2002-10-11 - 11:50 p.m.

Bloodthirsty Judges?

I'm not sure I meant for the last entry to sound as desperate as all that. From my reading of the Protein Power book, my main problem is that I'm not eating enough. For my height and weight I'm supposed to have at least 40 grams of protein at each meal, and that's not a tiny amount. For example, for breakfast I routinely have three eggs, which feels like a lot, but according to the book in order to get the right amount of protein I'd have to eat SIX eggs for breakfast. That's a lot!

To look at it another way, I'm looking at the back of this package of Pemmican brand beef jerky. This is a 4 ounce bag, and it cost over $5.00, but according to the information on the back there's only 52 grams of protein in the whole thing! You'd have to eat almost the whole thing to get enough protein for just one meal.

I really didn't think that I could be eating too little (considering my track record) but that seems to be the case. Probably the reason I'm not losing more weight is that I'm making some dubious food choices, i.e.: I've been eating a lot of nuts, which are a protein source but a very high-fat one.

Anyway, the 4th version of the Diaryland Survivor is now underway, and the voting for the first immunity challenge just finished. The winner with, 8 (!!) votes was Loudwoman. Congratulations!

It's really not hard to figure out why she won, and by such an overwhelming majority. She's the only one who didn't just write a rather straightforward narrative of the first day on Survivor Island, instead she wrote haikus for each of the contestants. Yes, creativity counts, but it can boomerang on you. It this case, it was like a breath of fresh air.

Right now there is something of a mini-controversy about how the contestants think the judges are a bunch of bloodthirsty bastards, waiting to see the contestants attack each other. I don't really think that's true, I just think that the judges have seen DL-Survivor from the inside, and they know that things can turn mean when people actually start getting voted off. It's just human nature. When people's feelings get hurt, they lash out.

Right now the contestants seem to be trying their utmost to be nice avoid conflict with each other, even to the point of producing a "sportsmanship pledge" for everyone to follow. Again, this is laudable, but futile in my opinion. In fact, I think this plague of niceness may have had the effect of somewhat sapping the vitality of the immunity challenges. After all, when you main aim is not to ruffle any feathers, what you produce may come out rather bland. However, several of the ICs showed that you could be entertaining without resorting to unkindness.

Well, we shall see how this round plays out. It would be pleasant if we could get through a round without controversy, but I find myself doubting it will happen. The cynic in me thinks that while the contestants are talking about forbidding alliances, they are making secret deals behind each others backs. Aren't I awful?