In my prime, I approached all you can eat buffets the way Edmund Hillary approached Everest, and my plate was piled nearly as high as that mountain. I'd show up at a Sizzler during off-peak hours, when the real pros are loading their trays, and go to work creating an epic bloat. Age and the glucose monitor plugged into the back of my arm have stifled my devotion to devouring. While I've lost my appetite for the physical toll of over-eating, like a professional athlete who longs for one more season on the field, I still have the latent desire to overgorge. For millions of Americans, the actual desire to eat, specifically to eat junk food, has been nearly erased. The proliferation of GLP-1 drugs is making people feel fuller faster, and is seemingly driving away cravings for the products big food has spent decades training us to crave. Let's take a stroll through the supermarket with a guy who used to suffer from a sugar addiction. "He took us straight past the Doritos and the Hostess HoHos, without a side glance at the Oreos or the Cheetos. We rushed past the Pop-Tarts and the Hershey’s Kisses, the Lucky Charms and the Lay’s — they all barely registered. Clumsily, close on his heels, Auerbach and I stumbled right into what has become, under the influence of the revolutionary new diet drug, Taylor’s happy place: the produce section." With seven million people already on these drugs (and one assumes they were among the heaviest consumers of the foods they now avoid), you can bet food companies are taking notice. And if Ozempic users I know are any indication, the alcohol industry should be worried, too. Tomas Weber in NYT Mag (Gift Article): Will Ozempic Crush the Junk-Food Business? "Patients on GLP-1 drugs have reported losing interest in ultraprocessed foods, products that are made with ingredients you wouldn’t find in an ordinary kitchen: colorings, bleaching agents, artificial sweeteners and modified starches." (So what does that leave? Celery?) 2We're Hosed"A 135-mile internet link connecting Sweden’s Gotland Island and Lithuania stopped working on Sunday morning, and a similar 700-mile-long cable linking Finland and Germany ceased to operate the following night." Russia Suspected as Baltic Undersea Cables Cut in Apparent Sabotage. 3Adjusting Your AmplitudeWhat if you could catch the wave of reusable energy without suffering any of the political undertow? Well, if that's your goal, surf's up. WaPo (Gift Article): This seaside town will power thousands of homes with waves. "Home to fishing operators and researchers, Newport attracts tourists and retirees with its famous aquarium, sprawling beaches and noisy sea lions. If you ask anyone at the lively bayfront about a wave energy project, they probably don’t know much about it. And yet right off the coast, a $100 million effort with funding from the Energy Department aims to convert the power of waves into energy, and help catch up to Europe in developing this new technology. The buoy-like contraptions, located several miles offshore, will deliver up to 20 megawatts of energy — enough to power thousands of homes and businesses." Gnarly. 4The Last Straw"In 2009, Tropicana replaced its familiar logo, an orange with a straw poking out, with a minimalist design featuring a glass of orange juice. The backlash was swift ... Tropicana’s sales dropped 20% following the redesign, sinking by $30 million." So, obviously Tropicana learned its lesson and will never change the logo again. But they just changed their bottle. Customers are not pleased. Orange you glad you're not not in the orange juice business? 5Extra, ExtraAudities and Curiosities: In the media pool where I swim, the top story this week is the decision by the Morning Joe team to meet with Trump at Mar-a-Lago. According to Brian Stelter, one of the reasons they made the pilgrimage was because "Scarborough and Brzezinski were credibly concerned that they could face governmental and legal harassment from the incoming Trump administration." (If that concern is driving journalistic behavior, it's a bad sign for the industry and the country.) Yes, of course I’m on BlueSky! Follow me! I need, I need.
6Bottom of the News"A YouTube baking influencer made her late father the star of the first episode of her new podcast by smoking cannabis grown in a pot of his ashes." (I tried this but instead of getting high, I got really disappointed in myself for not living up to my potential.)
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