I wish you would step back from that ledge my friend

Pay no attention to the dazzling creature you see before you, light dancing off the mirrors of her magnificently mosaic frame. The Fitness Blog is clinically depressed, and feels not her power.

Three weeks into the Most Pointless Diet in the History of Womankind, I have gained back 2 pounds, leaving me just 6 pounds less than I was when I started. Not to mention infinitely more sober, which has done nothing to improve my mood. If I get any more clear-headed I'm going to have to start going to meetings. Preferably meetings sponsored by Celebrity Rehab's Dr. Drew, whose freshly detoxed people all seem to turn up weeks later on TMZ partying at Teddy's or Chez Deux, none the worse for wear. And lookin' mighty trim, I'd like to point out.

In any case, I am frustrated and unhappy with my sudden inability to control my own body. I know how to do this thing, dammit. I have been a dedicated dieter since the age of 15 when, much to my mother's dismay, I dropped 15 pounds on a balanced diet of black coffee, TAB and teenage angst. Since then, whenever I put on a couple of pounds I simply throw myself into the latest diet craze, be it Grapefruit, Atkins, the Zone or Cabbage Soup. I vaguely recall one which started with rice cakes and peanut butter in the morning and ended with canned red beets and tuna at night. Oddly, it was not all that bad, and not the worst regimen by far. Certainly not as bad as eating several grapefruit a day. Those vodka and grapefruits can really get to you over the course of an evening.

Inevitably, I would get back down to where I wanted to be and resume normal eating habits, which are generally not all that different from what I've been putting down here for the past 3 weeks: primarily fruits and vegetables 3 or 4 days a week; steak, chicken, fish or pasta on weekends. The only difference is that when I'm not dieting, I really let go when I play. When I'm dieting I don't, and aside from the one blowout weekend, I haven't this time either. I've behaved myself. I've counted calories. I haven't seen a potato chip or M&M in weeks. I've run and stepped and downward-dogged myself from here to Texas, and still I can't fit into my jeans. Frankly, I'm flummoxed. And it goes without saying, poorly dressed.

An article in this week's Times on the merits of fasting states that women of my age should be eating between 1600 and 1800 calories a day. I would like to be on that diet. And everyone seems to be losing weight; the folks over at The Biggest Loser are losing 10-15 pounds a week; anyone gaining weight, as I have, would have been laughed clear off the farm. Or beaten to death by that mean-girl trainer, Jillian. Now there's a woman with issues.

But the reality is that years of extreme dieting, coupled with decades of regular, strenuous workouts have slowed my metabolic rate down to that of a tree sloth. In fact, I have developed a metabolism so ruthlessly efficient that I no longer burn calories, I create them. And the vast storage areas required to house them. Thus, I am a victim of evolution. I should be studied by scientists. And possibly theologians. I'd love to be able to settle that dispute.

The good news is that if my plane ever crashes into the Andes or a deserted island somewhere I will be able to exist for months without food, and therefore not forced to eat my fellow survivors for energy.

The bad news is that I will be so insufferable in my smug plumptitude that my fellow survivors will choose me to be eaten first. It's a win/lose situation.

So, I win. I am the Biggest Loser!