As soon as I'm done writing this post, I'm going next door to return the box of Trader Joe's Multigrain O's cereal I bought the other day.

It seemed like such a good idea when I saw it — perched colorfully with its identical siblings on the end cap — that I went for it, even thought I'd bought plain old regular O's at the Stop and Shop 15 minutes prior.

Both were for Joe, of course, who fulfills the kids-love-Cherios stereotype admirably. I knew he'd all those O's soon enough, and the TJ's box just shouted good tidings: Not only was it multigrain, but it promised 14 grams of whole grains per serving, 29 percent of the RDI for whole grains. (How whole grains appear in a box of O shapes, I don't know, but I'm sure they can back that up. I guess. I mean, they're marketers, not (outirght) liars.)

The package also cries out low fat in orange capital letters, on top of a list of 9 vitamins and minerals the cereal is "an excellent source" of.

So I was pretty surprised when I got home, though perhaps I shouldn't have been, that Trader Joe's Multigrain O's cereal, is a glazed sugary cereal. Sugar is the second ingredient, and brown sugar is the sixth. Every ounce has six grams of sugar.

Moved by this story on Crop To Cuisine, which recaps recent maneuvering on the "corn sugar" battlefield, I renew my support for the Corn Refiners Association bid to rebrand its high fructose corn syrup.

Yes, I'm being redundant, but I am so rarely on that side that I'm indulging the sensation. The refiners seek the change because HFCS has won such a villainous reputation that some products are now promoted as having "real" sugar instead.

It is not good when marketers are selling their product by crowing that they left out your product.

I point you toward dullsubjects.com, where proprietor Scott Davis has filed the first part of his "Confessions of a compulsive eater." This excerpt should tell you that he and I are of an ilk:

Even though it was a great hour of radio, I've been lax in linking to the audio from my appearance Monday on "Where We Live," the hourlong show on WNPR-FM and Connecticut Public Radio. Though I've no reason to, it could be I'm getting blase about such appearances. Even though I have no reason to. I love doing them, and I'm grateful for each opportunity.

I hear frequently from readers, more all the time, about their experiences with food, and this week, a woman who heard me on Connecticut Public Radio shared:

I am dealing with an office full of people that bring in desserts to share. I'm not having luck convincing them that this is as bad as smoking in the office. One woman brings in brownies every week, has been asked by the manangers not to, and she still continues.

The Melanie Warner blog post I wrote about in my most recent entry pointed toward a HuffPost column by Dr. David Katz, director of the Prevention Research Center at Yale, that is as obtuse as it is interminable.

In "Is Sugar Toxic?" his New York Times Magazine cover story, Gary Taubes is clearly talking about manmade sweeteners, whether they are refined from beets, sugar cane, corn, or some other plant. Katz, however, defends sugar as it occurs in nature, first invoking hummingbird nectar and then mothers' milk. Continuing, Katz cites natural selection, evolution, and humans' innate taste for sweetness, all of which are entirely valid — if you're talking about sugar as it appears in nature. But Taubes wasn't.

I continue to be a big fan of Melanie Warner's Food Fight blog, and was glad to see her follow up on Gary Taubes's NYT Mag cover story, "Is Sugar Toxic," which I wrote about last week.

I am the guest of a longtime former colleague, Stan Simpson, on his WTIC-TV interview show on Saturday, but we taped the show Wednesday evening and video is already posted online. This links only to the first of three segments, but the other links appear just below the video window.

It was fabulous to spend time with Stan, as well as to say hello to several pals in the adjoining Hartford Courant newsroom. I was at the Courant from '84 to '93, and it was, in many ways, the best place I ever worked.

Connecticut-based insurer CIGNA is about to embark on a seven-month series of free telephone seminars to help people better understand eating disorders.

The first is next Tuesday, and will feature Stacie McEntyre, executive director of the Carolina House residential eating disorders treatment center.

Via Bettina Elias Siegel at The Lunch Tray, (a great site, btw) I saw this compendium of trenchermania: 83 American eateries that challenge customers with absurd mountains of food, offering not only to give it to them for free (or nearly), but to give them merchandise and to venerate them on walls of fame, if they can down the platters within a specified