Settled into one of my usual neighborhood diner haunts this weekend, as I normally do, with a copy of the New York Times and a cuppa coffee. One of those real American kinds of diners where you can get eggs made fifteen different ways and the chocolate malt is something that’s made by instinct. Now, I’m great at making breakfast, but on Sunday mornings I like someone else to make it for me. It’s the little things, you know. Anyway, so I’m sitting there reading the paper and a smile is playing on my face as I watch two horrifyingly skinny girls walk in and ask the poor waitress if she could adjust their menu choices to “not have any carbohydrates in them.” I’m always bemused by this particular request (particularly at DINERS!) because to me, someone with a chemistry background, it’s kinda like asking if you could get your food made without esters in it, or without polysaccharides or proteins (“tertiary-folded proteins are fine, but no quaternary ones!) “Can I get my organic compounds made without carbons, hydrogens, and oxygens in it?” I guess I’ll never fully understand people, but this is also, I suppose, why I’m not into marketing. Or crazy anti-carbohydrate diets.