One guy on the 20 day Plan (day eighteen)...
Sue is convinced my low BBT’s are due entirely to my using a digital thermometer,whereas, her high BBT’s are due, in part, to her using an old school “analog” thermometer.
I sorta thought we settled this way back in week one but Sue’s not letting go. “Lyn recommends a mercury thermometer,” she tells me. “And you have to leave it in under your arm for at least ten minutes to get an accurate reading.”
I can’t imagine lying in bed with a thermometer tucked in my armpit for ten whole minutes. Me, I like digitals. They bleep in a matter of seconds and I’m on my way.
“Just get one reading,” she says, “and that way you’ll know how much your digital is off.”
“It’s just, if I lay in bed for ten whole minutes, who’s to say I don’t fall right back to sleep?”
“I really don’t like the thought of that,” I say and I say that because I have long regarded myself as an accident prone person. Sue once asked me how I thought I might die and I immediately responded, doing something stupid. Whatever it is, my last thought will be, that sure was a stupid thing to do.
“Say I fall back to sleep, okay? Now say I roll over and the glass thermometer cracks. Now I’ve got a sharp glass shard piercing my skin and pumping mercury or whatever that shit is that’s in that thing, into my veins. I could be dead in seconds.”
“That seems highly unlikely.”
“But not out of the question. And let’s just imagine for one second that were to happen. Do you have any idea what that would mean? My death would get splashed on the front page of the Press Enterprise. ‘“Bread man dies in freak encounter with thermometer.’ And that’s exactly the kind of story that gets picked up by that Darwin blog, the one that tracks idiot behavior, and then my entire life is reduced to an Internet meme, “You will not believe what this idiot did to kill himself.”
The room is pitch dark. Sue is silent but I can see her face, in my mind, I know exactly what kind of look I’m getting.
She reaches over to her bed stand, flips the light on then shakes her thermometer down and hands it to me.
Ten interminable minutes pass. I lay wide awake, my heart thumping. “Okay,” I say, “Ten minutes.” I hand Sue the thermometer. I have no interested in the eye strain required to read it.
“Ninety-six point three,” she says. “Now, see what your digital says.”
Fifteen seconds later I have a reading. “Ninety five eight.”
Okay, see? It’s off at least a half a degree. Okay?”
Breakfast and lunch are a blur. All we talk about, all we think about the entire day is dinner tonight. It’s day eighteen and that means The Plan has okayed going out to eat.
We narrow our list of possible restaurants in town down to three and settle on RoseMarie’s largely because we know their menu, we have our favorites but, are they going to be plan friendly?
We arrive before six. I didn’t make reservations thinking we’d be early enough but the place is packed. And yet, magically, a table opens. We’re handed menus and taken to our seats.
Sue wants the filet, the steak. This is a decision she made days ago and she has not waivered. I’ve been saying house salad but, here we are, last minute, and Sue now cautions me it’s going to have tomatoes. She knows I know tomatoes can be hugely reactive on The Plan and we have yet to test them.
“I can get it without tomatoes,” I say.
“And what about the mozzarella? Or the olives or the spinach? I don’t know, Doug. Are you sure you want the house salad?”
Our waiter arrives with two glasses of water.
No, no. No thanks, we both say and waive him off. Water with a meal is verboten on The Plan.
“Something else to drink?” he asks.
“Wine. Red. Please. Your House Malbec.”
As soon as he walks away, it occurs to me, wait, I haven’t drank my allotment of water today. I tell Sue my dilemma and tell her that there’s plenty of time for me to down a glass of water before the food arrives.
I jump up and grab the waiter a moment before he disappears behind the bar.
“On second thought, I’d like to take you up on that glass of water.”
“Oh, sure,” he says, more than happy to hand me one or both of the glasses he has in his hands.
I hesitate. The glasses are filled not just with water but with ice. I can’t remember the last time I drank ice cold water. Certainly not on The Plan. Ice cold water will throw my BBT’s all to hell.
“Um, actually, I’m uh…” I’m stammering. “Could I please have the water without the ice…?”
“Absolutely,” he says, sounding extraordinarily pleasant about it and not the least bit perturbed. “I’ll bring it right out.”
Back at our table I peruse the menu and settle on either the scallop salad or the scallop entree. Scallops appear to be plan friendly as they are a suggested protein option early on in The Plan.
Sue isn’t so sure. She points out that the scallop entree comes with sun dried tomatoes and a white sauce.
“White sauce…?” I say. “That could be anything.”
“Cream,” Sue says. “And we haven’t tested dairy.”
“Cream in a white sauce would be cow’s milk,” she says. “We haven’t tested cow’s milk. I think there’s a difference.” Her expression shifts a bit as if searching. I fear a Lyn quote is imminent.
“Forget the entree,” I say. “I’ll just get the scallop salad.”
“On a bed of spinach…?” Again, her tone is filled with doubt.
The waiter arrives with the wine and my water. “Are we ready to order?”
Sue is. She orders the filet mignon with a side of sautéed veggies. She settles back secure in her Plan Friendly choice.
I get an idea. We eat a lot of Kale on The Plan and it’s always sautéed. I say to him, “I would like to order the Scallop salad, however, if you wouldn’t mind, could you please ask Tank if he would sauté the spinach for me?”
He walks off. “Tank” is what everyone calls the chef at Rose Marie’s. I assume it’s his build; large, squared, imposing, the kind of guy you can picture walking thru walls. Sue congratulates me on my quick thinking for turning my salad Plan Friendly but we wonder how Tank will take it. The waiter returns.
“We’ll be happy to sauté the spinach for you but would you like the mushrooms sautéed as well?”
“It comes with mushrooms?” I ask but it’s such an obviously stupid question I quickly correct myself. “Yes, mushrooms, of course, sautéed, that would be perfect,” I say. He smiles but I abruptly motion to hold on for confirmation. I turn to Sue, “I think? Right? we’re good with mushrooms, sautéed? Of course we are…?”
Sue takes my menu with hers and passes them back to the waiter.
“Sauteed mushrooms are fine,” she says then adds, “We’re on a special diet,” as if explaining her companion’s odd behavior. “We have to test everything before we can eat it. And this is our first day out, you know, where we get to go to a restaurant.”
The waiter laughs. It’s a polite, congenial sort of laugh. “I completely understand. Shall I bring you your basket of flat bread?”
“No, thanks,” we say in unison.
“Very good,” he says and leaves us. We go back to looking at each other while sipping our wine. The silence extends and threatens to become slightly awkward. I say, “So this being on The Plan... Are we turning into a couple of idiots?”
“We…?” Sue says, not missing a beat.
She laughs but also reads my expression perfectly.
“You think I’m an idiot?”
“Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous,” she says then adds, “It’s just your way. It’s endearing.”
“Acting like an idiot?” I say.
“You’re fine,” she says and indicates my water, “if you’re going to drink that, you better drink it right away.”
She’s right about that and I gulp away. The water is very cold but I find I’m extremely thirsty.
Dinner arrives and it is fantastic. I could not have been happier with my choice. I order a second glass of wine and share it with Sue.
The waiter returns for a desert choice and we explain in more detail about The Plan. He sounds genuinely interested. I realize he is a very good waiter. Sue agrees and we leave a tip that is commiserate with his skills.
Back home I get on the computer and check orders and emails. Orders are down. I try not to worry about it. Orders tick up. Orders tick down. I find I obsess either way. I check my bank balance. I can make payroll. That’s good, but I’m way late on some other bills.
I check an email from a longstanding customer of our bread, a woman from New Hampshire. She hasn’t placed in order with us in some time. She’d gone all paleo, she explains. No grains. And she was okay with that for awhile but, ultimately, she couldn’t stand not having our bread in the morning. There’s nothing else like it, she writes, and tells how she’s looked and looked for a baker closer to home. And now she’s feeling suddenly desperate. Can we ship her ten loaves? Immediately? I write back and tell her we’ll ship Wednesday after our very next bake and give her an amount and tell her to send a check.
Sue comes downstairs and announces she’s fading fast and am I coming to bed. I want to say yes but I should really put the bread order into the system right now lest I forget. The problem is, I’m going to have to dig thru old emails for that woman’s shipping address. I promise Sue I’ll be along soon. She nods turns and disappears back upstairs.
