In our home, the stairs to the second floor rise on one wall of my son's bedroom, and the hall to my bedroom follows another. So especially when he's near the beginning or end of his slumber, I try to walk lightly.

When I was young (though much older than he is now), I had a different reason to step quietly on stairs at night: Typically, I was en route to or from an illicit trip to the kitchen, seeking to eat in secret what I knew I'd be faulted for if my parents knew.

I reach perhaps my greatest convergence of outlook with author Barbara Kingsolver in this latest excerpt from her 2007 book "Animal Vegetable Miracle," to the point of wanting to effect that quizzical look puppies evince when they see something that truly flummoxes them:

Here's another excerpt from Barbara Kingsolver's 2007 book, "Animal Vegetable Miracle."

Grocery money is an odd sticking point for U.S. citizens, who on average spend a lower proportion o our income on food than people in any other country, or any heretofore in history. In our daily fare, even in school lunches, we broadly justify consumption of tallow-fried animal pulp on the grounds that it's cheaper than whole grains, fresh vegetables, hormone-free dairy, and such. Whether on school boards or in families, budget keepers may be aware of the health tradeoff but still feel compelled to economize on food — in a manner that would be utterly unacceptable if the health risk involved an unsafe family vehicle or a plume of benzene running through a school basement. It's interesting that penny-pinching is an accepted defense for toxic food habits, when frugality so rarely rules other consumer domains. [Page 115]

As a compulsive eater and food addict in recovery for a very long time, these issues are mine in degrees greater than the general population, even if you'd think that my experience shoulda learned me better by now. Good nutrition and healthy ingredients are bywords not only of my personal health but of my professional standing, but I still bee-line for the reduced-price cart at my farm stand.

I have not read it yet because it's just out, but I feel I can recommend Nancy Appleton's new book, "Killer Colas, The Hard Truth About Soft Drinks," on the strength of her earlier work, including her 1988 book, "Lick the Sugar Habit," and

I saved a portion of the survey I wrote about previously because it touches on a subject I've been slow in approaching: Is government intervention the best way to reduce the alarming level of obesity in America?

Via Bettina Elias Siegel at The Lunch Tray, (a great site, btw) I saw this compendium of trenchermania: 83 American eateries that challenge customers with absurd mountains of food, offering not only to give it to them for free (or nearly), but to give them merchandise and to venerate them on walls of fame, if they can down the platters within a specified tim

It is very easy to get caught up in the excitement of being seen, especially by an entity with the broad reach of a national television network, but it helps me to get back, as quickly as possible, to the real issue, which is food addiction.

The core of my message, in "Fat Boy Thin Man" and on this blog, is that food addiction is real and that both for individuals and for all of us collectively, important changes will necessarily follow once we understand.

I now have a set of videos that I hope will be another avenue to spread word of "Fat Boy Thin Man" and the ideas contained therein. A couple of them are readings from the book, but this one is the centerpiece:

This is about a year old, and breaks little ground, but it's still wholly apt and valid.

Thanks to mentalfloss.com and to StumbleUpon.

Part of what drives my "food addiction is real" mission is the need/want to be smarter than everyone else. (No, I'm not proud of it, but it is true.) So why, then, do I get so much pleasure when I hear or see other voices saying essentially the same things that I am? It should ruin it, but doesn't.