Hangover

About a month ago, I was eating really well, and hardly including any sugar in my diet.  I felt good, as I recall.  Then, something happened, and I started to load up on sweets.  I was buying stuff I never usually touch: Coke, chips, cookies...  Like an addict, I was even sneaking things like Snickers bars, secretly, guiltily, when no one else was around... clinging closely to the wall as I surreptitiously scarfed some salty cheese crackers.

This turned into a month-long binge, culminating in my purchase of cupcake pans, and my second large batch of cupcakes last night.  Chocolate cupcakes.  I felt really icky this morning.  Like when I said or did something drunk the night before only to wake up wallowing in regret.  Yuck.  It's not that I ate them all by myself.  No.  I passed them out like a drug dealer to create more cupcake casualties.  Misery loves company.

According to an article I found in Psychology Today, "Laboratory experiments with rats showed that signs of sugar dependence developed over the course of 10 days. This suggests that it does not take long before the starve-binge behavior catches up with animals, making them dependent."  That helps to explain my rapid descent, but only in part.

I'd like to say that what I've been doing for the past month is in the name of science, that -- like the guy in The Fly -- I put myself into the experiment for the greater good.  Sounds noble, if misguided, no?  No.  I didn't even do that.  I slipped, I stumbled and now I feel like, well, like doo-doo.

I lucked on this video on the addictive properties of sugar.  It's really interesting and surprisingly entertaining.  The beginning -- how to magnetize a baby -- hooked me in from the start.  (I always wondered!)  The talk is given by Dr. Neal Barnard, founder and president of Physicians Commitee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM).  He's also the author of several books related to nutrition and diet.

Here's a short list of more videos for people who can't get enough of this sweet stuff:

• Sugar: the bitter truth (like going to a college lecture; long, but educational)
• Sugar -- how it's made (like going on a field trip!)
• High fructose corn syrup (CBS News interview with David Kessler and Eric Schlosser)
• Obesity epidemic due to fructose (ABC News/Nightline story)

Blasts from the past:  When I was searching for the popular 1975 book called Sugar Blues, I found the 1931 song by the same name.   I immediately recognized it as the song my brother and I used in a little super-8 movie we made, way back when...

That's all I got for you, Sugar.