Oh what fun it is to waste time on the internet!!

At ElfYourself.com, use any old JPG image of someone to create a jolly old elf version of that person which will dance merrily around your screen. You can have up to four elves, but I’ll give you this warning: The first face you enter ends up on a female body. Boy, that was embarrassing!

Check out the Trint and Tammy Elves! (Notice the Trint elf has absolutely no rhythm. How’d they know?!)

You can also go ScroogeYourself! (Hey, it’s not dirty! Get your minds out of the gutter, people!) I used a picture of myself in “evil Pharisee” stage make-up. It’s scroogeriffic!

New York City now has a training academy for Jedi’s. No, seriously. (Pause it and let the video load before you watch it. It’s kind of slow.)

I love the quote near the end of the video. I love even more that it comes from a girl! A girl who is actually, somewhat attractive. It’s the geekness trifecta: Extreme geekness, estrogen, AND tolerable appearance. That just never happens.

It’s not about nerds trying to best each other. It’s about nerds trying to better each other and make their lives better through the dorkiness that makes them great.

Okay, so, like, you know all this talk about WeightWatchers lately? You know how I’ve said that I get 28 points a day and stuff? Well, I’ve been living for the last three weeks on that 28 points a day (more or less… okay, mostly more) and I’ve done pretty well. I’ve figured out at which places I just can’t afford to eat and what foods just won’t fit in the points budget. I think I’ve been a great student.

So why would I be upset? Well, you know me. I didn’t really read every word of instructions when I signed up. I’m a guy. Worse yet, I’m a geek – a web geek at that – and when I sign up for some web service, I pretty much feel comfortable figuring it out on my own.

But somehow, somewhere, I missed the part where you’re supposed to “click here” to take your “target point quiz”. See, even the name doesn’t really tell me what’s really going on there. The “target point quiz” is where you “confirm” your height, weight, age, and gender, and pick whether you want to maintain your weight or lose weight. I figured that since you asked me all those questions when I signed up that the 28 points that showed up on my profile was correct. But noooo.

See I stumbled across the “target point quiz” purely by accident late last week. I “confirmed” all that information and clicked “save” (Why it’s “save” and not “calculate” or something more descriptive, I don’t know.) and then noticed that my point total changed from 28 points a day to 37. 37?! Good grief! That’s HUGE compared to 28. I could eat like a relative pig and not use up 37 points a day (plus the 35 “extra points” I get per week).

I took the “quiz” several times and the result was always the same: 37. I crawled all over the web site trying to find out how to set it back to 28, how to fix my calculated result from the “quiz”. I even googled the points and found a chart that showed, for my weight, I should be at 28:

225 to 250 pounds = 28 Points

Finally, I relented, and sent an email to support. Two days later, I get this response:

Based on your information 37 POINTS® is your correct POINTS Target. It is possible that you were viewing your POINTS® Target before you took the POINTS quiz. After the sign-up process you would have been assigned a POINTS® Target value that is based solely on your current weight.

So what you’re telling me is that 28 points is correct for a person that weighs 250 pounds, but is… what? …a four-foot-tall, ten-year-old girl? How could they make such a retarded assumption. They already had all the information they needed, but somehow they assigned my points target based on only one criteria. I’vE BEEN EATING LIKE A BIRD FOR THREE WEEKS WHEN I DIDN’t HAVE TO??!!

Never mess with a large, hungry man. He may not have the energy to curtail his ham-sized fists of rage.

So anyway, that was last week. I’m pretty much over being mad. I know I should be happy that I’m allowed to eat more now. But somehow I feel cheated. I feel like three weeks of happy eating has been stolen from me. Granted I’ve lost almost ten pounds, but the victory is as hollow as my stomach has felt for the last three weeks.

I’m going to have some ice cream now. About a half gallon. With a bottle of Hershey’s on top.

An open letter to the guy in the dressing room at Kohl’s this Saturday:

I’m sorry. I guess I just assumed too much. You see, in my mind, it’s always been a simple fact: If the dressing room door is closed, it might be in use, so either knock or use the next dressing room (you know, the one on which the door was standing open at the time).

But, clearly, you did not accept that fact, or at least it had not occurred to you. So, yes, I’m sure it was my fault that you opened the door to my dressing room while I was using it. I should have hung a sock on the door knob, or maybe brought along a Sharpie and scrawled, “ES OCUPADO” on the door on my way in. How could I have been so thoughtless.

Then again, if you did it on purpose, because you’re some kind of freakish pervert, then I only hope it was good for you, cuz I didn’t particularly enjoy it.

You know what I like best about real mexican restaurants? I love those warm, fluffy, hand rolled, love soaked tortillas. Mmm. I could eat a whole batch with a little melted butter and honey.

But I have bad news for you. If you love those little white disks of happiness, stop reading right now. I’m serious. Look away. You have been warned.

Tortillas are made from two basic ingredients: Bleached white flour and lard. That’s right, those yummy little flat breads are 100% fat and carbs. As far as your digestive system is concerned, you might as well, eat a big spoon full of Crisco with sugar on top.

I *LUVS* me some taco bell. I could have a 7-layer burrito and a bean burrito for dinner every day for the rest of my life and I’d die happy. I’d die at 38 years old and 800 pounds, but happy.

Using my handy-dandy WW Points calculator, I discovered that the meal above weighs in at 17.5 points (out of my daily allowance of 37*). Here’s the total, using my previous nutritional notation.

27 grams of fat:

9 grams of sugar (But more importantly, 119 grams of carbohydrates. Remember, you body treats bleached white flour much the same way it treats sugar.):

2540 milligrams of sodium:

And my new measurement, 17.5 WW Points:

Taco Bell has an awesome nutritional calculator (as do all the Yum brand stores). On their calculator, you can add extra or completely remove any of the ingredients in an item. That means that, yes Virginia, you can have a burrito without the tortilla.

I had to give it a shot. Today at lunch I ordered a 7-layer and a bean burrito sans tortilla. The staff was confused, but the manager assured them it was possible. Visualize a short, hispanic woman looking at you with furrowed brow like your just asked her to make a taco with extra crazy on top. “¿Menos tortiyya? ¿¡Por que!?”

Here’s what I got.

And it was delicious!! Even better check out these numbers with the lard pie removed.

17 grams of fat:

4 grams of sugar (And only 49 grams of carbohydrates, down from 119.):

1410 milligrams of sodium:

And only 8 WW Points:

Every value virtually cut in half! That’s SO AWESOME! The tortilla doesn’t add anything to the flavor and really offers nothing more than a handy carrying case, but doubles the gut busting anti-nutrition. From now on I’m a burrito bowl boy, baby!

I’m sure you picked up on the hints last week. I’ve signed up for WeightWatchers.

I have a few friends who’ve had great success with WeightWatchers’ online point system. One young man in our youth group lost 70 pounds last year. It’s easy, inexpensive, and you don’t have to buy any special foods, just be more conscious of the things you already eat.

Ultimately it came down the the fact that most of my “XL” shirts have become uncomfortably snug and my clever tactic of doing nothing about it was not working out for me.

Today marks the first day of week two. I am allowed 37* points a day, with 35 points of overflow to use throughout the week. I did really well last week, averaging about 30 points a day, until the weekend. My in-laws were in town and we spent the whole weekend together shopping and eating and site seeing and eating and eating and eating. I honestly surprised myself when I tallied up the points for Saturday and topped 50 points. That’s much closer to what I was eating on a regular basis before I started. Not every day, but at least a couple of days a week.

I weighed in this morning at 1 pound less than last Monday. I could probably lose one pound by getting a hair cut, so I’m calling the first week a wash. But it was a learning experience and that’s better than nothing.

Seems like nutrition is going to be a common topic for the foreseeable future here at SYNS.

Why would someone order a double cheeseburgers, large fries, and a diet coke?

I wanted to check on the nutritional value of a salad I had for lunch the other day. So I logged on to Wendy’s web site. I always look for the PDF document version of the nutrition info, rather than try to use some fancy fangled web form to find what I’m looking for. Some places will trick you with those web forms and not tell you the whole story.
Once, I’ve found the PDF, my eyes scan down the page, looking for “Mandarin Chicken Salad”. Ah. Here it is.

170 calories and 2.5 grams of fat. Say, that seems healthy enough. It’s only 3 points on WeightWatchers*. Sweet!

But wait. Something is amiss. These numbers seem way too low. Could 170 calories include everything that was handed to me through the red head’s drive-thru window? NO! Strangely enough, they separate out the various other ingredients that will balloon your back side.

What?! But that’s … *seven… three… carry the two…* That’s 540 calories!! Wendy! You vixen! You lied to me. But why?! This salad is not 3 WeightWatcher points*. It’s 12!! Gah! Now I’m going to have to eat half a lettuce leaf for dinner! Curse your crimson braids, Wendy!

Okay, for the purpose of full disclosure, I’m being a little sensational here. I didn’t actually have the Mandarin Chicken Salad. I had the Chicken BLT Salad which is listed the same way, but the difference is not as dramatic. And if you do use Wendy’s fancy fangled web form, it does lump all the ingredients together and shows 520 calories (closer, I guess). But still it took me a bit to catch on and realize that that stupid Honey Mustard Dressing had almost as much calories and even more fat than the salad and it’s on-board chicken. So I’m still mad about it.

A big ol’ boy like me is allowed around 37* points a day to stay svelte and sexy. I’ll write soon about why WeightWatcher points matter to me.

Don’t ya just love HotPockets? Those tasty little pastries, hard as granite on the outside and hot enough to melt your teeth on the inside? MmMmm.

This story is not about that kind of HotPocket. It’s about an actual hot pocket. Flaming hot.

According to this story from an Atlanta TV station, Danny Williams’ two-year-old iPod Nano could easily have got him arrested under suspicion of terrorism. Danny works in an airport and while at work, the Nano in his pocket burst into flames. Thankfully, the TSA didn’t notice his smokin’ hot pants and he had a brochure in his pocket that protected him from the flames.

Apple has promised to replace Williams’ iPod if he sends it in, presumable so they can study it, but when the TV station tried to contact them, Apple wouldn’t talk.

(Warning: This post got way too long because it really encompasses two separate issues: Deceptive media practices and ignorant, psuedo-religious ideology. Please read this with that in mind.)

I got an email from the AFA today asking me to buy and wear a button in support of traditional Christmas. Reason for the season kind of stuff. Not unusual. But the headline was about a school near Chicago that had “banned Christmas”. That’s a pretty bold statement. I appreciate the AFA but I’m keenly aware that they can get a little carried away in sensationalism, so I always do some background checking on their stories.

Initially, I found a bunch of blogs decrying the Oak Lawn school board for attacking tradition in favor of political correctness. The usual rancor you would expect. But all the rants linked to the same story from Chicago’s CBS affiliate. I read the story and even watched the news video clip and it seemed to me that it was all being over-blown. (Also something I’ve come to expect.)

This story and video report on a school board meeting at which a bunch of white folks say a lot of pretty stupid stuff* and the Muslim mother at the center of the controversy comes off as the most logical and level headed person at the meeting. So I begin to think, “Well, nobody is ‘banning Christmas’ here. It’s just a little Muslim mom asking that her kids be allowed to fast according to their religion. That’s nothing to get all mad about.”

But then, I found an older video which made much more sense. The blog links I had followed were referring to this video of the previous story in which the school did explicitly ban the celebration of “Halloween”, “Christmas”, and any other seasonal religious holiday. It was a knee jerk reaction to the display (and subsequent removal) of some Ramadan decorations. Instead, the school opted for sterile, politically correct “Fall” and “Winter” celebrations.

Now, normally, I would be upset about the religious ban, but the school board made the right decision in the end (according to the later story, allowing Christians and Muslims to celebrate). What I find really disturbing is that the CBS web site clearly replaced the first story with the second, using the same URL to cover up the upsetting story with the soothing one, hiding the story about religion being banned from school with the story in which the school’s “tolerant” final decision is made and the “good, white, Christian folk” are displayed using very poor logic* to condemn the school’s earlier decision.

Is anyone else bothered by the link switching going on here? If I linked to a story about religious intolerance and that link was later changed to a story about religious tolerance, I’d look like an idiot. Perhaps that was the TV station’s intention. Either way, it stinks.

* Now, I want to expand on this “stupid stuff”:

I’m very conservative and very nationalistic. I’m also a very vocal Christan and I tend to stand on the side of keeping Christmas Christian and public. But I really get aggravated when people use poor logic and bigotry to support their point. It makes the rest of us look bad. Here are some quotes from the parents at the school board meeting:

“If Muslims want the school holidays, menus and school traditions to become tailored to their needs or beliefs, then they should go to private school next to their mosque.”

So, tell me, sir: Why aren’t your kids in a Christian school? If your kids are in a public school, you should expect them to be exposed to multiple cultures. If you expect your public school to celebrate Christmas, you should not be surprised when they also learn about Ramadan. Your double standard in unconstitutional.

“They’re trying to take away holidays and stuff for the kids,” said resident Gene Boerema, dressed in a Santa Claus costume.

Wow. You really came out to support your religious beliefs, huh? Cuz we all know that Santa delivered baby Jesus and put him in a brightly wrapped box under a decorated pine tree. A Santa costume at a school board meeting? I think someone just wanted to make the news. People who turn serious issues into a circus really irritate me.

“We’re letting you come here, were honoring you, don’t dishonor us.”

Seriously?! You “let” people of another religion “come here”? What “here” are you talking about? “Your” school? “Your” neighborhood? “Your” country? You may need to brush up on your American history a little bit. “Here” isn’t “ours”. “Here” actually belonged to “them derned Injuns” first and the multitude of people to came “here” from somewhere else, I assure you, were not all Christians. It is very ignorant of you to assume a religion that is foreign to you is foreign to America. Now, if you’re talking about illegal immigrants using tax-payer funded schools and health care, that’s one thing. If you’re talking about Islam as something inherently foreign, you’re only exposing your own bigotry and stupidity.

Ok. I’ve ranted far too long. I’m going to have to let this one be and go take some deep breaths.