff when eating out. I will, in fact, have the salad. I will stop ordering the freakishly enormous chicken burrito from every Korean/Mexican Fusion food truck that pulls up to the quad. The healthier stuff, unsurprisingly, is usually cheaper because it’s just physically less food.

Proofreading this post, I realize I sound like I’ve become a little unhealthily fixated on food, but the problem is that if I’m not, I become flat-out unhealthy.

The good news is, I think I’ve identified the problem before I allowed it to get completely out of hand. We’ll see how it goes undoing the damage I’ve already done.

I went fishing with my dad today, and he did really well. He caught five fish: two HUGE cutthroat trout, two good-sized rainbows, and a pretty decent-sized brook trout.

I, on the other hand…I hooked one fish myself. Well, hooked might not be the right word. I had a little rainbow that was maybe five or six inches long bite on my fly, and I yanked the hook to set it.

Except I apparently yanked a little too hard for a fish that small, because this poor fish went FLYING out of the water, at least 10 yards onto the bank, and right next to the surprised and very amused guide.

The guide was nice enough to put what I’m sure was a very confused fish back in the water. His friends will never believe the story he tells: “My god, I saw giants!”

Two things gave me nice little “Oh…fuck…” moments this weekend, but for once, luck was actually on my side.

First, I dropped my ATM card at Benihana’s. I’d gone for a friend’s birthday, and dropped my wallet as I was getting ready to leave.

I didn’t realize the debit card was gone until we got to the post-Benihana bar, and I went to pay for drinks and found a horrifyingly empty slot. I walked back, fearing I’d have to go through the colossal pain in the ass of canceling it and getting a new one.

Thankfully, they found it immediately. The card was gone for only 15 minutes, and my bank’s online system seems to indicate that nobody used it in the meantime to pay for their awesome teriyaki steak.

The second almost-oh-fuck came today. I decided to bike down to the beach, but I hadn’t used my bike in some time, so I decided to pump up the tires with my little cigarette-lighter-port powered pump from my car’s roadside assistance kit.

I didn’t turn the car all the way on, I just turned the key so the battery would power the pump. When I finished, I put the pump away and then rode down to the beach. A few miles down, I went to stop, lock my bike, and walk down to the water.

Except I didn’t have my keys. I suddenly realized, “Oh fuck, they’re still in the damn ignition. And the power is still on.” So of course, when I got back to my apartment, an hour and a half after turning on the car, the battery was dead. Part of me was just glad the car was actually still there.

Thankfully, again, I found one of my neighbors that I’m friends with and got him to give me a jump. After a quick drive around, I stopped for gas on the theory that if it didn’t start, at least at a gas station I’d have a better chance at another jump to get home.

Even more luckily, the car turned over like nothing had happened. The short time it took the battery to run down indicates I probably need a new one, but still. Better to have it work for another few weeks until my 120k overhaul (THAT should be a fun use of my economic stimulus check) than be totally stranded.

And that’s how my weekend seemed like it was doomed twice, but it turned out to be pretty much fine.