Checking out at the grocery store makes me sad. Not because I have to hand over my credit card, (though that doesn’t fill me with paroxysms of joy either) but because of the magazines. Oh, the magazines. The covers of tabloids that ridicule women for being too fat or too thin. Covers that pimp the soup diet and the potato diet and the carrot diet. Covers that speculate on who’s pregnant and who’s just fat. It’s depressing and I rarely ever want to buy any of those magazines. I doubt I will, until I see a cover that touts how to lose 20 pounds sensibly in 20 weeks instead of in 20 days. Why are there always women on the covers? Magazines marketed at women have women on the covers and magazines marketed to men…also have women on the covers, though usually with considerably less clothing. Odd.

Seeing covers like that makes me glad that I’ve essentially checked out of pop culture over the past few years. I’m really picky about what TV shows I watch, [...]

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As I mentioned earlier, whenever I’ve started my car the last couple weeks the “Change Oil Soon” light has turned on for 30 seconds and then turned itself off. I finally read my owner’s manual, and learned that if you don’t reset a button in the fuse box after you change the oil, this light comes on every four to five thousand miles. I had my oil changed 1000 miles ago, and I bet the mechanic forgot to reset the button. So I popped the hood, got my hands dirty, reset the fuse, and the light hasn’t come on since.

The “Change Oil Soon” light in my head is still flashing, causing my nerves to light up a headache in my skull although nothing is actually wrong with me. I have not been able to reset the fuse for the past 19 days. Yes, I have had a headache for literally 19 days. 24/7. Non-stop. Not 19 headaches over 19 days, just one, long, never-ending symphony of pain. It feels like too much pressure in my [...]

• Continue reading "Marinating in the migraine of pain"

In France 99.9% of their citizens are organ donors, as apposed to only 28% of Americans. Why are the French dying to give people their kidneys and corneas more often than Americans? Because in France the default position is to be donor, whereas in most US states you have to sign something to indicate that you wish to be donor. According to the blog We’re Only Human run by The Association for Psychological Science this is because of something called “‘default heuristic’ which basically says: If there is a default position, don’t question it.”

Holy crap, that’s exactly how I got fat. It’s also why I keep getting e-mails about kitty litter. When I register with sites online to redeem my Paw Points from boxes of kitty litter or to comment on message boards or just to read the stupid New York Times online, I have to fill out forms – forms with lots and lots of checkboxes. Sometimes the boxes are unchecked, but sometimes they are already checked for me, as if the webmaster [...]

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A lot of mice have gotten fat so someday we won’t have to. Scientists recently discovered that turning off a gene in mice’s genetic code caused them to stop producing an enzyme which caused the build-up of an amino acid which caused cells to make new proteins and then destroy them over and over again burning lots of calories without getting fat. Did you get that? Basically, some people have cells that do a lot of busy work that waste time and energy – just like your office job! But unlike sitting in front of a computer all day, this busy work keeps them thin. It’s a long way of saying that genes do probably play a factor in making you fat and yes there really are some people who can eat cake all day and not gain weight. You can find more information in the easy-to-read MSNBC article or the more detailed Nature.com article or if you have PhD in cell biology you can dive into the original paper published in Cell Metabolism. [...]

• Continue reading "Anti-Fat Pill"

I finally renewed my driver’s license last month. Between the 190 pound weight loss and the LASIK, I was mildly worried I would get to the Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) and they’d accuse me of strangling the real Jennette Fulda, stuffing her in a deep freeze, and stealing her identity. If I had been hit by a bus on the way there, I wouldn’t have been surprised if the police report said, “There was no identification on the victim’s body, but she appears to have mugged a fat girl before she was run over.”

The clerk at the counter, who had far better hair and complexion than I’d expect from an employee of the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, asked me, “Has any information on your driver’s license changed since your last renewal? Are you still 5′ 9″ and weigh 250 – whoa, girl you do not weigh 250 pounds.”

I admitted I didn’t even weigh 250 pounds when I said I weighed 250 pounds. She congratulated me and thankfully did not accuse me of identify theft. [...]

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