Feast or Fumble

Thirty five years ago on this day, the person who would forever send my heart into a pitter-patter was born. Guys, Justin Timberlake is real special. He’s the closest thing that anyone will ever come to perfection and no one will ever convince me otherwise. So to celebrate I’ve compiled an oral history of my delusional pseudo-relationship with Justin.

AND just so we’re all clear—this is meant to be tongue and cheek. I am crazy, but I’m not that crazy.

1. On my 14^th birthday, my friends bought me ‘NSync’s self-titled debut album. My life has NEVER been the same.
2. At some point a friend of mine proclaimed her love for Justin Timberlake. I being forever passive told her that I was in love with JC Chasez to thwart off any potential confrontation. This is neither the first nor the last lie I’ll ever tell in the name of love.
3. I bought the ‘NSync ‘N the Mix DVD with my allowance and proceeded to watch it multiple times on the daily. I was so inspired by its contents that my friends and I waited for 5 hours outside of the Wherehouse so we could get tickets to see Justin, err I mean ‘NSync in the flesh. The entire time we were sweating thinking they’d end up passing wrist bands and we’d lose our place at the front of the line. We got floor seats. SCORE!
4. I can’t remember what happened, but my friend Brent somehow convinced me to switch my floor seats at the Arrowhead Pond to nose bleeds at the Forum. My mom wouldn’t let me ride from Montclair to Inglewood with a 16-year-old driver (imagine that), so she drove me. I met my friends there and waited outside the venue for what seemed to be an eternity. Justin was amazing on stage. After the show, my friends ditched me since my mom took forever picking me up. I was standing on the corner of Manchester and Kareem Ct. waiting for my mom until well past 11 pm. The cop that was nice enough to wait with me was getting nervous he’d have to take me to the station—I on the other hand was in the same building as Justin Timberlake and didn’t have a care in the world because JUSTIN IS AMAZING.
5. The span between ‘NSync’s first and second album, coupled with the fact that my mom refused to pay for cable, AKA MTV, cause feelings of high anxiety because I couldn’t see Justin on a consistent basis. So I called Comcast and set up an appointment. The cable guy came and almost left without installing my life-line to Justin because I was underage and couldn’t sign a contract on my own. I pleaded with him and said that I’d spent the whole summer cleaning vomit and running the Ferris wheel at Family Fun Center so I could see Justin Timberlake on Total Request Live. He installed it on the condition that I never tell anyone AND well I’m sorry sir, but the truth will set you free.
6. My mom never wanted to pay for cable, but she did pay a guy to photo-shop me in a picture standing next to Justin. It was the best $12 she’s ever spent in my opinion.
7. Just prior to ‘NSync releasing their 2^nd studio album, No Strings Attached, I convinced my friend Lani to spend a small fortune on semi—oh who am I kidding—they were terrible seats to see ‘NSync at the Rose Bowl. That night the traffic was so terrible on the 210 that my mom dropped us off at the exit and told us to walk to the stadium. We must’ve walked 2-3 miles to get to our seats, but it didn’t matter because I WILL WALK TO THE END OF THE EARTH FOR JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE.
8. By this point his whole relationship with Britney Spears was made public. Was I heartbroken? Duh. Did I hate her? Duh. It was completely irrational hate, but I’m so sure I wasn’t the only one who used to draw mustaches and devil horns on Britney, right? RIGHT?!
9. My friend Brent was able to snag backstage passes to meet ‘NSync. I was so upset that he was going to meet Justin before me and I just couldn’t stand it. As fate would have it, Justin wasn’t feeling well and didn’t greet anyone prior to the show that night. Love you, Justin.
10. Remember when I said I had to lie about my true feelings for Justin because of a friend? Well after high school I never saw her again so my closeted feelings for Justin were out in the open and I stuck a poster of a shirt-less Justin over the bed post in my dorm. Swoon.
11. Lani was going to UCLA at the time and I found out that JC Chasez was going to be at the House of Blues in Hollywood, so I drove all the way from the OC to LA to see him on the off chance that Justin Timberlake would be there to support his buddy. He was not, but JC put on a great show anyways. If anyone knows what happened to him, please, do tell.
12. At the end of my freshman year of college we went and saw ‘NSync at the Arrowhead Pond and the whole breakup with Britney was so fresh, you could hear the pangs of pain as Justin sang “Gone.” Is it possible to be sad for someone and completely giddy at the same time? Yes, yes it is.
13. After releasing Justified, I bought tickets from a scalper so I could see Justin on tour with Christina Aguilera. She was good, but Justin was GREAT. It was the closest I’d ever been to him. During the show I saw his mom walk right past me and I’m pretty sure, but I’m not positive that she heard me say “GOD BLESS YOU FOR JUSTIN.”
14. In February of 2004, I suddenly had an interest in football because Justin Timberlake would be performing with Janet Jackson at half-time. We all know what happened and obviously Janet Jackson is to blame because Justin can do no wrong.
15. College wasn’t easy. I had a particularly tough time adjusting to being on my own. Let’s just say that “Let’s Take a Ride” got me through.
16. The time period between Justified and Future Sex/LoveSounds was kind of a lull. I blame Cameron Diaz.
17. I began working at the courthouse in the spring of 2006. As I was driving home one night, I randomly turned on 102.7 KIIS FM just as Valentine was announcing that Justin was going to be at the House of Blues in Anaheim promoting his new album. There’s no other explanation other than it was DESTINED. Except the tickets would go on sale while I was at work the next day. I literally had only been working there for three months at that point and my LG Chocolate phone didn’t have a data plan. You don’t need to know anything else other than I got my clammy hands on those tickets the next day.
18. My friend Leanne came with me to see Justin at the House of Blues. She got a little aggravated by all the screaming, pushing and shoving that was going on in the main room so she left me down there and went up to the balcony. All good. It’s always and will always be JUST ME AND JT when he’s on stage. No one else exists.
19. When Justin announced his stadium tour dates for Future Sex/LoveSounds you know I had to go. I went with my friend Alya and we got tickets on the floor. We were sooooo close to Justin that during the show he threw some of the contents from his water bottle on the crowd and as the droplets of Justin water/spit were flying on me all I could think was OMG I LOVE JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE.

20. The second time I saw the Future Sex/Love Show was at the Staples Center. There’s nothing else I really need to say about that other than at this point I’ve probably spent thousands and thousands of dollars on Justin and I regret NONE OF IT.
21. I was in the deepest of funks after the Lakers lost in the NBA finals to the Celtics. Then in July of 2008 Justin hosted the ESPYs AND OMG I LOVE HIM SO MUCH.
22. I was finally off probation in 2008, so I took a two-week trip to New York and naturally had to try Justin Timberlake’s restaurant, Southern Hospitality while I was there. I dragged my friends Judith and Erica, likely against their will, so I could have my fill of pulled pork and his grandma’s peach cobbler. AND YES I DRESSED UP BECAUSE WHAT IF HE HAD BEEN THERE??
23. That same summer I caught wind of the fact that Justin was going to be hosting a golf tournament in Vegas. You know how sometimes things just kind of fall into place? That’s exactly how this happened. All-access pass to the tournament: $250; one-week lodging in Vegas: paid for by my aunt (who’s awesome); money spent on gambling entertainment: nunya; SPENDING AND ENTIRE DAY WITHIN 20-FEET OF JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE WHILE HE PLAYED 18 HOLES OF GOLF: PRICELESS.
24. While we’re on the subject, I have to be honest. Justin was NOT HAPPY that his private golf session somehow morphed into a public viewing. After every hole, the flock of girls (and guys) seemed to expand and by the 18^th hole, he had a PGA-sized audience. At one point my stupid camera made that shutter noise and I’m pretty sure he gave me the stink eye, which pretty much shattered me, and I cringe a little every time I think of it. Maybe I shouldn’t have been so bold, BUT it wasn’t like I woke up one morning and decided that Justin was the best thing ever, this day was 10 years in the making! After he finally finished, he got bombarded with people asking him for pictures and autographs, myself included. At that point every passive bone in my body seized to exist and felt compelled to gently grab the upper part of his arm and asked him for a picture. So God help me, I don’t know what came over me. You know how your survival instinct kicks in at the face of death? Well if I hadn’t done something, I’m sure the regret would’ve killed me. In any case, I got my picture and as of October 13, 2008 I CAN NOW DIE IN PEACE.
25. That same week, Justin put on a charity concert with a bunch of his music friends. He performed with a few interesting people, most notably Adam Levine. It would mark the first time my two great musical loves would share the same stage—I don’t suppose they ever really knew that I had to split my love between them, but trust me JUSTIN ALWAYS GOT THE LION’S SHARE.
26. OH that was also the night I completely lost my sh!t when Lionel Richie came out to perform with Justin because HELLO its LIONEL RICHIE!!
27. During the interim between the 2^nd and 3^rd albums, Justin makes films and launches a clothing line with his BFF Trace Ayala. Highlights include: he shows his bare backside in Friends with Benefits and THAT IS ALL.
28. It took Justin another six years to release the 20/20 Experiment and a lot happened during that span. Most importantly, the Lakers were great and super relevant AND I know that fact has nothing to do with Justin except that after he tweeted something regarding the Lakers I responded back and he re-tweeted my tweet and added the words “HA” which can only mean one thing: JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE LOVES ME THINKS I’M HILARIOUS.
29. Do you ever get the feeling that something is going to happen, except you don’t know what it is and the anxiety of the unknown puts you in a funkity funk that you just can’t shake? Well that was my entire October of 2012. I didn’t know it until it happened, but that’s when Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel got married. I’ll say this, I don’t draw mustaches or devil horns on her face and I am generally, mostly, genuinely happy for him. But that took a long time and it goes back and forth and I can’t keep explaining myself without sounding crazy so I’m just going to stop.
30. The next show I went to was when Justin toured with Jay-Z and they came to the Rose Bowl. I’m not going to lie, it wasn’t as good as the previous tour and I’m solely basing this on the fact that the guy behind me kept hitting the back of my head as he continuously “put up the ROC.”
31. Justin Timberlake becomes minority owner of the Memphis Grizzlies and since the Lakers suck for the majority of 2013-present I suddenly have an interest in the Grizzlies.
32. On Justin’s 33^rd birthday, Alya and I go to Vegas to see Britney Spears. The entire show was on a track and she’s lost a step or two in choreography, but she took me back to 1999 and I had a great time. Please forgive me Britney!
33. I’m not going to brag or waive my government salary in your face, but I’ve reached a point where if I wanted to spend an insane amount of money on a ticket to see Justin super close I could, but budgeting is important if for no other reason than to support my Yogurtland addiction, so the last two times I’ve seen Justin in concert has been close, but not personal. And I’m ok with that.
34. Last April, everyone and their mom started posting links to the picture of baby Silas on my Facebook feed. I resisted seeing it because really I just couldn’t. Then I finally got over myself and clicked on the link. That baby is so damn cute, and YES tears started welling in my eyes. I didn’t cry uncontrollably or anything, or no wait I did never mind.
35. Justin Timberlake performs at the CMAs with Chris Stapleton. This marks the first time I’ve ever watched the CMAs. That is all—oh no wait, YOU’RE WELCOME COUNTRY MUSIC.

Say you make the conscious decision to eat at a buffet. You know what you’re in for. Aisles and aisles of gourmet eats right at your fingertips. You may not like prime rib, but it’s there, and damn it if you didn’t just pay $19.99 or whatever, you’re having prime rib. And ham, and chicken prepared every which way possibly imagined. Then you rummage through the side dishes. Potatoes, salad, dinner rolls, fruit, vegetables and the like. Should I even mention the dessert table? You get the idea.

It gets a little out of control in the end. You may not feel great about gorging, but you made the decision to go all-you-can-eat and you came, saw and conquered. Maybe it was a special occasion? Maybe you just ran a long race? Maybe this is your usual Saturday go-to, I’m not here to judge.

It’s not an everyday occurrence after all. Live and let live, right?

Say you get up in the morning and say to yourself, “today is the day, that I drink juice all day and detox.” Good for you! Once committed, it all starts out fairly innocent. For breakfast you drink a green concoction filled with kale, celery, apple juice and a plant-based protein for good measure. You chase that down with water a little later and then someone comes and tempts you with a carbohydrate, but you remain strong–until you’re about half-way  through your smoothie of berries and beets at lunch.

Will power is a muscle and you know what happens to muscles when they get strained. The more tension and stress placed upon it, the more likely it is to break down and after sustaining a liquid diet for seventy-five percent of the day, your will power is up against “likelihood of winning the power ball” type odds.

So you say one bite of a granola bar will not deter me from my liquid diet. Then one bite becomes the entire bar. One granola bar becomes a bite of a chicken strip. That bite turns into gorging on whatever remains of the strip and really, since the whole detox has gone to crap, why not just have a side of fries? You can start again tomorrow.

There’s always tomorrow.

Maybe you’re familiar with CJ Wilson. If not, here’s a brief description. Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim pitcher, idiosyncratic, married to one of those swimsuit models, overly obsessed with being left-handed and a generally so-so pitcher for the majority of his career.

Wilson has had his hey-day. His peak is likely behind him, but none of that matters in relation to what I’m about to say.

CJ Wilson’s greatest obstacle has always and will always be his own self.

As a starting pitcher for the Angels, Wilson has not been either particularly stellar or terrible. However, when he gets into trouble by way of walked batters, hittable pitches and quick homeruns he completely loses his composure and one hit snowballs into a 4-run inning for the opposing team.

I’ll spew out some stats in a second, but you can use a simple eye test to see what’s going on. He gets down in a pitch count and instead of just relying on the fundamentals of pitching mechanics or muscle memory, he over-thinks it—loses control and just mentally checks out.

In 2014, Wilson experienced his worst year as a starting pitcher. He had a 13-10 win/loss record, 4.51 earned run average with 151 strikeouts, 85 walked batters in about 176 innings pitched. In layman’s terms, he sucked. He’d give up a couple of quick hits and couldn’t recover—he just tried too hard, and ended up complicating things on the mound, when really he should’ve just stuck to the basics.

** Yes, this is a ridiculously small sample size and no, I don’t care.

Wilson averaged 17.7 pitches per inning in 2014. To start his 2015 season he told the Los Angeles Times, “Low pitch counts are totally predicated on the hitting approach of the other team.” Just so we’re clear, placing blame on someone/something else is classic Wilson. It’s like saying, “Eating in moderation at a buffet is totally contingent on the product that’s being placed under the heat lamps.” Clearly, binging at the buffet was clearly the buffet’s fault! How many buffets have you been to where the food was sub-par, yet you still came out of there feeling like somewhat of a rhinoceros?

Yeah, exactly. He’s just as guilty of having a bad, lack-luster inning as the other team is to being guilty of taking advantage of a Wilson Inning.

Does having the food-equivalent of a Wilson Inning mean dooms-day for your waistline? Well that depends on you. If you have a propensity for over-eating, it’s likely that just a single bite of a chocolate chip cookie could completely derail your concerted effort to eat cleanly.

If there were only a way to discipline yourself to the point where rejecting that second, or third, fourth, fifth, (you get it) bites were automatic—brain muscle memory, if you will, then we’d all have this keeping-your-diet thing down pat.

If I had the answer, I’d be filthy rich, because everyone wants their diet to succeed. No one really wants to fail. When diet fails do happen, understand that while picking yourself up and starting all over again is admirable, it’s not effective in the long run. At some point the cycle of counter-productive dieting has to stop, but at what point does it your focus shift from quasi-engaged to fully committed to shrinking body mass?

Will you still ultimately lose weight, even if you have a few cheat meals? Sure. Did CJ Wilson lose all of his games? No. He won quite a few, but the habit of checking-out at the mere whiff of a failed-inning, stayed with him throughout the season. Would you rather have consistently good eating habits or consistent cheat meals? The choice is yours.

As craptastic as Wilson has been for the Angels since last year (worth noting, those years being on the higher spectrum of his salary), his decline in production could be attributed to nagging bone spurs in his elbow. Bone spurs, mind you, that probably formed as his body tried to repair itself by building extra bone in response to pressure and stress over time from overuse. Those spurs were surgically removed in August and as of this blurb’s publication—he’s feeling great and should be ready to go come Spring 2016.

Greeeeaaaat.

If you take nothing else from this, take this. Think of every binge-fest as a notch on your belt. You may not feel it the next day, but it becomes a pattern—a habit that’ll become increasingly harder to break. Wilson Innings happen to the best of us. They happen to me all the time. Understand when it’s happening and nip it in the butt. Or don’t and learn to live with the results.

I have this condition—I’m not really sure what to call it—when you spend an entire weekend stuffing your face, causing your stomach the ultimate confusion of wanting you to constantly shove food down your throat, even after you’ve made the conscious decision to revert back to the old system of eating light. I’m sure I’m not the only one who suffers, or has suffered from this—it must date back to when cavemen existed. Maybe they had these giant feasts after they killed off a bison or something and then had to go back to surviving off a meager gathering of nuts and berries (or whatever it is they were able to pick at) and had this same feeling of intense hunger post-bison feast. It’s like when you wear the same outfit after a long night of partying, making known your current slor status—so does that constant gurgling and growling of your underbelly give away your weekend gluttony.

The Growl of Shame.

My mom laughs at me for wanting to keep the contents of the fridge stripped to a bare minimal, but there’s always a method to my madness. If I’m at home not doing anything—I dive head-first into the fridge to fight my boredom with snacks. It’s not productive to maintaining a healthy weight, or sanity for that matter, but it seems to satisfy whatever lull you may be faced with at that exact point in time. Except when you’re forced to stay at home for an extended period of time, those dull moments are never few or far between. Before you know it you’ve ingested an entire can of Pringle potato chips, a snack pack of granola and maybe a few sugar snap peas within an hour. Not to mention having 4^th, 5^th or even 6^th meal, maybe even 7^th meal. What if our first reaction was to do Yoga or something? Would we all be super flexible models of health and wellness?

I’m only 40 minutes away from the lunch hour and yet I’m already starving. Okay fine I was starving an hour ago, but that’s beside the point. You’re supposed to get past a certain point after your stomach starts realizing that it’s plea for food isn’t going anywhere—you suppose those hunger pains would subside—but they haven’t. On a normal day, maybe they do, but after a full-fledged weekend of gorging they remain for long periods of time.

I keep stuffing my face with water, somehow attempting to convince myself that I’m really thirsty and not hungry, but we all know that’s a lie. I get that some scientist a long time ago said that your body could just be confusing hunger for dehydration, but trust me when I say, I drank well over a gallon of water yesterday and am about 1/3 of a gallon in today—it’s not thirst. You’re supposed to pile on the protein to prevent these sudden intense feelings of hunger, and in my defense I had two eggs, brown rice and green beans for breakfast, that should at least afford me close to 20 grams of protein—enough to get me through to noon, but so far it hasn’t sufficed.

So what do we do when we’re stuck in this conundrum? I know what you’re thinking. This is really all my fault. Had I just conducted myself like any other reasonable human being, I might not be in this predicament in the first place. You see, caveman probably went weeks or months before they were able to kill off a big ass bison. I only go for a week before I crush the 2015 equivalent of said bison. Then the vicious cycle starts again—and again—and again.

I was sitting at work and this 110-pound woman blurts out, “I have a craving for McDonalds, but I just had In-N-Out last week!” I bit my tongue for a second, but only because I was trying to process what she just said. People still get cravings for McDonald’s? Aren’t we past that? Isn’t that why they’re shutting down 15% of their restaurants? Before I could mutter another sentence she responded to herself with, “I made myself sick ordering my burger animal style with extra sauce!” I was tempted to ask what her time frame was between feasting/cheat meals/greasy hamburger and normal submission to 1000-calorie per day status, but I didn’t. I couldn’t get past the fact that she was on the verge of eating a cheeseburger meal for lunch while I had been dreaming about my turkey lunch meat/spinach/Greek yogurt combo platter for the last 2 hours. It’s just not fair, right?

Metabolism is a sneaky POS. So are fat cells. Wouldn’t it have been more beneficial to explain the fat-cell theory to me as a child and install the fear of obesity in me at 4 years old? Some days I think so. Is it not beneficial to show pictures of sexually transmitted diseases to semi-sexually active teenagers? Of course it is. So then why not show pictures of morbidly obese people to grade-school kids?

But the difference between her and I are both simple and complex. She loves indulging part of the time and I love indulging all of the time. Obviously her genetics play a part, but really let’s face it—she wins the mental battle. She’d rather cheat during one measly meal, while I’ll likely maintain 30 additional pounds of pesky visceral fat all in the name of having Yogurtland whenever the heck I please.

Control. That’s really all it is? You can control what you put in your mouth. You can control your metabolism somewhat. It’s not easy, but it’s worth it. Are there going to be times when all you really want are pork spare ribs drenched in some gloriously sticky barbeque sauce? Duh. Are there going to be times when you put the cookie down and grab an apple instead. Likely. You’ll both feast and fumble, but after the sun sets in the evening and rises the next day, you’ll be able to start fresh.

Maybe even one of these weekends, I won’t overdo it. It’s not likely, but it’s possible. And with that, there’s a pack of celery and peanut butter that’s calling my name. If you listen closely, somewhere, something just as delicious is calling yours to.