I’ve always envied people who have a separate exercise room in their homes. Half of my reasons why I don’t exercise regularly have to do with lacking both a comfortable space and complete privacy.

My exercise bike, for instance, sits in a corner of my bedroom which, during the summer, feels like a sauna from around noon until sunset. To use my bike I have to move my reading chair aside then wheel and reposition the thing until it faces the TV… which gives me all of 3 inches of space between the bike and my side of the bed. It’s quite cramped, needless to say.

That space in my bedroom is too small for aerobic workouts, though. I learned that the hard way after injuring my foot while doing a roundhouse kick during Tae Bo. So aerobic workouts require a trek downstairs to the basement where I have to move my son’s PlayStation stuff, his video game rocker chair and our coffee table. By the time that’s done, I’m almost too tired to work out!

In either location, my husband and son are guaranteed to pop their heads in at least once while I work out. I hate that. I do not want to have to think about where we keep the ice cream scoop while I’m grunting through my third of five miles on the bike, nor do I want to hear from my husband how much he likes watching my “wobblies” wobble while I’m jumping up and down to an aerobic tape.

Lately, I’ve been eying our back patio as the ideal location for a sun room. Right now the only things on the patio are a plastic storage shed and our hot tub — something I don’t use very often precisely because it’s sitting on a patio near a storage shed, and not in some nice, clean spa-like room.

I mentioned to my husband the other day how nice it would be to turn that patio into actual living space. We’d use the hot tub, sure, but we could also put a TV out there once there were walls up. There would be room for my exercise bike, for aerobics, for my yoga mat and ball, and even room to spare for towel racks, spa supplies and a plant stand.

He, naturally, came up with all sorts of objections. First, it was the money: then I reminded him that he’s perfectly capable of building the sun room himself for a very reasonable price.

Then it was the fact that the room would get too hot in the summer. I pointed out that window A/C units are about to go on sale.

Sure, he said, but what about in the winter? I rolled my eyes and reminded him that between the hot tub’s steam and using the room to exercise in, freezing isn’t something I’d need to worry about. Besides, I said, we could always put in one of those portable wall fireplaces that use vent free gas logs, and wouldn’t it be romantic to sit in front of a fire while we soaked together in the hot tub?

So, OK, I played a bit dirty by reminding him that with actual walls and blinds on the windows to screen us from the neighbor’s prying eyes, we’d be soaking naked in the hot tub, bathed in flickering fire light, maybe even with a shelf of cocktails conveniently located within reach.

I woke up this morning and found a rough sketch of my future sun room laying on the kitchen counter and was thrilled… until I remembered that, once built, I won’t have any reason not to work out regularly.

I’m starting on Alli again today, thanks to a friend who found out the hard way that she’s just not capable of cutting her fat intake back to the 30 grams or less required to avoid the “unwanted treatment effects”. Her loss (and lack thereof) is my gain since she gave me the rest of her bottle for free.

Meanwhile, Amazon is running a one-day special on Alli 90 capsule starter pack (a 60 day supply) for $41.99 instead of the usual $59.99.

That deal expires at midnight, though.

Earlier we were talking about the “good ol’ days,” and how people ate in the 1950s compared to how we eat these days. As a number of you noted, back when gravy-swamped Salisbury Steak and buttery mashed potatoes swam on our plates next to green beans simmered in bacon fat and a slice of pie for dessert, Americans were still more thin.

We aren’t just imagining that, either.

[T]he notion that Americans ever ate well is suspect. In 1966, when Americans were still comparatively thin, more than two billion hamburgers already had been sold in McDonald’s restaurants, noted Dr. Barry Glassner, a sociology professor at the University of Southern California. The recent rise in obesity may have more to do with our increasingly sedentary lifestyles than with the quality of our diets.

“The meals we romanticize in the past somehow leave out the reality of what people were eating,” he said. “The average meal had whole milk and ended with pie…. The typical meal had plenty of fat and calories.”

“Nostalgia is going to get us nowhere,” he added.

No doubt, such nostalgia is part of the lure of Atkins-style diets which tell us we can enjoy that same buttery goodness (albeit with mashed cauliflower in place of the spuds). I know I, for one, find myself often growing sick of munching on celery stalks and the Styrofoam substitutes known as rice cakes and begin thinking that breakfasts of bacon and fried eggs, lunches of burger patties topped with butter pats and slices of Brie, followed by a medium-rare rib eye steak with Caesar salad and roast asparagus for dinner all sounds like a grand way to diet.

Unfortunately, my body has yet to respond well to that kind of diet. In fact, it’s that precise kind of eating — taken up right around the time I got married — that’s packed on the 40 pounds which seemed to appear on my belly, ass and thighs oh, about three days returning home from my honeymoon. (That joke about wedding bands adding 50 pounds to a woman’s body does, unfortunately, hit a bit too close to home for comfort if you ask me.)

One thing I have noticed: the size of my waistline has grown directly in proportion to the amount of time spent at my computer. And, no, that’s not all caloric-related.

I have, on and off through the past 20 years, kept food logs. Being a pack rat of sorts, I’ve also kept the majority of my logs in a huge box in our storage room. While cleaning out some of my husband’s unnecessary crap a little clutter last week, I ran across them. I couldn’t resist the chance to thumb through one or two, secretly hoping to remember just how I used to eat back when I effortlessly remained a size 4.

You can imagine my surprise when I saw, in my own handwriting no less, that I was actually eating quite a bit more back then. Oh, sure, I was also a bit more active: I walked from my parking space at university to my classes and back, and I went out dancing both weekend nights. I hauled hampers of dirty laundry up- and downstairs rather than ferry them from one room to another on the same floor. And I spent my home-bound evenings on the floor in front of the TV doing leg lifts or donkey kicks and crunches — something I don’t do much anymore thanks to all of the Cheerios, Legos and cat hair now covering our carpet wherever our home furniture and my piles of books don’t already occupy.

One thing I did not do much of: sitting behind a computer. Yes, I had one — I was online quite a bit of time, even — but with a 9600 baud modem (something that was state-of-the-art at the time but nowadays would be justifiable grounds for a homicide spree), being “online” really meant getting up and cleaning house or folding laundry whilst waiting for a web page to load.

In other words: I didn’t sit a lot back then. I was up, and I was moving, thanks to both the configuration of my apartment and the slowness of the World Wide Web. My waist was smaller then, too. When I did gain weight — and I admit to yo-yo’ing quite a few times in those years — it settled on my hips and ass but not at all on my waist. Gaining weight meant simply looking more like an hourglass — something not nearly as desirable in those pre-J.Lo days.

Sometimes I wonder if these things aren’t linked: despite the amount of calories being the same then and now (actually, in fact, a bit higher then), does sitting at a computer by necessity lead to big bellies?

Consider, for instance, the number of muffin tops you see on young girls these days. Girls with coltish legs, lithe arms and still relatively flat chests but big, bulging love handles spilling over their waistbands. They are, of course, the reason why those swing tops, Empire waistlines and baby doll cami’s have come back in style: how else to hide the flab that flops over.

It’s not just young girls who experience this, though. I, myself, have gone from the allegedly “healthier” pear-shape to what can most kindly be described as apple-esque. I see it in other women, too: ladies who are equally computer-bound and whose bodies resemble potatoes perched atop two toothpicks. I have to admit: I envy the fact that at least their legs have remained thin.

Is it our computer culture that’s causing this, and not merely our calorie consumption? One has to wonder. I know I do. But I also wonder: what if it is? Would I actually be willing to cut my time at the computer by half (or even more) in return for the effortless size 6 of my past?

Decisions, decisions.

UPDATE: I may be on to something. Bloggrrl shares my plight.

A while back I read a magazine article (which I now can’t find) about a woman who spent an entire month living in a 1950s style household, eating meals prepared precisely as called for in 1950s recipes, performing housework exactly as a housewife would have done it in the 1950s.

She lost 14 pounds in a month. It was, she said, the easiest and best diet/exercise program she’d ever been on.

Now, I’m not about to go out and replace my nice upright vacuum with one of those horrid, awkward cannister things that turn floor cleaning into a wrestling match. Nor am I going to start mopping my kitchen floor daily whilst wearing high heels and a pearl necklace.

I am, however, doing my best to remember that even if she was eating steak, home fries, creamed peas, corn bread and a glass of milk for dinner, she was still consuming fewer calories than I’m probably getting in my Cobb salad. Consider, for instance, the drastic portion size difference that’s taken place.

At what point did we begin to expect larger portions even though it means higher prices — and bigger waistlines? I really don’t remember, but it’s interesting to see that the portion size pendulum has begun to swing back to the other, smaller side.

At TGIFriday restaurants, for instance, they’re now advertising smaller menu options at prices that aren’t all that significantly smaller. Yet I’m happy to pay for them anyway because I know that such a choice won’t do as much damage to my diet as its larger counterpart on the regular menu.

Interesting, isn’t it, that as we continue to battle the bulge in America we’re starting to equate “value” not so much with serving size but with how it fits our lifestyles, instead.

(The bandwidth for this post has been compensated by this mention of Century furniture.)

By now the evidence favoring resistance training as a method of weight loss is well established. But new research shows that slow and steady repetitions may not be the optimal way to work out.

The researchers explored the effects of explosive verses slow contractions and exercise intensity on energy expenditure in their study.

The study showed that explosive or more rapid muscle contractions used more energy than slow contractions, even when the amount of weight lifted was identical, increasing the benefits of the exercise for weight loss.

The study does not indicate whether rapid, explosive movements can be performed in less time and still produce the same benefits. So 30 minutes of rapid movements will naturally lead to more repetitions than, say, more leisurely repetitions performed in the same amount of time. (This might explain why those rabid little old ladies who practically live at the Golden Nugget Las Vegas slot machines still have better-looking biceps than I do.)

On the other hand, it does mean that short, intense workouts can still reap benefits. Pressed for time? Knock out a couple dozen bicep curls, squats, lunges, crunches and jumping jacks and ditch the guilt.

A (skinny) friend recently suggested that one way to squeeze my workouts in with my other commitments is to incorporate exercise throughout my day.

“Do squats while you put away dishes,” she suggested. “Lunge while you vacuum the floors. Wear wrist weights when you dust. Instead of carrying all of the laundry in one basket from room-to-room, make several trips so you get the extra walking in.”

This is all easy for her to say. As I mentioned, she’s skinny. She has no idea that by the time I’ve made one trip up- and downstairs I’m so covered with sweat that I might as well have not bothered showering that morning.

But I do see her point: a little bit of extra thought and effort can actually add up to using some muscles that might otherwise have gone neglected all day long.

Note to self: do not use the kitchen cabinet hardware as handles when doing those squats.

P.S. Don’t forget to buy replacement hardware now.

Since I’ve been sick for the past three days, I didn’t bother stepping on the scale. I’d kind of hoped, as a matter of fact, that all of the soup I’ve been living on would’ve led to a little weight loss.

No such luck.

Sure, I didn’t gain an ounce but I haven’t lost any, either. I’m going to blame the sodium content. Yeah, that’s it: I must be retaining water. By the way, are you interested in buying some shore front property in Arizona? What? You’re not that gullible? Me, neither.

You know, if this keeps up I’m not going to need to rent an animal costume for Halloween this year. I’ll just need to dress in gray from head to toe and tell folks I’m going as an elephant. They won’t have a hard time believing me, I’m sure.

Some days it feels like I’ve tried everything — everything — to lose weight. I’ve eaten low fat, I’ve eaten low-carb, I’ve watched my glycemic index, increased my exercise and tripled my water intake. I spent a week eating clear broth before every meal in an attempt to reduce my appetite. I’ve taken Alli and I’ve sucked down more Slim Fast shakes than I care to remember. During those two weeks, I might add, my aerobic exercise increased, too, if you’re willing to include the heart-pumping race to get to the bathroom on time.

I’ve tried setting small goals and promising to reward myself if I meet them (jewelry is, after all, a wonderful motivator). I’ve even extracted a promise from my husband that I can buy a completely new wardrobe — no questions asked — if I manage to lose 40 pounds. Still, no luck.

Sometimes it feels like I’ve tried just about every possible alternative to weight loss short of abandoning every activity in my life in favor of living on my exercise bike.

According to a recent health report, it might not be my fault. Someone may have infected me with adenovirus-36, a human virus that appears to promote weight gain.

An American team led by Dr Magdalena Pasarica, from Pennington Biomedical Research Centre at Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, obtained tissue samples from a cross-section of patients who had undergone liposuction.

From the samples, they isolated adult stem cells – immature cells which have not yet developed a specific role in the body.

Half the stem cells were exposed to ad-36 and half not.

After a week, most of the virus-infected stem cells, but none of the non-infected cells, had grown into fat-storage cells.

“We’re not saying that a virus is the only cause of obesity, but this study provides stronger evidence that some obesity cases may involve viral infections,” said Dr Pasarica, who presented her findings at the annual meeting of the American Chemical Society in Boston.

Sure, I know it’s probably just another one of those weird health reports that won’t amount to a “breakthrough” for dieters. But let me just say now that if it does pan out and I do find that I “caught fatness” from someone else, they’d better pray I’ve been slacking off on exercise because, otherwise, I’m going to hunt them down and pound them into sand.

You know, just the other day I was saying to myself, “Self, perhaps the reason your garden is dying isn’t the unrelenting 95+ degree temperatures we’ve been having. Perhaps it’s because you don’t talk to your plants often enough.”

So, during the 5 brief pre-dawn minutes when the temperatures actually dipped below 90 degrees, I stood in my PJs watering my garden and telling my plants how lovely they were, how yummy were their vegetables, how I simply adore the way they look on the counter sitting next to the bag of potato chips that’s infinitely more convenient to eat.

Turns out, I needn’t have wasted the time — nor alarmed my neighbors — by talking to my vegetable garden. I should have been talking to my fat cells instead.

So many of the diet options out there insist on three meals and two snacks per day, beginning with breakfast. I’ve never been a breakfast person. Ever, ever, ever.

Even on days when I have only a salad for dinner, I simply don’t wake up hungry. Now, waking up craving coffee? Oh, yeah, I definitely do that.

I always find it humorous to read about people who — like me — are trying to lose weight and yet aren’t morning eaters. They moan and groan over having a morning meal, and everyone assures them they must eat. “It’s the most important meal of the day,” the saying goes.

But consider this: one of the things everyone with extra weight knows we’re supposed to re-learn is the habit of eating only when we’re hungry. Not when we’re bored. Not because the clock says it’s time to. Not as a way to relieve stress. We are to eat when we’re hungry and stop when we’re not. (Ideally, we’re supposed to learn what hunger actually feels like, too.)

I’ve often found that my best weight loss happens when I “forget” to eat — then find myself at dinner time absolutely hungry to begin with, but full after the first helping. It runs counter to all of the talk about keeping your metabolism up by eating regularly, I know, but it works for me. And if it works, I’m not going to argue with it.

Apparently, I’ve been following the Houseguest Diet:

It’s quite simple: you can eat anything you like. But only once a day. And it has to be food already in the house, you’re only allowed one paper towel to eat it with – no dishes, utensils or pots, and you have to eat over the sink. The rest of the time you can drink as much tap water as you like – but straight from the faucet please.

As the article notes, you never really realize how much work goes into feeding a person until you’ve got a houseguest. By the time you’ve finished cooking, eating and cleaning up after one meal it’s already time for another. If houseguests are my in-laws, there are also snacks and desserts to be prepared, served and cleaned up after, too.

I’d love to put them on this diet. Hell, I’d even join them myself if I thought starving my mother-in-law would in any way diminish the appeal of visiting my home.