Right. How to start this. My diet blog. Perhaps not the manliest of things to write about, but it's important to me and it might strike a chord with someone out there.

Here I am at the end of a wet summer and in the final third of a year that has seen my weight balloon from an already balloon like 15st or thereabouts to a 16st zeppelin. I'm a male at the wrong end of my thirties and am trying to implement some lifestyle changes which will hopefully ensure that the next 50 years will be healthy and enjoyable or at the very least enjoyable without being obese and having any embarrassing trouser splitting moments.

I'm in a little bit of shock as I write as I've just weighed myself and found out that I've passed the 15st 7lb mark - a new personal record. I knew that I'd gotten heavy and I knew that I wanted to do something about it - but am a little disappointed that I've just increased the distance to go until I reach my ideal weight - somewhere between 13 and 13.5 stone. Hey ho.

So which diet ? There are a lot to chose from, a lot of which I've tried already over the years, with varying results. I've decided to follow a new one (or at least new to me) LIPOTRIM. It turns out a few friends and colleagues have had amazing, even drastic, results on this so I think I'll give it a go. LIPOTRIM (if you've not heard about it before then you can find more information here http://www.lipotrim.co.uk/) is basically a diet where you can only eat some scientific powder, water and fresh air - and that's it. Unless NASA changes the application criteria, it's as close to spaceman food as you're likely to get.

It works (supposedly) because it's a total food replacement - and if you cheat then it doesn't work. This appeals to me, I suppose in a perverse way, because it's that strict. You either follow it - which in principal is easy - or you don't and you don't lose weight.

I'm writing this blog, mainly to keep me on the straight and narrow, well in actual fact, it's completely to keep me on the straight and narrow. I've no idea how hard this is going to be and I need all the help I can get. I'd hate to have to own up to some misdemeanor, and I'd also like to actually successfully finish something that I've started.

I've planned to start the diet tomorrow and am off to meet the pharmacist first thing to get officially weighed and buy my 'food' for the next week. There's also something about filling in a questionnaire - which I hope I don't fail - to make sure that I'm fat enough to start the diet. Pretty sure that I won't fail. There's a video as well - which I'll watch later (a pre-requisite of the first weigh-in is to watch a half hour video explaining LIPOTRIM and all about the diet - you can find it on the website).

In anticipation of the following period of abstinence I've splashed out on one my fave meals - a nice sirloin steak, some oven chips, onion rings and a bottle of Rioca. In fact I've bought two lots as they were on offer and I figured I'd celebrate with the same at the end of the diet.

Bon appetite