BOBOLOGUE REDUX OK, most of you weren't impressed with the January Bobologue. A couple of people thought it was the greatest ever but, as I've observed before, I have some weird-ass friends. To clear up confusion, I really did fall off my bike and break my arm in December. It was a relatively painless break (the pain was not comparable to the September fingers-smashed-in-window incident) and it was never in a cast; but it did prevent me typing for a few weeks -- and whatever time might otherwise have been spent on my thesis I instead spent getting the speech recognition software to work (or to not work, according to some of you). I try (I don't always succeed) to devote 100% of my attention when I'm on my bike to staying alive. The accident was discouraging because if you had asked me one second before if I had my safety ducks in a row, I would have said yes. I was on a good street, in a good lane, at a reasonable speed, and I was paying a lot of attention to the cars around me. What I had against me was that I was carrying some groceries in my right hand, so I only had one hand to operate a brake and I was sitting up a bit so my center of gravity was maybe 1 inch higher than usual. What that meant was that when a car started to make a move to cut me off and I slammed on the front brake, the D'Alembert force from my deceleration provided more forward torque than gravity provided backward torque, and my bike duly rotated around the now-stationary front wheel and deposited me ungraciously on the street, where my forearm cracked at the elbow. (Extra credit question: explain D'Alembert's Principle. Preference given to those of you who are *not* physics PhD's.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ NEW YEAR'S DISSOLUTION I did not eat well in 2000. Maybe a little better than most of you, but not well. So I decided to adopt the Mediterranean diet for 2001. Although I'm not sure I'm really doing it in a healthy way: to me, Mediterranean doesn't mean more fruits and vegetables, but just slathering olive oil and feta and nuts on whatever vegetables I do eat. In practice, I've mostly eaten the same junk as last year, and then chased it down with an oil-feta-nut salad at bedtime. But I am trying -- I got through a month with no McD's or In-N-Out; and visited the office candy machine no more than necessary to accumulate laundry quarters. There is a theory among the health food community -- I don't know if it has any validity -- that if you fast for a few days, all the toxics that have been quietly accumulating in your fat for the past year get squeezed out and make you feel terrible. I decided that that would be a fine pain with which to start the new year, which I hoped to keep toxic-free after the initial purge. I had my last Keebler cookie before midnight on New Year's Eve, and fasted all day on January 1st. My plan was to fast until (a) I got a headache, and (b) it went away (2 or 3 days perhaps, with a little fruit juice and bread to keep my intestines alive). (NOTE: Jesus said when you fast you shouldn't tell anyone, as that is bragging. But he was probably talking about fasts for spiritual reasons, not for health reasons, so I think I'm off the hook here.) I spent the day in Santa Barbara at my movie partner's house, and when I started driving home the night of the 1st I was *really* sleepy. I despise caffeine (and all drugs), so I usually regulate my sleepiness on long drives with food and sugar. By the time I wearily reached the Valley, I reluctantly concluded I would just have to give up the fast a little earlier than planned. So I exited on Ventura Boulevard and found the inevitable Denny's. In my younger, more spiritual days I had read _Celebration of Discipline_ which contained practical tips on fasting. I was vaguely recalling some advice about how to break a fast gently, though I couldn't remember exactly how or why. I decided that Chicken Fajitas would probably be gentle enough. Apparently not, as I woke up four hours later with an enormous, painful turd slowly wending its way down the left side of my large intestine. So the first night of my year of healthy eating included about 40 minutes sitting on the toilet hoping the pain would stop. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ LOGICAL VS. PSYCHOLOGICAL Never think you have no influence -- on the advice of Bobologue readers I fired my therapist in January. (I know some of you voted to keep my therapist; but this is a democracy, as recently demonstrated in Florida, and I went with the majority opinion.) Our last session was mostly nice; I asked him to summarize what he had learned about me and he made several points -- I'm not sure any of them are true but they could be and I want to take them seriously. * At my core, I doubt if I'm really lovable * I manage my relationships to avoid attachment * When I became angry at him, the relationship dissolved in a few weeks * If I doubt something he says, I am unable to work with it * I rejected some of his judgments out of a sense of superiority [I feel very defensive laying those out there -- I want to cite the evidence I have that they are not true -- but I will let them speak for themselves.] He couldn't resist one snide remark at the end though -- I had come in with a bit of a runny nose and looking for Kleenex, but he thought I had wanted it because I was expecting to cry. When I clarified my motivation at the end of the session, he retorted, "Oh -- I thought you were going to show some emotion -- I guess that's asking too much." I can't blame the guy for being frustrated -- being Bob Nolty's therapist is not a rewarding occupation. Even as I was getting rid of my psychologist, I got myself a new psychiatrist and got a prescription for anti-depressants. When I quit anti-depressants six months ago I had thought they were probably ineffective -- in the ten months I had been on they had perhaps lifted my mood a little but my life still looked like the life of a severely depressed person, especially my inability to get work done. But at the end of the ten months I was feeling good and thought I could live fine without the drugs. Four months after depression returned it suddenly occurred to me (duh) that maybe my feeling good after ten months of drugs was because of the drugs. So I decided to give them another shot. On the plus side, my mood noticeably lifted right away and has remained OK. On the minus side, I immediately started sleeping 11-13 hours per night. So now, instead of not getting work done because I feel bad, I'm not getting work done because I don't have any time. I also fear that while medicated I'll never have the passion necessary to finish a thesis. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ OTHER STUFF THAT HAPPENED I almost foiled a robbery, by interposing my truck (and my passenger) between the getaway car and the getaway. Although I didn't know he was a robber; I thought he was just a bad driver. What really happened is I slammed on my brakes just before he would have crashed into me, and he got away. I squandered a flirtatious moment. I walked into church and one of the she-Mennonites there felt the texture of my outer shirt and made this growling, "Sexy shirt!" kind of noise. And I said, "Thanks, Beth gave it to me." The moment audibly wilted. Another woman I've been seeing a bit was extolling the cost-saving virtues of a diet of burritos, concluding "and there's no need to buy salsa because you can get that free at Taco Bell". Obviously, to a guy like me a woman like that comes along once in a lifetime. When I recounted this tale to Chris Walter, he hit upon a brilliant idea: cheapdate.com. OK, Chris was joking but I think it's brilliant. Where you go to meet women who will appreciate that the food at Koo Koo Roo is as good as Chez Poullon, and even better if you have a coupon. So you guys are my market research -- how many of you would use it? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ QUOTE OF THE MONTH: "Actually, I understand that a new millenium started just today. In fact, another one is starting now -- and now!" -- *not* said on January 1 CURRENT READING: The Journey Inward, The Journey Outward by Elizabeth O'Conner -- the most compelling case I've seen so far linking Christ's ethics to all this twentieth century psychological mumbo jumbo.