This is the first of several posts I’m planning as part of the “Blog-a-Thon To End Sugar Addiction,” which started Tuesday and ends on Monday, Halloween Day, perhaps America foremost sugar-driven holiday. 

I’ve often remarked that “food addiction” is a misnomer that does not serve the very real condition it describes, and I’d say the same thing for “sugar addiction.”

In the former case, the problem is that no one argues that all food is, or can be, addictive. And so, I’ve said, a more descriptive (which not to say “better”) — would be “some-food” addiction. I don’t know any two addicts whose list of problem foods is exactly the same, though it’s fair to say that processed foods are more likely to appear on many such lists, and refined sugar and refined grain (aka flour) are particularly likely.

And that leads to the latter case: For very few people does the term apply to all sugars, which occurs naturally in a number of forms, most commonly lactose, fructose, and sucrose. What I react to in unhealthy ways is refined sugar, in which processing has removed the fiber and other parts of the plant, concentrating what’s left into a crystalline white powder. 

It should not escape your attention that that description — “processing has removed the fiber and other parts of the plant, concentrating what’s left into a crystalline white powder” — also describes cocaine. With only slight variation, it also would describe heroin and flour; the main difference is which plant the processor starts with.

Another concluding excerpt from my reading of "Animal Vegetable Miracle," Barbara Kingsolver's 2007 book in which she and her family became locavores for a year.

The biggest shock of our year came when we added up the tab. We'd fed ourselves, organically and pretty splendidly we thought, on about 50 cents per family member per meal — probably less that I spent in the years when I qualified for food stamps. ... Our main off-farm purchases for the year were organic grain for animal feed, and the 300 pounds of flour required for our daily bread. To put this in perspective, a good wheat field yields about 1,600 pounds of flour per acre. In total, for our grain and flour, pastured meats and goods from the farmer's market, and our own produce, our family's food footprint for the year was probably about one acre.<br/>By contrast, current nutritional consumption in the U.S. requires an average of 1.2 culitvated acres for every citizen — 4.8 acres for a family of four. (Among other things, it takes space to grow corn syrup for that hypothetiical family's 219 gallonghs of soda.) These estimates become more meaningful when placed next to another proediction: in 2050, the amount of U.S. farmland available per citizen will be on 0.6 acres. By the numbers, the hypothetical family has change in the cards. [Page 343]

The first comment I could add is that the value of her family's labor was left out of the calculation! But I can relate: I often rave about my cooperative community garden and one of the first measures I use is how much produce we get for the $75 entry fee. We surely get more than $75 worth, but then again, we are in the garden at least twice a week, and we have website and educational commitments as well.

Sure we pay only $75 out of pocket, but we pay in additional ways as well. For the record, the recompense I get from this involvement also goes way beyond the food: knowledge, shared by my fellow gardeners who know what they're doing; the community of those who come to garden; the community of the public park and of the town where the garden is located; the legacy for my son, now 2, to learn that food comes from the ground, not from cellophane wrap.

Another of the concluding excerpts from my readings, and commentings, on "Animal Vegetable Miracle," Barbara Kingsolver's 2007 book in which she and her family became mondo locovores for a year:

I will be interviewed on the "Top of Your Game" show with Ariela Sarai, tonight at 7 Eastern. I'm excited for the chance to talk about "Fat Boy Thin Man" and about spirituality's role in my recovery. Please consider tuning in and passing the information on to others. 

This is the first of several excerpts from what could loosely be called the conclusions section of "Animal Vegetable Miracle," Barbara Kingsolver's 2007 book about her family's locavore year:

I heard rumor of a boycott in California of candy for Halloween, but I've only found boycotts related to specific candy manufacturers, which is different.

If you know of anything like that, in Cali or elsewhere, I'd love to hear more.

I reach perhaps my greatest convergence of outlook with author Barbara Kingsolver in this latest excerpt from her 2007 book "Animal Vegetable Miracle," to the point of wanting to effect that quizzical look puppies evince when they see something that truly flummoxes them:

I recently had the delight of sitting down with Cathy Zolner, a compatriot in the battle for healthy living and eating who happens to live in the same town I do. We connected, quite appopriately, after a screening of the film documentary "Lunch Line" at Boston's Museum of Science. I found a great deal in common with Zolner, a "wholistic health coach" who works primarily with women.

If you've read "Fat Boy Thin Man," you know about Acorn Food Dependency Recovery Services. Chapter 6, titled "Itinerant rehab," is based on my spending five days in Acorn's treatment program, based that week at a rented vacation chalet somewhere in southern Indiana. Acorn has also conducted its programs in Illinois, Florida, Massachusetts, Maine, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, as well as in Iceland and Canada, and I'm probably missing a few, too.

Another excerpt from "Animal Vegetable Miracle," Barbara Kingsolver's 2007 book. In this one, she talks about those who choose to be vegetarian.