Calories (eaten)

For the uninitiated, a single calorie is colorless, odorless, tasteless, without weight, without volume, without mass. It is without any definable proportion or characteristic commonly held in a three dimensional space. This has led to the belief amongst some of the population (but unlike Miley Cyrus, Christian Bale and AARP memberships, this is a belief adopted by all demographics, cutting through age, race and heritage lines faster Barack Obama) that the calorie “does not exist.”

Nothing could be further from the truth. The calorie, you see, exists in the same metaphysical plane of abstract cognition as Santa, Maha-pudma, Huckleberry Finn and Lincoln. These abstractions are real enough to those who believe enough in them and yet abstract enough for those who’d rather think about something else with their time (what, however, they are thinking, is a topic for another day.)

But the calorie is printed on the side of nearly every food item (though, thankfully, not the frosting-decorated sugar cookies… which I should probably stop buying) to give it some gravitas in the great debate.

Thus, we explore the calorie today, and more specifically, what 1000 calories might look like (if only you could see such beauty!) and what would happen if I ate 1000 calories a day instead of writing 1000 words a day.*

*It should be noted, as it has been in the past, that the information collected today was mostly from internet and what wasn’t immediately collected from web browsing was invented by myself.

We’ll start out with a 1000 calorie menu, which would include one (1) boiled egg, one (1) cup of skim milk, one (1) piece of whole wheat bread, one (1) cup of fresh fruit juice, two (2) servings steamed white rice (the ingredients for which, I am now informed, include “clean water” and “clean rice,” as if the trouble with the dirty alternatives are their high caloric content), one (1) cucumber salad and one (1) beef* stir fry w/celery.

*As the recipe only calls for 5g of beef, one assumes that it means beef sprinkles or beef farts and not actually meet product.

Another menu I found details similar instruction with very specific calorie counting required: ¾ serving cereal w/ skim milk (110 cal and 85 cal, respectively) for breakfast; a turkey sandwich for lunch, with two (2) slices of whole wheat bread (130 cal), two (2) slices lean turkey (80cal), one (1) slice mozzarella cheese* (80cal) and light ranch dressing (80cal); for a snack, some pretzels (but only 108cal, which is like 2 pretzels by my math); and a dinner with one (1) baked potato (85cal), yogurt (140cal) and margarine (90cal).

*The single slice of mozzarella actually has fewer calories than American cheddar, which is probably why it has such little flavor. Best we mask its lousiness with pizza sauce and pepperoni grease.

Are these numbers intimidating anyone else? I’m not talking about the food (yet), I am just referring to the numbers. The constantly added and subtracting and remembering required for such a practice. What further complicates the experiment is the fact most foods in their ready-to-eat formats don’t have the federally mandated nutritional information printed on the side. Especially fruits and vegetables. That means you just have to *know* that a potato only has 5 more calories than a single slice of mozzarella cheese. (The potato also goes on more first dates while the single slice of mozzarella cheese has more meaningful relationships.)

For some reason, I always imagine calorie counters as being hyper-aware of numerical values and hyper-bored by abstractions and emotions. This isn’t exactly post hoc ergo propter hoc, I’m not saying there’s a linear progression between counting calories and left brain dominance, but perhaps the other way around, that left brain dominance and allows for calorie counting. They work with spreadsheets and accounts, applying interest rates and calculating supposed loss. They balance their checkbook at the cashier lane and play sudoku “just as an exercise.” These aren’t the people we generally think of has living unhealthy lives though.

Speaking of unhealthy lives, there are apparently varying opinions on which diets are “healthy” and which are “not.” For as many menus, advisors and “nutrition” websites as I found, I found an equal number of website warning us of the dangers of the 1000 calorie diet. Here’s the other thing… I wasn’t looking for dieting advice or weight loss advice. I just wanted to know what 1000 calories looked like, and the internet made its own conjectures.

Here’s another daily menu that I’ve devised, factoring in at 1000 calories: for breakfast, a cheese Danish (106 cal) and a medium depth charge, taken black (12 cal): for lunch, one (1) burrito (with rice, steak, cheese, lettuce, tomato and green salsa) minus the tortilla shell (500 cal) and a blue Powerade (60 cal,) and then dinner, one cup of French onion soup (80 cal) with one piece of French baguette (150 cal).

This only adds up to 908 calories, which means if they released a 92 calorie beer to the market, I could drink that instead of half a Grain Belt.

Why does my menu look so much more appetizing than the dieting ones? Could it be I’m more focused on foods I like and less focused on the numbers I want to see? Which menu do you think would be easier to follow in proportion to the amount of weight you actually end up loosing/gaining?

Dieting is an industry, calories are not. Let’s dispense with the notion that low caloric intake is the same as a high energy work out. Let’s also stop treating calories as if they’re the devil without a master. Remember, the “calorie” is not a thing you can hold your hand. It’s merely a way of explaining the world we’re interacting with. And for that, the calorie is fairly accurate unit of measurement. It’s the fluctuation of an individual’s metabolism that’s inconsistent. One man’s feast is another’s paltry snack.

I should have a light snack now.