Dieting: What's not to love?

I love lifestyle ads. I love the ads for real estate that show a hand in hand couple grinning at a creek they call "waterfront". We have condo complexes in Toronto called "South Beach" and "The Tides", even though we are located on the Great Lakes. Ads for restaurants full of grinning waiters, hot food and well behaved children. And those diet books, with handsome capped-tooth husbands in white shirts snogging with their wives over a chopped pepper.

I love an optimist, but I also like some degree of grounding in reality. I am a fat woman. I didn't get that way because I wanted to. I got there because I was upset, or bored, or because every moment of my day was accounted for, or because my husband was fooling around, or because nobody gave a damn. Least of all me.

And so I went on a diet. Grapefruit, Poon, South Beach, flavour of the moment. And I lost weight! And everyone said it was wonderful. And it was! But it doesn't last.

You cannot go around eating no carbs, or just grapefruit, or soup, for any length of time. It's not just impractical, it's antisocial. Would you like to show up to a luncheon with tub a home made salad?

And it's expensive. On a weight loss program, you can figure on paying up to $100 a month or more for quality food. That is because flour (breads, pastries, pastas, etc) and sugar (you know this one) are subsidized, and as a result, cheaper. Nobody wants to subsidize tomatoes, salad greens, or a big fat apple. As a result, you pay more. And that can hurt.

Ever notice how, for all the good these programs are supposed to do, they are always expensive? Thousands of dollars a year, in sonme cases. Somebody's got to pay Valerie Bertinelli, and it may as well be you.

My biggest steam (are you listening, Feds?) is the cost of gym attendance. Here in Canada we can be indoors 9 months out of the year. Yet there are no subsidies or tax  breaks for staying fit. In fact, it can cost upwards of $1,000 per year.

This is why you are fucking up:

IMPRACTICALITY + EXPENSE = LACK OF COMPLIANCE

This is how you solve the problem:

ADAPT IT TO YOU
ADAPT IT TO YOU
ADAPT IT TO YOU

God made me smart. I don't care about Jenny Craig or any of the others; I care about what works for me. I take what I need and add what I have invented to make it work. And as of this writing, I have lost 22 lbs since December.