Can we just take a moment to savor the title of this post? I went through a half dozen variations on the theme until I found one I really liked, and I am pretty dang proud of it.

*contented sigh*

Ok, let's talk Doctor Who.

It seems pretty clear to me that, at this point, I have reached a perfect equilibrium between how much I like to exercise and how much I like to eat. My body continues to change as I add more strength training, but my weight has remained stable for a couple months now. I am perfectly, joyously happy with this. I feel great, and pretty much any time I go out like I did tonight I get multiple compliments on how good I look. I am wearing clothes right now that were packed away a dozen years ago because I got too fat for them. It's like having a complete new wardrobe without having to go shopping. And for all of this I have Doctor Who to thank. So, thank you Verity Lambert and Sydney Newman. Thank you Waris Hussein. Thank you William Hartnel, William Russel, Jacqueline Hill, and Carole Ann Ford. Thank you for everyone over the past 55 years at the BBC who provided me the perfect distraction so I wouldn't notice just how hard I was working and how much I was sweating. Five more months to go before I wrap up Phase 1 of this ridiculous project.

In other news, this morning I finished the very last Damn Dalek story of the classic era, and it was a good'n. Let's talk about that.

Can you believe it, I started the twenty fifth season of Doctor Who today. It seems like only a few weeks ago when I first stepped on the Time Treadmill and visited the Coal Hill Academy and 76 Totter's Lane, and now here I am one year and sixty pounds later, and find myself back in the same place.

So let's talk about that.

Sad news today for fans of Classic Who: actor Peter Miles passed away last week at the age of 89. He was best known for his role as Davros' second-in-command Nyder in Genesis of the Daleks. He also appeared in Invasion of the Dinosaurs as the scientist who brought the giant lizards to London, but for me his best appearance was as Dr. Lawrence in The Silurians. He was absolutely riveting in that story as he faced off against the Third Doctor. The scene in which Lawrence is infected by the Silurian plague and attacks the Brigadier is one of the best moments of the story, sold entirely on Miles' strong performance. It is at least a comfort to know that Miles' passing was peaceful. My deepest condolences to his family and friends.

On a happier note, today I saw the last of Mel. So let's talk about that.

It was a weird day of viewing today. Usually I watch two 25-minute episodes per day, and usually the stories have an even number of episodes. In fact, prior to today the last time there was a story with an odd number of 25-minute episodes was with The Dæmons all the way back in the Third Doctor's second season. With Delta and the Bannermen only being three episodes, I had originally intended to just watch part three of that story today and fill the rest of my time with special features or something. But then I realized two very important details: the next story was also a three parter, and if I started that today instead of waiting until tomorrow, then I could make Mel go away a day sooner.

So let's talk about the end of one story and the start of the next.

A week ago I added pushups to my morning workout routine. Being a total wimp, I could only do three. Since then I have been able to add another one each day, such that this morning I was able to do nine pushups without resting. That's a 300% increase in only a week!! at that rate,by my math, by the end of March I will be doing.... let's see... 729 pushups in one go without resting. How cool will that be? Wait, what, that's not how it works? Huh. Well, anyway, after a year of primarily cardio I am slowly introducing strength training. It's a little tough, with an hour of each day committed to the Time Treadmill, but I am doing the best I can. I just did the math, and it is going to be August before I complete this project.But pushups are a good start, and I will add more variations as I can. If anyone has advice on what home strength training tools work vs what ones are scams, please send me a note. I would love some practical advice.

Meanwhile, over on Doctor Who, I watched the first two thirds of possibly the most batshit insane plot ever devised for the show. Let's talk about that.

I know this will shock and astonish you, but when I was a teenager I played a lot of Dungeons & Dragons. There are a couple other role playing games I remember fondly - one also made by TSR called Gamma World, which was basically just D&D in a postapocalyptic future with mutants instead of goblins, and another called Paranoia which was set in a dystopian future where everything is run by an insane computer. Great stuff. So anyway, in one of those games a friend of mine had a character named Ped Xing, thus named by his parents after a holy artifact they had found from the before times.

What made me think of that today? Well, today's story featured characters named Bin Liner and Fire Escape. In the Target novelization one of the other characters is named Drinking Fountain. Great stuff. So let's talk about that.

I am a child of the 80's. I mean, I was born in 1968 and was certainly present during the 70's, but I was a teenager throughout the 80's and that is where my pop culture heart will always find anchor. I don't have to remind you that, being the heart of Cold War and with Reagan driving the politics here in the States and Thatcher driving the politics in the U.K,, both post-apocalyptic and dystopian themes were ascendant in genre entertainment. From quality films like The Road Warrior and Brazil to trashy cash-ins like Solarbabies or Cyborg, my entertainment was filled with pessimistic visions of the near future. I saw news reports recently about a study that basically said that the music that you love when you are 14 becomes the foundation of the music you love for the rest of your life -- you certainly might expand your interests, but more likely than not you will frequently find yourself back enjoying the same styles that tickled your brain back then. I think that applies not just to music, but to your other entertainment preferences as well.

Which is a long-winded way of saying, holy crap but today's viewing of Doctor Who on the Time Treadmill played on my teenage neurons like a maestro at Carnegie Hall. So let's talk about that.

You know, I have posted something to this blog every single day for over a year. Some days it's nearly a novel, some days it's barely a sentence, but there's one there for every single day. Today is no different. And that's about as profound as I feel like getting on this particular day.

Yeah, I also watched Doctor Who while walking on a treadmill, so I guess I'll talk about that too.

So I am out at a social gathering tonight, and order a baked mac & cheese dish to eat. A friend sitting across from me looks at it when it is brought to the table, then she says to me, "That's on your diet?" 

"If you burn enough calories," I reply, "you can eat whatever you want. Just ask Michael Phelps."

In other news, I rather abruptly got a new Doctor today on the treadmill. Let's talk about that.