I'm trying to decide what book to take with me when I fly to Jane's tomorrow. I need something that's lightweight. Something that's interesting. I'll probably take two or three books--one that's more ponderous, like one of the books Sally brought home from Newsweek. One is about the Iraq war (do I really want to read about that?)--the other is about how the miracles in Genesis and Exodus can be explained scientifically. That's the kind of book I enjoy reading, but maybe it brands me as a skeptic or apostate or something. I'm more sensative about that nowadays. I know there are a lot of good classics I should read, but all the ones I look at don't seem too appealing. We'll see.

I've been doing very well at my plan to use the treadmill every day. I don't notice that I'm any stronger or any more firm or anything like that. I'm certainly not any less fat, but that could be because sometimes I take just a little pile of chocolate chips and put them on the cup holder and just eat them as I tread. That's pretty counterproductive, isn't it. I don't know how much good I'm doing just treading a fat body along. Maybe that's doing more damage to my heart than just sitting around with a fat body. Hmmmm! The food has got to go. But, I can tell you what the problem is. It's that I've been on two excellent diets where I had all kinds of control and lost 25-30 pounds. Then, I just gained it all back. The second time I gained it back much faster than the first. It's too discouraging to try to diet again with those two big fat failures. It makes me sympathize with smokers or alcoholics.

I'm a little concerned for these movie stars who are gaining and losing weight for parts. I think the body will remember that fatness and it will be much harder for them to lose next time. Or...maybe they just have extraordinary will power. It's long been my contention that many movie stars have a free pass to heaven. Those who keep weight off, that is.

My heaven would be very interesting. It would include people who have conquered difficult challenges--like drug addiction. Maybe it would include everyone. Probably would.

Well, I guess I'd better pack.