pickles are vegetables, right?

well despite possibly incurring bill maher's wrath, here is my first official blog.

oprah's favorite poop doctor, dr. oz, has a new diet book out. while i am forbidden to buy it (or any other book for that matter), he's done a tv special and enough appearances for me to get the gist of it. it's all about waist management. weight doesn't matter, it's your waist size that's important. for women, it should be under 32". to that end, a few simple things can be done. no processed foods, no partially hydrogenated anything, no high fructose corn syrup. walk 30 minutes a day, do weight training 2 or 3 times a week. totally simple.

not so simple. not when hershey's limited edition cherry cordial kisses are in stores now.

but it turns out, eliminating the partially hydrogenated things is easy for me. i already use only whole wheat pasta and breads, cereals and oatmeal. but those high fructose items, they're much trickier. canada dry ginger ale, i'm talking to you. and actually eating a colorful palette of vegetables? sheeesh. anything that can be cooked with a liberal amount of garlic is good, plus it keeps vampires away (unless those vampires are in a better-cast version of "interview with a vampire"). pickles seem to be the wonder vegetable - no cooking required, lots of garlic, and it started out as a cucumber so it's got to be healthy, right?