John's Final Thought

This whole master cleanse nonsense if finally over. At first, I was curious and interested in the whole thing, but by the end I was so glad it was over. I've reached the conclusion that the whole thing was defintely not healthy. I didn't really feel all that much better, although I definitely lost weight. That's cool, but I think I lost too much weight, too quickly. Don't get me wrong, I don't look like a famine victim, but I just don't think it's healthy to not eat solid foods for an entire week. You all probably agree.

Either way, I don't really regret doing it, I just wouldn't do it again. There were some positive aspects, like realizing how much junk we eat on a regular basis (a lot!). So maybe I'll eat a little healthier because of this, and that would be a good thing.

When I finally ate on Friday night, the plan was to just have a salad or something like that and take it easy. Well, that didn't happen, in no small part because of a little peer pressure from Aidan and Max. Instead, I ended up eating a few chicken wings, a burger (turkey, not beef), mashed potatoes, too many of Meghan's fries and a chicken strip. Surprisingly I didn't feel all that bad after stuffing my face, although I didn't feel great either. This morning I do feel great and am really excited I can eat breakfast. I think I'll make eggs and toast.

Final verdict: don't do the master cleanse, just eat healthy on a regular basis and you'll feel a lot better about yourself.

Note: I'll post an after picture with Elissa as soon as I see her and take the damn picture.

Day 3 is the hardest

Today is defintely the hardest. It kidna goes in and out with how bad it is, but I've definitely been hungry all day. Maybe that's because I haven't eaten solid food in so long (although, as it turns out, there are a lot of calories in maple syrup). Somebody had a McDonalds hamburger in the edit room today and I almost lost it. I don't even like McDonalds that much!

I'm also definitely losing weight (well duh!). I was wearing one of my larger pair of pants today and I could barely keep them up. I think I'm totally going to American Apparel and buying some hipster clothes now that I'm skinny. Where did I put that v-neck t-shirt?

As cool as it is I've lost a few pounds, it's not really the kind of weight loss that feels good. It just kinda feels empty, like, well, I'm not eating. You know how after a week of really good work outs and you fell really fit? Well this isn't the same thing. Is this just man-o-rexia that's disguised as having some health benefits? So many questions. Good or bad, two days and change left.

Food takes a lot of time.

I never realized how much time I spent eating until I stopped eating. Think about it, 15 or 20 minutes in the morning pouring a bowl of cereal, plus the time you spend cause you sit down in front of the TV while you're eating it and get sucked in to one more segment of Cops reruns. Maybe 45 minutes or an hour at lunch, depending if you go out. If you come home and make dinner, that could be another hour between prep time and eating. Maybe 15 minutes to make a peanut butter sandwich while you're watching Letterman, if you're bad about eating late at night like I am. I mean we're talking about two and a half hours a day eating or making food. That's a lot! That's enough time for me to, I don't know, drive to Bend or watch or movie or read a book.

Now I'm saying this is wasted time, I just think it's a curious point. I just got home from work, and during this time I'd normally make some dinner, I'm kinda at a loss for what to do. I guess blogging is a good use of time, right?

As far as the fast goes, it was pretty easy today cause work was incredibly busy/incredibly stressful. I didn't even finish an entire nalgene bottle of the lemonade. I'm kinda hungry now (my stomach just grumbled as I wrote that line), but not unbearably. I still really want a spinach salad, but I want it loaded with cheese and bacon and walnuts and all that good stuff that negates the health benefits of the spinach. Still, I'm surprised I have no serious hunger pains to report.

24 hours and no solid food

I have to admit I'm surprised I never really felt all that hungry today. Yeah I can tell right now I haven't had any food all day, but I'm not having any hunger pains or anything like that. It's just kinda a feeling.

At the same time I'm kinda wondering why I'm even doing this whole thing. Is it to be more healthy? Lose weight? See what this whole thing is all about? I'm not really sure. I'm positive that I'll lose weight doing it, but I'm equally positive it will come right back once I start eating regular again. I have been thinking it will be a good reason to start eating healthier when the "cleanse" is over. In fact of the foods I've been "craving," many have been healthy foods. Like I really want a spinach salad and grilled asparagus. Pretty good, right? I've also craved a giant hamburger and grilled cheese. (It's important to note the cravings I've had today aren't like normal hunger, it's more a passing thing where I think, man, I really want a hamburger, then it's gone.)

I'm not sure I'm sold on the fact that my body will "detox" because of this whole thing. Maybe it's all just a mental thing, like proving you can actually go 5 days or 7 days or, for some people, 40 days without food. I don't know, but maybe I'll find out.

Side note, check out Joel Klein's article in Time about doing the master cleanse. It's a pretty funny read.

Other side note, the maintenance guy today came and fixed my toilet. Probably, uh, well lets just say that's a good thing.

So far so good

So far I'm hour 18 of not eating solid foods and feeling fine. I'm a little hungry, but really no major cravings to report. I got a little lightheaded in the afternoon, but nothing too terrible. I'm also almost out of my magic lemonade for the day, so tomorrow I'll make a bigger batch.

Dangerous?

So the questions have been raised is this whole detox thing dangerous? I definitely had that same worry when I agreed to do this, so I did the most scientific thing I could think of and consulted google. I found surprisingly little that said it was explicity dangerous, although many doctors doubt its effectiveness or usefullness. A lot of what I read said the body is perfectly good at detoxing itself without the help of some bizarre diet. I also read that this may just have the placebo affect, and one nutritionist said it may be useful only in getting people to think about healthier eating and living.

All I know so far is the salt water tastes like ass.

The master cleanse

So, I don't know exactly what I'm getting myself into, but for the 300 billionth time in history, a girl has talked a guy into doing something crazy. This time the craziness involves me not eating any solid foods for at least 5 days on a regiment known as the master cleanse. Thanks, Elissa.

The idea is to clean out all the evil toxins in my body, toxins that come from delicious things like beer and french fries and peanut butter. For sustanance, all I will be drinking is a mixture of fresh lemon juice, grade b maple syrup, cayenne pepper and water. Lots of water.

Credible celebrity endorsers like Beyonce and Jared Leto say they've lost weight on this diet, but really I don't think it's so much about losing weight, as it is about cleaning out your body. Eric's dad did this, and said he felt great when it's all over. Apparently you're only hungry for like a day, then you get this rush of energy and are supposed to feel amazing. This detox is also known as the lemonade diet, although I have serious problems with this name, because my lemonade has never before had maple syrup in it.

Now in fairness, Elissa and I made our first batch of this magic liquid this evening, and it's not all that bad tasting. It might even be considered good, although it's not replacing real lemonade any time soon. I'm assuming the maple syrup and lemon juice provide some type of good sugars so you don't die and the apparently the cayenne pepper acts as a catalyst in the detox department. If you want to know this science behind this fantastic mess, the Wikipedia page has a fairly decent explanation.

Part of the process is also taking a salt water flush every morning, and drinking something called "laxative tea" in the evening. I understand this is necessary because without it, the digestive system would stop making bowel movements with the lack of solid intake.

My goal is to blog my way through this experience, so check back here for updates. We decided to take a "before" picture, and see if we look any different at the end. Notice the "before" pic is on a cell phone, in bad clothes and taken in the harsh lighting of the grocery store. The end picture will be an airbrushed glamour shot taken by David LaChapelle, so of course we'll look more beautiful.

Look forward to sharing more in the coming days!

Party at the Moon Tower!

The party 'til the 6 am streak continued right through the weekend. I officially partied until at least that late four days this week - Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. And every one of those nights was invite-only parties with open bars. What the fuck.

We really capped off the last night in the grandest of styles. After Taylor and I met the manager for the Cool Kids on Friday night at the Blender party, the guy kept trying to woo Taylor because of his advertising connections. Part of that wooing was getting us 15 passes for the Red Bull/Facebook Moon Tower party Saturday night. Yes, 15 passes. We rolled up on the list Taylor Grimes +15. Insane.

Do the math: 15 Oregon/UT Law School kids roll up on a party with free drinks until 5:30 am (too many of them vodka Red Bulls.) This is what you get. Complete debauchery.

The party wasn't all that full before the Cool Kids came on, so we were able to get up against the front rail. Our group we definitely the loudest in the front, and it was cool cause the guys recognized it. Eric's friend Ben has an encyclopedic memory and was throwing up all kinds of Cool Kids knowledge up on stage, which made for some great looks when the band would ask a question to the crowd and this nerdy looking white kid threw back all the answers. The best came though when they pulled out a Chicken Little pinata and picked Eric's friend Belle to come up and break it. They glanced right by Matt and I volunteering, but made the right decision with her. She is a gorgeous girl, we are ugly dudes, plain and simple.

The rest of the night saw more crazy acts, including an un-billed performance by Talib Kweli (although the Cool Kids manager had told us he was playing). Actually it's not that Talib wasn't on the bill, but he was playing with Idle Warship, his new group with Philly singer Res. You might know her from the song "Where do We Go" off Quality.

The rest of the night also saw a lot more Red Bull vodkas. A lot more. Like really, a lot more.

The last rock star thing we did before leaving for the night was pretend we were rockstars. I don't think I've blogged about it yet, but Eric, Taylor and I had a mission this week to invent a fake indie band and try to create viral buzz and hype without ever playing a note of music (watch out for the MySpace music page coming soon.) So let me officially announce the creation of Liquor Store Holdup, the greatest band in the game today. We're basically a indie/pop/hip hop/swing/jazz/big band fusion group. We basically kick ass.

The best part is people believe we are a band. Taylor and I and a few others were trying to get out through the back of the party, but there was a security guard blocking the gate. He told us the area in the back was an artist lounge area with a bonfire, bar and couches. We told him we were Liquor Store Holdup. He let us in the lounge. As Taylor said, "I am a-list." My ego is huge.

A few of the bands we saw at the party:

Idle Warship


Crystal Castles


Team Facelift. Hilarious, wish I would have seen more of their show. They have a guy who wore a onesie and was named Fat Jew. And I quote from him, "I bet you never expected to see a white rapper in a onesie tonight?"


DJ Z Trip

White people love the Cool Kids

Sometimes when you think it can't get any better, it does. If you've read the previous post, it is clear that Friday night wasn't going to top Thursday night kickin' it with Playmates, but it still held its own.

Every afternoon seems to be filled with day parties, which seem to be almost always free shows sponsored by this company or magazine or radio station or whatever. Can I just say that I love the phrase "day party?" I don't know if this is a phrase that has always been around and I'm just catching on, but I love how people walk around this place saying things like "which day party did you catch" or "who played at that day party?" I don't know why this amuses me so much, but it does. Day party. It's like a night party where somebody invited the sun. We had VIP to a Village Voice day party. The only band we saw was The Black Keys, and even then it was only like two songs. I met this cool guy from the Portland Mercury.

In the afternoon we checked out Dizzee Rascal. As always, Dizzee did not disappoint. This show he did almost all songs from his new album, which drops next month.

Since most of the boys flew in at various times Friday night, we had quite the trick getting people from the airport. The solution was Eric stay and get them and play beer die, and Taylor and I went to the Blender party.

What we didn't know was the Blender party was deep out in the hood. Because of complicated arrangements I won't bore you with, I had to ride my own cab out there after Grimes. When I told both the cabbie and later Eric the address, they looked at me like I was crazy. I'll go lots of places for free booze, including the Austin hood.

The party layout wasn't as poppin' as some others, but the music was amazing. The first band we saw was Drive A. The lead singer could wail as good as anybody I've heard in a long time and get this, he is only 14 years old. In fact, the oldest dude in the band is 17. Check out their website and get a look. If you just heard them you would never know, until you heard the kid talk when he wasn't singing. Then he sounds like a little kid, because he is.

After the next crappy show, The Cool Kids came on. Some of you might know these guys, they were in a Rhapsody commercial and are getting pretty big. If you don't know them, consider yourself lucky I just told you about them, because they rock. (that sounded really pompous, huh?) Taylor actually met one of their managers in the bathroom talking about his STL hat, and he described them as a black Beastie Boys.

The manager is super into Taylor because of his ad connections, so tonight we're seeing them again at the Facebook/Red Bull Moon Tower party. This party is actually deeper out in the hood than last nights. Oh yeah, we're going to see Talib Kweli. That blows my mind I can watch one of my favorite rappers and drink free booze. Super cool. Look for pics of all of it on Facebook soon.

Check out the Cool Kids:

Rocking the Rabbit

You hear stories and see TV shows about Playboy parties and how legendary they are and this and that. Sometimes you think 'yeah, that looks awesome' or maybe 'how over-hyped,' but it's hard to tell. Well, if you're with Taylor and Eric at SXSW, then I can with complete certainty say Playboy parties are one of the greatest things on the planet. Free booze, free food, amazingly gorgeous women, cool dudes, great music, ends at 5:30 in the morning. Sounds like my kind of place.

The night started with the line "I've never felt so cool in my life," a phrase that followed us being allowed to bypasspast the growing line. Being an invite-only party, everyone there was a pretty well-connected person, or at least knew someone who is well-connected. These are not the kind of people who like standing in line, so naturally everyone was upset there was a long line, even though we all had names on the list. Well Grimes called up his rep to complain, and she told us to come to the front. I was skeptical the plan would work because all the event planners kept saying "everybody stands in line, no matter what." But being the baller he is, we were whisked right by the line and brought into the still empty party. Pretty cool.

Inside the warehouse were several hosted bars, a big set up to play Guitar Hero, a lounge area with seats and Playboy bunny pillows and then the concert area. We scoped it out, got some red bull vodkas (or rather "bunny bull" and vodka, because it was Playboy brand energy drink) and chilled. Then the playmates showed up.

These weren't just your run of the mill bunnies, these were legit Playboy Playmates, as in Miss March 2008 and so on. And they were gorgeous. Beyond gorgeous. Also pretty cool to talk to, that's if you weren't scared by the secret service-esqe security guards who followed them around.

Being Rock the Rabbit, the music was pretty insane, especially the first band called The Heavy. These brits were fucking amazing. Check out their video I posted down at the bottom. Super fun to rock out to when you're standing next to a Playmate.

Moby was also amazing. The light show was blinding, the music deafening and I was pretty drunk, so you can imagine. Eric and Taylor even went up on stage with him (they were looking for me, and thought I might be up there I guess).

Carson Daly was there. Eric was talking with him when I walked up an introduced myself. Being pretty tipsy, I told him I had seen him back in the day on TRL when I was in NYC one time and that I thought he was a tool back then, but now his show is really cool. He told me he agreed that he's a lot happier now, although he might have been appeasing me. I'm not sure. I might have pissed him off. I did tell him he used to be a tool. Would you be pissed?

All told, easily the best party I've ever been to. No questions asked.


The Heavy:

Taking it easy, or not

Well, yesterday was our "take it easy" day as we rested up for today. Taking it easy consists of sitting outside at the bar Esquire mag called the best bar in America and drinking about 8 rounds of bud light then going to play shuffleboard. Well also stumbled upon these lovely ladies hawking, of all things, eyedrops. Eric fell in love. He won't stop talking about them. They are pretty hot, though, so I'm ok with it.

Today the entire pardigm shifts. I'm a little scared. By the time the day is over I might also be scarred. NPR Music party all day (althogh with no VIP passes, which I'm a little mad about) featuring Vampire Weekend, aka my new favorite band. In fact all you people at home can watch along, cause NPR is streaming the show online! Very cool, I think. Vampire Weekend really kicks ass. They're a group of dudes from New York who play rock music, but they use all kinds of crazy rhythyms from all over the world. It's a trip and reallly cool. Check them out.

NPR is child's play comapred to Playboy. Eric, Taylor and I are now officially confirmed on the list for the Playboy Rock the Rabbit party tonight, and the main musical act will be Moby spinning a special dance DJ set. Moby, dancing, playmates like her. I'll take it.

Maybe the NPR people will be at Playboy tonight, too? Terri Gross interviewing playmates, Andrew Theen? Who knows.

Welcome to Austin

Ahh, where to begin? I'm 20 hours deep into Texas and what a trip it's been so far. As any of the scores of you who received semi-coherent text messages from me last night can attest, I got a teeny bit drunk, but really, it wasn't my fault. Blame the Independent Film Channel because their awesome party had an open top-shelf bar (once again, many of you probably heard this in text messages last night). Being the stud that he is, Grimes hooked us up with wristbands to the IFC party. Yo La Tengo and My Morning Jacket were playing and tore it up. I hadn't really heard either band before, but I'll be hitting them up on iTunes as soon as I get home.

Besides the show, the Austin experience so far has been pretty typical, hitting the must-see spots. BBQ lunch at Stubbs (great sausage sandwich), drinks on Sixth Street (super cool billiards club) and drunken Mexican food at 2 a.m. (I have a feeling this will happen a lot). Then again, there is nothing typical about a town where 1,600 bands all descend at the same time. Take seeing Michael Stipe walking down the street. Of course being the TV producer I am, I saw a crew fliming something and was paying more attention to the actually taping when Eric yelled out "that's Michael Stipe!!! Pretty cool.

Looking on to the future, there are great things again. Dizzee Rascal later this week, Talib Kweli and Ice Cube possibly with VIP pass on Saturday. My new fave band Vampire Weekend tomorrow.

But the creme de la creme will certainly come on Thursday when we go to the party that seems to be the talk of the town, the Playboy Rock the Rabbit party. Grimes (the man, the legend) has our names on the list for the invite-only fete where Eric will hit on several girls that look like this. Yes, Miss May 2007 is scheduled to show up. No word yet on if PMOY and OSU Beaver Sara Jean Underwood will show up. If she does I will hit on her. Deanna Brooks(google her)is also supposed to be there. She is 33, so that will take my cougar hunt to a whole new level. Way better than those chicks at Rogue, eh Laura? Stay tuned.

A1A Beachfront Avenue - Life on South Beach

"Yo so I continued to A1A Beachfront Avenue
Girls were hot wearing less than bikinis
Rockman lovers driving Lamborghinis "
-Vanilla Ice

Recovering from the weekend's hangover of all hangovers, we decided a nice, relaxing evening on South Beach was in order. What Steve and I didn't realize is there are no relaxing evenings in South Beach, no matter how much you want to have one.

While eating at possibly the worst Italian restaurant on Lincoln Ave we saw the following things, in no particular order:

No fewer than 8 full real-life models: These bitches are freakishly tall and amazingly skinny in person. You now how they say the camera adds ten pounds? Well think how skinny they still look.

A robbery in progress with police pursuit: It wouldn't be South Beach I'm told without some dude trying to steal a backpack. We were eating at the earlier mentioned terrible restaurant when I heard the crash of broken glass and saw this dude come flying by as he knocked over a menu board. As he ran by our table, his shoe somehow came flying off and the cops and security guards on bikes were in hot pursuit. We overheard a security guard saying they later caught the thief. But the real lesson I learned is that if you're stealing something in a crowded tourist trap, make sure your kicks are properly laced.

Quasi-Celebrities: There were two cameras, three sound guys and two producer-looking people following around a group of black guys and one white guy. That's right, we saw the cast of "Making the Band." They were hanging out why around where we were eating for a good 20 or 30 minutes and the whole thing was about as ridiculous as you would imagine. If only Diddy were there.

Various forms of wheeled freaks: It started with a guy riding a bike with a live rooster sitting on the handlebar and ended with a complete freak-a-zoid in a pink unitard dancing around a pole on a unicycle.

Pub crawl means you start drinking at noon

Unfortunately I couldn't post yesterday because I started drinking at noon, and I just don't think that would have worked very well. We were locked in fierce pub crawl competition, Taylor and Steve's team versus the way better team with Lood and I on it. After the pub crawl, I'm beginning to wonder how anybody lives in this town and doesn't just curl up at die after about two weeks. I'm not even five days in and I feel like I'm about to just keel over.

Saturday is a blur from about 1:30 p.m. on, which is around the time I drank a margarita with a shot of tequila on the side. Even though my pub crawl team, Team Awesome, cheated repeatedly in our attempt to win the scavenger hunt and drink challenge, other teams cheated way more and ended up beating us. Oh well, at least we got drunk.

Lood, God bless his little heart, got hit especially hard by the hurricane of alcohol. The poor guy just got off a red eye, headed basically straight to the bar, hadn't slept barely at all and hadn't had a proper meal since noon on Friday. Needless to say, homeboy was pretty much destroyed by the time we made it to our last bar, which was of course Hooters. (FYI, Hooters girls in Miami are broke as hell.)

Now it's almost four pm and we're finally getting up and moving, and we're going to head down to South Beach and eat some cuban food. Unfortunately the weather kinda crapped out on us all week, but it's still 80 degrees, so I can't complain.


Team Awesome rockin' the pub crawl.

Team Ditch, aka Team Bitch, working on losing in the most glorious fashion. They are totally shitcanned by this point.

Hangin' in the Grove

When you start a night in a bar where the main entertainment is organized games of beer pong, odds are good you will get thoroughly wasted. Last night proved that theory. Grimes and I won our first game against two guys who supposedly play there quite a bit, and from there on out, things begin to get more and more blurry. Eventually we moved on to a place called Sandbar, which is one of the most popular bars in Coconut Grove. We were definitely men on a mission, trying to recruit some ladies for Saturday's pool party.

There was one moment about a half hour into our time at Sandbar that the alcohol took over the night. By our estimation, we made strong moves to hit on at least ten girls, with varying degrees of success. At one point, I remember dancing with a girl, trying to talk to her. Things seemed like they were going really really well, then she asked a question (couldn't tell you what it was). I remember answering, but all I heard in my head was a jumble of unintelligible words. Whatever I said, her response was giving me the most awful look I can imagine right before she stormed away. I'm assuming it was something quite offensive. Oops.

Still, overall we pulled three numbers of cute girls, including one on a business card from the waitress that says her title at the bar is "token black girl." When we finally left at 3:30, I don't really remember much except that I was totally amazed I could get a to go beer for the way home. It was pretty cool. The scary thing is by all accounts tonight will be more ridiculous and saturday will be the king of them all.

UPDATE: After a little checking on one of the numbers which was recorded by a lady in the iPhone, it turns out there are 11 digits in it. Now we have two theories, one that I was given a fake number, or two that she typed it in wrong cause the iPhone is hard as hell to use while wasted. I am believing the second theory, and I think the body of evidence speaks for itself.

These feet have touched the mighty Atlantic

We spent the afternoon getting lost on Miami beach. It was kinda cloud, but it was still 85 degrees, so how can I really complain. In a few minute we're going out here in Coconut Grove with a bunch of the local folks. Should be a good time.

Thought I'd share a picture:

Frequent Flying

So the rumors have been confirmed, and our dear friend Kris Lood is flying his ass to Miami this weekend. Working in conjunction with good buddy William Shatner and the fine folks at Priceline.com, he has procured a ridiculously cheap last minute flight. He will be joining us just in time for the Coconut Grove Pub Crawl, which starts at noon and will be followed by a pool party at the Taylor/Chuka/David estate. Why am I telling you these seemingly mundane details, you ask? Well because it's not to late for you too to procure said ridiculously cheap airfare and make your way south as well. C'mon down.

Bienvenidos

I've been in miami for less than 12 hours, but this city is making quite an impression. First of all, all cliches and preconceived notions aside, the women in this town are as far as I can tell, amazingly gorgeous by rule. As I said last night, in a few hours I saw 34 of the 39 most beautiful women I've ever seen, and seven of those came in the last three minutes leaving the bar. Grimes says with a straight face we haven't even seen the tip of the iceberg.

Oh yeah, there is no closing times or last calls for drinks. Steve was thrown off when one bar rang a bell, so he ran up and ordered drinks real quick, only to learn the bell was signaling a big tip. It was 3 am on a wednesday and the bars were relatively full, and yes, with scores of beautiful women in various states of dress.

Today calls for getting acclimated to Miami, scoping the neighborhood, etc. Rumor has it Kris Lood can't resist and made a last minute purchase to come down this weekend. That could get ridiculous.

Wow.

A lot of TV reporters have done tough stories. Kids dying, tragedy, etc. But this might be one of the toughest stories I've ever hear of to do. Imagine reporting live in front of a burning house in San Diego County ... your own burning house. That's what this reporter at KFMB had to do. Check it out:



That's just insane, the fact he was able to even do this. That takes some serious balls. Good for him for doing this report, although I wouldn't have blamed him one bit if he decided not to do this live shot. I just hope it was his idea, not some gung-ho producer. We can get that way sometimes.