Come on!

A new low this morning - 72.8kg.

So, that's (since mid December) 17.7 kg or 2 stone 11 lbs gone or nearly nine 2 litre bottles of (Diet) Coke.

20% of me has disappeared.

Ta daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!

"Shrink Wrap" new series...

I just caught the last half on Dr Pamela Connolly's "Shrink Wrap" with Joan Rivers.

I've blogged about these programs before here and here - the new series is absolutely no less enthralling than the last. Why do I find these programs so fascinating? A good question. I think it's, for me, because the human condition is revealed, in all its weakness - and these sessions are very revealing.

I'm reminded, as I watch, of the earlier Michael Parkinson interviews when I was younger. He'd have on his program, say, a Hollywood star and he's interview them, just them, for long enough to find out something new about them, something that revealed a facet of their character as another human being - not the "Celebrity" persona. When his show was brought back, that had all gone, replaced by short chat sound bite irrelevancies. Shame. Big shame.

Dr Pamela's program is amazing. The participants are genuinely stunned at her perception and her ability to show them things about themselves they didn't expect or know.

Next week it's Gene Simmons of rock supergroup KISS, I can hardly wait!

Mindgames...

I have noticed that I've been "relaxing" a bit with my eating and need to refocus as my weight's gone up a little. This feels like a second phase type of thing - I've lost the bulk (two and a half stone in old money) but have a bit more to lose. As of today I am, according to my cheapo Fat Percentage monitor 27.7% fat. I weighed 76.1kg this morning so I'm pretty much 21kg of fat. Now, you do need some fat, so weighing about 55kg would be bad. Not much danger of this, however...

So what's my "healthy" weight with the recommended BFP (Body Fat Percentage)? Here, for a 39 year old male it's 22%, for a 40 year old it's 25%.

22% makes me 70.5 kg, next year I can be 73.5kg.

(Yes, Alex, I am assuming no change in muscle since it is for ALL intents and purposes here, IRRELEVANT!)

So, 5.6 kg to lose.

Now, the temptation I've been recognising is to stop now and settle for what I've achieved - "You've done really well, Mark, now you can just relax and EEEEAAAATTTT!!"

Hence my take-out count has been creeping up, I ate much more than I normally would this weekend whilst away and my snacking during the daytime has re-emerged a bit. A wise man told me that "Good is the enemy of Great" and it is sooooooo true.

Today I recommit myself to my task and stop messing about.

Pass the Zimmer...

I've entered the Salisbury Triathlon on 21st of May, yay!

I looked at a Tri site yesterday to have a browse and discovered, to my consternation, that you become a Veteran at the ripe old age of 40! I'm 39, next year I'll qualify for the Vet's category! Yikes, that makes ya think.

I'm finding my reaction to this very interesting. I like getting older and enjoying each life season as it comes and goes, I wouldn't want to be younger again, I feel I'm still approaching my prime. But, it does make me feel odd that in a year I'll be a Vet!

Newsnight...

And Nigel's just been on Newsnight on the BBC as well! Up against Prof. Chris Rapley CBE from the Science Museum it has been fascinating. "An Appeal To Reason" is the title of Lawson's book (and it was the title of the lecture I alluded to earlier) - Paxman quoted from the book, "It is better to do nothing than to do something stupid." Nice, I like it. Lawson's point is that devoting all to Mitigation based on, in my opinion, groupthink, is indeed stupid. Moreover, the economics of it all, and this is primarily Lawson's point, don't make sense.

I know you tend to get that for which you are looking, but I think Chris lost that particular one, and he was looking as one on the back foot.

Altogether now: "The Times They Are Achanging"...

Nigel Lawson...

...is on The World Tonight on Radio 4 now and I'm listening as I type - another example of the increasing media coverage being given to the alternate viewpoint. As you know, I've blogged about him before in November '06 and his Lecture to the Centre for Policy Studies in which he presents a wonderfully sensible viewpoint with which I wholeheartedly agree.

Boots...

...is at the emergency Vet! "Boots is bleeding!" the kids cried, and indeed he was. Somehow the 6ft snooker table leant against the wall fell on him (I have no idea how this was even possible...) and so off to the Vet I went. He's in shock with a nasty cut to the top of his palate (stitches...) and a dislocated jaw! I'm to pick him up at 8am and take him to our regular Vet for his continued care. Worried about him, he's in a bit of a pickle right now :-(

Pray for our cat.

Doubt...

Tonight's meeting at New Community was about doubt - and how refreshing!

When considering doubt I always remember (and this is true, I do always remember this...) my first placement in my PGCE year when training to be a maths Teacher. I had a conversation re Christianity with a teacher at this school, who was a "lapsed Catholic". I said to him that I "knew" that God existed. He said to me that I couldn't "know". So I asked him what I could I say then, and he replied that I could say that I couldn't imagine believing anything more strongly than I did; that without doubt, there is no faith. I stopped right there. I paused, and said, "Good point!". Hmmm, faith in a vacuum is meaningless.

Y'see, I realised in that moment in my life, that his lapsed faith had greater depth and reality than my easy certain cheap answers faith. The wrestling with doubt is, actually, essential to faith. What is faith if it is not the triumph over doubt? And doubts will surely come, either fleetingly or sustained. I have read of great heroes of the faith enduring these very struggles with doubt and overcoming - it all sounds so, well, holy, but these people were wondering whether God actually existed or not! True, they came to the conclusion that he did, but in conversation of a Sunday I would be thinking, "Oh, it's a shame that they're a bit weak in their faith!", not, "Oh yes, see the mighty Christian warrior battling against doubt and overcoming!"

I can be driving along in the car on the way to lead the musical worship and find myself thinking, "Oh, come on, how can this all really be true, eh?", but then I remember all that He's done for me and that I "knew" from my earliest memories that He is who He is and that I was, am, and will always be, His.

Faith without doubt cannot exist any more than light without dark.

I am a "New Breed of Thinker"...

Well, I thought that was a very good radio programme. But this should not surprise you if you've read this blog before, eh? I was expecting Nigel Lawson to get a mention (he didn't) since his lecture to which I alluded in a previous post , here, is in line with the "Adaptation" (see below) approach.

This half an hour was a breath of very fresh air indeed. I detect a subtle but big shift in media coverage emerging in just the last few months. The view that we should focus entirely on the reduction of the "carbon footprint" simply needs to change. Let's all agree that Climate Change is a reality (although not proven to be anthropogenic in origin). Well, big news everyone, the climate does change over time, and please don't fall into the trap of assuming that correlation necessarily indicates causation. This is lazy thinking.

The two words punctuating the programme were "adaptation" and "mitigation". Our entire emphasis has been, up until now at least, on mitigation. We will save the planet by changing the entire globe's weather systems simply by changing our behaviour. That would be good, wouldn't it? That Man shall control the planet, that Man shall have this power. What we fear the most is our own impotency in this changing physical climate! As stated on the programme, if there were no, that's right, NO CO2 emissions from tomorrow in this country we would still be looking at decades of change.

The poor countries cannot adapt as well as we can, we were told, because they don't have the money to finance schemes such as those in Holland in response to possible sea level increase. Well, let's help them. Again, let's help them? Shall we? This is something that can be done and Nigel Lawson made this point very clear in the lecture linked to above.

OK, enough for now, but I am genuinely encouraged with the changing emphasis in the debate. I watch and wait in anticipation of common sense winning through in the end.

Good night :-)

Is the penny ACTUALLY DROPPING??

Let's all listen to Radio 4 tonight at 8:30:

Analysis

The Wrong Road to a Warmer World

Kenan Malik asks whether we are approaching climate change and how to combat it from the wrong direction.

Government ministers and green lobbyists want to reduce global warming by persuading us to take drastic action to reduce our carbon footprint.

But might a better strategy be to accept that climate change is going to happen anyway and to adapt society to meet its challenges? And if so, why is no one talking about it?

This sounds like music to my ears - we shall see! Or hear.