Health Food

Delivered as a Toastmasters speech

Why did the asparagus cross the road? To get to the other side. That's not funny.

And why did the bull cross the road? To prove he wasn't chicken. Now that's funny, right? We enjoy certain foods so much, that they're funny.

Do you see the difference? Health food is boring. I could have said brussel sprouts, or egg plant, or squash, and it wouldn't have been funny, either. You can't really have fun with health foods, except maybe broccoli and carrots, because their names have the hard K sound. Words with K sounds are always funny. You say Alka Seltzer, you get a laugh. Cucumber is funny, but tomatoes are not, unless someone smashes you in the face with the tomato; that's funny. Cupcake is funny. Marketing is funny. Finance is not.

Did you ever wonder why "Kookamonga, California" is funny? It's the hard K sound. Brussel sprouts and asparagus are not funny.

In general, health foods are no fun. Here in America — K sound, go ahead and laugh if you feel the urge — here in America, we are raised on foods that are over processed, over cooked, and over marketed. And if you're not careful, eating the wrong food can cause you to gain weight.

You know how I knew it was time to eat healthier foods? I visited the zoo and the elephants threw peanuts at me.

When I walked past the chimpanzee cage, one of them threw his poop at me, and I suddenly had a taste for chocolate. That's when I knew I should be eating healthier foods.

Fun fact: if you eat a pound of chocolate, you'll gain five pounds. But you should never eat chimpanzee poop.

It behooves us to eat bland food. Rice cakes, steamed vegetables, and simples fruits and nuts. It's because the tasty things, the sweet caramel flavor, the chocolate syrup, and the sugary residues, drive a part of our brain nuts so that we crave more and more of them.

Speaking of nuts, it's much better to eat them plain and without salt. Did you know that?

I used to work with a guy, Al, a really skinny guy, who always kept a bowl of peanuts on this desk. But he never, ever offered me any. Well one day, he was gone from the office, and I decided to try them. And I swear, they had very little flavor — no salt, no sugar coating, nothing. I thought, these must be very healthy for me because these are the worst peanuts I've had in my life. You see, I am much more a fan of honey roasted peanuts, and salted peanuts — that's what I grew up eating. These were plain, and I thought maybe they'd just been boiled instead of roasted. And because they seemed to be healthier, I kept sneaking them all day long, and I ate the whole bowl.

The next day, Al comes back to work, and so I confess to him, "Al, I ate all those boiled peanuts you kept in that bowl." He said, "Oh, you mean my Goobers."

I said, "No, Goobers are coated in chocolate, these were plain and kind of bland."

He said, "Them was Goobers. I just like the chocolate, so I suck 'em clean and then spit the peanuts in that bowl."

But not all healthy food is good for you. My friend once went to the doctor because he, my friend, had baby carrots stuck in his nose, peas in his ears, and alfalfa sprouts in his hair. My friend says to the doctor, "What's wrong with me?"

The doctor looked him over and said, "I don't think you're eating properly."

The point is that you can choke on celery just as easily as you choke on steak, and the salmonella in natural peanut butter is just as dangerous as the salmonella in Jiff.

But the real difference between healthy food and unhealthy food is that eating unhealthy food will make you crave more of the same. Lays potato chips used to advertise that very fact — nobody can eat just one — and it was true. If you're like me, then you have opened a package of Chips A'Hoy cookies and a quart of milk, and devoured it all. Or started separating Oreos to lick the cream filling until you have a stack of cookie wafers like a Vegas casino. Have you ever finished a bowl of ice cream and then looked around to see if the carton was still out, and maybe if you were alone in the house you'd have filled your bowl again? I doubt you can say the same with brussel sprouts and acorn squash.

But it is vitally important that we do exactly that. Our bodies crave the nutrients in the natural foods, the foods that emerge from the earth and are offered to us whole, but we ruin them with salt, gravy, and a sugar. Think about chinese food: you start with an amazing list of healthy ingredients, but serve them dripping with cooking oil and sweet and sour sauce. The reason you are hungry an hour later is because your body is demaning more sugar and salt.

In closing, I'd just like to suggest that the next time you crave sweets, eat carrots, celery, and an apple first. Just force yourself to do this, as an experiment, to see how it affects your urge.

But I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, Mickey, if I give up my unhealthy living, the smoking, the binge drinking, and the excessive eating of sweets, can you guarantee that I will live longer? No, I can not guarantee that you will live longer.

I will, however, guarantee that if you give up all of your bad habits, the smoking, drinking, and overeating, it will seem like you're living longer, because life won't be any fun any more.

Mickey Hadick

February 2009