The Surge

I am surging this week. Friday I have an appointment at Kaiser to have a physical, my first in almost two years. For a decade or more, these visits to my physician have been as stylized as a Noh drama. My doctor tells me I'm overweight. I agree and pledge to do better. I don't do better, but I don't do worse, either.

For a long time my weight has stayed the same, my silhouette as reliable as that at the beginning of the old Alfred Hitchcock television show. But about a year ago over the holiday season, I put on five pounds -- not unusual -- that did not go away. That was unusual. So I have been postponing my visit to the doctor because maintaining weight, excessive though that weight may be, is one thing, but adding to it is another. I am ashamed.

At a certain point the idiocy of this becomes apparent, even to a manchild like me. I made my appointment. But by god if I have to go in shamefully, I want to go in "shame lite." I'm dieting hard this week. I'll weigh Thursday morning, and -- depending on the tip of the scale -- may well fast until after my appointment.

This is vain and pointless and, worse than pointless, possibly hazardous. My friend George would understand.