Books Lying Open
¤ The Bachman Books, Stephen King
¤ Thief of Time, Terry Pratchett
¤ Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah, Stephen King

Soul-Devouring Worry:
¤ Hunger.

Answer of the Day:
¤ Because I work at Jamba!

Curse of the Day:
¤ May your girlfriend repeatedly dream about loud snoring, while simultaneously confusing her dreams with her very sleepy late night waking moments.

know I make this request all too frequently, but I had an email crash (on the server end, not mine) and was unable to pull any emails from Monday morning. My email client just locked up on "downloading 1 out of 135 emails" and stuck there, so I had to access my account controls and delete that mailbox, then recreate it, vanishing all of the mails in it in the process.  Given my usual ratio of mail to spam/junk/virus, I would estimate that one or none of those 135 lost mails were real ones. On the off chance that one of them was from you, can you resend it?

Also, be sure you mail anything from now on to flux@blackchampagne.com. I'll still be checking the catch all mail, but since at least 75% of my junk comes in to old emails I posted for fun on the articles pages (crap@, tits@, bullshit@, god@, etc@) that were then harvested by spam spiders, I'm going to be checking flux@ all the time, and other stuff much less often, as well as subjecting the others to tighter spam controls.

My filters are working pretty well though; I did a sweep of my junk folder (where mail tagged as junk is automatically routed) and for the past week there were around 1800 mails there, and only 1 was a real mail from a real site reader.

As for today's new content, you'll find movie discussion and booth babes up here, with diets of the present and future below. Enjoy.

It's surprising (to me, anyway) that not only didn't they do a huge worldwide opening (like the Matrix LotR, etc did) since most hit movies now make 2 or 3x more internationally than they do in the US. Take Troy: it made $131m in the US, which is actually a loss, given the massive movie and promotion cost. However it's pulled in another $328m worldwide, so far, giving it a total of $460m, and making it a huge hit. What's Spider Man 2 waiting for? It hasn't opened anywhere outside of the US and Canada yet.  The first Spider Man made around $400m in the US, and another $400m world wide; what are they waiting for?

All box office talk aside, is the movie any good? It's still at 94% on RT, with 151/160 reviews positive, and most of the geeks seem to love it. I'd throw in my opinion, but I don't have one. Neither Malaya or I seem to have any interest in it, and despite my comments from last week that we might check it out at a matinee this week, I don't see much likelihood of that happening. She's much more interested in King Arthur, which opens Wednesday, for some reason.  I'd have waited until Friday if I were them; let people get Spider Man mania out of their heads and give them a week to ponder seeing a different movie. The problem with King Arthur is that it's apparently not any good. Almost all of the early screening reports I read said it was boring. Like a PG-version of Braveheart, with less memorable characters. Real critics are weighing in now, and though there are only 13 reviews up on RT as of Monday evening, 4 are positive and 9 are negative, which isn't a real good sign, early though it may be.

Malaya and I are certainly not slaves to the critical mass, happily sitting through critically reviled action schlock on a regular basis, so we may yet to check out the new KA anyway.  I'm not real high on it personally, but I've been annoyed by this one since the first teaser trailer, with the Mr. Voice intoning:

For centuries, historians believed that the tale of King Arthur and his knights was only a legend.

But the myth was based on a real hero, who lived 1600 years ago.

Which makes it sound like the movie is based on some amazing new archeological discovery. It's not, and the claim is bullshit. There were plenty of legends about warriors and soldiers back then, and while all of the modern "knights in shining armor" versions are entirely anachronistic (plate mail armor as seen in movies like Excalibur didn't exist until centuries and centuries after the mythical Arthur's time) and it's nice that the new King Arthur doesn't use those, it does still have every other fairy tale element.

The modern conception of KA came about from romantic French writing in the 1000 BCE time frame; existing British legends mostly starred Sir Gawain and other random knights, and when those became popular in France, they were rewritten and jazzed up with the introduction of a King, the story of the legendary sword, magic from a wizard, a sexy queen, and a romantic triangle in the form of Lancelot, who has no counterpart at all in the original British myths.  So while the new KA is going for realism by taking things back to a pre-shining armor time, and removing all of the fairy tale magic of Merlin and other familiar supernatural elements, it's retaining characters like Lancelot who are entirely fictional, and making everything else up from scratch.

All of which is fine, that's what movies do (it might be a bad idea in this one, since most of the reviews say it's boring and that they miss the magic and mystery): it just annoys me, and the few remaining tidbits of knowledge from my 9 college units of world mythology, when they claim to be basing their movie on a real hero, who in fact never existed. And his entirely fictional exploits with other, entirely fictional characters.

I don't think KA is going to be much of a hit; there aren't any big stars, it looks too much like every other mythological movie of recent years (flops like Timeline, for instance), it's coming out too soon after Spider Man, and it's getting poor reviews.  Then again, Braveheart, Gladiator, Troy, and the LotR movies proved that movies with fantasy, sword and sorcery, and mythology can be huge hits. So maybe other people are more jazzed up for KA than I am, and it'll churn out $90m the first five days and I'll be left eating my words.

I ask if she's comfortable with so many guys posing with her. "It's weird when they put their arms around me," she replies, "but then I feel them shaking and I'm like, whatever, if it's so important to you . . . it's funny when guys come up to me and tell me that it's their first time touching a girl."

Okay, two quotes:

I ask Lauren if she's had any embarrassing experiences. "Only a few guys attempt to get fresh. They're not really that caliber of guy. They're more nerdy and wide-eyed and so excited that you're actually talking to them. They seem so un-used to seeing girls. I guess they just play videogames and don't go outside much. It's so cute they way they're so enthusiastic and enamored."

The article is by a girl, which likely explains much of her ability to gain access and trust with the models. Oddly, I wanted to do an article like this 3 or 4 years ago, after my first visit to E3 and my first exposure to the strangeness of the booth babe phenomena. My idea was to walk around, get a few photos of all of them, ask how they got the job, how it paid, if they were gamers, if they were models or strippers or students in real life, what weird stuff had happened thus far, etc.  I never did it since 1) I didn't have a digicam back then, 2) I spent every minute there watching D2, playing D2,or talking to D2 programmers, and 3) I left the minute I wasn't doing that since the noise and crowds and chaos of E3 gave me a headache and I wanted to get started on my 3 hour drive back home.  That and Elly didn't think such an article would be useful or appropriate on the D2 site, and I didn't want to do it enough to pitch it to gamespy or gamespot or whoever.

I'd still find preparing and writing such an article interesting, especially if it came attached with eye candy, but as uninterested in gaming as I've become, I doubt I'll ever attend E3 again anyway.

iet time!

I'd been growing less and less tolerant of my waistline for the past couple of months, and while there was no critical tipping point, in late June I decided I wanted to lose some weight. So I started exercising more, and eating less. It's been 10 or 12 days since then, and I've been doing as much exercise as I can, shin splints permitting (jog down steep half-mile dirt hill, jog back up it, repeat) and eating less, and while we don't have a scale here, I'd say I've lost maybe 5 pounds.

Well, actually I have no idea if I've lost any weight or not, but I can fit comfortably into some jeans that were rather snug a month ago, and that makes me happy. It's not that I especially care how I look in my clothing (ask Malaya how often I consult a mirror on a daily basis) but I do care that I can fit into clothes I like, and while the two pairs of 30" waist cargo pants I bought last summer in a very thin period are still unbuttonable, I feel better about not being a tub-o-guts when I can put on all of my shorts and jeans, and sit down in them.

I bring this up not for the hell of it, but since it's basically the first time in my life I've tried to diet, and I'm surprised how easy it's been. I've tried to cut down on eating some times in the past, but never with much success. Generally I've just changed food; more salad, less fish and chips; that sort of thing. And that works by reducing calories and total food mass. Just don't snack, or if you must snack on celery or an apple or rice cakes. Rather than Doritos or candy or other fatty crap.

But more than not snacking, I'm just not eating that often, and really thinking about it when I do eat. Try it yourself sometime, and rather than thinking, "I want to chew on something." and going to grab a snack or make a meal, wait half an hour and see if you're really hungry. I haven't had more than 2 meals a day, with very minimal snacking, for a week, and it hasn't bothered me at all. I keep wanting to eat, like right now I could easily fry up a Boca burger and fry some FFS and eat that down without a thought. But I don't need to. I just want to salty and greasy and crunch textures and tastes in my mouth.  I'd love to walk over to the nearby 7/11 and buy some Hostess Cupcakes, or some of their day old donuts too. But do I need to do so? No.

I don't usually keep track of what I eat in a given day (which is certainly a good way to get fat), but since I've been limiting my mouthfuls I have been keeping a mental list. It's been a lot easier to do so with less food going in.

Friday I woke up around noon, and didn't eat anything for a couple of hours. When I decided to eat something, more out of habit than actual hunger, I got out a bunch of veggies and the flour tortillas and heated up the pan of super refried beans. I scooped the beans onto the tortilla, threw some bits of pepper jack on it, folded that over and stuck it in the toaster oven. While it was heating I cut up the veggies; red onions, bell peppers, black olives, tomatoes, and got the salsa and sour cream ready. Unfortunately the sour cream smelled like Michael Moore's shoes, so out it went. The rest of the food was good though, and I ate one burrito, expecting to eat one or two three, as I usually do.

However, after I ate one and came back into the kitchen, I stopped and thought about it, and realized that I really wasn't that hungry. Oh, I could have eaten another one easily, and I would have enjoyed it, but I didn't need to. So I didn't, and when Malaya got home from the gym a bit later, and didn't want one either, I put all the stuff away.

That was something like 3pm, and I drank a lot of water and had a few peanuts in the evening, but I didn't eat anything else until around 10pm, when I made a medium-sized platter of nachos supreme to share with Malaya. We ended up eating about 90% of it and rather than stuffing down the rest, I just threw it out. And that was it. I had maybe 8 peanut butter pretzel bites with some white wine around 4am, while I was writing and getting ready to go to bed, and went to bed at 7am feeling fine.  The 1.5 meals and a couple of small snacks were all I needed for the day.

Saturday, I had a couple of plain TJ's rice cakes with some orange juice when I got up around 1pm, ended up throwing out half of the orange juice when I noticed that the inside bottom of my glass was covered with stuck on black gunk (probably debris thrown up and somehow not rinsed away by the dishwasher), and had one burrito around 4.  I ate a veggie burger and a few FFS around midnight, and that was it, other than a couple sticks of celery during the afternoon, just to have something to chew on. I got out Saturday afternoon and ran a couple of miles up and down hill too, so it's not like I was too tired and listless from lack of food to move.

Sunday and Monday were much the same, with at most 2 meals a day, and rather limited snacking. Will I last at this pace, eating maybe 50% of what I usually would? I dunno, but it's been nearly 2 weeks and I feel fine.

One thing the diet does very well; makes me realize how much of eating is just a habit. It tastes good, we enjoy doing it, so we do. It's a social thing for a lot of people, but I don't really socialize much (other than with Malaya) and while we eat together every day, we don't always do so at the same time, while eating the same thing. I was in the habit of having a large meal every 4 or 5 hours, so I did. I was in the habit of snacking in between meals, so I did. Whether or not I was hungry enough to actually need to eat was not a major factor in my dietary planning.  Food tastes good, and eating makes us feel good. It's a basic survival instinct, and it's reinforced by an abundance of tasty options. The fact that few of those things are actually good for us is secondary, as is the fact that few of us (including myself, or I wouldn't be dieting in the first place) with constant access to food can turn it down often enough to stay fit and thin.

My diet isn't anything special. Eat what you like, just eat less of it and exercise more often.  The "Sporadic Bursts of Willpower Diet" wouldn't move too many books, would it? Not a real catchy title. So how about this one? The Master Cleanser. Sounds a bit like an S&M mistress, but it's a diet that Malaya's best friend heard about and grew interested in, and that she and Malaya are going to try out sometime this summer. I wasn't real interested in it initially, since it's basically a fast with some lemonade drinks and lots of herbal tea to cleanse the digestive system (orally administered enemas, basically). It's meant to be cleansing and healthy, not so much a diet, even though most people who stick with it for a week or longer (the suggested is 10 days) lose a lot of weight. Like 10 or 15 or 20 pounds.

As I say, I wasn't much interested, but after reading most of the reader reviews for the book on Amazon.com, I'm a lot more curious. A sample review:

I was told about this book by my local Health Food Store owner. I had read much about fasting and had tried a 3 day water fast previously. But, when I got this book, it just seemed like a great way to cleanse through fasting. I couldn't believe the difference between a water fast and the Miracle Cleansing Fast. Not only was it delicious, but I felt no lightheadedness, no headaches, no loss of energy...I just felt terrific! I love the 'clean' feeling, inside, you get from this fast and actually dread going back to eating because of it. I have told many people about the Lemonade Fast and have enjoyed watching as many reluctantly decided to sip my brew and were surprised at how wonderful it tastes. During an 11 day fast, I lost 14 lbs., took it along with me while I played golf, and had absolutely no problems. I love this book, I love doing this fast, and I highly recommend giving this method a try.

Given that I'd never really dieted, (at least not on purpose), it should be obvious that I've never fasted either. My mom has done weekend ones for years, and really enjoys the mental clarity and quick weight loss they provide, but I just figured I'd be too hungry to stand it. However, as I've successfully cut my food consumption by about 50% over the past week+, just by paying attention to when I eat and not eating unless I'm really hungry, I'm curious about trying the Master Cleanser one.

In addition to feeling better, detoxifying, and losing a bunch of weight in very short order, the whole bowel-cleansing aspect of it intrigues me. If you're wondering what that is, read this article and hold on to your chair. It's about a water fast with enemas thrown in for variety, but the end results are about the same. It's also the funniest news articles I've ever read, and I blogged about it back on March 13, 2002, in an update that's since been archived on the Food: Diet article page.  I don't think we'll get such dramatic um... results, from just the lemonade/maple syrup/cayenne pepper drinks of the Master Cleanser diet, since we're not going to be dropping 5 gallon enemas along with it, but think about it. The Master Cleanser weight loss is coming primarily from your body sloughing off the accumulated crap (literally) inside of it, and quite a bit of that stuff is built up in your intestines from a lifetime of eating food the human body did not evolve to digest, in quantities the human body did not evolve to tolerate. They don't call it "cleanser" for nothing. As I said, read that Guardian UK article, and see if you ever want to put red meat into your body again.

Speaking of eating meat, or not, I suppose I should comment on the Atkins Diet fad, since it's getting more and more popular (at least judging by the amount of TV commercials I see for low-carb foods) despite regular warnings from health experts that it's dangerous. The Atkins/no-carb diet is essentially the opposite of the Master Cleanser diet; on Atkins you gorge yourself on protein of every kind, meat and cheese and eggs and such, while avoiding almost all carbohydrates. That means no bread, pasta, almost no vegetables, fruits, beans, etc. Calories aren't counted on Atkins, and most people use it as an excuse to eat as much as they want.

I'm generalizing a bit; I've not read any books on it, but you can bet neither have 90% of the other people out there, a depressing amount of whom are now eating worse than ever, consuming more red meat and eggs, and sending their cholesterol and weight skyrocketing out of some half-hearted fantasy that if they cut their carbs a bit, they'll lose weight anyway.  Enjoy your heart attacks, kids.

People get very passionate about Atkins, since it's a dream for some, and a nightmare for others. I'd hate it personally, but I don't like to eat meat that much. I do like cheese, but in limited doses, and almost always on top of other things, like nachos or pizza. I could never stick to the Atkins diet, even if it guaranteed weight loss, which is why I've never given it much thought. 

It does work, for a while, if you stick to it. Logically it's insane; how can you eat fatty stuff like steak and eggs and lose weight?  It works, if you're very strict and adhere religiously to the guidelines, because you can eat less and still feel full, due to the high energy/protein aspect of the food. But mostly it's great for first timers, since the lack of carbs sends the body into a state called ketosis, in which you shed stored water rapidly. It's a sort of forced dehydration, and people can indeed drop 8 or 10 pounds in less than a week, even while eating steak, pork chops, hamburger, etc. If you enjoy that sort of food, it seems like a miracle.

And it is, for a couple of weeks. By then almost everyone loses it and returns to eating pasta, bread, and other carb-heavy stuff, their bodies put the water weight back on (which is healthy; your body carries that to keep you from dying if you go thirsty for a couple of days) and they end up heavier than they were pre-Atkins, and disillusioned by their diet failure. But, since it's basically a dream diet for most Americans, and lets them eat all the fat and meat they want, they'll probably try it again in a few months or a year, since after all, they lost so much weight so quickly. That part is easier to remember than the 2 or 3 pounds a week they put on for a month afterwards. Of course the real sticking point is how much you've increased your risk of heart disease, cancer, and other things tied to heavy red meat consumption, but we won't know more about that for a decade or two, until lots of Atkins dieters have been on the program for decades, and we can evaluate the long term damage.

Cutting your carbs can work long term, but it's largely done by limiting portion size and calories. Humans can survive with far less carbs than most of us eat. Of course we can survive with far less of all food as well, as my last two weeks of dieting have demonstrated. Basically, every diet works, if you just stick with it. No diet at all, just eating what you like in smaller portions while exercising, will work as well. It's just that hardly anyone has the will power to stick to that for long.

Radical diets, like strict no-carb and the lemonade fast cleansing thing I mentioned above, are for short bursts, and should ideally scour your body of toxins. The problem with Atkins is that you're shoveling in terribly unhealthy food, things omnivorous humans are not meant to survive on, and you probably need a cleansing fast afterwards just to get back to normal.  It would be interesting to take an overweight person, put them on Atkins for two weeks, and then as the ketosis was fading out stick them on a cleansing liquid fast for another couple of weeks. It would be one way to purge all of that built up meat from their lower intestine, at least, and though they'd probably not lose so much weight on the liquid diet portion (since their bodies were soaking up liquid to replace what they lost from the ketosis) they'd certainly lose weight overall. If they lived.

I wrote most of the above on the weekend, updated it Monday night, and here's the latest update. Malaya returned home from shopping and a visit to her parents' house Monday evening with all of the Master Cleanser ingredients, including two plastic jugs with measurements on the side, a lemon juicer, grade B maple syrup, cayenne pepper, and about 20 pounds of lemons, picked from the tree in her parents' back yard. The start date is Friday, so we'll be eating our last meals for a while the next three days, and mostly trying to get rid of everything perishable in the fridge, I suspect.  Needless to say, discussion of the diet progress will most likely figure large in the blogs next week, so stay tuned.

Or run screaming in horror if the prospect of surviving entirely on sugary lemon juice and lots of roughage-enhanced herbal tea makes you unhappy.