By Matt Stone
Low-Carb Mechanic (LCM)
Customer: My car has got something really wrong with it. When I step on the gas it doesn’t do anything for a moment, and then bursts forward.
LCM: Easy sport, sounds like a fuel-injection problem, probably due to too much driving. You see, the thing is, everyone in the world thinks gasoline is the best kind of fuel, but it’s not. In fact, powering your car with gasoline is the root problem of all auto failure. Without gas, cars remain in mint condition forever. With gas, you’re bound to run into worn out tires, engine corrosion, valves getting choked off with gunk, and your oil not circulating through the engine. It just keeps piling up. What you need is to start putting grass and water into your fuel tank. Here, let me drain the gas from the tank and replace it with grass and water.
Customer: Wow, great! I had no idea that gasoline was so harmful! (Tries to start engine). Uh oh, now the car won’t start.
LCM: Great! That’s the idea. If your car’s fuel delivery isn’t working properly, you just remove the fuel and all the problems associated with poor fuel injection just fall by the wayside. Without fuel, your car’s engine will last forever. Even the tires will still be good as new 30 years from now!
Customer: Sorry but, doesn’t it make more sense to fix the fuel-injection system so that my car uses the gas like it’s supposed to? I bought it so that I could drive it, not just let it sit around doing nothing.
LCM: You’re not getting it here bud. Cars never had problems until we started using gasoline to get around. Transportation evolved to have horses pulling our buggies, and they were fed grass and water and never had fuel-injection issues. Gasoline is a flawed form of energy that simply wasn’t meant to be transporting us around. Just look at the archaeological data. You won’t see engine corrosion or even worn out tires until gasoline was put into use. Eskimos never had any clogged valves or corrosion ? that’s because they never gave gasoline to their sled dogs.
Customer: Yeah, but look at Asian cars. Asian cars can be fed gasoline all day long without the same problems that American cars have. What about that?!
LCM: Easy to explain. Asians use Omega 3 engine oil and mix in green tea, but nevermind that. Listen Mac, it’s simple. Gasoline raises engine gasoline levels. Higher gasoline levels means higher rates of degenerative auto disease. Got it?
Vegan Mechanic (VM)
Customer: My car won’t move an inch. I’ve driven it for thousands of miles and now it won’t go anywhere.
VM: Looks like you are out of gas my beautiful child, but don’t worry. You don’t want to have gas in your car.
Customer: Why the hell not? Doesn’t my car need gas to run? Haven’t cars always needed gasoline to run since they were invented?
VM: (Closes eyes, smiles, takes a deep, soothing breath). Yes, this was the old paradigm, but we are now entering a realm of higher spiritual consciousness. Gasoline is actually what contains all the harmful elements that lead to your car’s destruction. A study done in China showed that the more gasoline used, the more car trouble. But that’s not all. Every time you buy gasoline you take a precious life from the Earth Mother. By abstaining from the consumption of gasoline, you can literally save the environment, all of its magnificent creatures, and your car at the same time. All the while your spiritual energy increases and your chances of achieving enlightenment become attainable.
Customer: Wow, I had no idea! Gasoline is so atrocious! I can’t even look at it now without being disgusted. The very thought of it makes me want to gag! I can’t believe the world has let the criminal and barbaric act of feeding gasoline to cars go on for so long! But how will I get my car to run without it?
VM: Worry not my little flower, all you have to do is focus all your Chi into the third Chakra, put a couple of supplements into the tank, and pour in a combination of soy, sprouts, raw kale, cacao, goji berries, acai, some superfood powder concentrate, and fruit into the tank. Go heavy on the soy. It is amazing for your car and like so nourishing for our home ? planet earth.
Okay, that’s enough.
A key thing to think about, is that nutritionists, dieticians, various dietary and lifestyle evangelists, holistic and mainstream medical practitioners and more all tend to identify a problem or weakness and cater to it. They are all too eager to blame a particular type of fuel (overall calories, fat, protein, carbohydrates, animal products, cooked food, fiber, salt) instead of figuring out how to fix the factors that make sure the fuel is used properly. The world in general is in a diagnosis mindset that views heredity as the limit/prison. 180 has an improvement mindset, and a fixing the root problem mindset ? and heredity is extremely mutable and malleable. In other words, identifying a metabolic flaw or weakness and avoiding putting stress on it is helpful, and gets some results, but it’s never as good as repairing the weakness and metabolic flaw.
If nutritionists were mechanics, regardless of their bias ? from carnivore to vegan, cars would never get fixed. If the car won’t go forward, the nutritionist would recommend driving exclusively in reverse. If the brakes didn’t work, most nutritionists would recommend using the parking brake to stop the car. If the clutch was out, the diagnosis would be: Shifting Insufficiency ? recommendation is to drive in 1st gear.
Read Part II
Have you looked into the Specific Carbohydrate Diet? If the hypothesis behind it is anything close to correct, it explains why many people respond positively to either paleo, instinctive eating or raw vegan.
The hypothesis is that when the intestines get damaged, they do a poor job of breaking down dissacharides. The result is undigested carbs feeding bacterial overgrowth which damages the intestines which creates a viscious cycle.
Restricting carbs to certain easily absorbed carbs breaks the cycle, and eventually many can go back to regular eating after their guts heal.
i have tried SCD, and the sort of similar Low-FODMAP, both for IBS. yes, they get short-term results. but they are incredibly restrictive, and you have to put all of your focus and resources into eating this very limited diet, and that has implications for your social life and general rhythms. i never got long-term results on those diets. i only got transformative results from two things: a really amazing Mayan abdominal massage, and the Eat for Heat approach.
oh wait – i totally meant to include this:
while using the Eat for Heat approach, i still reference what i learned from SCD and Low-FODMAP, and that led me to steer around a lot of unrefined carbs like broccoli and beans, which were definitely giving me trouble. but those 2 diets both have you cutting out wheat and any lactose-containing dairy, and i ended up going with Matt’s recommendation that wheat and dairy can be healing for an underweight/low metabolism person (such as myself). i just pushed through any lingering mental resistance to wheat and dairy, and found that to be true for me. i still avoid beans and large quantities of vegetables. for the time being. i hope to add those back in at some point.
Your low-carb criticism is pretty weak… only poorly informed low-carbers would respond to the "asians do fine with high carbs" argument with the omega-3s answer. Asians don't do fine on moderate or high carb diets, that's actually a myth. China is having huge problems with their carb based diets, and it's true elsewhere as well. Traditional asian diets were and are not very high in refined carbs, starches, or sugars.
The majority of all asian cultures eat at least a decent amount of carbs. That's not a myth.
All of them are consuming rice or wheat products in certain amounts.
What troubles the chinese people is certainly not their traditional carb rich diet on which they were doing good for hundrets of years. It's the typical western diet which they adopt more and more. Or their stupid government who force every child to drink milk in order to get taller even if most of them are not able to digest it.
Firstly, the Asians and carbs and omega 3 had more to do with the Japanese than the Chinese. The Japanese are the world's longest-lived peoples on a diet that's up to 80% carbohydrate.
In Thailand they eat a mostly carbohdyrate-based diet as well. I spent a month there without seeing a single overweight person. Not one.
Same goes for the other Asian countries I have been to – Vietman, Laos, Cambodia, and Nepal. In Japan there are plenty of overweight people, but nothing like the United States.
I'm not saying that the Japanese embody the great health that we all should seek. Definitely not, they have much room for improvement, and as a society their health is spiraling down just as quickly as it is anywhere on earth. In other words, a diet of mostly white rice is unhealthy, but not because it contains carbohydrates. Good lord no.
If you want a stronger argument against carbs, check out my glucose meter. There is not a low-carber on earth with lower fasting or postprandial glucose levels than mine – and I got there eating more carbs, not fewer.
I grew up in Thailand and traveled Asia. What they eat is rice- white jasmine rice. It’s the center of every meal. Lots of vegetable, especially pungent ones like onions, garlic, herbs and night shades. Absolutely fantastic, to die for tropical fresh fruit. Tons of salt and fish sauce, TONS of chile and spice, coconut milk and oil, some peanut sauces, a little meat or fish everyday, but it’s not the centerpiece of the meal, more of a flavoring agent. The condiments are traditionally fermented, but the food is fresh. A little tofu, but not a ton.
They also take long breaks from work and school to eat slow meals with friends and family- they wind up eating much smaller portion sizes then us, but not because they are stressed about it, but because when you eat slowly, you naturally get full.
The other health cue we should take from them is that they literally celebrate the holidays of every single culture- so they take tons of days off of work and school to just celelbrate and party. (Though, interestingly, the students there have amazing work ethics and school is taken very seriously).
The cultural motto is ‘Mai Ben Lai’ which means something like, ‘nevermind’ or ‘no big deal’. They are happy, relaxed people who let nearly everything roll off their backs- nothing will get in the way of having a good time.
Oh yeah, and they are all thin.
that is an excellent cultural motto
Carl –
I believe that fructose is the most difficult sugar to digest, perhaps with the exceptions of lactose and oligosaccharides in beans and legumes. Fructose, a monosaccharide, is much more difficult to digest than say, sucrose – a disaccharide.
Is that why food combiners always say to eat fruit alone?
troy
And your belief may be true in general. But you yourself noted how some people respond very well to a fructarian diet — for a time. Such a diet is high in fructose.
Elain Gottschall's "Breaking the Viscious Cycle" provides a possible explanation. It explains why my digestion went from terrible to perfect in a week when I did a modified instincto diet. Now, I am trying her (much less restrictive) diet and getting quite good results, though not quite as dramatic as from the modified instincto.
You ought to add this book to your considerable reading list. I suspect many of the paleos get their benefits for the reasons explained in this book. Some people have good reason to be anti-starch fanatics. The reason is digestive, not metabolic.
I read it a couple years ago after having been turned onto Natasha Campbell McBride who is a SCD fan. There's no doubt that some cannot digest starch very well.
I'd like to personally try it during 2010 – excluding starch in favor of primarily fruit and honey-based carbohdyrates while being hypervigilant about PUFA's to try me some of that Ray Peat stuff as well.
I really appreciate your input Carl. For sure.
"a diet of mostly white rice is unhealthy, but not because it contains carbohydrates. Good lord no."
I thought you were saying Japanese and Thai people are healthy? I'm in Thailand and my only options for carbs are white rice and from raw milk. I have unlimited coconut oil fwiw but it gives me diarrhea if not eaten with carbs (do you know why btw?). What's your dietary recommendation in my situation?
Hey Kirk,
White rice is probably the best option of all refined foods. Sure, it's devoid of nutrients, and sure, Asian countries are seeing rising rates of degenerative disease, but much of that is due to rises in refined sugar consumption and other processed foods – including vegetable oils displacing other fats just as it has here.
Brown rice would be better. There's no question that the switch from brown to white made a difference, but one can still attain better-than-average health on typical Thai fare. Enjoy it. It's not optimal, but it can't even be compared to a diet of veggie oil, 170 pounds of HFCS per year, and white flour comprising more than 50% of calories.
Sorry if I made you nervous. Thai food is literally "to Thai for" anyway. Eat the Phuket out of it.
It'd be great to see you try a Ray Peat diet after the milk diet. Gelatin and ice cream would have to play a major part. And maybe even a half grain of thyroid daily. What about pregnenlone?
Oh hell yeah. I think thyroid and pregnenalone should be the next Ben n' Jerry's flavor. Maybe toss in some Gummi Dancing Bears.
Great. You can report your blood sugar levels on ice cream and table sugar. Maybe try to get your fructose levels up to the 30 pound a year mark. If thyroid doesn't appeal to you, maybe visit your GP for some Zoloft. Try reducing your serotonin levels, you know, and make sure that when your body temperature falls (http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/28/whats-your-temperature-rethinking-986/) you notify your GP so that if, later in life, you succumb to a serious fever we'll be able to diagnose you properly. And with any proper diagnosis comes acetaminophen. Let's see how your liver deals with it.
Of course I'm starting to doubt the evidence that suggests that fructose does damage the liver, but that's no need to take things slow, as they say. Rev up that car, turn on those hazards, and let's put the top down and cruise. We're always on the lookout for a good rabbit, whether or not he's been shot up with cholesterol to accompany his diet of saturated fats. …that's what she said
Do you know of a good GP? I haven't been to one since 1998. I think his name was Dr. Campbell. He gave me an inhaler and a prescription for Claritin. It made me feel ill after a day so I threw it out. Too bad Dr. Campbell didn't have a Doug to the L.A. double S at the end.
It was extremely interesting for me to read that blog. Thanx for it. I like such themes and anything connected to this matter. I definitely want to read more soon.
This is in response for Carl and "Breaking the Vicious Cycle. I have personally done this diet 3 times in the past 6 years and it worked to stop my bloating and gas and I'm sure healed my gut somewhat. But after a week back on normal eating (and I eat real foods) the bloating and indigestion was back with a vengeance.
You could argue that i didn't do it right, maybe I introduced certain foods too soon, but that to me is why I find this blog so intriguing. It is teaching me to focus on my metabolism and retraining my body to digest these foods and readapt.
It is impossible for most people to stay on restrictive diets for a long period of time and even if you do, is it healthy in the long run. Matt is trying to teach as well as learn himself how to enjoy life while eating joyously from all the food groups, and if you really think about it, why would you strive for anything else.
For me it was always the catholic school girl syndrome. I would always end up doing something naughty after weeks or months of being good. I would feel like a failure and get down on myself for being so weak-willed, but now I believe that our body’s main priority is self preservation, and there is an over-ride mechanism in our brain that will force you to binge on certain things to try and bring things back into balance and ensure its survival.
This blog really opened my eyes to metabolism being the culprit and not a specific food or food group. Whether this proves to be true or not, it is another alley that I never even thought of as I was always looking to place the blame on the next food or food group after my last hypothesis fell through.
I did that for 10 years, and learned more about ?health? through reading and applying then any one I know personally. Yet I didn’t have this radiance of health I was looking for, nor did I seem healthier then any of my asshole friends that would never take my advice on how they should be eating :) Matter of fact, I think they were probably healthier, as I was always the one getting sick and staying sick longer.
Something was definitely missing, and this makes more sense, as I know the foods that bother me now, did not bother me when I was in my teens. I used to eat the hell out of some shrimp, I would polish off an entire party platter no problem, but now I am highly allergic to it and break out into hives. How did this happen? Truly the bulk of my health problems, from allergies to migraines didn’t get worse until I started eating ?healthy?. Well that, and being immunized about 50 times when I joined the Air Force.
I’m not saying don’t do Elaine Gottschall's program as I did get good results, while I was on it, but in the end I don’t think I was eating enough. So my advice would be to make sure you are eating a lot, keep those calories up so you don’t further damage your metabolism and possibly negate the effects of the diet in the long run.
Sorry for the long post and unasked for advice.
Matt:
Did you read Dr. Davis? Ornish-experience? I don’t think the Ornish-diet is an optimal diet, far from it, but I’d expect at least a decent insulin sensitivity. How do you explain what happened to Dr. Davis?
"Let me tell you about my low-fat experience from 20 years ago.
At the time, I was living in Cleveland, Ohio, and served on the faculty at a large metropolitan university-affiliated hospital, supervising fellows-in-training and developing high-tech cath lab procedures like directional athererectomy and excimer laser coronary angioplasty. (Yes, another life.)
I was concerned about personal heart disease risk, though I knew next to nothing about lipids and coronary risk prediction outside of the little I learned in training and what the drug industry promoted.
I heard Dr. Dean Ornish talk while attending the American College of Cardiology meetings in Atlanta. Dr. Ornish spoke persuasively about the dangers of fat in the diet and how he "reversed" coronary disease using a low-fat, no added oils, no meat, vegetarian diet that included plenty of whole grains. So I thought I'd give it a try.
I eliminated all oils; I removed all meat, eggs, and fish from my diet. I shunned all nuts. I ate only low-fat products like low-fat yogurt and cottage cheese; and focused on vegetables, fruit, and whole grains. Beans and brown or wild rice were a frequent staple. I loved oatmeal cookies–low-fat, of course!
After one year of this low-fat program, I had gained a total of 31 lbs, going from 155 lbs to 186 lbs. I reassessed some basic labs:
HDL 28 mg/dl
Triglycerides 336 mg/dl
Blood sugar 151 mg/dl (fasting)
I became a diabetic. All through this time, I was also jogging. I ran on the beautiful paths along the Chagrin River in suburban Cleveland for miles north and south. I ran 5 miles per day most days of the week.
It was diabetes that hit me alongside the head: I was eating low-fat meticulously, exercising more than 90% of the population, yet I got fat and diabetic!
I have since changed course in diet. Last time I checked, my lipid values on NO statin agent:
HDL 67 mg/dl
Triglycerides 57 mg/dl
Blood sugar 91 mg/dl
That was my lesson that fat restriction is a destructive, misguided notion. The data since then have confirmed that restricting total fat is unnecessary, even undesirable, when fat calories are replaced by carbohydrate calories."
http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/overweight-hungry-diabetic-and-fat-free.html
I would say you had some problems that have nothing to do with low-fat, high-carb.
First of all, you were most likely low-protein, and Ray Peat has mentioned that low-protein is stressful(remember that natural carb eaters don’t fluctuate with macro nutrients as much as people who visit this blog).
I would also question about the current values of the following were in the diet:
Calcium
Copper
Phosphor
Add to that your long running so I am not surprised your body might have been a bad state.
Dermatend –
Thanks for your comment. This is the perfect time of year to be abolishing the "Catholic School Girl" mentality. I hate that New Year's Resolution, "let's make a bunch of unsustainable promises to do stuff that is in complete discordance with our physical desires" bullshit. In fact, I'm going to incorporate the Catholic School Girl mentality in the next eZine. Loved your comment. So true. Ditto most of that. My girlfiend also became anaphylactic in response to shellfish and developed an autoimmune disease while trying to "get healthy."
It's called poor constituion meets low-carb/low-calorie meets marathon running.
Sven –
I would suspect, in general, decent insulin sensitivity. But I've determined that cortisol, in response to inflammation, blocks insulin function making them resistant to insulin's action. Running doesn't help. I'm sure he ate the hell out of some low-fat cookies as well. He might've had a good initial response as well before it radically turned around. That's been my response. Low-fat diets are a good way to get short-term gains and long-term pain.
Matt Stone, you are a funny man. I loved this post!
Matt, you forgot a mechanic. The metabolic typing mechanic (MTM), also called the biochemical individuality mechanic. Here comes his story:
Customer: My car won’t move. It makes strange sounds. The electronics are?
MTM: Enough said. You know, I don't care about all those symptoms you are going to explain to me over the next 10 minutes. Symptoms are just that ? symptoms. And honestly, I just want to find the underlying cause, fix it and get some cash.
Customer: But, Sir, I haven't explained that the engine creates these strange vibrations when driving left turns and?
MTM: Okay, okay, okay. Do you know that there are zillions, yes zillions, of possible causes for the symptoms you are talking about? The very same symptom could be caused by completely different causes. Now, I am sure you agree to stop wasting our precious time by talking about symptoms that tell us nothing and better get your car fixed.
Customer: Well, ?
The MTM inspects the car carefully from front to back.
MTM: Alright, there we go. You know, yesterday I had a customer basically experiencing the same problems as you but the causes totally differed. Your engine's fuel to air ratio is too low. His ratio was too high. Still you both experienced the same problems with your engines. Oh, and your electronics fail because the current is too high. Yet, yesterday the man's electronics failed because the current was too low.
Customer: Great job, man. You know, usually I fix my car by myself because it's cheaper. At least I now know what to do next time when the problems reoccur: raise my fuel to air ratio and reduce the battery's current.
MTM: Sorry, did you actually listen to me?
Customer: Sure, I did. That's what you've said.
MTM: How can you be sure next time that your reoccurring symptoms have the same causes as today?
Customer: Oh, ?
MTM: One tip. Cure cars, not ailments!
Customer: Okay, I'll remember that. How much is it?
The MTM gets paid.
Customer: Bye for now, I'm eager to fix my friend's car. You know, he is experiencing the same problems that I had. We agreed that only one of us visits a costly garage and then we fix the other's car alike.
The MTM feels severe inner pain regarding his customer.
MTM: Bye. And good luck fixing your friend's car?
http://homullus.blogspot.com/
Ha, ha. Solid. I might've included that but I got worn out after LCM and VM.
Customer: Hi my car isn't working as well as it used to. I used to be able to eat any kind of fuel and have no problems, but lately things have been sluggish and heavy when I put my foot on the gas.
The Weight Watchers Mechanic:
Your car naturally performs more differently as you get older. Have you signed up for our special support group for cars that are thirty years old? It's great fun, it doesn't cost much (unless you have the ability to add your monthly bills together, which is NOT recommended) and will get your car back on track to self esteen. Remember your car's lifestyle needs to change. Permanently.
It is sluggish and heavy because you are putting in too much gasoline. We recommend you put in only a half tank of gas for the remainder of your car's life. We have two programs for this. One is points system that will let you use any kind of fuel you like as long as you don't exceed half a tank, while making you think you are getting more by giving you less than half a tank and then giving you bonus points to make up the rest. The other is the core program which lets you fill up the tank but only with our special, highly-processed, low fat, high-fiber fuel. If you experience problems with your fuel injection clogging from using this fuel, please try not to talk about it with your support group. You'll just lower their self-esteem.
Customer: Gee, my car is running better now, I'm getting the results I hoped for. But I need to make a long road trip, can I go ahead and fill up the tank.
WWM: No. You have to fuel this way for the remainder of your car's life.
(A few months later)
Customer: After inital gains, I've notice my car's performance has stagnated. I can't even fill it halfway before it gets back that old sluggish and heaviness problem. My injectors have clogged up on both the core and the points plan.
WWM: If you experience problems it is because you put too much fuel in the tank. Are you sure you weighed and measured everything you ate? Remember this is a lifestyle change. You have to fuel your car this way forever. Here, talk to our life long member who has reached her goal of perfect car performance and therefore doesn't have to pay for her support group any more.
Lifetime Member: This is a lifestyle change. Did you change your lifestyle? Did you accidently call it a diet instead of lifestyle? Can you honestly say you've been focused and ON PLAN every minute of every day?
Customer: Um, no, er, I mean, I guess I might have messed up somewhere. But really, it feels like I'm putting in less fuel in the tank. I've been running my car more and more so that I can add more fuel, but even that isn't working.
WWM: Ah there in lies the problem. You are using your car too much. Also make sure the wiper fluid is topped up. It makes the car think it is full, so that it is tricked into running better. Just remember to stay on plan and talk to your support group if you think you might need help staying focused. Also, we have been meaning to talk to you about that credit card you gave us when you first signed up. Can you just give us access to your bank account instead?
Lifetime Member: Don't worry, someday you won't have to pay!
Customer: Um, aren't you a different person than was here a while ago?
Lifetime Member: Oh, that lifetime member fell off plan, starting using too much fuel and dropped out. Don't worry, she'll be back. Meanwhile, I'm here for you and all your lifestyle questions…
Customer:My current car is ok, but I've always dreamed of a muscle car. Is there some way I can turn my 89 Toyota into a 68 Mustang?
Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle Mechanic:
There sure is! Just download my e-book and pay me a monthly installment for access to my website to find out.
Customer: I've downloaded the ebook. It really is detailed and that's nice. It's taken me a while to do the homework to figure out how much fuel to use, how often and what combinations are OK, but I think I'm getting the hang of it. I think I'm reading to begin exercising my car to make it a lean mean muscle machine!
BFFM Mechanic: You will need to run your car a lot. Every single day in fact. You will need long, hard trips that burn fuel steadily and short trips up high hills that use a lot of gas.
Customer: But with all these extra trips, won't I need more fuel than you are recommending?
BFFM Mechanic: You need to learn to go outside of your comfort zone. Are you afraid of running out of gas? Of breaking down? You need to listen to my hour long motivational tapes that will help you over come that fear and make your car the best it can be. Here talk to some of my cadre of professional dieters, I mean body builders who've managed to transform their sagging old heaps into vintage muscle gods and goddesses by following my plan.
Vintage Muscle Gods and Godesses: Dude! You need to get ripped! Eat clean! Shred Hard! Kowabunga! Wacka, wacka, wacka wacka. Also try putting in more highly processed whey powder into the oatmeal you put into your car seven times a day at precise intervals. It is so clean it will make your muscles burst forth out of that rusty old chasis. Woooooooo! Boooyah!
Customer: Look, it's not just a fear of running out of gas. I literally ran out of gas and had to walk home. I missed a whole morning of work and now my boss is mad at me. Not to mention my family are tired of me getting up 5:30 a.m. to start the car and leaving every couple of hours to add fuel. It's driving them nuts.
Super vintage god #1: Woah dude, don't blow a gasket! Like, relax. You need to get out of that comfort zone. What ever doesn't kill your car makes it stronger. Sounds like your family is a negative influence. Have you tried replacing them with motivational tapes, like we have. Cowabunga dude! Shred hard!
Customer: How can I use fuel to make sure my car never breaks down?
Weston Price Mechanic: First of all forget everything you think you know about fuel. Everything that's been told to you is a lie, a conspiracy as a part of corporations to make money. The fuels they told you were harmful are actually good for you.
Customer: Wow, that is really good information. Also, I read your 800 page tome on vitamins and nutirtional perfection, and I'm really excited by the possiblity that all disezse might be prevented simply by getting enough of the right kind of foods.
WAP MEchanic: Really, is that what you got from that? Hmmm. No, what you were supposed to take away is that you need make sure that all your gasoline is soaked for 12 hours before you put it in your car to eliminate harmful acids in it. Never heard of those acids? Well that's part of the conspiracy. While your in the garage soaking fuel, make sure you ferment all the vegetables you eat so that they contain lactic acid which will help keep your car perfect forever.
Customer: That sounds a little wacky. What about just eating a lot of foods that aren't processed and avoiding the bad fats which you've successfully convinced me are causing disease.
WAP Mechanic: What are you a slave to the conspiracy! Put some raw milk in your tank and call me in the morning.
Customer: That raw milk made my car sicker than ever.
WAP Mechanic: Have you thought about asking God to help you with this problem?
Customer: Yes, I did that already. I asked God to explain to me again how sugar is the root of all evil and yet it's OK to eat it as long as it's not processed.
WAP Mechanic: Any feedback on that? We'd be interested to hear because we are editing a new edition of our manual, New and Improved with even more desserts!
(Some time later)
Customer: I replaced all my car's oil with coconut oil, topped off the gas tank with only gasoline that's been soaked or fermented and tried shoving raw milk in there as well. I even asked God, what to do. I'm still having problems.
WAP Mechanic: Clearly your car's problems require more than just a fuel adjustment. Try steeping the entire thing in a poltice of cold liver oil for a week. That fixes everything!
Oh sweet Jenny. This has absolutely no business being hidden in the wee comments section of an soon-to-be ancient post. Do you mind if I make it into an official blog guest post? Will you send me a pic, or larger-sized version of your thumbnail to include in the post? I don't mind being upstaged. These were truly badass.
Customer: My car's performance is terrible. It's broken all the time. Please help?
Ray Peat: Your thermostat is broken. You need to put some desicated pig brain in the tank, drink a gallon of orange juice and ice cream every day and never, ever even look at poly unsaturated fat. It killed the dinosaurs.
Customer: OK, I'm doing that stuff, but my car is still not fixed.
Ray Peat: Try putting in 2 ounces of coffee every three hours in the tank. Not one ounce every two hours, or three ounces every hour! That will make the engine explode.
Customer: That is soooo random. But I will try it because I think you must have some mystical power and you are at least answering my emails.
Ray Peat: Oh, I forgot to tell you not to put any juice in the car at the same time you use meat. You can get too much iron that way.
Customer: Excuse me sir you are insane.
Actually, scratch the photo. That one will work.
Oh God, they keep coming. I feel like this is an early birthday gift or something. It's as if these have descended from the heavens.
Sure! I'd like to correct some typos, so I'll send you an email with the edited version.
I'll also attach the pic…
It's up to you. I was planning on doing it if you didn't. I hope to post it Wednesday or shortly thereafter. Thanks again Nippa. You numba wan!