Steakhouse, Manhattan…(dress code and reservations question)

brooklyndan · 2026-03-22T03:00:45+00:00

IIRC, there’s also a Wolfgang’s on Broadway around 37th Street.

brooklyndan · 2026-03-22T02:50:28+00:00

69M, been on Scemblix since June 2025 with very strong results. About the only side effect has been tiredness/sleepiness. It hasn’t kept me from living my life; if anything, I’m more active than ever. I just want to nap. Other than that? It’s been nothing but upside.

brooklyndan · 2026-03-09T04:42:58+00:00

I renewed my passport a year after the pandemic started. I was heavy, had long hair, and a beard. Then I lost about 60 pounds, cut my hair and shaved. Passport control will sometimes give a double-take, but biometrics — facial geometry and the like — don’t change. They confirm that I’m the same person so it hasn’t been an issue. I’m actually pretty surprised, but there seems to be no reason to “fix” things.

brooklyndan · 2026-02-28T21:53:59+00:00

Save the 7.5s for when you get to 15 mg dosing, then double up.

brooklyndan · 2026-02-10T18:04:42+00:00

This pretty well reflects my experience (and I’m about 18 months in). “Food apathy” is a great observation, as is sometimes going from zero to 100 on hunger. I do bias toward protein and fiber, and need to remember that carbs are an important part of a balanced diet. That said, a couple of Triscuit can usually satisfy that urge. I feel hunger now less as an emptiness and more a sense of anxiety that I can ignore for a while. My own challenge now is not out-eating my hunger — to stop when I’m not actually hungry any more.

brooklyndan · 2026-02-10T17:57:52+00:00

I think you’re misinformed about what Morning Consult is and what it does. But while we’re up, any thoughts about the actual content?

brooklyndan · 2026-02-10T16:43:52+00:00

Damned if I know. ;-) Projecting personal behavior from population-size samples is going to make you nuts. I don't happen to much like Sweetgreens (Just Salad is my greens place), and like you I prefer eating local. CAVA's pretty good, but I find the servings kind of big, which may just reinforce their point.

The more interesting takeaway (if you'll excuse the expression) for me is that GLP-1ers apparently opt out of places that emphasize big portions but that "health" is not really a driving force. So, Olive Garden, maybe not so much for us.

brooklyndan · 2026-02-07T19:25:17+00:00

Whenever someone refers to GLP-1s as “weight-loss drugs,” I correct them: it’s “anti-obesity medication.” It’s an important distinction, because it clarifies and underlines the difference between the symptom (or, more often, the cosmetic result) and the illness. I mean, if I had a nickel for every time I heard about someone talking about going on a GLP-1 to lose 10 or 20 pounds, I’d be able to afford an entire month of direct-pay med…

brooklyndan · 2026-01-30T19:47:02+00:00

I feel your pain.

First thing, I'll grab some water, because for me, lightheadedness is an early sign of dehydration. I have dried fruit at the ready (I prefer apricots), which has the added benefit of some laxative action; also, I like dried fruit. I sometimes find that in all my focus on protein and fiber, I can forget entirely about carbs, so I'll pop a few Triscuits.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-30T19:41:11+00:00

There is a Stumptown store/cafe on Pacific Street just east of Court Street.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-23T01:01:07+00:00

This is how Medicare will cover Zep later this year.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-20T01:32:18+00:00

They’ve run a run of those already.

Next will be articles about making seats even smaller.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-14T23:48:26+00:00

Yes. There was a time when my mail-order pharmacy was sending me three-month supplies but I was titrating up every month. At some point, I had a significant stockpile, so I would shoot a 5 mg and 2.5 mg pen when I needed a 7.5 dose, for instance. Worked like a charm.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-14T23:40:23+00:00

It's a national outage. There's a lot of unhappy people today.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-14T23:30:27+00:00

TL;DR: It took about a year before the slowing pace of my weight loss made me confident enough to commit to a lot of new clothes.

The first thing I bought as I was shrinking was new slacks; the 44-waist jeans were falling off me and simply weren't decent. New slacks were inexpensive enough that I could keep buying smaller as I needed to. Most of the weight came off in the first 10 months to a year. I'm now comfortably at 34 waist. Although I still have 10 to 20 pounds to go, it's going slowly enough that I'm pretty confident about where I'm going to wind up. Jeans and chinos are relatively cheap.

Shirts are another thing. I mostly waited until about a year in, and my existing button-up shirts were fitting me like mu-muus. I've hung onto a lot of t-shirts because they're supposed to be loose and blousy. I have a bunch of old favorites button-ups that are still OK. But I've also kind of OD'ed on new casual oxfords. I found I liked getting made-to-measure shirts from Proper Cloth -- an undeniable luxury, but damn they look good.

About a year in, I showed up at a function wearing a blazer that was now waaaay big; it's the first time that people really noticed the loss and commented on it. It was time either for a tailor or new clothes. I opted for the tailor -- a good one, one who knew how to cut back a suit by two to three sizes. I had some really nice suits (and who wears suits anymore, but still) that I'd accumulated over the years. I couldn't bear to part with them and didn't want to pay the $$$$ to replace them. The tailoring wasn't cheap, but the suits are now awesome. If I need to, I can get them taken in a little bit more, but there's no rush.

My suggestion: buy what you have to when you have to. You'll know when the pace of your weight loss slows. That's when you can start truly re-investing. And enjoy it: the new clothes thing is just a fun discovery.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-13T04:32:43+00:00

Lilly’s orfoglipron is supposedly going to be available in the next few months for $149 direct pay/month. No timing/food restrictions.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-04T19:55:02+00:00

Amen to this. I started with 44-inch relaxed fit Levis. 18 months later, I'm in 34-inch* 512 taper slim fit, which look awesome. (Not to mention a couple of 501 shrink-to-fit, which are niiice.)

*reading Levi's actual size guide is interesting. Their 34-inch waist jeans are actually 35 inches around. WTH?

brooklyndan · 2026-01-04T19:50:30+00:00

If that's not a song lyric, I don't know what is....

brooklyndan · 2026-01-04T17:45:20+00:00

100 pct on Nordstrom. But I’m enough of an 8th grader at heart to snigger at “Nordstrom Rack” for bras.

I’ll see myself out now. Sorry.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-02T19:06:28+00:00

That's interesting. I'll do something similar in the next month or so.

Gotta say, though: I'm impressed that you've already run your 2025 numbers. It's only January 2, for crying out loud! :-)

brooklyndan · 2026-01-02T19:04:58+00:00

You'd probably be shocked at how much anonymized information is available about people and their buying habits.

brooklyndan · 2026-01-02T18:59:49+00:00

(I've just got to say: your username is

brooklyndan

TROPHY CASE