Archives for August 2012

Prepare for outrage, because that’s the unabashed reason behind this “guest post.” Actually, it’s a hybrid, because I’ll be adding plenty of follow up after her part of it. Sadie sue Saunders is a longtime reader, longtime supporter, and was actually the subject of a couple of other blog posts—one of which was included in version 2.0 of my book. See here, and here.

Sadie sue emailed me with some info the other day and I immediately replied: “Make it a guest post and I’ll toss it up.” She polished it, but kept it in the form of a letter to me. Then she emailed me some other stuff you are not going to believe (wait until the end of the post). …I’m also going to tell you single guys that Sadie sue is a single mom of three beautiful girls in the midwest and is looking for a suitable “caveman.” If I were single and 30s-40s-ish, I’d figure out how to get an email out to her and strike up a friendly conversation leading to friendship. Just sayin’. She told me it was OK to mention that when I asked if I could.

Thanks for allowing me to rant about the new, despicable Michelle-Obama-inspired crime against our children. It is called the “improved” school lunch program. You can see the guidelines recipe for starving our children here. I am not nearly as articulate as the former teacher who wrote this very well-researched article, but I am going to give it a shot anyway and here is a quote from the other post so you know it’s worth looking at:

As a biologist and someone who taught anatomy and physiology as a part time job, I’m appalled. Apparently dietitians no longer take anatomy courses because the first thing you would learn about the nervous system and the brain in MY three credit college class is that the brain is fueled by protein and fat. And the USDA has all but eliminated protein and fat from the school lunch menu.

We cave people know a bit about portion sizes, but to illustrate the utter stupidity of the school lunch snack program, I would like to point out that for my daughters, the meat portion sizes equate to 1/4 of a hot dog, 3/4 cup of lettuce, and 1/2 cup of some canned HFCS drenched fruit and a carton of skim milk. That’s it. Nothing else… W.T.F.??? Oh, and breakfast may not have any protein at all. None; as in nada, zero, zip zilch…Elvis has left the building and he took Common Sense and all the bacon and eggs with him. This isn’t about my kids; it’s about everyone’s kids. This so diabolical that it seems like the goal is to stunt people’s growth and add to keeping them dumbed down. Like a bunch of evil geniuses sat around asking themselves, “How can we keep everyone weak and stupid?” None of us can really concentrate and learn while we are starving, not that it’s a scientific opinion, but that’s how it works with the little humans at my house and I am far too lazy and pissed off to find any of the gazillion scientific studies that prove I’m right.

I used to pack the girls lunches about half the time, but now it will have to be every single day, and no, I don’t have a money tree in the back yard. Oh yes, I will bitch about the extra cost and the pain in the ass of getting up extra early to make breakfast and pack lunches and I will need to clock a little OT here and there to cover the expense, but ultimately, I can afford this. Sadly, many families count on their kids getting that free meal, so what the hell are they supposed to do? I’m all for thinning the herd, but the slow, weak and stupid generally do a great job of taking themselves out of the equation and I don’t think that it’s necessary to intentionally starve innocent children.

I have talked to several parents about the new “higher” supposedly “healthier” standards and, needless to say, even the non-paleo folks (if they are able to afford it) are packing their kids’ lunches from now on—including the head chef for our district—who is also fully prepared to resign over this outrage. On top of the portion sizes the schools are now forbidden from making anything from scratch. Nevermind that the school was never going to serve up meatza—but now they have to use highly processed nutrient-free frozen crap instead of allowing our talented food service folks to make the pizza dough and sauce themselves. (Seriously, I refer to the head lunch dude as “chef” because he and Mrs. Chef own the local bakery and they cater big events. It’s not paleo, but it is delicious!)

Imagine how it would feel to be a growing child being given 1/2 of a hotdog as your “main” entree. Oh, wait, did I mention that meat is no longer the main dish? The school must now serve the veggie on the big part of the lunch tray. Meat, if you can even call a hotdog or canned ham-like-meat-flavored-product “meat,” is now a side dish and there is no requirement that meat be served at each meal. In contrast to the government dietician approved wisdom, this morning, the girls ate a big pile of bacon and each one had 2-3 eggs plus a couple handfuls of cherry tomatoes. That was at 6:30 this morning. At 7:05, they walked 1.2 miles to the school/bus stop. Zoe’s lunch was at 11:00 and then—sorry, no afternoon snacks allowed—at 3:55, when the bus dropped her off she and Mattie walked the 1.2 miles home. Zoe is having a growth spurt, so after that, I wouldn’t at all be surprised if she used her cavegirl stick to actually kill something and eat it on the way home. Even worse for Skyler, she is at the Jr. High now and she has volleyball until 6:30pm. Skyler went to volleyball practice for two and a half hours after having a “lunch” that consisted of two chicken nuggets, ½ cup of canned peaches and some mushy, disgusting green beans that she wouldn’t even eat. Yeah, that will freaking fuel an athlete and girl about to hit puberty…arrgh.

This concludes my bitch session. Richard, thank you so much for allowing me to vent my frustration on this topic. If your readers have any suggestions for lunches or tips for keeping things hot/cold, I would really appreciate it!

Think she’s alone? Here, see these comments on the USDA’s own blog (courtesy David Brown)

…I know that most, especially long timers, will always understand how my rage works. For others, it’s always and will always be about them—even as they waste their hours trying to convince all y’all that I’m a detriment to the community at large. But, unfortunately, sane and essentially caring heads like Sadie sue’s will always, always prevail (the ones I really care about)—and I have zero fear and much amusement over what an evil celebrity I’ve become. Let it roll, grils. And, kisses. You give me good laughs almost everyday…to the point I’m sorely disappointed and my morning coffee tastes bad if I don’t have something new and salacious about myself to read. Consider my ego, please!

…I exchanged a few emails with Sadie sue in the runnup to all of this. Like this.

Glad you liked the letter format that I sent you.  I tried to be brief and keep the language accessible, as I am obviously not qualified to have any sort of expert opinion other than having little kids.  We cooked all day yesterday trying to get some of the lunches made that the girls will take this week.  They “sampled” everything we decided on and I am pretty sure that they ate an entire week’s worth of Ms.-Obama-approved calories yesterday afternoon alone. (Take that, government control-freaks!)

BTW, pork chops marinated in raspberry vinaigrette and stuffed with cornbread and dried cherry stuffing are delicious!

I’ve always loathed the idea that a “First Lady” has any more than fuck all to say about your life—like, by virtue of a bigger mob of social masturbators (voters), they are somehow anointed in ways that diminish your on-the-ground efforts and reality in lieu of their political reality and promotion for the sake of adulation and power over you. For those who have the stomach for it, here, from 2007: Fuck Obama and His Stupid Bitch. Call me a misogynist if you like for the 100th time, but what do you wanna bet that Michelle’s innocent kids aren’t living the life of luxury and opulence at your expense (…just so you know: Fuck GWB and his stupid bitch, too; she ought to have stuck to honest work, like teaching kids). This ought not be taken as political in any sense. I don’t vote. Fuck ’em all.

Last. If you’re outraged about my characterization of “our leaders” (who the fuck needs one?) that was my intention because if you don’t find this even more outrageous, then I have nothing for you. From Sadie sue, yesterday afternoon. If you paid attention, she wrote how now she has to pack a lunch every day. Well….

Update on the lunch outrage: Salad chock full of homegrown veggies (beets, green beans, kohlrabi, carrots and broccoli on some store bought lettuce) topped with the meat from two  grilled chicken drumsticks. Lunch monitor (scratch that) Overbearing, Control Freak, Lunch Nazi told the middle child she had too much meat and that isn’t allowed.  Stay tuned.  This could get ugly. [emphasis added]

Now it’s your turn. Just go ahead and complain that I called dear dear Michelle a Stupid Bitch. Go right ahead, because I can’t wait for it.

Today’s post is a guest post about men, women, sex, even more sex, and orgasms. Greg Swann has been around here a few times and most recently, featured weekly, chapter-by-chapter for his book Man Alive! Last week, Greg and I presented back-to-back at The 21 Convention. Given what so many presume and assume that convention to be about (some is, much isn’t) you should find this an interesting read. I’ll have more to say personally about T21C and PUA in general in my own future post. As always with guests posts, views expressed are the views of the guest author and not necessarily my views.

[For an update, please see: Lemons to Lemonade Documentary – Ed]

Fifty shades of bleak: Looking for love everywhere it isn’t.

by Greg Swann

Another Ineradicable Regret

Here are two complementary facts about the ontology of adult genetic Homo sapiens:

Men are seed-sprayers.

Women are egg-layers.

Men and women are functionally equivalent, in the sense that, away from our sex differences, we can all do pretty much the same stuff. We are intellectually equivalent, even if the vestigial effects of poverty, religion and tradition have cost humanity the full benefits of female mental prowess over the centuries. We are politically equivalent, obviously. There are biological differences that result from our sex differences — men tend to have better upper-body strength, women have better blood circulation at the core but poorer circulation in the extremities — but apart from those sex differences, we are an awful lot alike.

That much is not surprising. We are the same species after all, and the XY model is just the one-off variation on the XX prototype. Even men’s sex hardware, of which they can be very proud, is just women’s junk turned inside out. This is true of male mammals in general — except for the pride part.

But because males — male mammals, not just male Homo sapiens — are seed-sprayers, their reproduction strategy will be different from that of the egg-laying females.

Human beings are thoughtful creatures. We have had the gift of mind cultivated within us, the graduation from an animal’s style of cognition and communication to the fully-human state, thinking and communicating in notation systems — in Fathertongue. For now I am am talking about thoughtless biological reproduction strategies, but in no way am I excusing human beings for behaving like thoughtless animals. Too much the contrary!

But the thoughtless reproductive objective of a seed-sprayer is to spray those seeds everywhere. This is what a Maple tree is doing with those cascades of whirling “helicopters,” and it it what an Agave plant is doing with its seed pod, one of the most inspiring phallic symbols to be found in nature. For seed-sprayers, reproduction is a numbers game. His supply of seeds is effectively infinite, and, plausibly, his best chance of reproducing himself is to spray seeds everywhere.

Egg-layers have the opposite problem. Eggs — and the conditions necessary for their proper gestation — are extremely scarce. Female sea turtles can lay their eggs and swim away, but female mammals have to stick around to nurse their young. That’s what those mammary glands that give our class of organisms its name are for, after all, their ornamental beauty in human females notwithstanding. Egg-layers nest, and, practically speaking, the most important manifestation of her reproductive strategy will be not reproducing — except with the right male.

Every species of mammal is different, but the only species of organisms that matters to us is us, Homo sapiens. Even then, we’re only really interested in human beings, genetic Homo sapiens who are fluent in Fathertongue. It is possible to argue that male human beings should pursue every possible mating opportunity, much as a male lizard should spray every egg it comes across. It is possible to argue that female human beings should deflect every male suitor who presents himself, since it’s unlikely that any of those slobbering jackasses is going to live up to the arduous role that is fatherhood for human beings. But I can think of at least two insuperable objections to those propositions:

First, both infinite-impregnation and zero-impregnation are very poor strategies for successfully reproducing human beings.

And second, for the most part human beings pursue sexual contact for reasons other than reproduction.

What do male human beings want from sex? Romantic intimacy leading to orgasm.

What do female human beings want? Orgasm — both of theirs or just his — leading to romantic intimacy.

That’s a currency-exchange issue, and I’ve talked about currency-exchange in the larger context of marriage: He promises her loving devotion in exchange for a lifetime of hot sex while she promises him hot sex in exchange for a lifetime of loving devotion. If they talk through this currency-exchange in open, explicit Fathertongue, they will have a great marriage — lots of love, lots of great sex, boundless devotion to each other and to the family they make together. If they do not talk things out, each partner will cheat the other with counterfeit currency from the outset of their marriage, and each will never tire of bitching about the other partner’s duplicity.

But the failed currency-exchange starts long before the wedding bells ring down at the chapel. If what he wants is an orgasm, it’s to his interest — he may tell himself — to pay out as little in romantic intimacy as he can get away with. Likewise, if she can get romantic intimacy without giving him many — or even any — orgasms, she may think she’s getting a great deal.

The latter scenario — all traction, no action — is the Victorian sexual ideal: Suitors court in courtly fashion and the blushing bride putatively comes to the marriage bed as a blushing virgin. But the first strategy — maximum action with minimal traction — is where we are now: Men do everything they can think of to get laid as often as possible, with as many different women as possible, while offering as little true romantic intimacy as possible in exchange.

Who is at fault here? The men are just doing what they say they intend to do, pursuing orgasms. The women are getting cheated out of most or all of the romantic intimacy they might hope to reap from their sexual encounters — but they are volunteers to their own repeated despoiling. They’re doing what they think they have to do to get men to pay attention to them at all, but the sad truth is that they have been scammed by a very clever con game.

Somewhere there is an evil genius of sex who came up with this idea: What if it were possible to get egg-layers to behave like seed-sprayers? Human beings can have sex for fun, not just for reproduction, so what if we could come up with words and ideas that would induce women to relinquish their very high sexual power — the power to withhold sex until the desired price in romantic intimacy has been met — and instead estimate their sexual value at or below the very low evaluation men hold for their own sexual power?

In other words, what if we could convince women that their best strategy for attracting lifelong love and devotion is not to behave like high-value ladies but instead to act like low-value skanks?

The Sexual Revolution did not start in the back seat of Daddy’s car. It was not caused by the birth-control pill or rock ‘n’ roll music. The Sexual Revolution was caused by a sheaf of very clever Fathertongue ideas devised to convince women that their own desired sexual currency — romantic intimacy — was worth less than that sought by men — orgasms — to the extent that they not only could not negotiate for romantic intimacy to be delivered “up front,” they might not be in a position to demand it at all.

So the girls put out, and the boys put the word out. Loving devotion? Romantic intimacy? Respect in the morning? The truth, never said out loud but obvious to everyone, is to be found in this expression: “Baby, I don’t even respect you now!”

So the girls dress like sluts, dance like sluts, drink like sluts, screw like sluts — and are nevertheless endlessly dismayed that the boys treat them like sluts, like self-maintaining pass-around sex-dolls.

So the girls twist themselves this way and that, striving desperately to find the interest or hobby or pose or costume that will somehow hold his attention — or even just his eye-contact — in the seconds after he is done coming. Some of them literally eat their hearts out, starving themselves, stuffing themselves, guiltily puking up anything they manage to eat.

And now comes the bleak world of Fifty Shades of Grey, in which women seek to fascinate men by volunteering to become objects of humiliation and degradation. The logic could not possibly be more wrong — “Of course he will love me after he has seen himself treating me like garbage!” — but the logic behind every one of these stupid dating strategies is inverted. That’s the point, to convince women that the only way they can win the game of love is to surrender every value they bring to the table.

This is a mistake.

It’s a horrible reproduction strategy, obviously. Men cultivate precisely those attributes of character that will make them the worst possible fathers. Women squander precisely those assets — loyalty, fidelity, probity, sobriety, chastity — that will make them most attractive to the best available fathers for their children. But it’s a mistake just as a dating strategy, as well.

Why? Because, in reality, women start with the better hand in the dating negotiation. The currency she holds — the power to grant or deny him orgasms with her — is far more valuable to him than the currency she is seeking — romantic intimacy — is to him. There are interesting Fathertongue reasons for this, but there is a purely biological factor in play as well: She feels no terrible bodily urgency either to fertilize or to dispose of her eggs, but he feels physical pain if he does not dispose of surplus seed on a regular basis. She may want to have an orgasm, but there is a a degree to which he needs to come.

That’s why he takes the risks of making the initial overtures, despite his tongue-tied fear of rejection. That’s why he takes on the awful burdens of making smalltalk, making time, making out. That’s why he buys the drinks, buys the dinners, buys the movie tickets, buys jewelry and clothing and cars and houses. That’s why he writes love poems and love songs and love stories — and deep, yearning lamentations over frustrated or unrequited love.

Boys discover girls at twelve years old or sixteen or twenty. Girls discover boys when they are still children, and, hence, they are adept at handling boys long before the boys even know they’re being handled. This is why men’s overt dating strategies seem so transparent to women. But it is also why this covert strategy — getting women to hold their own immense sexual value in contempt — has been so devastatingly successful. She thinks she is trading for stuff — for drinks, dinners, jewelry, cars and houses — and she does not see until it is too late that she has traded an infinitely valuable prize for useless trinkets.

Here is the blinding epiphany that occurs to teenage boys when they finally grow into their own sexual power: “Women want love and sex, too!”

Here is the countervailing epiphany, which men have successfully concealed from women for all of human history: “Men want love and sex more!”

Do you want proof of that claim? If what men want is orgasms, why don’t they just jack-off? They do. A lot. But it’s still not enough. They may say they disdain romantic intimacy, but they want it even so. Men make time with women they have no sexual interest in, just for the human contact. Men pay prostitutes for sex and then swear they are renting a girlfriend. He wants to achieve orgasm, and his body wants to throw away surplus seed, but he wants loving devotion, too.

She wants orgasms, too — and her orgasms can and should be much better than his — but not nearly as much as she wants romantic intimacy, ultimately leading to the loving devotion of marriage.

And that’s her bargaining power, her ransom from a sexual dystopia that is fifty shades of bleak. All women have to do to regain the upper hand in their currency-exchange with men is STOP PUTTING OUT!

When women raise the bar on sex, their men will rise to it. His body will insist most insistently that he do so, but his mind will rise to the challenge, too. He’ll be a better man for it, and he will love her that much more for making him become a better man.

Meanwhile, while masturbation for him is a second-best orgasm, a woman who has learned to masturbate proficiently has no need whatever to wake up next to a slobbering jackass just to get her rocks off. If she buys a Hitachi Magic Wand vibrator along with the Gee Whizzard attachment, her nights degrading herself with slobbering jackasses will be over for good. If all she’s going to get from him is an orgasm — maybe — she can cut out the middelman and at least get a good orgasm.

We are organisms, animals, mammals, and our urge to have sex is biological in origin. But we are reasoning animals, and hence we can discover and explore the pure, ecstatic, orgiastic joy of loving coupling. But we are rationalizing animals, too, so we can look for love and sex in all the wrong places, for all the wrong reasons. We can end up looking for love everywhere it isn’t, and never in the only place it truly is — in the mutual and enduring commitment of two people who like, lust for, honor and respect each other.

That’s the love that has a chance, at least, to turn into a marriage, to turn into a family. He wants her body — he wants those orgasms. But what he needs is more than just a mad, frenzied dance of masturbation-by-proxy. What he needs most, and what his children need most, are her virtues — her loyalty, her fidelity, her probity, her sobriety, her chastity — the virtues he dismissed when he was busy entreating women to shed their virtues with their clothes.

She needs his virtues, too, and not just his comfort or his affection or his doting devotion. Marriage is the means by which self-adoring adults cultivate the best attainable virtues within each other. The attraction and admiration and respect she felt for him when first they met should grow ever stronger, ever sturdier over the years. As they grow into each other — and grow with each other — their sex lives will be ever more loving, and their love lives ever sexier. Nothing worth having is easy, but this is what their marriage can be — and should be — if they work at it.

This is the love that provides the best chance for human children to grow up to be happy, healthy, responsible, productive adults. But this is also the love that most enriches, most ennobles and most enthralls each one of us. This is the love we were born to make, and this is the love that makes us most worthy to be loved in return.

Accept no substitutes…

Readers here know me as the author of Man Alive! I’ve also written a novel illustrating my ideal of love and devotion, The Unfallen. It’s a very sexy book about philosophy and a very philosophical book about love and longing written about and for smart, productive people who understand self-adoration the way I do. On a more practical level, I’ve written quite a bit about sex — especially orgasms, to which material I commend you. Life is short. Drink deep.

[For an update, please see: Lemons to Lemonade Documentary – Ed]

Edited from a comment posted on an unrelated thread after saying I had no comment and being admonished to comment anyway.

~~~

EatLessMoveMoore:

OK, I’ll throw you a bone in general—even though I suspect you’re just trying to (nicely and respectfully) bait and goad me into doing what both of those women might dearly love, and issue my “standard treatment” in a post.

Well, I’ve already done that way back and that’s done for good. As for Evelyn, she’s pretty much just rehashing everything over and over; and even in the new twist of my post on the AHS volunteer, one of her own supportive commenters (then another—both who don’t like me) grudgingly admitted that on a closer reading of my post, I wasn’t attacking that person individually, but some of her silly notions about what AHS was and should be in my opinion.

I do have a post in draft clarifying that.

As for Melissa, I’m unsure of her motivations. That blog, while much is about me, much is also about others; and increasingly, Paleo/AHS in general. She’s just getting it started and things like that tend to be hard to judge in initial stages. It may surprise you, but I’m open to the possibility that it might turn out to be more constructive, like her regular blog is. I find it hard to accept that Melissa is at base the sort of nasty, bitter person who only finds fault in others. She has done a great deal to advance this whole movement going all the way back to the NYT piece and then her blog, and I don’t easily toss earned capital aside.

Furthermore, not responding directly to critics is not the same as ignoring them completely. I suppose it’s different for different things (such as performance artists, etc.). I do read pretty much all the criticisms of me I’m aware of or made aware of, and I do try to be open minded about it after the initial surge of anger or indignation. I’m a huge fan of dialectic (thesis, antithesis, synthesis) and I believe it absurd to think that we’re not in some ways shaped by what others say about us, good and bad. It’s a long process, hopefully to the betterment of all.

I’m also a big fan of lemonade, if you know what I mean. I do want to do more good than harm out there, so when there are reasonable arguments that I’m doing real and not just perceived harm, I want to take note of those charges and consider them. And if I’m wrong, I’m wrong; and the only thing to do is to stop being wrong. Simple. Logic. Egos sometimes need to be put in check.

The Kruse thing was a very bad error in judgment on my part, and the c-word thing, an error in doubling down when I should have been folding (as Robb Wolf did in that same situation, the LC Cruse incident). Had I done that then, none of this would be happening now. I caused it and brought all this on my self. Oh, well. Live & learn. I was at least able to chat some cordial hellos with Emily Deans at AHS, and she even mentioned it—I think in comments on Evelyn’s blog—and that she’s not a grudge holder. Me either. So that’s good.

Bottom line: It’s absurd to think that I or anyone else can’t use some criticism. But, perhaps Melissa, et al, is out to see to my destruction in terms of Paleo/Health blogging. I’d suggest there’s probably better uses of her time, but I don’t tell people what they should or shouldn’t do. I’m still considering some of the criticism of me and how it might mold what I do going forward, but I can also say that at least some of the criticism of Paleo/AHS I’ve seen so far is very much worth paying attention to, y’know, for those who want to improve and do better.

So there you have it.

~~~

As an additional note, Stefani Ruper of Paleo For Women has unfortunately been drawn into this for her implied association with me in connection with the guest post she did here: No One’s Power but Our Own: Paleo Sexist Woes, and an Invitation to Rise Up and Roar. As of right now, that post has a remarkable 62 ReTweets and an astounding 747 Facebook Likes—the most ever for any post on this blog.

She’s under pressure from a number of women to publicly denounce me and request that I take the post down.

…It’s suggested that I sought out Stefani for that post for largely the same reason I married a Latina, roomed with black guys in the past, employed mostly female Hispanics in my company and have gay and lesbian friends: as a smokescreen to hide my true nature of sexism, white supremacy, domination and misogyny because, you know, words in blog posts over a short time speak louder than actions over a lifetime.

Whatever…

In fact, Stefani emailed me to tell me she was going to write a post for my blog and suggested I damn well post it if I know what’s good for me, because she will be heard. That’s how it’s done, folks. She knew how to deal with me.

For those who asked me why I didn’t go after her in that AHS post because she had done a post on the masculin focus at AHS (she’s taken it down in favor of more positive endeavors). Two reasons:

1. It was not my intention to go after anyone personally—as those who’ve read my post more carefully now know—but to criticize some of the notions of what AHS lacks and should be in terms of “diversity.” So to the extent that what Stefani advocates falls into that category, you could consider that my post covers it in general.
2. Stefani knows I don’t agree with her on some stuff, and I know she doesn’t agree with me on some stuff. We both know where we do agree and what’s most important. But here’s the essential difference. Stefani isn’t sitting around complaining that the women’s issues important to her in a paleo context aren’t being emphasized enough by men so women can sit back and take them in. She went out and created a blog focussed on those issues and values important to her, and I’m quite delighted that her guest post on my blog helped her to advance those goals and values.

Stefani is a doer and in no way do I even remotely require that what she does meets all of my standards of what’s most important. Simple as that.

Incidentally, in case anyone is going to assume I’m putting this up here in order to “butter Stefani up” so she doesn’t fall under the pressure to denounce me and request taking down that post, the foregoing has already been discussed with Stefani personally in email exchanges. We were and remain cool with one another.

Skyler Tanner is, to me, just like one of my brothers in many respects. That is, when together, there is pretty much never a moment of silence and each has a backlog of shit to talk about—more than half forgotten by the time either can get a word in.

…Oh, and while in Austin, my real brother, Stacy, came up from Houston and stayed a night. He saw my presentation and a few others, and was graciously invited by Anthony Johnson  to attend dinner with the presenters. He knows Austin pretty well, so took me to a place or two, Peché among them…which was great. Scotch and pork belly. Neither of us were ever at a moment of loss for words. That’s what I mean.

You know Skyler, don’t you? Now, unless you read that post I just linked, you won’t understand why it’s funny that as I was walking by in the hotel for The 21 Convention and didn’t see him, what I heard was, “Hey, Fuck You!.”

As I already blogged, Skyler gave an impressive, sciency, exercise/health physiology presentation, while Keith Norris gave an impressive exercise/power/efficiency practicality presentation—back-to-back. While Skyler is my “brother,” Keith is the epitome of paleo in terms of soul, kindness, and example. He’s the poster boy. He’s the nicest guy in the paleosphere and any shame or embarassment I ever feel for myself over whatever anyone may say about me…it pales in comparison to the shame I feel at a peripheral glance at Keith Norris. In essence, he’s my PaleoTouchstone. When I grow up, I want to be like Keith Norris with an edge. It’s a lifelong pursuit I will never attain, but will keep trying anyway.

Back to the subject

That photo was taken yesterday morning after Skyler kicked the asses of, in order:

1. Rachel, fiancee of Eric Daniels (at AHS and 21)
2. Dr. Doug McGuff
3. Eric
4. Me
5. Then Doug kicked Skyler’s ass

This all happened within the space of about an hour, 10 minutes or so per workout. It’s an epiphany for me. In general:

• One single set
• Three to six reps on average, depending
• Four to five exercises
• Completely safe (usually, dangerously high weight is needed)

In that second bullet, I said “depending.” While I’ve worked with a trainer, Skyler is not a regular cheerleading, encouraging trainer. He’s a cold, detached, …”and 3, 2, 1″…torture chamber master. Here, just look, the essential message, featuring Skyler, Keith, and even an appearance by Rob Wolf.

The thing is, it doesn’t even take two 30-minute sessions per week, and I’m sure Skyler and Keith would tell you that (though, perhaps at the beginning, to get people up to a reasonable performance level). I believe Skyler told me he’s at about 15 minutes once every 5 days.

Back to Skyler the torturer. It’s weird, and while I was chomping at the bit and initially dismayed to have to be last to come under his gauntlet; in retrospect, I’m glad I did. Skyler is a smart mutherfucker, though you’d never know it by looking at him. See, he’s of the same general exercise philosophy as exercise author and 23-year emergency room physician Dr. Doug McGuff: Body by Science: A Research Based Program to Get the Results You Want in 12 Minutes a Week. And Eric and his wife exercise at Doug’s own center. I had no idea I was the odd man out, into some weird incestuous affair, until I began taking cognizance of the inside banter.

So basically, Skyler—without telling me—wanted me to observe how it’s done. It’s a good thing, because the style of exercise was totally foreign to me. How can you possibly get an ass-kicking workout that gives you all the benefits you want for health and body composition—without atoning for your sins in the gym for hours per week…because you’re a lazy ass, and that’s your penance?

You do it efficiently. How do you do it efficiently? You have someone show you. Who shows you? Skyler the torture master does. But, see, he’s even smarter than the entire Catholic Church Monolith. While they put people on racks and burnt them at the  stake for one-off affairs, Skyler isn’t forcing anyone, and thus, needs people to come back for more. His genius is in getting you to accept the benefit of your torture. “….3,2,1…you’re done.”

“That’s all?” any given torture victim asks? “I was expecting a 5,4,3,2,1-torture countdown.” See, he  cleverly throws you bones, almost randomly. Mutherfucker. But you know what? If you’re literally torn asunder on the rack, or burnt to a crisp on the stake, there’s no repeat business, which of course is proof positive that free market capitalism harms people less. Skyler doesn’t have the power of taxation (or the purchase of indulgences towards early release from purgatory), and as such, has had to devise clever ways and means of torturing people to effect…just enough. And it goes to his mastery that he can get them to come back for more.

…If only. Imagine where we’d be had we skipped the 1,000 year Dark Ages and gone straight to enlightenment, featuring “Torture Lite.”

Alright, let me indulge myself in the serious for a moment. Skyler isn’t just a coach or cheerleader, he’s a mouth-on manager—because you have to do it yourself so his hands would work against the goal. Basically, he directs you through every single rep of every single set of every single exercise, until you’re done.

The result? Efficiency. Time saved for you, and probably more exercise benefit. Time saved for them…they can help more people in their limited existential time and physical space.

I was going to go over details about how Skyler does this, but in spite of a wonderful dinner afterwards, hosted at his home with his wife Sarah, he still owes me for the sore butt, even after a gracious lift to the airport. So ask him questions in comments and I’ll be sure he sees them.

Blurry Sous-Vide Roast and the Most Amazing Butternut Squash Puree Ever.

R-L: Skyler, Keith, Michelle, Sarah, Doug

OK, ask Skyler questions about efficient exercise in comments, but certainly not before making fun of his Ronald McDonald smile in the photo. You’re probably more likely to get a good and thorough answer from him if you do.

I would.

[For an update, please see: Lemons to Lemonade Documentary – Ed]

Watch this disgusting video of a bunch of men laughing it up about breast and vaginal mutilation.

….Oh, wait!

[For an update, please see: Lemons to Lemonade Documentary – Ed]

Tomorrow evening when I fly home it’ll be a day or two shy of three full weeks since I began traveling. On August 1st I left for for a 5-day hang gliding trip to Hat Creek which, for the first time since the beginning about 15 years ago, Beatrice could not attend. Upon my return I had exactly 24 hours with Bea before I dropped her at the airport to attend to her brother on an hour or two sudden notice. Then I left for the Ancestral Health Symposium, came back, had a few days, and then left for The 21 Convention. She returned home yesterday.

Essentially, I’ve had a single day with my wife in three weeks, and that was two weeks ago. I miss her terribly. Anxious to get back. I’ve never been away from her form more than a few days since we began living together in about 1997.

Luckily, friends, family, and good people abound. For instance, my dad had some things to take care of in San Jose, so he was there for an evening before I headed off to Austin on Thursday morning. It’s been quite a time. Owing to my schedule when I spoke there last year and not being able to see many presentations from others, I didn’t get a chance to really get a bead on what this whole “pickup community” is all about. I basically decided to go when invited, because Sisson & McGuff had done so the year prior—and Keith Norris and Skyler Tanner were presenting last year as well.

This year is different. I’ve been in attendance for almost all presentations, including those from the “pickup artists,” and have some thoughts to share on it. In the meantime, some photos of good times over dinner tonight with friends.

Bulletproof Exec Dave Asprey and Skyler Tanner

Dr. Eric Daniels and Dr. Doug McGuff

Keith Norris & wife Michelle…and Skyler’s wife Sarah

The Ever Present Jolly

Skyler and Keith, along with their business partner at Efficient Exercise here in Austin, took up the whole afternoon with very good presentations and demonstrations. Tomorrow morning, Skyler is going to put me through a workout on their amazing machine. I’ll see what I can post about that.

Eric Daniels was at AHS and presented here on the topic of rational philosophy, on day one. Fabulous. Doug McGuff presents tomorrow. As does Dave Asprey. And in addition to doing the photography, Jolly is presenting tomorrow morning on Intermittent Fasting. Unfortunately, it’s when I’ll be at Skyler’s training center for the workout, so I’ll have to wait for the video.

…And in spite of being women, there’s been quite a few round and about here at this “pickup artist” convention. They all seem quite self assured, confident, vivacious—and seem also to actually have some real first hand knowledge of what “game” is really all about—at least as it’s portrayed by Anthony Johnson and his world class picker uppers. You know, when ignorance isn’t working or makes you look stupid, try knowledge. That’s what I always say. But more on that later.

Oh, yea, my longtime friend Greg Swann put on a very interesting presentation on “Ontologically Consistent Teleology” this morning to great enthusiasm. I’ve been doing the weekly gigs about his book, Man Alive!, and curiously enough, one of the reasons Anthony invited him is he loved Greg’s scathing critique of “pick up” in chapter 10 (oh, shit, there’s that pesky knowledge over ignorance thing again…ok, more later).

A final photo.

The Regular Evening Nightcap

Jolly joined me last night, though not for the beer.

Tomorrow afternoon a bunch of us are headed over to Skyler and Sarah’s house to be treated to a sous-vide roast he’s had in for like a year or two so it’s gotta be tender. And then the flight home.

Until next time.