You know how old I am? I'm so old I can remember when medical and nutritional "authorities" insisted that enriched white bread was nutritionally equivalent to whole grain bread. Prescribed menus, like the original Weight Watchers program, would allot "1 slice bread, enriched or whole wheat," as if it made no difference. People who insisted that whole grain bread was superior were branded "food faddists."

Ihave a woeful tendency to write about seasonal events too late -- like the time I wrote about the Superbowl on the Saturday before the game. So I thought that I'd get a Halloween article up now! I first wrote this in October 2003, but it required only a little editing.

Now that it's October, can the scariest day of the year be far off? Halloween can be utterly terrifying.

Got this question from a friend of mine the other day:

Does Dana have a low-carb app for the iPhone? I tried the free "carbmaster" one, which I like, but before buying I thought I would ask.

Neither Dana nor I have iPhones, so we're not particularly well-versed in that technology. Anyone out there who has used Carb Master, or some other app? Suggestions?

I owe you an apology. Because I have been trying to become an affiliate of Puritan's Pride, a big vitamin mail-order house, I have held off on telling you about their biggest sale of the year. Sadly, I'm still in affiliate limbo, and today is the last day of their biggest sale of the year. Figured I better tell you while you still have 12 hours to order, if you want to.

It's the end of September, and I've officially bought my first stocking stuffers, so can the holidays be far off? We all know that this season, more than any other, is the diet buster.

Was at the pharmacy the other day, picking up a prescription. They had a rack by the check out, with a little give-away magazine called "Diabetes Focus," so I flipped through it to kill a few minutes. I'm sorry to say it was just what I expected.

When I posted the winning recipes the other day, I named the winner as "FoodMagic," which was the name submitted along side the recipe -- That Nice Boy I Married, who had been managing the submissions, was the one with the real name, and he was out, and I needed to get the post up.

So now I would like to announce that the winner's actual name is Rani Merens, creator of Rani's Stuffed Peppers. Applause, please!

My publisher recently forwarded this message to me; I thought I'd share it and my answer:

My name is Seymour Hartman

I am referring to Dana Carpender's book, "New Carb & Calorie Counter."

She makes no mention about the sugar content of all of the foods. She only shows carbohydrates. Can you ask her is the sugar content contained within the carbohydrate count? If not how does make allowances for the sugar content?

Hey, Mr. Hartman:

I recently posted the text of an email I sent the Huffington Post in response to their promotion of Dean Ornish as medical editor, and the lying garbage he wrote about the recently study he claimed proved the Atkins Diet killed people, when it didn't show anything even vaguely like that. Well, the HuffPo has at least partially redeemed itself. You have to read this.

Dr. Mike Eades' Protein Power blog is always worth reading, one of my very favorite blogs, and you should read it, too. (Link in the blog roll, over there to your left.) But I thought his most recent article was particularly worth referring you to.

I had a query at the Facebook page (link over there to your left) whether I was still doing intermittent fasting. The answer is no. I tried it for a few weeks, and found it unwieldy, just very hard to implement. Why? Because even with a 6 hour "food window," longer than many people use, and an 18 hour fast period, again, shorter than many, I was always ravenous when time to eat came around. Yet I frequently had appointments scheduled that conflicted with the beginning of my food window.

I have to say, y'all are way better at coming up with and submitting recipes than you are at trying them and voting on them. We got a total of 35 recipe submissions , but only eight of them drew any comment at all. And boy, they sound good, too -- I haven't tried them myself, because I've been busy with recipe development for my publisher, but some of you appear to be in line for my job. Which is, of course, a good thing; the world needs more great low carb recipes!

I know that many people eat, and in particular eat carbs, to cope with negative emotions, so I thought it might be helpful to share a personal experience with you. That Nice Boy I Married was having some problems with anxiety. There are, of course, some very effective anti-anxiety medications available, Xanax being the best known. Unfortunately, these medications are among the most addictive and most abused drugs available today. We wanted something a little less hazardous.

Have you seen the ads for 5 Hour Energy Shots? People in a busy work environment, talking about "that 2:30 feeling?" Long about 2:30 pm, they're tired and groggy, can barely keep their eyes open. They used to drink several cups of coffee or bottles of soda to cope with the fatigue. Now they take one little two ounce bottle of 5 Hour Energy, and they're wide awake and focused for hours, with no crash later.

A few months back, a young woman at a website where I hang out was complaining about having received a gift of "juice glasses" -- little four ounce glasses -- from her mother-in-law, who insisted that every household needed such glasses. The twenty-something recipient was confused. Why, she wanted to know, would her mother-in-law give her something so strange and useless? Who drank such a small serving of juice, anyway?