Neglecting One's Blog: Thankfully Still Only Sin #548

I would make a terrible nun. On a quick reckoning-up, I think I commit all seven deadly sins on a daily, or near-daily basis. Every now and then I get a wave of latent guilt (although, having been brought up about as atheist as they come, I've got nothin' on the lapsed-Catholic husband in this respect) and vow to myself that I'll do something about it. Donate money to the homeless instead of Jigsaw, eschew avocadoes (only a green vegetable in the most technical sense) in favour of celery, pretend to care more about a man's politics than his pectorals. You know the drill.

The thing about that, though, is that I have pretty much zero willpower. I mean, it's fortunate for everyone that I prefer reading books and gardening to snorting cocaine and molesting small children, because if it were the other way round I'd be hanging round playgrounds with a pocket full of hard candy and a face full of nose candy. What can I tell you, I'm just not good at self-deprivation.

And this, of course, is why every now and then I say something like 'I'm going on a diet' and then it's never referenced again. Basically what that translates to is 'I'm going on a diet, just as long as there aren't any avocados in the house, or slabs of gooey Brie, or very large glasses of Chardonnay…oh, fuck it, what are the odds of that, pass the bottle'.

So yesterday I confronted a problem. I have a formal ball to go to in just over a month, one at which the majority of female attendees will be younger, slimmer and better dressed than I. Not to mention richer, but don't get me started on that. This, after all, is a work environment in which if one's shoes (and by shoes, I mean heels, because we are young sexy lawyers, you know) do not tone with one's designer shirt, one is letting the side down.

And then there's me, who considers the jacket with only one button missing as "the good jacket", who has been known to wear a pair of trousers with the ankle hem down for two days before getting it fixed, and who considers one haircut every four months as "frequent grooming". I ain't gonna to be the belle of the ball, is what I'm saying here.

However, resigning myself to a lack of lustful eyes is one thing. Standing out as the frump of the evening is quite another. And so, yet again, I am announcing my intentions to go on a diet.

Obviously, you're about to point out, this hasn't worked so well in the past. And this is true. But this time, I have come up with a plan so cunning that one might be justified in naming it A Cunning Plan.

Overcome Gluttony by using the other Sins to my advantage.

So I've already made a start. I've enlisted the help of a friend at work to compare eating and exercising notes with, since such an arrangement is likely to enable my random competitive streak (Pride). I'm perusing glossy magazines full of sylphs in expensive gowns (Envy, obviously). I'm promising myself rewards in the form of clothes if I succeed (Greed, which I always think is interestingly differentiated from Gluttony). As for Lust, well, sex is exercise, right?

I still have to overcome Sloth, of course, and I'm not entirely sure how Wrath plays into it. But I'll keep you posted.