Eggs

Lately some of my peer group has gotten serious about weight lifting. Some to pass time or work off stress, one because he wants to go home and surf and look good doing it, and some just to do for the doing of it. Along with bigger muscles also goes muscle definition, and that require less subcutaneous body fat, and that requires dieting.

Several of them are doing the Atkins diet right now. I sat at breakfast today and listened to them talk about the color of the strip they dip in their urine to ensure they are deeply into ketosis (?). Anyway, they’re in the first two week phase, lots of protein, no carbs. I’ve been watching them get a large helping of scrambled eggs, and top that off with 4 fried eggs. I saw a kid this morning with six hard boiled eggs, who was waiting for two more fired eggs.

I asked one of the guys about all the eggs, which they eat for the protein, and he said he doesn’t worry about the cholesterol. He said “I figure it’s all natural. They come out of a hen’s ass. It’s got to be good for you, right?”

The chow hall is a good place to do the Atkins diet, because it is all buffet and pretty much all you can eat, so they can tank up on meat and cheese.

I’m not doing the Atkins diet, nor am I lifting weights; I’m no slave to fashion. I do like to eat fried eggs for breakfast, but about half the time that is kind of annoying. We can order fried eggs or an omelet, both to order, and lots of guys do. We stand right in front of the cook, and look at the eggs through a (recently installed, thank God) clear sneeze guard.

The short, dark and hairy Pakistani cooks tend to get feeling rushed with us staring at them, so they try to give you fried eggs that are pretty runny, in order to keep up throughput. I time my eggs; 1 minute from the first flip over. Well, what usually happens is that after 15 seconds or so, the cook spatulas up the eggs and waves them at me. I shake my head, and they splat the eggs back on the grill. Then, irritated, they turn the eggs over every 15 seconds or so and look at me expectantly. I look at them, look at my watch, and look back at them. A little Pakistani standoff.

I’m not holding up the line, by the way. They can cook 6 omelets or 6 or 8 pairs of fried eggs at a time. Anyway, by the time they get done with my eggs, at least one yolk is usually broken. I know, a petty thing, but jeez, a couple of eggs over medium with intact yolks doesn’t seem like so much to ask. And, you know, first thing in the morning and all, little things like that can be annoying. After all, by then I have stumbled a quarter mile across a landscape of large, ankle turning rocks, had to show my ID, cleared my pistol, and am standing in line waiting for eggs, wearing a helmet.