Eat. Pray. Love. Weight Watchers.

My feelings toward Weight Watchers has always closely resembled my feelings to most hate groups or cults: disgust.  Just like those quitter Alcoholic Anonymous people who "let go and let God" or "take it one day at a time," Weight Watchers teach/force people to stop having fun and live a healthy life.  Now, I am really good at very few things, and eating and drinking happen to be two of them.  If Weight Watchers took that away from me, what would I have left?  You may as well look for me in the local airport handing out flowers and praying like a Hare-Krishna or going door to door recruiting new Moonie commune members.  So how, then, did I find myself sitting in the Technology Room at the Leslie County High School surrounded by some very pleasant over-eaters at a Weight Watchers meeting?

The answer is the persistence and relentless determination of a skinny, energetic lady named Mollie Sizemore.  Mollie is the local Weight Watcher instructor, and I made the mistake of expressing interest in losing weight and attending WW back in June, but other than that, had done nothing about it.  Mollie, however, did not forget.  She stopped by the pharmacy weekly, usually on WW meeting day, just to say hi and remind that class was that night.  I managed to shake her all summer and remain fat and sassy.  However, when she told me that this week Weight Watchers would change their program for the first time in 13 years, that was apparently the straw that broke my fatback.  I gave in and agreed to attend.

As I sat in the room along with the others, the anticipation was growing and growing about the changes in the Weight Watchers plan.  "What could it be?"  "How could it be improved upon?"  These were common things overheard while waiting for Mollie to unveil the plan.  I personally hoped that the fine people at WW had discovered that butter was actually good for you or that pickled bologna helped burned fat, but deep down I knew that wasn't happening.  Finally, class started!  The big reveal was...

FRUIT HAS NO POINTS!  EAT ALL THE FRUIT YOU WANT!  Huh?  THAT is it?!  What the heck?!  Sure, there were some other changes too, and it makes the plan very doable and even more healthy, but the BIG news to the people in my class was the go-ahead to eat some fruit.  There were several questions to clarify the issue, "So if I ate a banana AND an apple in the same day, that would be zero points?"  "Yes," Mollie replied.  "What if I had peaches at breakfast and some grapes for a snack during TV hour?"  "Zero points," Mollie answered.  People giggled uncontrollably.  Heads were nodding in disbelief.  If women chest-bumped, there would have been some chest-bumping going on in the Technology Room.  I wanted to say if that if Weight Watchers added Chili-Cheese Frito's or Snickers to the zero point list, I would share in the excitement, but I (a) didn't want to bring down the fruit-induced high of the room and (b) was afraid of most of the woman in the class.

After Mollie regained control of the room, and finished explaining the plan, even I was impressed and excited about it.  It seems like a plan that even Mr. Fat and Sassy can follow.  So here I go, into the land of Weight Watchers.  I have joined the cult. 

(Not really my body, yet)

I have drunk the Kool-Aid, and it is sugar-free, my friends.