Tag: Warren Buffet

Down Eleven Pounds

If you invent the dietetic pretzel, you will be as rich as Bill Gates and Warren Buffet combined. I will kiss you on the lips.

My diet continues. So far, so good. I’m down 11 pounds. Yesterday I was down 12.

You shouldn’t look every day – right? How can you not?

When I last dieted, Dr. Steve looked at my blood numbers and said, “No more Atkins.”

Actually, he hinted at it. I picked up the hint. He said he was glad I did.

This diet is very different for me, in that I’m not being 100% strict. I have had cake. I have had pasta. Just less than I would have had before.

Mostly, I’ve made healthier choices… and avoided pretzels. I love pretzels. That’s the most difficult part.

If you invent the dietetic pretzel, you will be as rich as Bill Gates and Warren Buffet combined. I will kiss you on the lips.

Nowadays, instead of getting the “Chicken Caesar Wrap” at dinner, I’ll get the “Veggie Wrap.” No potatoes or fries, it’s grilled vegetables there too. Mayo is replaced by mustard. I’ve developed a taste for salmon. I’m losing weight a few hundred calories at a time.

My biggest change happens when I get home from work. There’s a whole lot less grazing, and (as I mentioned) no pretzels. I do eat a lot of fruit.

These are simple things. They are working.

I have dieting and weight theories. They aren’t based on ‘real’ science, but they make sense to me.

For instance, I don’t think I could go below 160 pounds and still be healthy. I have found 200 pounds is much too much weight. So, there’s a 40 pound range to ‘play’ in.

With that in mind, I’ve lost about a quarter of this ‘optional’ weight. I’d like to lose another 12-13 pounds, bring me into the mid-170s. As a grown-up, that seems to me to be my ideal weight.

Of course, the best part for me is seeing the results. It’s easy to see how much better my clothes fit. I’ll never become a swimsuit model.

When I was in my twenties, home cooking was Hydrox Cookies and Coca Cola. I had daily lunch at Burger King – Whopper, minus onions and mayonnaise, and a chocolate shake. I never put on an ounce.

Age is cruel. You metabolism changes and hair grows in all sorts of strange places.

Health aside, I’ve got too much invested in clothes to be heavy.

Enough Is Enough

I make a good living. It’s not enough.

I watch actors in the movies. They already have fortunes beyond my wildest dreams. Still, they’re acting for cash. What they have is not enough.

Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Sumner Redstone… these guys are working? Why? Obviously, whatever they’ve got, it’s not enough.

The exception to this universal mindset is Craig Newmark. He is Craig of Craigslist.com.

Craigslist.com is to the worst thing to ever happen to classified advertising… at least that’s how folks in the newspaper business feels. All those lovely little ads selling everything in your daily paper – they’re free on Craigslist&#185! It’s tough to compete with free.

From Reuters:

“Who needs the money? We don’t really care,” Craig Newmark said in an interview at the Picnic ’06 Cross Media Week conference here.

“If you’re living comfortably, what’s the point of having more?” Newmark said

Craig, you’re killing me. Can’t material wealth be an end unto itself?

“We both know some people who own more than a billion (dollars) and they’re not any the happier. They also need bodyguards,” he said.

Being privately held, no one knows what Craigslist’s revenue is. Even with the few categories that are monetized (a word I’m positive Craig doesn’t use), there’s more than enough cash for its 22 employees. Craig, who could easily be a millionaire many times over, still works on the site.

Seriously speaking, how can you fault him? He is a man of principles who decided not to sell out. There are far too few of those left.

But Craig, you really are giving the rest of us a bad name.

&#185 – There are some minor exceptions. Craigslist charges in certain categories in certain cities, but only enough to keep people from listing and relisting to keep atop the pile.