Midnight Ramblings

Here's some cool TV news for the day.

Y'all remember that movie Super Size Me, right? About the guy who chooses to eat nothing but McDonald's for a month and how it just destroys his health? Well, that guy was Morgan Spurlock, and he's taken his Super Size Me concept and turned it into a TV show.

The show is called 30 Days, and it follows the transformation of people as they do something completely opposite to their lifestyle for 30 days. The first episode stars Spurlock himself as he and his wife attempt to live on nothing but minimum wage for a month.

Granted, most episodes sound like sitcom plots. There's one episode which is about a homophobe living with a gay man for a month. Spurlock says that the most moving episode that they've filmed chronicles the 30 days of a fundamentalist Christian - a man who believes that "Muslim" and "terrorist" are synonomous - who lives with a Muslim family for 30 days. Spurlock says that it's just amazing watching this man's whole world outlook just dramatically change.

The show premieres on June 15 on the American cable channel FX. No word yet on if or when it's coming to Canada.

Man, I still can't believe I haven't seen Super Size Me yet. Although, I've read about all those who have gone out of their way to counter Spurlock's film. It was back in February that I read about an Edmonton phys ed teacher who went on the "nothing but McDonald's for 30 days" plan - and actually lost weight. But see, here's the big difference. When Spurlock went on his diet, he limited his physical activity to the average amount of walking that a person does in a day. This Edmonton phys ed teacher put himself on a very strick exercise regime to compensate for all the extra calories. See, the teacher was trying to make the point that, when it comes to personal health, physical activity plays just as a big a part as diet choice.

Oh, and I finally found the counter-movie. See, some other guy also went on the "nothing but McDonald's for a month" diet, actually lost weight, and made a movie about it. His movie's only half-an-hour long, and you can download it freely at his website. The movie is called Bowling for Morgan, and the official website is Bowling for Morgan.com.