A year ago this month I weighed 238 pounds. I'm 5 foot 10. I sat at a desk all day at the county assessor's office and I sat on the couch all night, and I told myself the couch part was "unwinding." My knees hurt going up stairs. My belt was on the last hole. I had that thing where you get out of breath tying your shoes, which is embarrassing to type even now.

Then, September 1998, my daughter went off to college and left us her dog. "Just until I get settled," she said. She is settled. Charlie is still here. Charlie is a beagle, and if you've ever had a beagle you know the one thing about them, which is that they have a nose and the nose must be walked. A beagle that does not get walked will howl at the ceiling and eat your recliner. I have the recliner to prove it.

So I started walking him. Twice a day: once before work and once after supper. Not for my health. For the recliner. I didn't own a pedometer, I didn't have a goal, I didn't join anything. I just went around the block with a dog who wanted to smell every mailbox in the county.

Twelve months later I weigh 198 pounds. Forty pounds. My doctor, who I went to see first (see the bottom of this page, I mean that), says my blood pressure is the best it's been in ten years and I should "keep doing whatever the dog says." The belt is on the second hole from the other end and I had to buy pants. My wife says I snore less. The knees are fine. I can tie my shoes and talk at the same time.

I put this page up because a fellow at work asked me what diet I was on and I didn't have a good answer, so here's the long one. The short one is: I walked a beagle and I stopped eating seconds. That's about it. Everything below is details.

Weighed on the bathroom scale the first Saturday morning of every month, before breakfast, after Charlie's walk. Same scale, same spot on the floor, same everything. The scale is not accurate, but it's consistently not accurate, which is what matters.

Notice it wasn't a straight line and it wasn't fast. Three or four pounds a month. Nothing you'd put in a magazine. But it added up, and it stayed off, which the fast stuff I tried in my thirties never did.

I measured these with the car odometer, so they're approximate. Charlie measures them in mailboxes.

The Short Loop (about 0.8 mile, 15-20 minutes). Around our block and the next one over. This is the morning walk on a workday and it's what we did every single time for the first two months, because it was all I could do. There's a hill on the back stretch that I used to dread. Now I don't notice it, which is the best thing I can say about the whole year.

The Reservoir (about 2.5 miles, 45-50 minutes). Out to the county reservoir on the gravel road, around the water, and back. Weekend mornings and most evenings now. There's a bench halfway where I used to sit down. I still stop there, but now it's for Charlie to drink out of the creek and for me to look at the water, not to get my breath. Geese in the spring and fall. Charlie has opinions about geese.

The Long Way to the Post Office (about 3.2 miles, an hour). Saturday mornings. Down through town, past the school, out and around by the old fairgrounds, and back up Main Street where I mail whatever needs mailing and Charlie gets a biscuit from the lady at the hardware store. This one's the reason I have a dog and not an exercise bike. Nobody stops to talk to you on an exercise bike.

Rain: We go anyway. I have a raincoat and Charlie is a beagle and does not care. Snow: We go anyway, shorter. Ice: The Short Loop, slowly, holding onto things. Charlie thinks watching me is the best part of winter.

I want to be straight about this. The walking got me started and it's what I enjoy, but I don't think the walking alone would have done it. About two months in I made a few changes to the eating, and none of them are a "diet" and none of them have a name. Here they are, in order of how much they hurt.

1. No seconds. One plate. I fill it normally, I eat it, I'm done. This was the biggest single thing and I fought it for a week. Turns out I was never hungry for the second plate. I was just still sitting at the table.
2. Water instead of pop. I was drinking three or four cans of regular pop a day at the office without even tasting them. I switched to water from the cooler in April and you can see it in the table. I still have a pop on Saturday with the Long Way. It tastes like something again.
3. Smaller plate at supper. My wife's idea. She quietly started setting the table with the lunch plates instead of the dinner plates. Took me three weeks to notice. Rule 1 works better when the plate is smaller. I'm not proud.
4. Nothing after the evening walk. Used to be chips in front of the TV. Now the walk comes after supper and by the time we're back I'm not interested and I've got a beagle asleep on my feet.
5. Breakfast. I used to skip it and eat a donut at 10. Now I eat oatmeal or an egg and toast before the morning walk. Not hungry at 10 anymore.

I didn't count anything. I didn't weigh food. I didn't give up anything entirely; I had pie at the reunion. I just ate the amount of food a person my size should eat, and walked a dog, and it took a year.

Christmas 1998. There it is in red on the table. Three pounds back. We went to my wife's family's for four days and there is a rule at that house that you don't say no to fudge. Also the walks got short because it was six degrees and I didn't want to be the guy who leaves a family Christmas to walk a dog in the dark. In January I was pretty discouraged and about ready to call the whole thing a nice try. What got me back out the door was, honestly, the dog, who did not know it was January and stood at the door at 6:15 a.m. like he did every day. You can quit on yourself. It's hard to quit on a beagle. By February it was gone again.

The week I hurt my ankle (April). Stepped off a curb wrong on the Reservoir. Ten days of the Short Loop, very slowly, with Charlie giving me looks. Didn't gain, didn't lose. Lesson: watch where you're going, not where the dog's going.

The plateau (July). Three weeks at 205 with nothing happening. Read later that everybody gets this. I just kept going and it started again. If you hit one, keep going. That's all I've got.

(My wife says this part is silly. My wife is right. Here it is anyway.)

Hello. I am Charlie. I am a beagle. Last year the girl went away and left me with the big man who sits. At first the big man was very slow and stopped a lot and made a noise like the vacuum cleaner. I did not mind because stopping is when you smell things. There is a mailbox on the corner that a very interesting dog visits and I have to check it every day.

Now the big man does not stop as much, which is a shame, but he goes farther, which is good, because there are more mailboxes. Also there is water at the Reservoir and geese who need to be told about things. On Saturday there is a lady with a biscuit. I have trained the big man to go there.

The big man used to eat chips at night and drop some. He does not do this anymore. This is the one bad thing that has happened. I do not know why he changed. I am still working on it. Otherwise things are good. I have my own spot on the couch now because there is more room.

Talk to your doctor first. I did. I went in before I started (my wife made me) and he checked me over and said walking was fine, start slow, and come back in six months. I'm 51 and I'd been sitting for twenty years and I'm not a doctor and neither is Charlie. Go see yours.

Start with the Short Loop. Whatever your Short Loop is. If it's to the corner and back, it's to the corner and back. Do that for a month.

Twice a day beats once. I think this is the secret, if there is one. Two short walks were easier to keep up than one long one, and the dog needs both anyway.

Get a dog, or borrow one. I'm serious. A dog will get you out the door on the mornings you wouldn't go for yourself. If you can't have one, I bet there's a neighbor with a dog who'd be thrilled. Or find a person who'll stand at the door at 6:15 like a beagle. Harder to find.

Don't weigh yourself every day. Once a month. Write it down. The month-to-month number is the one that tells you the truth.

Some other pages here that helped me keep going: The Tuesday Night Walkers (a whole group of them), Masters Swimming After 50 (she's a lot more athletic than me) and The Dog Park Regulars for the dog part. And Rescue Greyhounds, because if a beagle can do this to me I don't know what a greyhound would do.