FAT HEAVEN OR SKINNY HELL?





Although not raised, culturally, as a Latter-Day Saint, my body been decidedly Mormon and Orthodox Jewish since birth.


I never liked coffee (although I certainly tried), I can't hold my drink (or my head or any other part of my body when I drink alcohol), and my entire gastric system riots when I eat any pork.


But there several gray areas with LDS dietary rule.


Ultra-conservative Mormons feel that any drink with caffeine is somehow as evil as coffee. They also believe in voting Republican, watching Glenn Beck and Fox News, and never teaching a lesson with a tablecloth, flower arrangement and a hand-out.


Moderate Mormons think that you will not be sent directly to outer darkness if you are not a dead-dog Republican, you can drink Diet Coke as long as it's not in public, and you can watch Comedy Central on T.V.


Liberal Mormons see no problem with Mt. Dew, supporting human and civil rights, and supporting President Obama.


So here is my personal quandary.


I normally drink two Diet Cokes a day - discreetly, in private, in the dark of my closets (my bishop may be reading this blog).


Today I drank FOUR - and I know it was the reason I got by with less food.


So, the question is - should I be good and end up in heaven as a chubby cherub, or be a skinny woman who ends up in the Mormon equivalent of hell (which actually is the Democrat National Convention in an election year)?

DIRTY JOBS

I am trying to come up with unusual ways to curb my appetite.

An old adage is don't keep food you like to eat. With me, that doesn't work - my standards just keep lowering.

So tonight - let's watch "Dirty Jobs" on the Discovery channel and see if that can turn my stomach off.


Hmm... Mike Rowe is still hot enough that I can watch the garbage and still have a bit of an appetite.

ON THE PLANE AGAIN

My last official day of vacation.

Tomorrow I have that ridiculous flight home - six hours of a very, very dark plane, drawn window shades, showing a movie you would never have paid money to see play on 57 different 3 x 5.5 inch mini-screens, all of which you don't want to watch, and definitely do NOT want to hear the 39 people who are watching it laugh at the same moment at something that you can't understand unless you are listening on the headsets (only $10 each, no cash, only credit and debit cards accepted - honestly, cash is not welcome)...

All the while you are trying to read your book-club selection of the month by a 25 watt light-bulb six feet above your head but operated by a switch right next to the emergency call button you are not supposed to push until you are giving birth or experiencing heart attack symptom (and in both of those cases, they will calmly advise you to wait until the plane lands and taxis to the terminal before you call 911 on your cell phone).

This is all to keep you from focusing on the fact that you are flying over 2, 251 miles of very lonely, very open and very DEEP Pacific ocean with nothing for miles and miles and miles in any direction (a coincidence that they never show "Lost" episodes on planes? I think not).

But at least they don't feed you on airplanes anymore. Or at least don't feed you anything you could possible want to eat. You can enough caffeinated sodas to keep you awake and running to the broom closet-size toilet every hour on the hour, and I carry a carry-on bag large enough to sneak a small bakery or candy store on board.

But even chocolate will only do so much.

Today - yogurt, Subway sandwich, home-made cannoli (two, actually), popcorn.

And I rode a bicycle tonight - proving that it is true you don't forget things like that. Although I did forget to wear shoes - and the bottom of my feet are more than a little tender tonight.

Tomorrow - all diet bets are temporarily off. I will eat like a junk-food addict, I will drink more Diet Coke that the state of Louisiana produces in a month, and when I finally get into Phoenix right around midnight, I will go to the closest greasy-spoon truck stop and eat nothing but pie.

PUSHING THE EDGE

There are some things which actually are possible in life:

1. You can go without Diet Coke.

2. Life does not stop without chocolate.

3. And you can not be embarrassed by wearing outrageous red lipstick if you do not have any mirrors around and nobody tells you until you get home.

Yes, it is possible.

But I'd really rather not.

Yogurt + Fiber One

Spaghetti (which, eaten in the presence of missionaries, counts only as negative calories since you get a spiritual message at the end of it)

Salad (which counts as only a vegetable if you don't like the salad dressing on it very much)

TWO pieces of chocolate pie, but the second piece only because it was saved just for you

So that adds up to, what, 3 calories?

Now, this coming week - more exercise by more closely following my three year old granddaughter, who never seems to stop.