“Bat Boy Secretly Advising President”

OK, I admit it.  I read the supermarket tabloid headlines.  Sometimes I can barely get my groceries on the belt, I am so busy learning that “Nostradamus Predicts World Ends, Hockey Season Cancelled”.  Holy #$@*!  Half of that already came true!  Sure, it happened before the headline hit, but Nostradamus must have predicted it first, right?  Man, I’d better get two more bags of M&M’s.  They might be my last! 

I am proud to say that I never buy the tabs.  I never even pick them up.  I just devour the deceptive headlines like the gossip loving cretin I profess not to be.  Bat Boy is my favorite.  He shows up on the cover of Weekly World News about every 3-4 months.  What a career he’s had!  Who is this guy?  Why hasn’t he been on Leno?  He must be worth a fortune!  I’d like to get a look at this kid’s parents.  If he’s a fake, and I’m not saying he is, who would let their kid be headlined in the supermarket as Bat Boy? 

And then there are the star reports.  I’m not really a star struck person, or a film aficionado. I don’t know many of the popular actors and actresses names, or who is in what movie currently.  Hey, I have kids; if it’s not animated, I don’t know about it.  I do know that Kirstie Alley is fat.  Can you believe that is news if you’re famous?  I’ve been fat for years, and nobody’s hiding in my shrubbery to snap a photo!  I also know if Oprah is up or down, who’s supposedly cheating and with whom, and what problems Mary Kate and Ashley are allegedly coping with.  All valuable information that I am sure I will one day find a use for.  Like maybe writing a column, or something. 

My weakness is the cheap women’s mags that promise to help you never feel fatigued again, and lose 25 pounds by the time you finish reading the magazine.  I know it’s just a 2500 word article with pictures and recipes that boils down to “eat fewer calories, exercise more”, yet some stubborn part of me foolishly hopes somebody will discover the miracle “Eat A Lot of Chocolate After Dinner” diet, that it will show up in one of the cheap women’s mags before it hits the major networks, and that I will just happen to see it while waiting for Valerie the Checker to slide all my low fat yogurt and cat food over the scanner.  

See, I don’t have any trouble sticking to 90% of the rules of any of the diet fads, except the really weird ones where you only consume papaya juice and green tea for two weeks.  Yeah, like I need to buy a magazine to tell me starving for two weeks will drop a few.   No, it’s the pseudo-believable diets that get me.  I’ve switched to only whole grains.  I eat wild salmon, and only consume “good” carbohydrates with my meal, following a healthy portion of protein, of course.  I’m a model dieter until the dishes are done and the kids are getting ready for bed.  Then I’m a junkie.  Yeah, that’s right.  I got a problem.  I’m not ashamed to admit it.  I eat sugar after dinner.  After 8 o’clock, even.  And if it’s not chocolate, then it doesn’t count.  

Those sneaky people at the women’s mags, they know all about people like me.  They know we’re suckers for a headline.  “Miracle Ingredient:  Lose 10 Pounds in Two Weeks”.  Pictures of Felicity, formerly a size 18, now a slim size 6.  All she did was follow this miracle diet.  It was easy!  You can do it too!  

Sure I can.  Until the dinner dishes are done.  How come nobody ever addresses the overbearing need for treats and comfort at the end of a long day?  What, am I the only one here with a problem?  There are enough chubbettes in line with me to tell me that lots of us have some kind of problem with food.   I tried some low carb sugar alternatives.  They have this sugar substitute, a “sugar alcohol”, called Malitol.  It should be called Fartitol.  And if you eat too much, Crapitol.  It’s fine if you live alone and you have good ventilation, but believe me, your spouse and kids will not thank you.  They’d rather have you fat.  

Yes, I have one of those mags sitting abandoned in my “inbox” right now.  I knew the headline was sell-more-magazines-speak for “eat fewer calories, exercise more”, but there was that tiny spark of hope.  I justified the purchase by telling myself I was only wasting $1.49.  The premise of this particular diet was reducing cellular inflammation brought on by aging.  Not only would you lose weight, you would look younger, too!  Even your wrinkles would decrease!  Wow, that sounds great!  I read through a week’s worth of menus.  OK, not stuff I really like, but I could do this.  I could stick to this during the day.  So if I stick to the diet 90% of the time, I’ll lose 9 pounds instead of 10, right?  I know that’s not how it works, but I was willing to delude myself and try again. 

Then I read the part where you’re supposed to give up coffee, too.  What kind of sicko wrote this?  Is this a women’s magazine, or one of those “alternative” publications, for people who like to suffer?  I can give up most of the good stuff, and I can accept that I am wrong, wrong, wrong for giving into sugar, but there’s no way, honey, that I can get through my three kid day without being juiced.  Uh uh.  We have stock in Starbucks.  

So like all the others, this one will end up in the trash bin.  

I checked out the headlines today.  Apparently it’s not a miracle diet I need, it’s a miracle liquid.  “Lose Weight Without Dieting”.  I’m proud to say I declined to purchase.  I did learn something, however.  There is a very successful Bat Boy musical playing in London, and Hillary’s thong is too tight.  Now that’s news!