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On Saturday morning, I headed out to Seattle’s Mobile Chowdown II, a gathering of some of the city’s best food of the mobile variety, which I stumbled upon via my Yelp addiction here in the Emerald City. I’d heard that the last event was crazy, with some of the vendors running out of food, the lines being ridiculous, and the facilities and things being a bit lacking, so I headed out to get there as it started up. As you’ll see in the first shot I took of the event in the Whrrl slideshow here, even that wasn’t enough to stay away from a long line for Marination, a merger of Korean and Hawaiian cuisines – but it was worth it.

I started it off with Marination’s shredded kalua pork sliders, on great buns with their super slaw (there’s a photo in the slideshow above). Let’s just say that two was most certainly not enough for this particular slider addict. Having not had breakfast beforehand (and really, why eat before this type of extravaganza), I headed over to Top Pot’s streamlined silver trailer and got my apple fritter on. I’d heard quite a bit of people rave about Top Pot, and after one item, I’d have to say I agree. Very good stuff.

What, you expected me to wash it all down with a little something? Well, of course I did it with local favorite Jones Soda, you know. I had the Jones Zilch Vanilla Bean (more on the sodas here), along with a Pomegranate a little later, and I’m most certainly happy that they’re very available now that I’m here in Seattle.

At that point, I kind of wandered a bit and took it in, wishing I was hungrier, heh. I closed out my “lunch” with a slice of Veraci’s pizza – pepperoni, natch. The crust was actually super tender – I’d heard a few people in the crowd talking about not really liking the crust, but I liked it as a nice mix between the foldable Brooklyn-style that I’m used to with my East Coast pizza mentality, and a more upscale, fire-cooked pizza. Not overdone at all, and not really needing the complement of seasonings that you have to add to some slices at your local pizza shop.

While I didn’t get to try out everyone’s stuff, now I have a pretty good idea on which trucks I need to be tracking down – if the lines were at all indicative of what people are into in this city for their street food, then I’ll be going “out” for lunch a little more often.

In today’s links, we’ve got food groups, new music, pizza box improvements, new Apple products, and what your email address and credit score together say about you.

• There’s a new Young Jeezy track. Go listen.
• There’s a new Rihanna single out. Buzzworthy compares it to “mid-period Massive Attack.” Go listen.
• Could it be that someone has, in 2009, created the next great pizza box?
• Apple releases new Magic Mouse. Coincidentally, $69 leaves the pockets of thousands and thousands of Americans.
• The Milwaukee Brewers have named Rick Peterson their new pitching coach. In related news, the New York Mets still suck and wonder what happened to their pitching staff. Willie Randolph just laughs.
• Delaware is getting a state park! In other news, it still only takes 15 minutes to drive through the state on I-95 if you have EZPass.
• Your tax dollars at work. Kids need to eat more vegetables and take in less calories. Hey, does this mean that ketchup will finally become a vegetable?
• This comparison of credit scores and their respective owners’ email address domains is more than amusing, and proves that there is indeed a statistic for everything.

First off, I’ll just say that this is one of those threads / memes / topics that I haven’t really ever gotten into when it comes to blogging. I know Jason had some great success documenting his process, Joe Jaffe as well, so maybe I’m late to the game, but whatever. I’m adding my own secret sauce, if you will.

Cutting to the chase, though, and I’m happy to admit that as of this morning, I’ve lost 15 lbs. since July 13, 2008. Taking a tip from The Fiancee, I decided to, partially in support of her efforts and partially because I thought it was a good idea, join Weight Watchers – I’m really just using it to keep track of what I eat, and to have a grasp of what “costs” what when it comes to food. What I think has been the biggest thing for me is how easy it’s been to lose weight, without TOO dramatically hindering my ability to like food, which I do. I still eat ice cream – just not as much; I still drink soda – but have switched to something like Sprite Zero, Diet Dr Pepper, and so forth. I’ve never really been a fan of the “diet” versions of most of the colas and such I like, but from time to time I’ll give them a whirl.

That said, here’s the quick and dirty – I get a certain amount of “points” per day that I can eat on Weight Watchers’ “flex” plan. Additionally, I get a number of points that I can use throughout the week, on days I might go “over,” have dinner out, or something else. You don’t have to use those extra points, but you’re supposed to use all of your daily points. To give you some perspective, it’s all about calories, fat, and fiber – that’s how the points are figured out. The thing that gets you thin(ner) is the perspective, if you ask me. For instance, a can of regular soda, most of the beer I’d drink (I don’t do light beer), and a few other things I liked to have on a regular basis all have a value of 3 points. Sprite Zero? Zero points. Three buffalo wings? Nine points. A cup of penne pasta? Four points. And so on.

Let’s just say that the biggest difference – seriously – that I’ve made is that I’ve stopped dropping 9-15 points a day in random things. Beyond that, I’ve started to get my sugar cravings out of the way with one- or two point J-ello puddings, for instance. Some things are surprisingly high in points – most PB&J sandwiches I’d make run about 8 or 9 points. Heck, a hot dog might be five points, but the bun is typically three! Might not sound like a lot, but it should when that’s about a third of the points you’re supposed to take in during the day.

I’ve never really, in my life, gone on any sort of “diet,” weight loss regimen, or followed any sort of plan for eating. Weight Watchers says, publicly, that it’s not a diet, and I have worked with a few people who’ve handed PR for the brand, and they tell me much of the same. I’m not going to compare it to anything else or any other diet, because I’ve seen great results on a lot of people from a number of different areas, but what I will say is that having some level of consciousness about what I’m eating is pretty much the big hitch. I’ve gotten fast food at least once per week while I’ve been doing this, and while I might have tweaked what I’d normally get, I’m not forbidding myself from eating anything – hence my being pleased with the situation.

I’m pretty psyched about the whole thing and while my “goal” is to lose about another 6+ lbs, I’m thinking I can actually take it a little further, and I’m sure I’ll have to add a lot more fitness-related things to get to that second point. I’m just flat out surprised that it was so relatively easy – with its periodic frustrations (no really, I’d like another glass of red wine, please) – to change eating habits and not really doing anything different w/r/t the gym, running, and so on. If only everything else worked this way. For someone who isn’t really a process / order guy, I’m surprised to be bought into something, but I guess that’s the point, huh?

Alright, this is so good that I had to throw down a blog post about it. My colleague Chuck just brought me a brownie from the Treats Truck, and I must say it’s pretty ridiculous.

You know you want to track down the truck and get one for yourself.