How many people are running around in the white onezie, anyway?!? Did anyone watch Giuliana & Bill on The Style Network Wednesday night? Then you got a glimpse of the white onezie I ranted about a few posts ago. Guiliana Rancic tricked her gay assistant/second husband into joining her for what he thought was a trip to a Club Med spa but turned out to be a tortuous weekend of fasting, fat flogging and colonics at a place ironically called the We Care Spa. Matthew, perhaps the most hammy but endearing gay to hit the airwaves since Queer Eye, innocently found himself having to don the white onezie for an endermology session. He did, as his female abductor pointed out, look a little like a gay superhero. And I realized in that moment that that's what was missing from my own endermology "incident"...my gays. This is just my opinion, but I think every girl needs a gay man in her life. I am fortunate enough to have five in mine. And I'm telling you, the next time I bare my white-onezie-encased self to be pinched, rolled and sucked into endermic perfection, I'm taking Jesus with me (Beloved Gay, not Beloved Master...although I'll need him, too).

In unrelated news, I'm still hiding out in dark alleys and skulking around under cover of darkness until the brown hair color fades. I've decided it's not so much the hair color itself as much as it is my face with it. Maybe Halle Berry is the only human being who can bring people to their knees with her beauty no matter what her hair looks like. But for me, one bad haircut or color gone awry...and I'm Kathy Bates in Misery. 

So I have two questions. First...what have YOU done in the name of beauty or weight loss? Whether it was a success or hilarious failure, what is the most ridiculous thing you've ever signed up for? And second, what's the worst hair disaster you've ever survived? Something that left you in tears and ready to join the Witness Protection Program. 

What do you do when you love your hairdresser but hate your hair?!? I went back to John the night before last to have one little spot touched up. I made the mistake of asking "Is it possible to make the highlights a little less gold and a little more ashy?" "Maybe use a toner to tone these babies down a little bit?" Bad idea! Apparently, I have no idea what "toner" means. Because I left there with brown hair and almost no trace of previously blond tresses. I look like I have Lego hair...like I just placed someone else's hair on my head. But here's the deal. I love love love my hairdresser. On top of that, I am loyal to a fault and can't even imagine a world without John in it every 6 weeks. Hair or hairdresser? I'm torn between two lovers. Feelin' like a fool. PS...guess who had her yearbook picture taken 12 hours after toning her hair Tootsie Roll brown? That's right...moi!

My BFF is up for tenure today. TENURE! I can't believe I'm tight with a tenured librarian. This is the same librarian who almost yakked on her trainer last week, who reads Cosmo, taught me that it is never - NEVER - acceptable to polish one's fingernails a different shade from one's toes, and to love Milk Duds and Kettle Corn mixed together in one heavenly bowl. I texted her to say "What's the worst that can happen? You'll be fired and forced to take the only job you can find in these economic times...as a public librarian in Tahoka, Texas. I'll introduce you to some of my old peeps." After I rolled on the floor laughing for a couple of minutes, I got up and went to work.  

Kara and I had a great talk the other night. About what else? Food. It was therapeutic, actually. We both realized we are great at gaining weight, okay at losing weight, but terrible at maintaining weight. That should be so much easier than losing, right?!? In the world of maintenance, I envision having all the time in the world...and none of the stress. When I'm not jetsitting around the world for my writing career, serving on the board of directors at ASPCA, or solving world hunger, I'll be writing handwritten thank you notes, whipping up gourmet casseroles while wearing heels and pearls, and dancing around with my turducken husband in our immaculately clean mid-century mod living room while Dean Martin and Mel Torme croon on the wave radio. While sipping a virgin Godiva chocolate martini. But the truth is, I have absolutely NO idea how to sip just one virgin Godiva chocolate martini. Before finishing the first one, I would be looking around the room, wishing Dear Husband would get his hands off me so I could make my way to the faux martini bar. Or the Sub Zero for a pint of Haagen Daaz. 

I read a book once, written by a 21-year-old uber conservative Christian. The book was called I Kissed Dating Goodbye. The premise of the book, basically, is that you should love God more and getting to 3rd base less. Actually, you should forget about getting on the field all together. Ixnay on the issingkay. That's right. No kissing. None. Until your wedding day. I saw a couple on A Wedding Story once that decided to wait until their wedding day to kiss. It was a disaster. Maybe the most awkward moment in TV history. More awkward than when the Grape Stomping Lady fell to her You Tube infamy and the cameras cut to the news anchors back at the station. (Please if you don't know what I'm talking about, stop everything and You Tube "grape lady" right now). It was MORE awkward than this. You could literally feel the pressure mounting in the packed church as they were prounounced man and wife and then had to figure out which way to turn their heads, what to do with the noses, and decide tongue, church tongue or no tongue. I was hiding under the coffee table by then. Watching Liza Minelli kiss David Gest was more comfortable. 

But I gotta say...the question raised by IKDG was a good one. Where do we stop? Where do we draw the line of intimacy in a hazy dating world? And, more important to me, where do we draw the line with food intimacy? I've spent my life bouncing between two extremes. 100% monogamy and 100% celibacy. I know how to eat an entire box of Entenmann's or the whole tube of Pillsbury chocolate chip cookie dough. In one day. And I know how to kiss it goodbye. But how do you casually date chocolate?!?    

In case you're wondering why I didn't post a photo of the newly tamed tresses from Hair Appointment #1...do I have a story for you. Friday was the first hair appointment and weigh in. I headed to the salon late Friday afternoon. Well, I say "salon" but it was really a little room in the back of a hookah lounge. That's right. A hookah bar. John, my hairdresser emeritus, is in the process of changing salons. The lease was up on his old place and now he's building bigger and better. But in the meantime, it means a little room in the back of his BFF's hookah bar. I have to say...it was my first time in Hookahville. And definitely my first time in a Hookahville hair salon. 

But just like a bad infomercial, I have to tell you..."But wait, there's more." I get to the door of Hookahville to find that John hasn't arrived yet. And apparently 2:30 in the afternoon is too early for the Hookahtribes to get their smoke on, so the door was locked. So I turned around to run - sprint - to the car and the promise of AC in 101 degree Pasadena...and bam! I feel like I'm on the Tilt-A-Whirl at Joy Land. Except there's no one around to stop the ride. It just keeps spinning and spinning. So, I barely make it to the car...in a vacant parking lot sandwiched between the hookah lounge and a seedy place called the Rancho Bar. I set the AC to arctic and wait for the ride to stop. 20 minutes later, John shows up. He approaches the car with a big grin on his face, happy to see me and obviously unaware of my plight. My shrill, high-pitched distress call warning "don't touch me or my head's gonna spin around!" wipes that grin right off his face and sends him scampering inside to set up.

45 minutes past the time my hair appointment was supposed to start, I'm ready to give it a go. But I have to call John on his mobile and ask him to come outside and help me in. The horror. My cute party-in-the-front-business-in-the-back hair guru has to walk me into his hip hair hookah like a geriatric patient.

But wait, there's more. Have you ever been on a Tilt-A-Whirl? Or the Tea Cups at Disney World? Then you know what I mean when I say I was green afterwards. Not a pretty seafoam, honeydew or celery green. No. It was more like a cross between boiled okra and French's spicy brown mustard. And there I sat, trying my best not to tip over or bend and send the breakfast that brought me...as John began to build a fleet of foils on my soon-to-be highlighted head. I am not exaggerating when I say what I hoped would be a momentous occasion turned out to be two-and-a-half of the most excruciating hours I've ever spent. And because I was 45 minutes late, it meant I had to leave the salon - I mean hookah bar - with a wet head. No big hair blow out for me.

But don't fret none...I'm going to live! I've had 48 hours to bedazzle, beautify and blow dry. I'm going to live to see another day, another hair appointment (or five), and 53 more pounds. But here's hoping Hair Appointment #2 is a little less eventful! PS...Good thing I have a genius photographer and partner-in-crime at work. She'll take glamour shots (minus the green glow) this week for me to post. Stay tuned!     

It's here! It's here! Not Christmas, unfortunately. I won't be running down to the living room at 5:00 a.m. to be greeted by Nat King Cole and Santa in my fleece onezie with feet. No...it's Hair Appointment #1. And the first weigh-in. I got on the scale this morning and what did it say? Drum roll, please. Seven pounds. (Isn't that a Will Smith movie?)

So, I've lost seven pounds...in six weeks. That's a little over a pound a week. For someone who watches the Biggest Loser and feels dissapointed when the contestant who worked out five hours everyday while consuming around 500 calories, only to lose 11 pounds that week...it was a mixed reaction. I was hoping for 15. But I'm so happy to be going back down the weight loss mountain...carrying a slightly lighter boulder. AND...AND...I'm under 200 for the first time in a year. I was stuck at 200.8...ugh!!!...for two whole weeks. Not 200.7, or 201. But 200.8 precisely. For two weeks. Then, it finally went to 200.2, after I stopped eating after 7:00 pm. And today...198.0. Hooray! Getting into the 100's was a HUGE mental accomplishment. And I managed to do it during the busiest, most stressful three weeks of my year. Take that, fat! It may have been a tough round, but I showed you! And I'm coming back...be afraid. Be very afraid.   

I was walking with a co-worker the other day. Through the parking lot. In heels (I was in heels, she in flats). After a minute, she looked down and said "You know, you take the tiniest steps. You look like you're doing all this work but we're not going anywhere." And it was true. She was almost meandering and I was doing the Cotton-Eyed Joe in fast forward. What can I say? I have a small stride. I look a little like a Chihauhau trying to keep up with a Great Dane.

Here's my point. There is a person within arm's length of all of us who feels like they are perpetually on a diet but going absolutely nowhere. They are stuck in the lap pool of life, kicking frantically with their kick boards in front of them, while the rest of the swimmers pass them by like they are swimming in place. If you read that I lost 7 pounds in 6 weeks and wanted to pick up your laptop and throw it out the window, ruing the day you ever found me and my 60x6 ridiculousness...DON'T. Because here's the deal. A) I am completely free of Diet Cokes and sugar, a feat parallel to scaling El Capitan for me. B) I am not...NOT...going to settle into complacency or deal with the emotional and physical burden of weight one minute longer than I need to. I am not going to take you along for the ride, only to drop you off at a shady bus stop 12 blocks away from your destination. And C) In case you are shaking your head and saying "See! I knew eating clean and exercising doesn't work! Losing weight is impossible!"...stop. Because the truth is, unless the Cotton Eyed Joe counts, I didn't officially work out for two of the last six weeks. And what's in my freezer right now? 10 Lean Cuisines I got on special. Far from cuisine...and not really that lean.  

You can't go into a bookstore these days that doesn't have an enormous section devoted entirely to weight loss and body image. Or sit in the teacher's lounge or employee lunchroom without sharing a table with someone who is on a diet and frustrated because they're eating carrots all day and still have junk in the trunk. But the truth is...you don't know what the other person is and isn't doing the 23 hours a day you're not with them. So please dear readers, don't get discouraged by anything that's happening around you. Your wrestling match with fat is yours alone. And you'll be the one to get the title and gold-plated trophy at the end.

As for my own wrestling match...stay tuned! There are lots of great moves coming up in the next five rounds. Watch this, Mickey Rourke!

Are you kidding me?!? How is it that people...women...who have decided to make a career out of making other women feel beautiful, end up accomplishing just the opposite?!? 

It happened yesterday, when I was getting the falsies put on. The acrylic nails (just overlays, actually...they're 100% Elizabeth underneath). My trusty nail tech, a woman I've been going to for over a year, offered me a Diet Coke. "No thanks," I said. "I'm off the sauce." When I proceeded to explain, for the second time, my weight loss in 6 hair appointments or less, was she curious? Humored? Overjoyed for me? No, no, and heck no. You know what she said? As she held my hand in hers? In her most sweetly condescending voice? She said "That means you're going to have to stop eating your little pizzas."

Oh no you di'int!!! Two problems. A) Are you talking about the 3 1/2 inch individual veggie pizza I enjoy once every other week when I come to this neighborhood to get the falsies touched up? And B) How incredibly rude. Where is your mother? Or were you raised by wolves, Romulus?

So, I ask you, beloved readers...has something like this ever happened to you? If you've ever been on the receiving end of some unsolicited and obnoxious advice, I want to hear about it. Every gritty detail. The whole story. Advice about weight loss, relationships, money...any conversation you knew someone was going to enjoy...but it wasn't gonna be you. I'm all ears.