I had my six-week post-op follow-up appointment today, and was cleared through to diet stage 5, aka Normal Food But Not As Much, and Maybe Consider Making Better Choices. This basically means my recovery stage is complete (though it'll take six months to a year post-op before everything completely settles and arrives at the Permanent New Normal).

They're very pleased with my progress. By their calculations, I've lost nine percent of my excess weight since the process began, which is right on target for D plus 42. (For reference, at my two-week post-op appointment, that figure was five percent, and that counted weight lost during the two weeks before the operation when I was on the 100% liquid diet. So they're both four-week figures, since if you count those two pre-operative weeks, it's been eight since the start of the process.)

I'm also pleased with that, but more pleased at the fact that I am now cleared for

PIZZA

I'm almost certain this is the longest I've ever gone without eating pizza since I was old enough to eat pizza. So naturally, I went to Pat's in Orono to break that drought.

The missing bit is how much I was able to eat before getting the rest to go, btw. I didn't get my usual double crust or extra cheese because I'd have had even less leeway before hitting my current limit, which is about 3 US ounces (ca. 85 grams). And yes, I did use a tiny scale to make that determination. Which felt a little weird, but I don't think anyone noticed.

On the home front, I salvaged these two cast iron pans, ca. 6 inches, from a bunch of stuff my father had in his shed.

They obviously need a bit of work, but once they're reconditioned, I'm going to experiment with making smaller pizzas in them, since the one I've been using for that purpose for years is now WAY too big if I don't have company.

(If you're curious, the rusty one is a Lodge; the one that looks to have some kind of protective grease smeared on it is unmarked except for its size, and we think was part of the same set of my late grandmother's that my big pizza pan came from.)

I've been watching a lot of YouTube cooking videos, and I have lots of ideas of things to try small amounts of. I just need to conquer my acute Horizontal Surface Syndrome and actually get my kitchen into a fit state for making stuff again...

(And the "phase 5" guidebook they gave me today has some good-looking recipes in it, too. I'm already hankering to try the garlic ginger chicken...)

Maybe I should add a dedicated food board to the forum. We already have a food-related channel on the studio Slack instance...

--G.
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Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
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