Cheetos and Noodles

Weight: 21-something lbs lighter
Mood: Bloated
Listening To: Dancing With the Stars

Not long ago I met someone who is a member of Overeater's Anonymous. It was a rather interesting treat for me because I had never met anyone from OA before and he told me that his triggers were sugar and something else. This made me begin to wonder about my delectable affair with sugar, myself. After a few hours of wondering about it, I managed to put it out of my head until I was on the ride home tonight from a parent's night at one of my high schools.

You see, I had been doing rather well on my diet and work out up until the weekend with the Aussies. I mean dam can those people drink and eat and somehow, someway stay skinny . . . . I forced Brian to leave the party at 1am, but they were still in full swing - almost like they had just been warming up the entire day and most of the evening. Oye.

Well, I kinda let myself go that weekend. I told my trainer I wasn't going to work out Friday - Sunday because I could tell I was getting exhausted and needed a break. (It's now Tuesday and I have yet to get on an elliptical)So my trainer kicked my ass on Thursday like it had never been kicked before and I was out the door, shaking and almost in tears. Looking back on the weekend, I really didn't do THAT bad. I had some healthy choice mixed in with some bad choices. It's not like I went crazy and sucked on bacon all day, every day. Sure, the 10 or so drinks I poured down my throat might not have been a good idea, but that's cool. I was just tryin' to keep up. Now that I'm back in town, it's back on track, right?? Oh, so wrong . . .

It started when Brian DRAGGED me to Taco Bell to try the black tacos. (Rating = neh . . . ) I told him - last fatty meal, okay?? I knew I was lying when I said it . . . . then today happened. Breakfast wasn't all that bad. Lunch wasn't all that bad . . . then I made it to the college campus, where I was going to make camp for 3 or so hours before the parent's night at the High School. As soon as I pulled into campus, I heard them . . . .

"Hey . . . . hhheeeeeyyy . . . Did you forget about us?? We're in the student store, still. We're still waiting for you. Little cups of peanut butter hugged in chocolate. One or two bites won't hurt you, you know. We're still here and you have cash in your pocket. You won't even have to use your card!" I tried to fight it, I tried to ignore it but the voice just grew louder the closer I got to the student store, and hey - my office is right next to the student store. It's true, one or two can't hurt. Before I knew it, I had three little wrappers sitting on the desk in front of me as I was checking my farm on facebook.

My boss had to shut the office down earlier than I expected, so I went down to the information desk to hang out with the students who work down there. On my way down, I heard a different little voice. "Hey . . . . hhhheeeyyyy . . . . remember us, Mr. flamin' hot cheetos? Remember when you first started working here and you pulled some shifts at the info desk and we first met? Yeah, it was pretty memorable for me, too. You know we haven't talked in a long time and I heard you were going to be visiting me soon. Do you have any idea when that will be, because, well, I miss you." I tried to tell that little voice that I had one and a half more pounds left before we could sit down and visit and this is what it told me: "That's taking too long. I think you should just give it up and come and have a visit. You know you will eventually get there, but I want to visit now." As I rounded the corner of the information desk, I saw it. I saw what was going to make me break and the voice said to me "Oh, I see you haven't met my sister Miss BAKED flamin' hot cheetos. I think you two should meet." The next thing I knew. I was wiping bright orange powder from my hands and catching a look at the cookies my co-worker had brought with her. By then, any sense of reason was gone and as soon as a voice in my head said "Those look good!" another voice said "You have another dollar in your pocket."

There was more debauchery that surrounds the evenings gluttonous behavior, and as I was driving myself home I was reminiscing about all of the crap that I had put into my body and certain phrases like "You spend way too much money on a trainer to do this." and "You do way too much work with your trainer to revert back to this" and "You know you're not going to reach your goal. You need food with nutrition!" I began to think about eating real food. Food with some substance to it and I remembered this amazing noodle dish I got from Mao's kitchen a few days before and 'accidently' left the leftovers behind . . . . I started to actually taste it in my mouth, feel the noodles run over my tongue and the sponginess of the eggs. Then I debated whether or not to take Brian out to dinner that night "just because."