swell

Today I was talking to someone who told me I looked "skinnier." And I got this e-mail this weekend from a wonderful and well-intentioned person that I happened to run into (along with her partner) this weekend:

It was nice running into you today. And we both noticed how much weight you have lost. You look great!

Alas, the eyes may deceive, but the scale does not lie. The fact of the matter is I have not lost a pound since various earlier weblog and other public proclamations about how I must extricate myself from some of the bodily baggage accrued during The Astonishing Weight Gain of 2003. So how does one respond to an e-mail like this? If you say "Thanks!", are you taking credit for something you not only did not do, but have so far spectacularly failed to do? Not to mention, of course, that a compliment like this just makes someone with my turn-of-mind immediately think: my God, if I'm assessed as looking comparatively great now, what kind of slovenly, last-days-of-Chris-Farley-looking mess must I have been walking around looking like before? Eek.