DEBRIS.COMgood for a laugh, or possibly an aneurysm

Every time I go to Hawaii, I am so overcome with the stunning perfection of the place that I declare that I want to move there. Once I even picked up a real estate catalog at the airport. The idea of the place, all waterfalls and warm breezes and gorgeous coastline, is so inspiring that it makes me want to change my life — and I’m coming from California. I mean, it isn’t like they had to de-ice the plane before takeoff.

In the same spirit, we had a dining experience last night that was so great, so radically awesome, that it made us talk about changing our lives.

(Now that I’ve said that you probably think I want to move to Napa so I can eat at the French Laundry every night. If I could afford to eat there even once, maybe I’d consider it, but in truth I’ve never managed to plan any meal 2 months in advance, which is what’s required to get a table there.) (Erm, except that I finally did eat there.)

The food at Roxanne’s is unusual in that it’s vegan; they serve no animal products of any kind. But what is remarkable about it is that nothing is cooked. They serve “living foods:” nothing is cooked above 115° F. Practically speaking, the food is raw.

This doesn’t mean that everything is cold, and it doesn’t even mean that everything looks like a salad, although both of these are sane assumptions, and there is an element of truth in both: although nothing is cold, it’s also true that nothing is hot, and although not every dish looks like a salad, many of them do.

Still… it was awesome. This was the most memorable meal I’ve ever eaten. And as we sat there, luxuriating in 5 courses of this delicious, sensuous, healthy cuisine, flavors exploding off the plates, we talked about permanently changing our diets. The concept is that powerful.

What would it take to eat raw? I think it would be tough, and I’m already on a sort of lazy-man’s vegan diet. Eating is a primary social recreation, but unless you happen to hang with a group of vegans, you’d have to change your plans — eat at home before the dinner party, or bring your own food. Roxanne’s husband Michael admitted as much.

But the benefits are enormous. Assuming it’s true that digestion consumes most of the body’s energy, and that uncooked foods are easier to digest, it’s clear that a raw-foods diet could radically increase one’s energy level. There is anecdotal evidence that this sort of change manifests itself as a reduced need for sleep. What if, by eating only raw foods, you could get by (or even thrive) on 2 hours’ less sleep every night? Would that be worth it? What would you pay to have another 2 hours a day to play with your kids, read, write, dance, whatever?

Even if you ignore the other health issues, this for me is a compelling reason to investigate “living foods.” I’d give just about anything to have extra hours in the day.

Programmers (and their bosses) take note!

Joel Spolsky: Nothing is as Simple as it Seems

Last night I got the surprise of my life. Literally, I think I have never been this surprised.

My wife, more sneaky than previously suspected, casually suggested we spend a nostalgic night in the City, visiting old haunts. We had a fantastic dinner at our favorite Thai place (Neecha — Sutter & Steiner) and then drove to the one pub in the world where at one point in time I might have been considered a regular, or at least a familiar face, Tommy’s Joynt (Van Ness & Geary).

We walked in the front door and along the food counter, a traditional Hofbrau presentation of steaming, roasted animal parts. I followed my wife as she continued toward the stairs in the back of the room. “Why don’t we get a beer at the bar first?”

She said over he shoulder, not even slowing down, “Let’s see if there’s a table upstairs.” This struck me as an odd thing to say as there was an empty table about 10' away.

“But upstairs sucks, the waittress never goes up there. Why don’t we —”

She was ascending two steps at a time. Were we running from someone? And then it struck me: “Who are we meeting?” Her purposeful lack of response sent a chill. I don’t really like surprises.

At the top of the stairs, we looked around and saw no one familiar. I felt a small dose of relief. And then the waittress (ironically, upstairs after all) called out, “Who are you looking for?” “Nobody,” I answered firmly. But she and my wife knew something I did not, and the waittress pointed at a third room behind a closed partition. Yeesh… what was hiding behind door #1? Probably not a vacation in Tahiti.

“Are you ready?” …a last moment of sympathy before she threw the partition aside to reveal fifteen of my best friends, gathered together and drinking many beers in my honor. I was speechless. And very touched.

Maybe the reason I don’t like surprises is that I haven’t had very many good ones. But this was good, better than good — off the charts good. More like this, please!

I have a few positive experiences to report. I’ve had the pleasure of sending money to a few companies that promise to treat my personal information as something to be guarded, rather than as something to be sold.

Loudspeaker manufacturer Polk Audio includes a card with their merchandise promoting online warranty registration. The card claims, “The data we gather on our on-line registration is never sold or otherwise shared with anyone.” I love to see that! I stopped filing warranty registrations ten years ago, when I realized that the amount of junk mail I received was directly proportional to the number of boxes I’d checked off the last time I sent in a warranty registration card. But I took Polk’s claims at face value and registered online in an effort to support the sort of business model I can feel good about, i.e. making money by selling a product rather than selling customer data.

One caution: I’m pretty sure the analog registration method (that is, the postcard with 60 checkboxes on it, asking what magazines I read and — unbelievable — how much money I make), is almost certain to generate an avalanche of glossy, coated-paper crap via the USPS. Buy Polk, but register online.

I also made a purchase recently from Crutchfield. As it is a huge, catalog-sales, mail-order vendor, I was surprised to see this on the order form:

The remarkable thing is, the “NO” option was prechecked! When was the last time you saw a company use opt-in rather than opt-out? I’m online more often than not and I was shocked (happily) to see this.

In the privacy doghouse is the Life Extension Foundation, whose FAQ claims, No information, including names, addresses or e-mail addresses is leased or sold to anyone else. But when I called them to confirm, two sales reps admitted that their opt-out system is broken — once you’re in the customer database, they lose control, and your private data could be sold to anyone.

Further caution: LEF.org uses Microsoft’s Passport service! That’s a great big red flag for anyone concerned about privacy. Microsoft’s track record is so poor that the phrase Microsoft security is an oxymoron.

So, LEF lost my business, and earned the wrong kind of publicity right here. If you’d like to live forever, I strongly suggest you place your order for anti-aging supplements with iHerb.com, whose privacy policy is short, unambiguous, and confirmed by their sales reps:

We do not sell, rent or share personal information with any third party. The information you give us is totally confidential, and will not be sold or given to any individual or company or organization under any circumstances. This is our simple promise to you.

When I called to confirm this claim, the iHerb rep actually scoffed at me. I generally don’t like to be scoffed at, but if ever there was a time to be scoffed at it’s just after asking the question “Will your company sell or rent my private data?” We don’t do that, he said derisively.

So, applause all around: Polk Audio, Crutchfield, and iHerb (maker of fine organic home theater components), thank you and good luck!

(The standard disclaimer applies: I’m making these endorsements without compensation, and regrettably do not expect to profit should you decide to patronize these fine merchants.)

What does it mean that I’ve only heard of about one-third of the artists in CDNow’s Top 100? I’ve always felt a bit out of touch with popular culture; this is clearly related.