My fitness progress this month

1. First, here's a recent picture of me, in which I'm apparently impersonating an ice cream cone. That, people, is what ignoring the rules of figure flattery will do to you. The crew-necked white t-shirt makes me look All Balcony, All The Time. The black capris make my legs look tiny.

If I had any sense, I'd wear the exact opposite color scheme: only dark t-shirts, and only light leggings.

Even if I have to raid a matador's closet to find the latter.

2. I find it astonishing that it feels perfectly normal to work out for an hour with a trainer, then spend 60 minutes on the elliptical.

3. Have you ever flipped through a woman's magazine and cringed at how stupid it made women look? I'm not talking Vogue or Harper's Bazaar with their fashion jargon that only Anna Wintour and Andre Leon Talley truly understand; I mean the deeply embarrassing stuff you find in Glamour and Redbook and Self. The relationship advice and 50 Sexiest Tricks to Try On Your Man. Or the articles that promise to tell you about great fashion finds for under $100, and you pop for the magazine and guess what? The great cheap clothes are shorts and t-shirts.

Well, from time to time I pick up a men's magazine because it renews my faith in humanity to discover that men's magazines are equally stupid.

My latest purchase is this

and I expect it to provide a lot of laughs. How's this for a sample: Food is power. The power to lose weight. The power to build muscle. The power to feel energized.

The power, apparently, to write Dick and Jane sentences. I am man! I want power! Grr!

I plan to read it cover to cover, and about every five pages, I plan to burst into girlish giggles, sounding, if possible, like Wilma Flintstone and Betty Rubble. But I'll let you know if I find out anything useful.

4. OK, I'll admit it. These Tory Burch pants looked a little stupid when I bought them. They don't look like this at all. Maybe they're straight legged in a small size, but in a large size, they keep the nine-inch leg opening at the ankle, but add all kinds of extra material in the upper thigh. They taper so much, they're vaguely reminiscent of stirrup pants. And that's when I first bought them. Now, they sag and bag so much in the derriere, they look like a before picture in a Depends ad. Kim Kardashian and J. Lo are weeping at the sight of my ass in these pants, but their tears are of laughter.

Still, having my new, relatively spendy pants falling off my ass is progress.

5. I decided that for a change of pace, I really wanted to get below 170 by Thanksgiving, but I keep falling victim to the Domino's iPhone app. True story.