D-day tomorrow

So tommorow is Nov 1st, first day of marathon preparation.
Things I have found out-
One has to be running atleast for a year-20 miles a week, before thinking about a marathon,my snail paced 6-8 miles of walking a week, if that, does not count.Then it takes atleast 3o weeks to train to finish a marathon-just finish-which is what we want to do. If we do the SFmarathon in Aug 2008,that gives us 9 months i.e 36 weeks, so we should be OK if we are consistent, persistent and smart about the training.
One will have to be careful about diet and nutrition, load up on the carbs, so all the halloween candy I consumed today will surely help me run longer and faster. Jokes apart, the marathon training might not help me lose much of the extra 30 pounds I carry since my body will need the extra nutrition.
There are as many different marathon training plans as steps in 26.2 miles-approx 52,000. So I will have to use my brains while sifting through the information, and I thought this was all about brawn.The best plan I have found so far is the Jeff Galloway plan of 30 weeks which recommends 30 min of running 3 times a week and one long run on the weekend. Also he has different run/walk ratios depending on the pace you can keep.I am a bit skeptical because on paper it seems too easy.
NB