Sunday 23 March 2008

A triumph followed by an orgy of sorts

14st 0lb; zero alcohol; 1,412; Ancient Rome.

In the old days, the thing I liked best about dieting was the variety it introduced to my dreams. Visions of steak and kidney pie made a hugely refreshing change from my usual nightly cabaret of naked ladies. But this time around, I am waking early after bizarre fantasies that seem to have nothing to do with either food or sex. Today I was lost in a very large theatre and unable to find my seat before the curtain went up. Yesterday I intercepted a strange old man rootling through a bin I haven’t got, and he then reversed his 4WD through my garden wall. I expect a psychiatrist would have a field day. Coming soon: ink blots and what they mean.

Still, it’s worth waking at dawn when one is rewarded with the fantastic sight I enjoyed this morning, of the dying snowdrops on the front lawn covered in the most spectacularly thick frost I have ever seen (with a bit of snow mixed in). It’s rather a shame that I decided to have breakfast and a bath before venturing outside with my camera, by which time most of the white stuff had melted. I’m sure you’d have enjoyed a picture.

I’d pondered long and hard whether I cared enough about meeting my Easter Day weight target to cheat, but in fact I didn’t need to. And what better way could there be to celebrate than by driving to my rival’s house and enjoying a light lunch? The table setting alone was such a work of art that it seemed a shame to disturb it, but somehow we forced ourselves.

A vision of loveliness (not the work of a crazed vegetarian)


Frankly it was hardly worth the drive for such meagre fare: a wonderful pea and scallop risotto, followed by lamb done three ways (rack, shoulder and haggis, the last served on the top of an intricately layered tower of mashed potato, neeps and leeks). Then a choice of desserts: grapefruit syllabub, Amaretto tiramisu and another of those fabulous bread and butter puddings about which I went into such extravagant ecstasies on Christmas Day. I tried all of them, just out of politeness you understand, but had four helpings of the bread and butter pudding to make sure that it was every bit as good as the last one. The glamorous lady off the telly who was sitting to my right proved to do a very fine impersonation of Mrs Doyle from Father Ted saying “Go on, go on, go on”, which did nothing to encourage restraint. At least I only had a couple of miniature chocolate eggs with my coffee.

It would have been churlish to turn down a glass of champagne on my arrival, and the lamb would not have tasted quite as good without an accompanying glass of claret, or the puddings without a little dessert wine. I was profoundly relieved that I had not brought a calorie counter with me.

I made an excuse and left as soon as the lovely television person started removing her clothes, or at any rate her boots (which were closer to the kinky than the walking variety). This is a strict policy of mine when visiting households in the Tyne Valley, an area notorious for staid lunch and dinner parties descending into orgies (at any rate, that’s what it’s always been like in my fantasy world, and I’m too old to face up to reality now). But lunch had lasted the best part of five hours by then, so I did not feel that I was being aggressively anti-social.

Of course, there would have been one advantage of participating in a bit of communal nudity: it would have stopped everyone telling me that I looked absolutely perfect and did not need to lose another ounce, so must stop dieting forthwith. I have the daily disbenefit of seeing myself in the stupidly positioned mirror at the end of my bath, and know that there is still quite a way to go. I may be slightly overdoing it in aiming for 12st 7lb, as I pledged to do in the newspaper column I wrote this morning, given that I have only attained that weight twice in my life before: once at about the age of 12, on my first run up to 15 stone, and again in the summer of 1974 after an aggressive diet. But I have never yet undressed in front of a woman and had her say, “No, I’m really sorry but I can’t go through with this – you’re just too thin.” So I shall persevere for a while yet, always alert to the possibility that one day I may glance into my shaving mirror and find the cadaverous Nigel Lawson staring back at me. At which point I shall complete my ablutions as quickly as possible and make a bee-line for the nearest fish and chip shop.

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