The night before I completely neglected my god-given gifts of taste and smell, my boyfriend made bear loin and feral boar bacon from Savenor’s. The meal was unbelievable ‘-‘- crispy smoked strips of pork paired with the gamey, complex flavors of bear in a pinot noir and rosemary braise. Although it was definitely what I would demand from the state before a lethal injection, the meal was not a smart choice in hindsight. The next’ day, Sunday February 22, 2009, I would be embarking on a colon-clearing cleanse diet akin to a gerbil’s.
It was my roommate Joe’s idea ‘-‘- a three-way cleanse-off. Fellow MUSE columnist Charlie and I would detox using conventional ways for, well, as long as we could, while Joe chose a liquid juice diet. Charlie sort of improvised and I decided to follow in the footsteps of Morgan Spurlock (‘Supersize Me’). After polluting his body with saturated fats and complex carbohydrates during a month-long binge at McDonald’s, his vegan wife planned a diet prohibiting animal products, white bread and rice, sugar, caffeine and alcohol. I knew it was going to be an uncomfortable transition, but how hard could it be?
Day One: 2:05 p.m. ‘-‘- I sluggishly order a Venti green tea at Starbucks, secretly hoping the stash was surreptitiously caffeinated by someone at the tea-bag company. As I sit at the Udon bar at the GSU, trying not to imagine the cheesey foccacias and savory ryes smirking at me through the glass window at Charles River Bread Co., I peer over and spy Charlie the Cheat at Loose Leafs. I immediately call him over and he justifies his behavior by explaining that it’s ‘still raw’ and ‘only oil’ is to be his dressing. I wag my finger at him, then walk over to Jamba Juice for a slimy shot of wheatgrass juice, necessary to wash down the Natural Cleanse Complex dietary supplements that are part of my regimen. Every day I must down eight of the massive horse tranq-sized pills, which use marshmallow root, slippery elm bark and other natural ingredients to function as a natural laxative ($15.99). I also take a milk thistle supplement to metabolize my liver, which is clouded with delicious toxins from my destructive addiction to red meat and wine.
Day Two: 4:30 p.m. For ‘breakfast’ I had POM juice and a banana with some decaf green tea. I was starving but felt bloated as my stomach gurgled with acid reflux. I began to feel guilty for my incisors ‘-‘- that I wasn’t using my teeth to their full potential. I would daydream about the pleasurable feeling of tearing through a ribeye with my bicuspids and molars. I justified my new diet by telling myself my skin looked better, but it was meaningless because of how jaundiced I felt inside.
About an hour later, I found myself cross-legged on my living room floor, watching a Karl Lagerfeld documentary, shoveling Upper Crust’s veal parmesan pizza into my mouth. A complete and pathetic relapse; I simply wasn’t thinspired enough. Supposedly Joe was successful in completing his cleanse and Charlie suffered the same fate as I. The moral of the story is: don’t cleanse, eat cheeseburgers.
