Losing a part of me

Category: Trauma

  • Awareness and Honesty

    There are myriad reasons why people are overweight, and I do my best to not judge people because I do not know their stories, what medical conditions they might suffer from, or the psychological trauma that they live with. The things that I say in this article are about me and are not meant to pass judgement on anyone else.

    Fifteen years ago, I moved from Quebec to Ontario. Aside from the obvious inconvenience factors, because our socialized medicine in Canada is administered by province, I was forced to find a new primary care physician. While it was not at the top of my agenda, I would eventually need to do it. In September of that year, I met Theresa, and it was just easy to go to the same doctor as she did. I met Doctor John Guy Yates sometime in 2008, and after the hiatus of living out of the country, I continue to see him to this day.

    As doctors do, during my first visit he planned to run a battery of tests – bloodwork and the like. He told me that because of my weight, he told me that he would also run tests on my thyroid. I asked him why, and he answered that very often obesity is caused by thyroid problems. I replied, ‘Doc, I am not fat because of my thyroid. I am fat because I like to eat a lot, and I do not exercise nearly enough.’ He looked at me and said that it is refreshing to hear a patient who is not trying to blame anyone else for their obesity… and that I was one of the few.

    Over the years, Doctor Yates has seen me balloon to my heaviest weight (twice – the second time I was living in the USA, so he did not see it), and has seen me drop to my lowest weight (or within 5-10 lbs of it). He has recommended me to a weight management clinic and has told me that I was pre-diabetic… and then, when I lost most of the weight, had the pleasure of telling me that I was no longer pre-diabetic. He has encouraged me in my weight loss efforts, as well as in my exercise regimens. These have included walking, running, Taekwondo (he knew me before I started, and look at where I am now!), as well as weight-training with a personal trainer. Now, once again, he is encouraging me by standing in for a weight-management clinic, most of which are still only doing telemedicine (ironically, since when I went to Japan, I tried to get them to do that, and they refused). I need the doctor’s office visits so that I can get weighed and really be accountable, and not just for the encouragement and admonishment I would get from the clinic.

    Fifteen years ago, I told Doctor Yates that I was obese because I like to eat. Fast-forward, I know there is more to it than that. I am fat because of myriad psychological issues that I have been dealing with since I left the Army… and before. The horrors of my military service, added to the trauma of an abusive childhood raised by a mother who always loved my sister more than she loved me (and who really enjoyed hitting me) have been no picnic. Add to that, it is impossible for me to discuss my military traumas with a doctor without security clearance… in Israel.

    In short, I am fat for two reasons:

    • I really like to eat foods that are fattening for me, and in large quantities; and
    • I spent so many years ignoring the psychological damage that I have endured.

    It cannot be as simple as that. I could sit here and write tomes on the reasons I have fought with obesity for my entire post-military life. Those tomes would be summarized in those two sentences.

    It is important when one has a health issue to deal with it. Of course, one cannot treat a broken leg with antihistamines. It is important to have the right treatments for the right malady. If that malady is an unbalanced thyroid (or whatever the term would be), then there are medical treatments for that. If the problems are psychological, there are doctors and therapists who can help you to deal with them. If you just like to eat a lot, then changing your eating habits is the key.

    Of course, once you have cured one or both of the medical issues, it is still important to change your eating habits. We might need to relearn how to eat healthy, and in some cases, we might need to learn that for the first time. If I gained the weight because of psychological trauma, that does not mean that as soon as I have dealt with that trauma (and let’s be honest, I will be dealing with them for the rest of my life), I will suddenly or even gradually lose all of the weight. Healthy eating is an important part of life, and please do not try to learn how to do it on Facebook… or even from actual books. If, like I had, you have forgotten how to eat healthy then there are professionals for that as well. Registered dieticians and nutritionists will educate and guide you in ways that books of fad diets and pop psychology cannot.

    That is not to say that all of those books or fad diets are bad – I remember thirty years ago hearing about The Atkins Diet, which from what I can tell was a program that cut carbohydrates out. In other words, it focused on ketosis. Yes, that can be a good program. No, it is not for everyone. In truth, despite what so many holier-than-thou proselytizers will tell you there is no single solution to losing weight and keeping it off that will work for everyone, and you need to find what will work for you. If it was as easy as everyone reading the same book and following the same program, then there would only be one book, and we would all be thin.

    Losing weight is neither easy nor simple. Before setting out on your weight loss journey it is important for you to understand why you are overweight… and to be honest with yourself about it. Nobody looks quite so dishonest with themselves as someone who tells you they are fat because of the slow metabolism, while ordering two pounds of Buffalo Wings with a large pizza. Of course, they so often order the Diet Coke to show you that they are trying.

    Be honest with yourself. If you believe it is your metabolism, or your thyroid, or any other medical condition, then speak to your doctor and discuss your options. Dealing with psychological issues might be harder than that… added to the stigma of being fat you have the stigma of being psychologically damaged. So many people are ashamed to seek help. You know what? Get over it. Psychological trauma is no less real – and is often much more damaging – than are physical maladies. If you just like to eat, then yes… dieting might be a temporary solution, but the better one might be changing your eating habits.

    Honesty and self-awareness are crucial to weight loss. Whether the food is the problem, or there is an underlying reason, you need to know. You cannot be cured by dealing with the symptoms. You have to address the source of the problem.

    I did not say that it was easy.

  • Why Are We Fat?

    This is another article that I wrote two years ago, which I revisited now. Thinking back on the psychology of obesity, I thought I would re-post it here.

    There are several reasons why people gain weight. Some of them are:

    • Lack of education about nutrition.
    • Gluttony – we just want more.
    • Stress – many people turn to food when they are stressed.
    • Emotional eating – my boyfriend girlfriend husband wife boss children or whoever have hurt me, and I am going to turn to food to relieve the pain.
    • Misunderstanding about healthy portion sizes.
    • Picking the wrong foods for more than the occasional treat.
    • Knowing what we should eat and how much we should eat… and ignoring them.

    There are myriad reasons why we eat poorly. These are just a few. However, I am not an expert on the subject. I am, however, an expert in why I am fat.

    • An abusive (first physically, and then emotionally) childhood with a mother who liked a lot of foods that were bad for us. She fed us healthy foods too, but the buffalo wings were always fawned over, whereas the fish was always just ‘Eat this.’
    • During my Army service I was able to eat as much as I wanted without gaining weight. Not only was I in my early twenties, I was also probably burning 10,000 calories per day.
    • Toward the end of my Army service I was injured, and owing to that injury, two things happened that were disastrous:
      • I stopped working out.
      • I developed a dependence on prescription pain killers, which would have a terrible effect on every aspect of my life, many of which are still apparent today (although my dependence on pills is long behind me now)
    • After the Army I was working as a radio entrepreneur with a partner. We had a lot of restaurants pay us in free meals rather than cash, and those restaurants were extremely unhealthy.
    • Many soldiers develop psychological traumas because of their service. That, coupled with the traumas resulting from an abusive childhood and a toxic relationship with a poisonous parent (long-reaching trauma that amplified the effects of the dependencies discussed in an earlier point), left me an emotional disaster zone in the personality of a rock. Outwardly I always seemed fine, grounded, stable, and reliable. Inwardly, no.
    • The same partner mentioned in an earlier point, along with a number of people I was friends with at the time, would go to restaurants almost every meal, and eat extremely unhealthily.
    • For many years I worked as a road warrior. In essence, this meant that I spent a lot of time travelling. Hotels, restaurants, airplane food, and little if any exercise is a recipe for weight gain.
    • I like fattening foods. I like sizable portions of fattening foods.

    There are probably more reasons, but they are really just excuses. I want to get to a point now where I can look in the rear-view mirror of my life on that terrible time when I was fat because I was unwilling or unable to overcome all of the obstacles that life threw at me. I have worked my buns off to get to where I am today, which is nearly forty pounds lower than my peak. I never want to be there again. For that matter, once I get to my ideal weight, I never want to be here again. It will take a lot more work.

  • Why Are We Fat?

    There are several reasons why people gain weight. Some of them are:

    • Lack of education about nutrition.
    • Gluttony – we just want more.
    • Stress – many people turn to food when they are stressed.
    • Emotional eating – my boyfriend girlfriend husband wife boss children or whoever have hurt me, and I am going to turn to food to relieve the pain.
    • Misunderstanding about healthy portion sizes.
    • Picking the wrong foods for more than the occasional treat.
    • Knowing what we should eat and how much we should eat… and ignoring them.

    There are myriad reasons why we eat poorly. These are just a few. However, I am not an expert on the subject. I am, however, an expert in why I am fat.

    • An abusive (first physically, and then emotionally) childhood with a mother who liked a lot of foods that were bad for us. She fed us healthy foods too, but the buffalo wings were always fawned over, whereas the fish was always just ‘Eat this.’
    • During my Army service I was able to eat as much as I wanted without gaining weight. Not only was I in my early twenties, I was also probably burning 10,000 calories per day.
    • Toward the end of my Army service I was injured, and owing to that injury, two things happened that were disastrous:
      • I stopped working out.
      • I developed a dependence on prescription pain killers, which would have a terrible effect on every aspect of my life, many of which are still apparent today (although my dependence on pills is long behind me now)
    • After the Army I was working as a radio entrepreneur with a partner. We had a lot of restaurants pay us in free meals rather than cash, and those restaurants were extremely unhealthy.
    • Many soldiers develop psychological traumas because of their service. That, coupled with the traumas resulting from an abusive childhood and a toxic relationship with a poisonous parent (long-reaching trauma that amplified the effects of the dependencies discussed in an earlier point), left me an emotional disaster zone in the personality of a rock. Outwardly I always seemed fine, grounded, stable, and reliable. Inwardly, no.
    • The same partner mentioned in an earlier point, along with a number of people I was friends with at the time, would go to restaurants almost every meal, and eat extremely unhealthily.
    • For many years I worked as a road warrior. In essence, this meant that I spent a lot of time travelling. Hotels, restaurants, airplane food, and little if any exercise is a recipe for weight gain.
    • I like fattening foods. I like sizable portions of fattening foods.

    There are probably more reasons, but they are really just excuses. I want to get to a point now where I can look in the rear-view mirror of my life on that terrible time when I was fat because I was unwilling or unable to overcome all of the obstacles that life threw at me. I have worked my buns off to get to where I am today, which is nearly eighty pounds lower than my peak. I never want to be there again. For that matter, once I get to my ideal weight, I never want to be here again. It will take a lot more work.

  • Day 65

    I am off to Montreal this morning. After my shake (which I am drinking as I type) I will pack HRF Princess Sophie into the car – her kit is already packed and ready to go – and I will drive her to the dog sitter’s house. From there, I will drive straight east – I have a couple of stops to make along the way, but all in all it should be a rather quick drive.

    Yesterday had some difficult moments for me. My empathetic side can get the better of me, and when those that I care for are unhappy then I am too. It is maddening when there is nothing I can do to help them. I know that things will get better… but the bad days are bad.

    I kept to the program yesterday, although I was downing the lozenges like candy as I taught last night. I do not know if that was a result of the trauma, or if it is just that they were there and readily available. I also do not know if it is the reason my weight was up this morning. I will endeavour to do better today.

    It will be a long but relaxing drive to Montreal, with only my audio entertainment and my cigars to keep me company. Have a great day folks!

  • Day 36

    I find that I have gotten into a routine of having a shake for breakfast, a salad (often with either canned salmon or tuna) for lunch, a proper (but well-planned and careful) dinner, and a bar in the evenings. I seem to be doing pretty well with my weight loss on that routine. We will see how it goes. This morning, I made an omelet for Leslie, and I helped her with it… just a few bites, but I have to remember these things when I am accounting for my food. It helps nobody to consume a food and not remember you ate it. “Hey, I cannot figure out why I am not losing weight!?” Maybe it’s because of that half-order of French toast of your child’s that you ate because you didn’t want it to go to waste.

    There are days when I feel that I cannot do anything right. I have to try to remember on those days that yes, most of what I did was good, but it is the things I got wrong that I focus on. That has been my history, because it was how I was taught. “Sure, Mitch… you did great on your math test, you played well with others, you even ate your greens… but none of that matters because you didn’t clean your room. Go there and do not come out until it is spotless.” There are days when I am nearly able to come to terms with the person that my mother was… and then I remember things like this, that to this day sabotage my happiness and that of other people, and I remember why I could not stand her when she was alive.

    Last night I made the fish with Buffalo wing sauce that I planned for, and it was very good. I put a couple of rainbow trout fillets into the air fryer, doused them in lemon juice, and cooked them for 10 minutes and 400°F. The sauce is one that I learned how to make when I was in college from my downstair neighbour who was studying to be a chef. It has four simple ingredients, three of which are almost always in my fridge or pantry anyways. I did have to buy ketchup, as I suppose I had thrown it out when I started the program. Once Leslie is gone, I will likely go back to the boring chicken-every-night routine, but while she is here, I am enjoying mixing it up. I also plan to, on days when I go to the supermarket, pick up a good piece of fish to enjoy that night. I do not like letting fish sit too long… you understand.

    I am waiting on two packages that are set to arrive by Canada Post today or tomorrow, and I am excited about both of them. One is a handle for the Corning ware pots that I am buying from Lyle and Dorothy. Meh, okay. There is a history behind these that is the reason I bought it… aside from the obvious ‘Corning ware pots don’t have handles’ aspect, my mother always had one in her kitchen… and it was something that my sister always said, ‘When she dies, I am taking this.’ She can have it. I’ll buy my own. Fuck you, Jennifer.

    The second package is a lot more fun. I have not bought new funky socks in a long time, and when I saw on Facebook that a buddy bought a pair of dim sum socks, I reached out and asked him where he found them. He told me… and I had fun. The short version of the story is that either today or tomorrow I will have eight new pair of fun socks.

    It is still a bit chilly to sit outside, but if the wind dies down just a little then I will sit with a cigar today. Leslie has a lot of work to do, and I only start teaching at 6:00pm. I suppose my goal for the day is to relax until then, and to not veer too badly from my weight management program. Oh, and to drink water. Plenty of water!

    Wherever you are, enjoy the day!

  • Day 35

    If I could believe my bathroom scale, I am down three pounds from yesterday. I do not believe my bathroom scale.

    For the most part, I did pretty well yesterday; my only cheats were a few honey graham crackers that my girlfriend was eating, and I do not think they did a whole lot of damage. Certainly, they would do less harm than the piece of cake that I had at Lyle ad Dorothy’s the other night – something that I neglected to mention, not out of shame but because I forgot.

    I think my class is going well. I am zipping through a lot of the material because there is a lot of redundant material between the last class that I taught this group, this one, and the next class that I will teach the group. Some of my students are still trying to pull the wool over my head. They log in, make a big show of saying hello in the chat window, and make sure I have marked them as Present in the book. Okay, it’s not a book. I just had a flashback to elementary school where there was an actual book that the teachers all used. No trauma… just a memory.

    On that note, it seems that recently, so many of the memories that are coming up are in fact traumatic. I have had disturbing memories and realizations of my sister (and of my whole family) and of my professional life. It is funny that through it all I am now longing for those wistful days in the Army when I was getting shot at and bombed a lot. For so many years I have been hopeful that one day my sister and I would reconcile; I have come to realize in the last two weeks that that will never happen… and it would probably be a bad thing if it did.

    That is a very disturbing realization to come to, and it is one of the reasons I have been down these last two weeks. To come to terms with the fact that life was better when Hamas and Hezbollah were trying to kill me than when I was with my immediate family (both growing up and later in life) is harsh. My father was a wonderful man, but a weak man, who failed to protect me when I was growing up for fear of my mother (his wife). Many years later, he finally left her. He and I were driving somewhere one day when he asked my forgiveness. I do forgive him, and I love him, and I miss him. But the damage was done.

    I cannot be sure, but these family traumas just might be the root of my unhealthy relationship with food. I am not blaming anyone for my obesity. I am just coming to terms within myself with some of the root causes. How does a high school athlete and soldier devolve into what I became? There you go.

    Fortunately, Leslie is here to help me through it. My friends are here to help when she is not. I have a great support system… now. Maybe, just maybe… if I had had one twenty-five and thirty-five and even forty-five years ago… well, the sands of time are in a one-way journey, and we can look behind us from whence we came, but we cannot reach back and change it.

    I do not know if I will make it through the day without cheating today, but I want to be good because I am planning a dinner for Leslie and I that will be scrumptious. I am going to buy some fish fillets (maybe rainbow trout), and I will make my Buffalo wing sauce for them. There will be some sugar in the sauce (ketchup is an ingredient), but not a lot, and it will be so delicious!

    The weather forecast is not great. Looking at today from yesterday, you would think that we’d be wearing shorts outside, with high temperatures of 11°c. What that would not have told you is that the high would be reached at 1am, and that by the time we woke up, it would be windy and snowing, with temperatures already below 0°, and heading for -8° in the evening. The winds are gusting at 35km/h, which is to say that while I might pop outside for a quick one, today will not be a comfortable ‘sit on the porch smoking cigars’ day. Phooey.

    Have a great day everyone!

  • Psychology, and taking responsibility for one’s own life

    There is a quote from The West Wing that “…Presidential elections are won and lost on one square foot of real estate.” (Meaning in one’s head). It occurred to me this morning that weight loss succeeds or fails in one’s head.

    Outside of the Army and my mother’s house (which was stricter and louder), nobody has ever held a gun to my head and forced me to eat. All of my food choices have been mine, and they were just that: choices. How many times could I have made a healthier choice instead of an unhealthy one? Could I have decided to not go for that second (or third) serving at the all-you-can-eat buffet? How many times should I have opted for the salad instead of the French fries, or ten wings instead of twenty (or thirty)? How many bags of chips should I have poured one small portion from and then sealed, rather than eating out of (and finishing) the bag… or should have not bought in the first place?

    Some of these choices were made out of ignorance. More were made because psychologically I was not strong enough to make smarter, healthier, better choices. Yes, I probably rebelled against the Army’s discipline when I was discharged, and I went on an uncontrolled eating frenzy. That frenzy lasted what – seven years before I first tried to do something about it? Something like that. For one who is (in so many respects) so strong, it is a disaster that I could not have picked myself up by the bootstraps and stopped the unrestrained gluttony sooner. Let’s review:

    When I was engaged to my first wife, I started on Weight Watchers. By the time she left me I had lost nearly forty pounds. The first meeting after she left, I walked out in disgust after my weigh-in and never went back. It was not until years later that I found out that the facilitators really dropped the ball and were supposed to call me to after I missed one or two meetings. I will not blame them… but maybe two weeks after my separation I might have been in a better state of mind to get back onto the program.

    I do not think that I had a slip after my separation from my second wife, mostly because I was very active in Taekwondo. I was teaching several nights per week, which kept me in pretty good shape. About a year later, I had my final showdown with my mother, which prompted me to reevaluate many aspects of my life. I will not spend any time on the long-term emotional trauma inflicted upon me by my abusive mother; suffice it to say that I had an epiphany, realizing that if I was ever going to be a good person, I had to unlearn a lot of the behaviours and attitudes that she had taught me were normal. A few days later, on a day when I was particularly vulnerable because of the sheer immensity of the changes that I would have to make, my GrandMaster (who I suspect was also having a particularly bad day) yelled at me inappropriately, causing me to walk out… and I have not returned to that club since. Owing to the sudden lack of exercise, I started to gain weight again.

    In 2017 I started the program for the first time, with a medical (non-surgical) bariatric program. I lost a tremendous amount of weight. While I slipped back a little from October through January, I was back on track, losing weight at a respectable pace. I am not sure how much of that slipping was due to my mother’s diagnosis with brain cancer. Around the time I started regaining the weight, friends convinced me (against my will and better judgment) to visit her in the hospital. I went the day that she went in (for the last time) and stood there making small talk. She was a grandmaster in the art of the backhanded compliment, and even as she lay there on what was probably her deathbed, she complimented my sweater… and told me how lovely it would look if I just lost some weight. I was sixty pounds lighter than the last time she had seen me, and I had just lost a hundred pounds. Grandmaster indeed.

    Over the course of the next few months, I drove to Montreal almost every weekend to see her. I watched this once powerful and mighty force degenerate before my eyes. I told her one day that I forgave her. I said it to put her mind at ease. I was lying. I did not forgive her what she had done to me, and despite years of therapy, I do not know if I ever will. My weight crept up throughout that time, despite a couple of efforts to control it.

    And then she died.

    I always had an extremely complicated relationship with my mother, but her death essentially put an end to her and I ever being able to resolve things. I suppose it would have been nice had she, even lying on her deathbed, apologized, or taken responsibility. Now that would never happen… could never happen. Over the course of the next year and a half, my weight was back up to where I had started.

    I tried again… and while there were bumps along the road, I got back onto the program in July 2019. By October 2020 I was the lowest weight I had been in nearly two decades. My weight valleyed below what it had been when my first wife left me. And then it started creeping back up. It took time to get to bad, but from bad to worse was again due to psychological and emotional losses and traumas. My father died, and I shot up another forty pounds. My sudden and unexpected return to Canada, and I shot up another forty pounds. Relationship trauma, another twenty pounds… and I realized I was at my heaviest weight ever, and nearly 130 lbs up from my best. Not all because of psychological trauma and issues… but a lot of.

    It would be easy to blame my mother, my ex-wife, my Army trauma, and so many others for my weight gain. Everyone suffers psychological trauma, and it is how they deal with it that matters. I dealt with my trauma poorly. I am not going to say that there were no worse ways for me to deal, but the long-term effects on my weight and health are obvious. I can blame others, but the buck stops here. The responsibility lies with me, and nobody else.

    Owning one’s own shortcomings is never easy. It is so much easier to lay the blame on others. How could that possibly help me to lose the weight and to keep it off? If I blame anyone or everyone else, then the next time I am slim and suffer a trauma I will have the easy out… I can eat to my heart’s content, gain as much weight as I do, and it will be someone else’s fault… but the consequences are mind and mine alone, so in the end, that is not a healthy way to deal with it. Taking responsibility for one’s own actions and state and course means that there is nobody to blame for where I am going; I am at the helm of my own future, and no matter what external voices may tell me, I can lose the weight and keep it off because turning to food and especially to unhealthy foods is an obstacle to avoid, but when I am at the wheel then I can do it without listening to the voices telling me to eat.

    I am not writing any mantras to recite, I just have to remember every day to do as well as I can… and that slipping one day does not mean I have to go down the slope, it only means that I have to redouble my efforts to stop my fall, and to get back up again.

  • Day 19

    While I worked most of the weekend, I did have a friend over for a cigar on the balcony yesterday. It was a beautiful and sunny day, and he and I (and Princess Sophie) were able to enjoy it to the fullest.

    I had a real non-scale victory last night. Yesterday evening, while video-chatting with Leslie, I decided I wanted to try on the pants that I had put aside with the tag ‘Try again February 10.’ She was so happy for me that they fit! It wasn’t like ‘OMG if I hold my stomach in as much as I can then maybe with a crowbar and a cinch, I will be able to close them… barely’ either… I am wearing them comfortably today. So many of my NSVs will revolve around clothes, and that is just fine by me. The fit of a shirt or a pair of pants can be a much more visible and tangible sign of improvement than numbers on a scale.

    It was great to spend time with my sons on Saturday. Sunday evening my phone rang, and on the other end was a screaming child. My poor son (the younger) was having a terrible meltdown and was in an uncontrollable hysteria. My poor son (the elder) and his mother were trying to settle things, and one of them thought that speaking to me might help. I am more than a little ashamed to say that I am familiar with such tantrums firsthand, having had similar issues myself as a child. Where my older son thought that I might be able to soothe and calm his brother, I was much more effective in counselling him, and explaining to him why he had to take a step back. His mother, who was listening the whole time, must have worked hard to keep her jaw from falling, and likely wished that I had been so wise with my counsel and my child (as well as adult) psychology when we were married. The regrets I have from my years married to her, and from all of the years that I have been a father, will be a shadow over my soul until the day that I die. If only I had a time machine…

    I stuck to the program pretty well throughout the day; being able to smoke two cigars certainly helped, as did the fact that I was busy working from morning to night. I enjoyed my chicken and salad for dinner, and I enjoyed my regular meal replacements the rest of the time. I do not think I even had any almonds.

    This morning, after dealing with a client issue where the sky was falling, I picked my friend/cleaning lady up from the train station and asked if she minded that we make a quick stop at the supermarket, where I picked up chicken and lettuce. As we walked into the house, she asked me if I had given up on my diet program. I was able to excitedly share that not only had I not given up, but I was doing really well on it. I showed her the bins into which I sorted all of my ‘not yet’ clothes and showed off that as of last night I no longer have a ‘try on soon’ shelf. She is a good friend and has always been very supportive with my weight loss… although she is also happy to help me enjoy an all-you-can-eat sushi meal when I am not watching my weight!

    Today’s work, now that the worst of the fire has been contained, consists mainly of watching numbers go up and make sure that they do not crash, which means that while I cannot be far from my computer, I can be on the balcony with a cigar after my lunch… which will start in just a few minutes.

    Have a great day!