Tuesday Updates

You know you're getting old when you leave town for thirty-six hours and it takes seventy-two hours to recover.

***
For several years I've traveled without my family, usually for school visits or publishing events. I'm proud to report I've finally figured out how to ensure I return to a clean house: I get the boys so overscheduled while I'm gone that they're never actually inside the house except to brush their teeth and sleep. Works like a charm!

***
The children's school pictures came back on Friday. Can I just say that school pictures may be the biggest rip-off since Pssst Dry Shampoo? The worst: Now you have to pay extra for that blue or green "gemstone color" background. I assumed if I opted not to pay, I'd get a nice, cloudy sky blue like every other year--not "gemstone," but nice enough.

Big mistake. What came back are really weird-looking pictures--as though color pictures had been superimposed over a black and white photo. Both of my children have the gray pallor of coal miners.

Will's eyes are closed in his picture, by the way, and you can clearly see that his shirt is inside-out. For once, Jack doesn't have a sweaty-head and he's actually smiling (you can always tell the children of photographer parents--they've used up all their smiles by age four). Too bad he looks like the living dead.

***

I'm having a terrible time with Weight Watchers this go-round. It's not Weight Watchers' fault. They are offering the same old sensible advice, printing out the easy to follow guides, cheering me on with supportive cheers. No, the problem is me and my insistence on leaving the safety of my own kitchen.

In Boston, I went out to dinner at a place called Olives (not to be confused with the Olive Garden, thank you very much) on my publisher's dime. I'd had to give a speech earlier and then spent another hour or so chatting with many lovely and kind librarians. I was famished. And so when the opportunity came, I ate. I ate oysters and onion torte and the most marvelous greek salad and french fries (you can see I'm starting to get in trouble here) and half a turtle sundae. I drank two glasses of red wine. Oh, and there was the bread basket. Bread to die for, I swear to you.

I came home, hoping against hope that at the very least I hadn't gained weight. I'd done a lot of walking, right? Roamed Beacon Street and the Boston Commons and Boylston and St. James. I'd walked through airports and across hotel lobbies. Lotsa walking. Miles and miles.

In fact, I told myself after that wonderful spinach and feta omelet ... and homefries ... and toast ... that I'd probably lost weight on my little foray into the big world.

Nope. Gained three. Skipped my WW meeting last night. But I'm back on my program today and trying to be sane and eat enough but not too much. It helps that I'm not going out of town ... for two more weeks. And then three weeks after that, it's Thanksgiving. Then Christmas.

I'm doomed.