Yodels as a dietary supplement?

I’d like everyone to know in advance that yes, I’m writing this in Microsoft Word and yes, upon completion, I will be posting it onto the blog site. Thank you for your wisdom. Or for reminding me that I continue to employ half of my brain, at best.

The summer continues to drag; so does the job. I’ve considered quitting my blog for fear of its discovery and the likely fallout that would result. Remember, I can’t get fired until January 1, 2007. The only way around this issue is to blog from home. Unfortunately, I’ve been getting some intense headaches at work, so staring at a computer screen when I return home from staring at three monitors all day is less than appealing. I’m attributing these annoying headaches to work-related stress (or, from pondering the correct pronunciation and implications of "moral turpitude"), and am going to ask for worker’s comp.

UNFORTUNATELY, I’d say that my chances of receiving it are as likely as Sean losing weight, but he has been doing so successfully as of late thanks to the Nutrisystem diet. For those of you who don’t have the pleasure of watching CNBC all day, every day, a commercial is played for Nutrisystem during every single commercial break. The two ads seem to alternate between Dan Marino* and this brunette woman who will be lucky if I don’t javelin her size two body into the nearest brick wall if I run into her on the street. Basically, she spends the entire commercial giggling and holding her waistband while reiterating, “This is a two! Tee-hee!” For reasons I may never comprehend, her flaky laugh and bimbo voice is painfully irritating to me, and I can’t help but cringe each time she touts the wonder that is Nutrisystem. This is the second most annoying commercial ever**, and I would resort to dire dieting methods including (but not limited to) Atkins, cabbage soup, leeks and even *gasp* good old-fashioned exercise before I gave these people any money. I guess it’s fitting that Sean selected Nutrisystem for his dietary supplement, and despite my hatred for the advertising, he has lost a total of 7 pounds in 11 days or something, which would be the equivalent of a normal person losing 4 eyelashes, maybe 5. He has quite a way to go before we can refer to him as “Skinny” without being reprimanded for our sarcasm, or before he can fit into a Size 2 (XXL). Regardless, his attempt to avoid a massive coronary is in my best interest: He drops, we drop and it's time to find a new job (prematurely). This is one of 3 diets he claims he will be testing (doctor’s orders, I presume) for Greg to go on no earlier than January 1, 2007 (Sean is really, really long December GregFat).

Greg has claimed to be on a diet himself, but adamantly refuses to start weighing in until the GregFat participants begin actively trading his pounds. He has been consuming honeydew melon for breakfast and salad for lunch lately, but I believe this to be a show as he doesn’t appear to be losing any weight whatsoever. He’s either maintaining (or gaining), or has stepped over to the dark side and is helping Katie smuggle the larger playground balls out to her car. He cannot resist temptation, and today exemplified that.

It goes without saying that I work with a competitive bunch of 12-year-old boys. In retrospect, I should have checked to see if they would be participating in the Little League World Series. Anyway, Greg has no willpower, so when Rich challenged him, “Betcha can’t eat a box of Yodels in 20 minutes,” it was go-time, and the various bets pooled in from around the desk. A similar contest was held back in April, but he had to eat as many Devil Dogs as possible within 15 minutes without any sort of beverage. Based on data gathered at this previous event (he ate 6.5 Dogs before nearly experiencing the dreaded “reversal of fortunate”), it was predicted that he could consume 6 Yodels in 10 minutes without a drink. Greg scoffed at his doubters, and Paul (of all people) took 20 whole minutes off of the desk to track down Yodels at Stop and Shop (I should note that side bets were taken as to whether or not he had the capacity to find them as there were doubts he’d ever been in a grocery store, period), and at 12:53 EST, the contest commenced. We watched curiously as he blew through the first 3 2-packs within 4 minutes, but then he slooowed down. The last 4 were painful to watch: It appeared as though Greg ran out of saliva, and actually had to chew each snack cake rather than counting on being able to swallow them whole (with assistance from the chocolate coating). Still, he pressed on and at the 8 minute mark, all that remained were 5 mangled packages. Theoretically, he consumed 200% of his DRV of saturated fat, but he claims that he’s double the size of a normal person so it’s practically normal. This line of reasoning, my friends, is how you hit 275 pounds. Surprisingly, it all amounted to a mere 1400 calories. Upon dissemination of this info, the desk scoffed at the size of the “puny” Yodels, claiming that “they used to be much bigger.” I’m sure there’s some truth to that—if I had to walk uphill both ways in the snow to get snack-cakes, I’d expect them to be the size of bricks as well. After some debate as to whether or not Greg’s feat should be considered legitimate due to the size of the diminutive Yodels, everyone paid up and prepared for the metals close as though nothing had ever happened.

Diet, my ass. I encourage everyone to buy December contracts between 265 and 275.

No other new and startling news, really. Jessica turned the big 3-0 today, and seemed to take it in stride. She complained that a few of her girlfriends had been bitter on their 30th and sent her emails/cards trying to induce the same effect, but she was having none of that. We did our part by singing a much more spirited version of “Happy Birthday” than normal***, and she praised our effort before indulging in a piece of cake (which, by the way, Greg couldn’t eat as he was feeling quite ill from the box of Yodels).

That’s all, folks. Until tomorrow. At 7:30 a.m. Oof.


*Who, thanks to Nutrisystem has lost 22 pounds and claims, “I’ve gotta new nickname: Skinny.” Yes, that’s the kind of award-winning acting you would expect from one of the “Ace Ventura” stars. As an aside, does anyone ever remember a FAT Dan Marino? Please provide a convincing photograph.

** Please see the most annoying commercial ever here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyIXAYTOryQ . Watch it more than once, and you’ll want to apply a gun directly to your forehead.

*** There was a birthday practically every week in May and June, and the birthday song was reduced to nearly inaudible mumbling by the time July rolled around. This “Unbirthday Song” was a common occurrence at CX, as no one had quite caught on to the fact that maybe 55 birthdays really weren’t special enough to necessitate splurging on 55 individual Baskin Robbins cakes and forcing whichever unfortunate employees were present to sing to someone they may have only spoken 5 words with.