He thrummed the growing ring of lard around his waist. Writing this first rule made him feel thinner. Eating crept up on him and had become his major source of pleasure outside of, perhaps, making love to Diana. To men in prison food is the central morale factor. Bad food causes riot and death. In El Paso weekend passes in the Air Force had sent men braying the restaurants, thence to bars, thence to the whorehouses of Juarez, thence to all night Mexican restaurants for more food. Then there was a tendency to vomit and fall asleep wherever one was. Lundgren was always the driver in that he never vomited. But then the Air Force had ended his art career and had only been to his father an acceptable hedge before he entered the real world. Eat Sparingly because he felt gluttony was creeping up from all flanks. On the far side of the table were the remains of a laboriously made Louisiana chicken hash. Too much Tabasco had necessitated a beer. Two beers, in fact. He must now fight the urge to nap, fight any plans for an unnecessary lunch, though the pig hocks he’d poached the night before nestled sweetly in their own juices in the refrigerator. NO! And there was another darker thought: maybe he was running out of hormones. He had read about something called testosterone in Playboy but it reminded him of tsetse flies, the bane of the tropics. He remembered getting a mosquito bite on his dick at boy scout camp. Diana would be home late from work and had requested something simple. Poach a chicken with noodles maybe. Stuff a sirloin with oysters and broil it. Not simple. Hot and crispy Hunanese fish? Nope. Grabure, an ascetic vegetable soup with braised oxtails? Probably.

Number Two. AVOID ADULTERY