Insomnia

My prolonged illness has thrown my sleep routine out of whack.

I was exhausted today, so I took two naps — one midday and one in the evening. When it came time to actually go to bed, I wasn’t tired. I tried to fall asleep, but I wasn’t observing any of my bedtime rituals: I wasn’t wearing my CPAP mask, I hadn’t taken my melatonin, and my mind wasn’t calmed.

I lay there staring into space.

Toto crawled over me, searching for the best nesting position. Kris snored. As often happens when I cannot fall asleep, my mind drifted to death. I imagined dying in a car crash. I remembered the day Dad died. I wondered who would die first, me or Kris?

Disconcerted, I went downstairs to the library and read comic books for two hours. Toto came down to keep me company, perched on my shoulders, wrapped around my neck and purring. I read X-Men. I read Star Wars. I read Superman.

At midnight I went back upstairs and crawled into bed. I could not sleep. Kris was still snoring. My sinuses were stuffed. I lay there trying to imagine what kind of superhero I would be if I were a superhero. Would I run as fast as the wind? Would I fly? Would I read minds? Would I sleep?

I got out of bed again and this time took some melatonin. Why hadn’t I done that in the first place? I checked my e-mail. I sat in front of the television and flipped from one informercial to another. There seemed to be some sort of Brendan Fraser fest coordinated between channels. And a Kevin Bacon fest.

I turned off the television and tried to fall asleep on the futon, but a heavy truck lumbered down the road and stopped at the neighbors. I heard Curt come out and talk with the driver. The truck began to beep beep beep as it backed up. For the next fifteen minutes I heard the scrape of shovels and gravel. I could not see from the window, but it seemed to me that the neighbors were getting a dump truck load of gravel at one in the morning.

Eventually I fell asleep. All night I had to contend with Nemo, who wanted to be curled at my side on the narrow futon, and Toto, who wanted Nemo to die.

I’m not particularly well-rested this morning.

Stayin’ Alive

I apologize for being scarce around here lately. I’m still mostly in sick mode, and don’t have a lot to write about other than being sick, and that’s not exactly interesting.

Briefly noted:

I still have a hacking cough and gunk in my lungs. It sucks.
On positive side effect of my illness was a loss of appetite and a subsequent loss of five pounds. Through sheer force of will, I am eating again, though I’m not really hungry. (I stopped by for a hot fudge sundae on my way home from work today as a method of obtaining more calories; I couldn’t finish the small dish of ice cream.)
There was an afternoon this weekend, when I was still feverish and stoned out on the vicodin, when a brief walk with Kris outside was a senses-shattering experience. The birdsong, the color, the feel of the grass on my feet: everything was bright and new and amazing. It was like seeing the world for the first time.
Last Tuesday, before I realized I was sick, I started to fix this site’s layout for Internet Explorer in Windows. I’m afraid that I simply made things worse before losing the thread of my plans, and now I don’t know what I had been doing. It’s VERY likely that I’m just going to implement a new site layout, one closer to the same thing that everyone else in the world uses. One the bright side, this will allow me to post more, smaller entries. Is that good? Bad?
I’m actually working on two or three largish entries, which is part of why I haven’t posted.

Tomorrow I’ll go for a walk with Jason. I may also see some more customers. ANY human interaction will bring a desire to share stories and to write a new weblog entry. That’d be good, eh?

Convalescing

I was moaning to Kris this morning about how awful I feel. “You should sit outside, get some fresh air,” she said. While I can’t say that following her advice has helped me physically, it’s made a world of difference mentally.

The sun is shining. The birds and the bugs are flitting to and fro. (There are so many insects in flight that the air looks like a thriving insect metropolis.) Everything is green. A warm breeze brings cherry blossoms from the far corner of the yard. The grass is quite tall — I tell myself that perhaps I will mow it tomorrow. The goddamn flicker is still chirp-chirp-chirping, as it has been without ceasing for the past three days. (Kris thinks it must be mating season.) Jays swoop and squawk.

I doze a little. I read a little in The Annotated Anne of Green Gables. When all three cats come to visit at once, I pet each in turn.

I get up and go search for Kris. I find her sitting in the yard, facing her flower beds, as if she were a Queen, and the roses and tulips and herbs her loyal subjects.

“What are you thinking about?” I ask.

“Just flowers and colors and birds and stuff,” she says. “I saw two hummingbirds in the walnut: they were either mating or fighting, I couldn’t tell.”

Something rustles the irises. “Nemo,” we say together. Nemo loves to hide in the irises. They make him feel stealthy.

I think I will spend the rest of the afternoon on the back porch, dozing, and reading, and writing. (With Toto on my lap, apparently, as she’s just jumped up and demanded that I put the computer aside…)

Here’s a recent photo of Simon. I took about twenty at this time, but this is the only one I saved. He kept flopping and rolling and twisting; he wouldn’t sit still. I’m not even sure why I kept this one, but in retrospect, it’s kind of fun:

A Visit With Doctor Comic-Book-Guy

So, yes, I am sick. Very sick. My temperature of 101.4 had escalated to 104.0 this morning. It stayed there until my eary afternoon appointment with Doctor Comic-Book-Guy. He took a reading of his own: “103.8, huh? That’s not good. Let me see your throat. OUCH!” Ouch indeed.

I was pleased that he didn’t simply say, “It looks like you have a virus. It’ll take about three to five days to run its course. Get as much rest as you can and drink plenty of fluids.”

Instead he said, “Well, this may just be a virus, but with such a high temperature, you could have an infection, too. I’m going to write you a prescription for azithromycin. It’s great stuff. If a bacterial infection is making you sick, this will take care of it. If you have a both a virus and an infection, this will take care of part of it.” He paused for a moment and thought. “Of course, it could just be a virus, in which case the azithromycin won’t do anything, but it won’t hurt to take it.”

I coughed, and then gasped with pain.

“Oh yeah,” said Doctor Comic-Book-Guy. “Take some vicodin for that cough and sore throat.”

I was too disoriented to argue.

I make the drive between Canby and Oak Grove at least ten times a week. Today it took tremendous concentration. I clasped the steering wheel and locked my eyes on the road. I drove slowly. Fortunately, the vehicle in front of me was also driving slowly. I wondered if the driver was also suffering from a high fever and dizziness.

I took the prescriptions to the Safeway pharmacy, and then wandered the store in a daze. I wanted apple sauce, but for some reason I couldn’t remember where the apple sauce might be. I did, however, find the gelatin and pudding aisle. I thought about picking up some cook’n’serve stuff, or some tapioca, but then I noticed that the pre-packaged puddings were on sale at Ten for $10. (That’s a dollar a piece for those of us not living in la-la supermarket pricing land.) Each package contained four pudding cups, yielding a total cost of only 25 cents per cup. And each cup only had 80 calories. In my fevered state, I felt like I’d found the promised land! I loaded my basket: chocolate, chocolate fudge, banana cream, lemon meringue, tapioca, tapioca, tapioca. When I had finished I noticed an old man standing next to me, staring at my basket full of pudding. I smiled wanly and made my way to the dairy department.

I was struck with the idea that strawberry milk might be the most perfect food in the world. Yes, what I needed was strawberry milk and a donut. And what’s this? The pre-packaged “bake it yourself” Nestle chocolate chip cookies were “buy one, get one free”. What a deal!

That was the extent of my shopping adventures. I had begun to sweat profusely, and my dizziness was changing to nausea. I found a chair and waited for my prescription to be filled.

At home, I took my azithromycin and my vicodin and my St. John’s wort, and washed them down with a swig of strawberry milk. And a bite of a chocolate-covered donut.

101.4

Out of nowhere, I have a cough. As near as I can tell it was caused by a bowl of raisin bran, but that makes as little sense to me as it probably does to you. I’ve been coughing all day, a cough both dry and phlegmatic all at once.

Around noon I decided that I had a headache and took to ibuprofen, but they didn’t help.

In the evening, Kris and I watched Rushmore for the gazillionth time. “Feel my forehead,” I said midway through.

“It feels normal,” Kris said. “Are you sick?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Where’s my temperature gauge?”

The temperature gauge was not upstairs, so I waited until after the movie to find it. By then I was shivering uncontrollably. I am shivering uncontrollably now. My body is cold, but my ears (and forehead) are burning. The temperature gauge says I have a fever of 101.4, my highest temperature in 4-1/2 years. (My normal body temp is between 98.0 and 98.2.)

I am cold. And coughing. And going to bed.

Spring Reverie

Today, at last, the world was beautiful once more. The sky was blue. The sun shone rich and thick and warm. The trees and grass strained and stretched for growth. The tulips and camellias smiled brightly. In the late afternoon, the air was still and perfect: room temperature outdoors for the first time since last October. T-shirt weather.

The morning was cool and white. A thin mist hung over the newly-plowed country fields. Turning from Gribble to Oglesby, I slowed when I saw the bowed outstretched wings of an enormous bird: it swept over the pond, dipped, rose, and then landed on the muddy bank. The bird cocked its head and, for only a second, seemed to be looking directly at me. A tall and willowy blue heron, perched on reed-thin legs.

McLoughlin Boulevard skirts lower Oregon City, hugging the edge of the bluff which overlooks the river. In the morning, people gather at the side of the road to fish. They cast their lines from the short stone wall to the Willamette River below. They’ve been doing this for decades. (One of my earliest memories is stopping here with my grandfather to watch people fish.)

Today as I drove through Oregon City on my way to work, I smiled to see a burly white Alakaskan Husky sitting near his master, lounging at the side of the street, in the parking area, scrutinizing each passing car. It owned the place. It seemed perfectly content.

Arriving home last night at ten, I stopped to rub my hand over the bark of the dying clarendendron. The tree is a shell. Half of it has split and fallen away; the other half is hollow, clinging to what remains of its root system. I closed my eyes and took pleasure in the warm night air. I inhaled the sweet scent of freshly cut grass. (When I had left for the writers group meeting, there were at least five lawnmowers humming in chorus throughout the neighborhood.)

Something moved in the rose garden. “Hi, Simon,” I said, but he didn’t respond. He slinked away. His collar didn’t jingle. “Simon? Flash?” I walked over to see which cat was there, and the garden erupted in motion: dark striped figures slid into the boxwood hedge. One made its way to the sidewalk, where it stopped in the open. A raccoon! Several, from the sounds of it.

I backed away. I let them be. I strolled through the darkened yard, examining strawberry blossoms and budding pears. The raspberries are a riot of new growth. I stopped to piss under the locust, which is just beginning to leaf. Rounding the corner of the house, Simon bounded from the ferns. He trotted beside me as I finished my inspection of the yard. On the sidewalk near the fron steps, he rolled and flopped, begging me to pet his belly.

Spring is here.

A Map in My Heart

I had dinner tonight with two of my favorite people.

Kris had been invited by the Willamette University Chemistry Club to participate in a panel discussion about careers in chemistry. I drove her to Salem and then joined my friends at The Great Wall, a Chinese buffet.

I love Asian food. If I could, I would eat Asian food for every meal: three meals a day, 365 days a year. I love it. A Chinese buffet is a dangerous place for me, especially when I’m on a diet. Earlier in the day, I had the following exchange with one of my friends:

F: We are big fans of Asian food too. It’s probably worth a trip to the Great Wall if you have never been. Their food isn’t the best Asian food we’ve ever had, but the spread is quite impressive.

J: Sounds excellent. I’ve had 500 calories today, so will have 1500 to spare for Chinese food!

F: You’ll need about 15,000! It is a very large buffet.

I should have heeded the warning. The Great Wall does, indeed, have quite and impressive spread. Row after row of steaming treats: General Tso chicken (of course), grilled salmon, bacon-wrapped crab, BBQ spareribs, black pepper chicken (my favorite), sweet and sour pork, spicy steak, fresh fruit, sushi, and that traditional Chinese dessert, tapioca pudding.

I didn’t eat 15,000 calories, but I certainly had more than 1500.

It felt great to spend time alone with these friends. I mostly see them in group situations now, and I miss the time we used to spend together, the four of us. Those were some of the happiest days of my life. For two years, Kris and I had been quite close to with them. Over dinner, we talked about our house and their house. We talked about pets. We talked about vacation plans. But we also talked about stuff closer to my heart.

We discussed how cultivating friendships is a lot like dating, but even more complicated in the case of couples. For one thing, all four people must get along well in order for the group to have a chance. In order for the group to thrive, every person must really like every other person. If the group can have fun together, can talk and laugh and play, then the friendship has a chance at real growth. We talked about how the addition of children adds another dynamic to the group, often makes a couple more inwardly focused. Our former intense friendship was never explicitly mentioned, but it felt like an implicit subtext to me, adding depth to the discussion.

It was a good meal. I’m glad we were able to get together.

“…every man has a map in his heart of his own country and … the heart will never allow [him] to forget this map.” — Alexander McCall Smith, The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency

After dinner, I returned to Willamette. I walked around a little, revisiting old familiar places on campus: the library, the botanical garden, the quad. As I entered the University Center, I stopped to inahled the old, familiar smell, and was swept away by a flood of nostalgia: a hundred different memories washed over me at once. Inside was worse. I felt like I was drowning in a sea of remembered faces, names, events.

Upstairs, in the Cat Cavern, I found a table against the back wall and waited for Kris to finish talking with students. I took out a piece of paper and began to write. But then I was no longer drowning in memories; I was living them.

In the back of the room, pen and paper in hand, writing, I might have been composing a paper for class. No — I am composing a paper for class. In a few minutes I will make my way to Eaton Hall for a study session with Heather James. I will spend an hour reviewing for the Psych final. Heather will just not get it, so I will play the role of the professor. She will sit three rows back. I will stand at the front of the lecture hall and scrawl psych terms and concepts on the board. She will be caught up in remembering every little detail about Maslow’s Heirarchy of Needs, and I will not be able to convince her that what is important is the Big Picture, understanding what it means. When we have finished, I will walk to Doney, or to York, where Andrew and Dane and I will spend two hours bickering about comic books and science fiction. And then, when I’ve had my fill of friends, I will find Kris and we will spend the night together, secreted in her room.

Pen to paper. It’s liberating. To hell with the computer — it’s been too long since I’ve written this way.

Dietary Resource Page

Today’s entry is a dietary reference of sorts, listing recommended intake levels for fat, protein, carbohydrates, fiber, alcohol, and more.

Kris and I have begun a shared diet. It’s been several years we attempted a joint weight loss plan; it’s fun to work together toward a common goal. I’ve created this entry as a set of notes regarding recommended consumption levels, etc.

I seem to start several diets a year, but rarely see them through. (Or, equally as common, I’ll lose twenty pounds, then fall off the wagon and gain all the weight back.) The good news is that mentally I’ve already bought into this one. I’m committed. I want to lose this weight.

My goal is to lose fifty pounds in ten pound increments. I want to lose the first ten pounds, to drop from 210 to 200, by June 1st, which will require an average weight loss of 1.5 pounds/week. Kris wants to lose ten pounds by August 1st. My current daily intake target is 2000 calories; Kris is aiming for 1500 calories. The first few days of a diet are tough for me, and this time is no exception. Yesterday was hell, though I’m pleased to report things were easier today.

Here’s a breakdown of my average daily calorie consumption from the past week:

[chart of calorie consumption, which actually looks okay

Because I’ve attempted so many diets during the past decade, I’ve done a lot of reading on nutrition and fitness. I can recite many of the bullet points by heart. Here’s some of what I know:

Calories
Calories measure energy consumption. In nutrition, calories measure the amount of energy the body releases when breaking down food. For example, when we say that one gram of protein has four calories, we’re really saying that the body needs to use four calories of energy to process that gram of protein. Confused? Basically, the body has to process everything you eat. It takes energy to do that, and your body can only process so many calories at a time. If you consume too many calories, then the body has to store the excess as fat, energy stores for later use. But if your calorie consumption is low enough, your body says, “Aha! I have some free time. I’ll go work on breaking down this fat I’ve stored.”

How many calories can the body process? A general rule of thumb is that the body of the average man is able to break down calories equal to about twelve times his body weight every day. The average woman’s body can break down calories equal to about eleven times her body weight every day. Active people are able to process more calories; sedentary people can’t process quite as many.

Weight loss is achieved when you run a calorie deficit, consuming fewer calories than your body can process every day. Weight gain is caused by a calorie surplus, consuming more calories than your body can use every day. As a general rule of thumb, one pound is equivalent to 3500 calories. This is a convenient number: altering your calorie consumption by 500 calories/day thus produces a theoretical swing of one pound per week.

In my case, I’m starting at 210 pounds. Using the above formula, my daily requirement is 2520 calories. Thus, if I were to reduce my calorie consumption to 2000 calories/day, I would lose about one pound per week. (Notice that as I shed weight, I’ll need to reduce my daily calorie consumption to maintain this 500 calorie/day gap. For every ten pounds lost, I need to cut my energy consumption by 120 calories.)

Also note that it’s possible to pump up the other end of the formula. That is, by exercising, one can cause the body to burn more daily calories. My rule of thumb (and this is only roughly accurate, but it’s close enough) is that traveling a mile on foot, whether running or walking, burns 100 calories. Biking for ten minutes also burns about 100 calories. So, if I take a three mile walk during the day, I know that my body will burn roughly 300 extra calories that day.

When I diet, I generally aim to maintain a calorie deficit of between 500 and 1000 calories.

Fat
One gram of fat contains about nine calories. Fat from all sources should make up no more than 30% of your daily calories. Our foods contain a variety of fats. Some, such as those from nuts, olives, and fish, are “good fats”. Others, such as saturated fats and transfatty acids are “bad fats”. Transfats should be avoided completely. Saturated fat should make up no more than 10% of your daily calories. Put into numbers, in a 2000 calorie diet, daily fat consumption should be limited to about 65g or less, no more than 20g of which should come from saturated fats. (Cholesterol should be limited to less than 300mg per day.)

Alcohol
One gram of alcohol contains about seven calories. I only have vague notions of alcohol and its relation to diet. I was a teetotaler until about five years ago. I did some research tonight, and was surprised to find that moderate alcohol consumption actually is considered acceptable, even healthful. I’d thought such claims were bogus. Moderate alcohol consumption seems to mean the equivalent of one drink (ten to fifteen grams of alcohol) per day for men, and half a drink (five to eight grams of alcohol) per day for women. (One drink is a bottle of beer, or a glass of wine, or a shot of whiskey.) If you consume twice this much alcohol, you begin to be susceptible to various health risks. If you consume four times as much alcohol, you’re considered a heavy drinker. If you consume 80 grams or more of alcohol each day (about six drinks), you are doing severe damage to your body.

Protein
One gram of protein contains about four calories. A diet should comprise at least 10% protein, though more is better. If I recall correctly, protein shouldn’t make up more than 30% of your daily calorie totals. Thus, assuming a 2000 calorie diet, you should eat between 50 and 150 grams of protein per day. High protein diets are not necessarily more healthful for the body (in fact, the opposite is likely true); high protein diets work because they encourage a feeling of fullness. Protein satisfies. It’s possible to apply this principle to a healthy diet without going overboard. If you’re trying to lose weight, maximize your consumption of beans, rice, and lean meats. (Actually, now that I think about it, rice always makes me hungrier. I wonder why this is…)

Carbohydrates
One gram of carbohydrates contains about four calories. The bulk of your diet (40-60%) should come from carbohydrates. Carbohydrates are essentially sugars. There are different types of carbohydrates, from simple sugars to complex carbohydrates. Simple sugars are easy for the body to process and provides little or no nutritional benefit. It’s quick energy. The body is forced to break down complex carbohydrates (think “starches”), so the energy from a potato, say, generally isn’t available for the body to use right away.

Two carb-related notes: added sugars (refined sugars), such as those often found in candies, sodas, and sweetened cereals, should make up less than a quarter of your total calories, the fewer the better. (It’s my understanding that these sugars are easily identifiable on nutritional labels because they’re the ones labeled “sugar” under the carbohydrates section.) Also, fiber is technically a carbohydrate, though mainly it’s just bulk that the body does not process. The old guideline was that 25 grams per day ought to be consumed for a 200 calorie diet, though a brief web search reveals that the new guideline is 38g/day for men and 25g/day for women.

Other Nutrients
Sodium intake should be restricted to less than 5000 mg/day, and preferably half that. (Past reading leads me to believe that sodium intake isn’t as critical for people who are not sensitive to it. I’m not sensitive to it, which is a good thing since I eat a hell of a lot of it.) Potassium intake should be greater than 3500mg/day (and closer to 5000 mg). I’m not clear on the reasons for these levels, though I do know that the body burns some amount of sodium (1500mg? 2500mg?) every day, and thus the need to replace it.

Water
Women should consume roughly 2.5 liters of water per day. Men should consume roughly 3.5 liters of water per day. Some of this water is taken in naturally through the other things we eat and drink. In general, the rule of thumb seems to be “drink when you’re thirsty”. Do that and you’re fine. (Note that drinking extra water each day is great for dieting. It promotes a feeling of fullness. If you are like me and often eat or drink simply to have something in your mouth, water is a perfect replacement. If you drink cold water, you expend a small amount of energy in bringing the water to body temperature.)

Excercise
The basic rule is: Just do it!

Doctors suggest a minimum of one half-hour of physical exercise every day, though an entire hour is recommended. Exercise has been proven to have enormous health benefits beyond weight loss and fitness. Exercise improves mental fitness. It encourages sound sleep. It enhances self-confidence.

Aerobic exercise, exercise that requires heavy breathing, is good for burning fat in the short term. Weight-lifting and other exercises that build muscle help in a different way. Adding muscle mass increases your metabolism, the low-level fat burning that occurs all day long, even when you’re asleep. A good exercise regimen includes both muscle-building and aerobic exercise. Unfortunately, most people prefer one or the other. (I prefer aerobic exercise.)

When I diet, I never count the exercise. I don’t track it. I do try to exercise, but any exercise I do is “bonus calories”, extra unexpected weight loss. It’s a subtle psychological game I play with myself, but it works.

Conclusion
I admit that most of this entry was composed off the top of my head. The information here could be inaccurate, or out of date, though I think it’s reasonably correct. This page is meant primarily as a resource for Kris and me to access over the next few months as we attempt to lose weight, but perhaps it can be of use to you, too.

One key point that I didn’t make above is that your diet should derive most of its calories from fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Fats, oils, and sweets should be used sparingly. This means: don’t butter those peas, don’t eat that candy bar, and don’t use that salad dressing. Season the peas with salt and pepper, eat an orange, and use lemon juice on your salad.

Finally, if you haven’t already signed up for a free FitDay account, give it a look. It’s a simple yet convenient site for tracking calorie consumption, exercise, and weight loss.

Impasse with Vegetable Juice

Strolling through Costco today, I stopped in front of a stack of V8 juice.

Standing before me were hundreds of cans of vegetable juice, stuff that might actually be good for me. (In case you weren’t already aware: there is no material difference between fruit juice and soda. All you parents who won’t let your kids have soda but pump them full of fruit juice are victims of the advertising industry. (Fresh-squeezed fruit juice is slightly not-as-bad.))

I checked the nutrition stats for V8: a twelve-ounce can (well, 11.5-ounce can) contains only seventy calories and grants three grams of fiber. There’s a hell of a lot of sodium in the juice, but I can live with that. I don’t seem to have a sodium sensitivity. (Which is good, since I suck the stuff down. I even eat it raw sometimes.) The V8 packaging trumpets: “Two servings of vegetables in every can!”

I bought a case.

Now I’m faced with a dilemma: I don’t particularly like V8. Or at least I don’t think I like V8. I’ve never actually tried it. I have a life-long repulsion to liquid tomato products, however; I like tomato products of middling viscosity.

I am loathe to try tomato soup (though I once had a delicious tomato soup that Pam made for a dinner party), and I won’t drink tomato juice. On the other hand, I cannot bring myself to eat a raw tomato in any form. The stuff in the middle of the tomato-spectrum is fine: catsup, ketchup (what’s the difference there, foodies?), tomato sauce, tomato paste, salsa — all good.

Now I have an opened can of V8 sitting by my side, but I’m hesitant to take a sip. Nick already praised me for buying it, and downed a can in short order, but the most I can bring myself to do is sniff the stuff.

It smells like tomato soup.

I keep telling myself that if I’d only force myself to like it, then I’d have a ready source of vegetable nutrition, but so far that sort of reasoning just isn’t working.

Maybe I’ll go grab an orange juice.

Update: Two hours later, and the can is still sitting here. I’ve dipped my finger in, and the taste is fine, but I can’t get over the texture. sigh

How to Get Me to Exercise and to Eat Right

We don’t get a lot of visitors out here at Custom Box Service. There aren’t too many people who need to visit a box factory, and even fewer who are willing to drive nearly to Molalla to do so. Still, from time-to-time a customer does drop by.

Just now a long-time customer whom I’d never met stopped by. He’s an older guy who’s done a lot of business with us. I gave him a tour of the place and talked up our history, as I always do with guests. We paused outside in the shop and chatted about market conditions. At one point, he made a little joke and to emphasize the punch line, he reached over and patted my belly: pat pat pat.

We wandered outside and he told me some about his company. He talked about how they treat their salespeople differently than most places, paying more than twice as much in commission. To make his point, he reached over and patted my belly: pat pat pat.

Inside, I introduced him to Jeff and Nick. We chatted some more, and then made our farewells. As he was leaving the office, he said, “It was good to meet you,” and then he reached over and patted my belly: pat pat pat.

If I wasn’t on a diet before, I am now.