It's been a cold winter, here in Tucson.

Probably not as cold as it is where you are, but cold for Tucson.

So I've become a bit of a couch potato, spending the grey afternoons curled up in a shawl in front of the fire with Bao, a good book, a box of chocolates and the occasional glass of red wine to keep my blood circulating.

And guess what? I got fat again, just like I did when I first came back to the United States to live and stuffed my face with all the lovely things I'd missed in Australia -- creamy American ice cream, American hot dogs, American pastrami.

Now, none of my nice clothes fit.

So four weeks ago, I went on a diet.

Low-fat yoghurt, no-fat cottage cheese, celery, carrots, cantaloupe chunks, hard-boiled eggs, rice crackers, the whole catastrophe. Bao has been quietly appalled. He doesn't even bother to beg, anymore. He reckons what he's got is better than what I've got, and I'm not sure he's wrong. And I bought a treadmill, and I walk on the damn thing every day. Bao sits on the bed and watches as I walk and walk and walk, and get nowhere. I wonder what he's thinking. Actually, I'm proably better off not knowing.

And what did I achieve? Yesterday morning when I got on the scales, how much weight do you think I lost? A grand total of three pounds. After four weeks of exercise and rabbit food! Three rotten little pounds.

So I said, To hell with this.

Last night, I had Tequila Lime chicken wings for dinner, skin and all. And a roasted potato. And a slice of my neighbor's pavlova with cherries and cream afterwards. And a Godiva chocolate before bed. Did I feel guilty? Not a bit. I felt fed, for the first time in four weeks.

And this morning, when I got on the scales to assess the damage, I discovered I'd lost two pounds.

Go figure.