You Can't Make It Up: Earning My Badge in Bulemia

I found this hilarious dramatization of "binge eating" on a Hungarian website. Appropriate, as Hungary is chock full of bony, brown-toothed ladies. My mother used to say that Hungarian girls have long faces, since their mothers had to squeeze them out of their skinny little bodies. Don't be fooled... my mother's a class act all the way. On to the topic of today's convo...

A funny thing happens in the winter. There you are, circa September, lookin good and feelin good (Louis), svelte as you're gonna be. You spot fat people on the streets and think "How can they let themselves get that way?" and shudder, not so much in disgust, moreso in that you superimpose your face over theirs as they stuff their pie holes with fatty foods and the fact that you secretly envy them doesn't sit well with you. You're happy! It's a beautiful day out. You take a long walk and forget for a second that you're single and in a dead end job.

Next thing you know, November rolls in. The dreaded "holiday season". No matter -- you know the 5 pounds you put on is probably somehow related to hormones and Christmas music. So your jeans are a little tighter -- you look good girl! Show off that big womanly ass of yours, Miss Thang! Let those jeans be tight. You can offset it with an off the shoulder shirt that will take some of that midsection attention away until January.

But the holidays alone aren't your downfall. You look at gotham outside the frost-bitten windows and it's exactly as Tim Burton imagined: bleak, dreary, damp. The type of weather that encourages endless hours of reality tv show marathons. The type of weather that says "Hey Ladyfriend! Everybody Loves Raymond is on -- and it's the episode where his parents come over! Come on, I got all the Snackwells cookies you need. Come home already." And you listen, because it's been so long since anyone's spoken to you.

Christmas feasts. New Year's drinking binge. Martin Luther King Day buffet. Then the groundhog comes up and says "Hey Michelle! Fuck you! Rot in your uptown apartment for 6 more weeks, cunt!" And again, you listen, because you're scared of groundhogs ever since you saw The Shining.

And now, cut to today. March 17. St. Patrick's Day. 10 pounds heavier. An expert in Real World/Road Rules Inferno. I'm disgusted with myself. Sometimes I wonder if maternity pants are onto something with their elastic bellies. For, in a way, I'm pregnant too, only my fetus is decomposed of Greek yogurt, roast beef, broccoli pancakes, Smart Start cereal and Cherry Garcia fro-yo and the babydaddy is the Pillsbury Doughboy (9 inches!). In other words, when Kirstie Alley starts becoming an inspiration and spiritual guide, you know you've got to take action, either in the form of a serious diet or contracting "dropsy of the brain", and putting the world and myself out of our mutual misery.

Last night, a breaking point, when, slightly buzzed and exhausted, I polished off a plate of deep-fried plaintains that weren't even that good because they were there. It's amazing what 32 oz. of vodka can convince someone to do.

Clearly, enough is enough is enough. Not to get all terrible-female-comedienne-joy-behar-cathy-comic-strip on your ass, but today was to be the day that the exercise goes up and the food consumption goes down. After all, it's getting a touch warmer (38 degrees today, yes?), and I miss my long sidewalk strolls. I can feel it.

Imagine my dismay, then, when I show up at work this morning to find a box of Samoas on my desk. About 4 months ago, right in the thick of my gorging, I had ordered a single box from a pushy co-worker of mine. Little did I know that these cookies would be delivered to me a third of a year later on the very day I decide to quit food. Worse yet, there's a picture of a small, sparkly-eyed 7 year old on the back of the box, smiling with only her mouth the way that baby pageant queens do, in a fireman's hat:

Look at her. I can hear her saying to me "Thanks for buying my cookies, Michelle! Aww c'mon. Treat yourself to one. Please? My grammas in the hospital and can't eat cookies no more. She would want you to have one." AND my boss, the very same boss who repeated the same funny story to me three times today, causing me to have to fake laugh all three times, something I hate doing, buys TEN boxes and leaves them in the kitchen. Hmm... maybe I could trick my metabotchilism with a coupla thin mints... Even the name is better than Samoas. When I think of Samoans, the first thing I think of are fat Samoans, and then mu-mus.

Sigh. Thanks for listening.

In other semi-food related news, last night I was introduced to Rachel Kramer Bussel, a feisty, quick-witted lass who you may also know as Lusty Lady. Perhaps this isn't the proper post to bring this up, but Rachel also runs a cupcake blog, Cupcakes Take the Cake, and judging by her enthusiasm for these tiny frosted treats, I'm guessing she can make a kick-ass cupcake.

Where I'm headed if this behavior continues. Special thanks to Morgan Spurlock for "educating me" about "delicious things."

pee-ass. Samoas aren't even that good.

pss-ass-ass. Happy St. Patty's Day.