THE COUNTER
Starting weight: 299
Last weigh-in: 287.8
Total pounds lost: 11.2
Pounds until 240: 47.8

WHAT I ATE TODAY
Here’s the rundown, but with only approximations on fat and calories. Now that I am eating non-labeled vegetables, it’s kind of hard to tell. I will say, though, that I need to invest in some measuring spoons.

Breakfast:
2 cups of honey nut cheerios
1 ½ cups of skim milk
Calories: 400
Fat: 2 grams (I am guessing. Forgot to read that label. Damn!)

Snack:
1 serving (5 slices) of super duper lowfat salami
2 slices of whole wheat bread
Fat free mayo
Mustard
Calories: 220
Fat: 3.5 grams

Dinner:
1 big ass salad with

Lettuce
Half a green pepper
1 medium-sized tomato
Several mushrooms
5 slices of super duper lowfat salami
2 servings of Just 2 Good Blue Cheese dressing

Dinner 2
A few too many pretzels (in my defense, it was 9 p.m., and I had to scramble back to work from a game. A little less than half the bag was left over from the last shopping trip, and they were the only thing in the house I could eat while I was writing a story on deadline. Better than getting a whopper, eh?
Calories: 500?
Fat: 4 grams?

Dinner 3
3 lowfat hot dogs
Calories: 135
Fat: 4.5 grams

Total calories: 1,595
Total fat: 20 grams

Exercise: None.

ON THE LOW-FAT BANDWAGON

So the salad was a big success, and I am grateful that I bought a lot of vegetables. However, after spending $114 on food Monday, I am realizing I might have a little too much in the house.

Certainly that’s not a bad problem to have, other than the fact that I shouldn’t have spent that much (the budget allows $100 every two weeks for food), I am quite worried that I will have a refrigerator full of rotten vegetables by this time next week. It’s happened before.

Still, though I didn’t break away from sodium-rich food (see salami and hot dogs above), I was happy to finally eat something green and unprocessed today. In fact, I’d venture to say that salad was easily the best thing I had all day.

Although there is a bit of a catch on all this. Let’s examine Tuesday’s eating a bit. However, we’ll throw away the pretzels because those were kind of an emergency time-crunch grab. Well check it out: Honey Nut Cheerios, lowfat salami and hot dogs, and a salad. Not a bad haul, eh?

See, I thoroughly enjoy all of those things, and that is why I actually look forward to eating in the morning. A little bit of an admission here: I was more excited to crack open that box of Honey Nut Cheerios on Tuesday than I was about eating the off-day pizza on Sunday. For one, there wasn’t any guilt associated with the cereal. Hell, if I don’t eat a good breakfast, I will be pissed at myself. So I actually had to have that bowl of cereal.