I was 21 years old when I looked in the mirror in the computer science building’s bathroom and saw the first grey hairs growing out of my scalp. It was that same year that I started to see small grey flecks of dust in my vision when I looked up at a clear blue sky or at a white wall. My eye doctor told me these were floaters, little blobs of protein that develop in the fluid in your eyeball. Near-sighted people like me get them quite frequently.

A couple years later I woke up in the middle of the night and wanted to scoop my gallbladder out with a spoon. The surgeon did it with a scalpel and a tiny camera instead, and I was only 24. Then my knees started to hurt when I climbed up the stairs. By this point I’d also lost track of how many cavities I’d had filled, caused by too much Mountain Dew and too little dental floss.

A friend my age told me over dinner she is fighting acid [...]

• Continue reading "My body doesn’t have a warranty"

I’ve been feeling out of my groove lately. It’s a lot of things. Things that I shall slap numbers in front of in a handy list format.

1) The winter. I should move to the equator where there are no seasons and I can sit outside and sweat all my weight off. The days here have gotten shorter and it’s so much harder to convince myself to work out in the morning when I can’t find my dumbbells without turning on a light switch. Dear Australians, please give me back the sun. I miss it. I miss going out on the trail too or taking my bike for a ride. Never mind that my back tire is flat and my bike is 13 years old and I need to pony up some cash for a new one before I can go riding. I just miss exercising outdoors. Which leads me to…

2) Workout burnout. I need to spice up my workout routine. I’m getting tired of the same old weights and Pilates and running regimen. I need something new, [...]

• Continue reading "PastaQueen wants her groove back"

Back in high school, Deirdre Barnes poked my belly on the school bus and giggled. I giggled too because I am ticklish everywhere I have skin.

“Why’d you do that?” I asked, confused.

“You’re so jiggly,” she said. It had never occurred to me that a thin person might not know what rolls of belly flab felt like. I didn’t like being poked. I hadn’t given her permission to feel me up. But I understand her curiosity now. I didn’t know what a thin person’s body felt like either. The closest I’d come to feeling up a six-pack was when I’d grab a Mountain Dew from the fridge.

I still haven’t felt up six-pack abs, but I’m sometimes surprised by how firm my body is becoming. When I but my hands on my sides I can feel solid muscle beneath my thin layer of fat. If I squeeze my thighs, there is extra skin and adipose tissue, but I also feel the ungiving firmness of muscle. My scale says I’m about 30% fat now, which means 70% of [...]

• Continue reading "Please don’t poke the fat girl"

There used to be an entry here that was a little bit too morbidly humorous. I realized it was in bad taste and removed it. I goofed up and I’m sorry. I apologize for offending anyone and I promise not to write any more entries at 7:00 in the morning before I dash off to work.

Why don’t you look at cute kitties and puppies instead?

• Continue reading "Move along, nothing to see here"

My butt hurts. Not right now, but after I’ve been sitting in my office chair for awhile my bum becomes a bit sore. I might need to just sit up straighter, since many of you have commented that I have the posture of a silly straw. But (heh), I think my butt may just be less padded these days. My tailbone has less layers of fat to poke through, so I start to feel like I’ve been riding a bicycle though I haven’t been pedaling anywhere. I certainly expect to feel a little sore after riding to the park and back on my bike, but office work shouldn’t be this uncomfortable, right?

In other amazing body news, I’ve noticed that I can squat all the way down to the floor and then stand back up without grasping for the kitchen counter. After I’ve been sitting on the floor stretching, I can bend my knees, put my arm on the floor and fling my back up into a standing position. And when I’m sitting on the couch [...]

• Continue reading "Bony Ass"