So my weight keeps fluctuating, and the holiday season - starting with Halloween - is making it harder to maintain let alone lose weight. I'm up a few pounds against my lowest last June, and struggling to get back on program. One of the positive factors is that I am exercising regularly, which ought to change the course of the weight I'm gaining. (This is purely a willpower thing, kids. I know that.)  My morning workout routine is going quite well, and I'm up to a half hour of high activity most mornings. And I can readily feel the improvement in my musculature. My ass and abs in particular, though my abs are still embedded in a stubborn layer of fat and my ass - which itself is resuming its "bubble butt" appearance from my college days - rests below a similarly stubborn pocket of back fat clinging to my lower back and oblique muscles.  Not me...yet Much of all this, of course, is psychological. Mental. And I've noticed a shift lately in my self-perception th