SKIES OPEN, PUD RANTS

I have a new tennis partner, and, after weeks of practicing, today was to be our first official tournament. Marty is a nice guy and a better player than I. I was curious to see how we'd interact in the crucible of competition.

But the downpour roaring on the roof, combined with satellite imagery, tells me it ain’t gonna happen. So I’m stuck indoors with Pud again.

Yesterday he was too much. He was so pissed off about this restaurant calorie law he was saying things, like a drunk Mel Gibson, that he would later regret. Pud actually said it’s a lesbian plot.

“Look at her,” Pud said, turning his laptop so I could see it, “this gal obviously doesn’t care about her appearance. Or if she does, she’s been getting some very bad advice.

“She’s skinny, but it’s totally ok to be fat if you’re a lesbian. Lesbians laugh at straight women and gay men who try to be thin.

“So why is Carole Migden, of all people, hassling the restaurant industry about calorie disclosure?

“She claims it’s a public health issue. But you know that’s bullshit. The diet industry itself is a serious public health menace.

“Weight loss is an eating versus not eating issue. To lose weight, one must give up the pleasure of a full stomach.

“If you want to lose weight, while at the same time enjoying the pleasure of a full stomach, which is what the diet industry promises, you are doomed to failure.

“Successful weight-losers come to associate the dull gnawing in their gut (hunger) with the pleasure they derive from being slimmer—visually in the mirror, tactilly inside one’s clothes, even aerodynamically. So the feeling of hunger turns into a good thing, but it takes a while.

“Is it better for dieters to go to restaurants that disclose the calorie content of their menu items? No. It’s better for dieters simply not to eat. The daily amountof food that a dieter needs to maintain basic health can be consumed in about ninety seconds. There’s no good reason for a dieter to voluntarily hang out in a food milieu.

“And when you have to go to a restaurant, you don’t need a fucking calculator to stay on your diet, green salad with no dressing and a diet coke will always do the trick.

“It’s like alcohol. How about bars being required to disclose the amount of alcohol in each of their drinks. This would help problem drinkers stay within ‘their limit,’ right?”

“But, Pud,” I said, “you can’t go around dissing all lesbians. It’s not fair, plus you’ll get your ass kicked.”

“Ok,” he said, “there are good lesbians and bad lesbians, and Carole Migden is a bad lesbian. Better?

“It’s the kind of do-gooder meddling that gives liberals a bad name. It’s easier to pretend to attack the big bad chain restaurant industry than to address real problems, like what is it about our society that makes Americans want to eat themselves into oblivion.

“Or turning around the thuggish SFPD.

“Or getting rampaging white youth off our streets.

“Or finding out who killed Lester Garnier.”

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