The author carb-loading on cupcakes and beer What with the holidays coming up and the extraordinary amount of fatty, sugary food most of us are planning to consume to celebrate them, it is time for my annual column on good health habits, so when January rolls around and we all crawl out of the hole of excess and stand blinking in the bright light of knowing all of our pants are too tight, it will be long forgotten.
I am not a fan of fad diets, or of any diets at all, to be honest. I do not avoid lactose, glucose, gluten or nuts. Rather than making a major effort to eat healthy food and drink copious volumes of pure water, I monitor my health like any other thoughtful American, by reading ominous headlines on the Internet and adjusting my behavior accordingly for a week or so. When artificial sweeteners were discovered to cause diabetes, for example, I resolved to put nothing but brown, raw sugar in my coffee, a natural sweetener plucked from the earth by smiling Haitian migrant farm workers, blessed by the tropical sun and watered by the occasional hurricane, to keep the diabetic curse at bay.
This lasted until I ran out of sugar and noticed I still had a box of Equal the size of a class-action attorney's briefcase in the cupboard. But when I run out of blue packets, I'm returning to the ways of Mother Earth, I swear.
Other health news I follow even more closely. Repeatedly, news hounds reported that drinking two glasses of red wine a day has copious health benefits. I forced myself to gurgle down half a bottle of Pinot Noir with dinner, followed by my usual six-pack of beer, in the interest of my health. Only later did I find out that that was far above the recommended daily dose of alcohol, so I cut out the wine. Quitting was no problem for me; my steely self-discipline made any thought of professional rehab laughable. Anytime I missed my wine, I just had another beer. Good thing, too, because just last summer, when it was discovered that farts prevent cancer, my regular consumption of crisp, foaming microbrews meant I was already bubbling with powerful therapeutic gases. To make a positive contribution to the public welfare it was only necessary for me to leap out of my chair, into which object's cushions I usually emitted my healing outbursts, and walk about expelling medicinal wonders into the open air, greeting the occasional critic with a beatific "You're welcome." Who knows how many were spared the curse of cancer due to their timely sniffing of my curative discharges? I felt like Mother Theresa among the lepers, until about a week later when it was discovered that farts didn't prevent cancer. Oh, well. It is the intention that counts, and someone has to eat the case of frijoles I bought at Costco so that the strength and frequency of my prophylactic eruptions would increase.
So ask not for whom the gas rips. It rips for thee.
I am not a fan of fad diets, or of any diets at all, to be honest. I do not avoid lactose, glucose, gluten or nuts. Rather than making a major effort to eat healthy food and drink copious volumes of pure water, I monitor my health like any other thoughtful American, by reading ominous headlines on the Internet and adjusting my behavior accordingly for a week or so. When artificial sweeteners were discovered to cause diabetes, for example, I resolved to put nothing but brown, raw sugar in my coffee, a natural sweetener plucked from the earth by smiling Haitian migrant farm workers, blessed by the tropical sun and watered by the occasional hurricane, to keep the diabetic curse at bay.
This lasted until I ran out of sugar and noticed I still had a box of Equal the size of a class-action attorney's briefcase in the cupboard. But when I run out of blue packets, I'm returning to the ways of Mother Earth, I swear.
Other health news I follow even more closely. Repeatedly, news hounds reported that drinking two glasses of red wine a day has copious health benefits. I forced myself to gurgle down half a bottle of Pinot Noir with dinner, followed by my usual six-pack of beer, in the interest of my health. Only later did I find out that that was far above the recommended daily dose of alcohol, so I cut out the wine. Quitting was no problem for me; my steely self-discipline made any thought of professional rehab laughable. Anytime I missed my wine, I just had another beer. Good thing, too, because just last summer, when it was discovered that farts prevent cancer, my regular consumption of crisp, foaming microbrews meant I was already bubbling with powerful therapeutic gases. To make a positive contribution to the public welfare it was only necessary for me to leap out of my chair, into which object's cushions I usually emitted my healing outbursts, and walk about expelling medicinal wonders into the open air, greeting the occasional critic with a beatific "You're welcome." Who knows how many were spared the curse of cancer due to their timely sniffing of my curative discharges? I felt like Mother Theresa among the lepers, until about a week later when it was discovered that farts didn't prevent cancer. Oh, well. It is the intention that counts, and someone has to eat the case of frijoles I bought at Costco so that the strength and frequency of my prophylactic eruptions would increase.
So ask not for whom the gas rips. It rips for thee.
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