Joe Kueser's Blog Another Geek Finding His Place on the Web

The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss

The 4-Hour Body: An Uncommon Guide to Rapid Fat-Loss, Incredible Sex, and Becoming Superhuman
No, I'm not the first blogger to write about this book, and I won't be the last, just consider this my endorsement, my thumbs up, whatever pleases you, dear reader.

A few things surprised me about the marketing around this book.  It's surrounded by all kinds of cool.  First, three of the chapters that are arguably the most appealing (at least when looking at the table of contents), are available for free online.  The Slow Carb Diet, Six Minute Abs (both via Tim Ferriss on Gizmoto), and The 15-Minute Female Orgasm (unlockable via Tim's Facebook page).

Three free chapters not quite cool enough?  It's too late for you, dear reader, but anyone that bought the book in the first 48 hours could register their receipt on the book's website and get a free digital copy of Tim's first book, The 4-Hour Work Week, and an exclusive eBook, The Slow Carb Cookbook.

On top of that, Tim Ferriss has been interviewed on a boatload of blogs, podcasts, and even real live TV about the book.  Don't believe me?  F-you!  Google it!  While you're at it, make sure you check out the book's blog, and Tim on Twitter.

The book itself seems a little ADD at times, but in a good way.  You expect diet and/or fitness books (especially ones that are 600 pages!) to be filled with a lot of scientific doublespeak that you really don't need, but was required to fill pages.  Tim is a geek, so there are some scientific nuggets there, but fun stuff that will make fellow geeks giggle like a girl.  Rather than a bunch of useful information padded with filler, this book tends to be a bunch of useful information padded with a bunch of useful information and anecdotes.  Some sections, though very relevant, feel very unprofessional simply because it's given to us raw without anything fancy done to the typeface or styling.  This sounds like a slam, but it's really a compliment.  Sections where emails from family are pasted in look like the email was cut-n-pasted.  Raw.  Nothing fancy.

I'm interested in losing a lot of weight.  A whole person.  I'll start with a small person, and set my initial goal at 20 lbs.  According to what I'm reading, I can expect that to be about 6 weeks.  I'll let you know how that goes.

The diet is simplicity itself.  Read the damned book if you want details, but basically eating about 4 oz. of protein (eggs, beef, poultry, pork), as much as you want of legumes (some of us dummies call them beans, including black beans, red beans, pinto beans, and most importantly lentils) and as much as you want of veggies (broccoli, cauliflower, spinach, asparagus, etc.), eating 4 or 5 small meals a day, and lots and lots of water.  No calorie counting, no "white carbs" such as bread, rice, pasta, etc.  The diet keeps with a KISS (keep it simple, stupid!) approach, suggesting the same meals over and over and over again.  (Hard to screw it up that way.)

If you were counting calories, depending on how many legumes you eat, you'd probably find that, while you're quite full, you're not getting nearly as many calories as  you would normally eat.  According to "the professionals", if I'm trying to lose 2 lbs a week, a fat dude like me is supposed to consume about 2,500 calories a day.  No, really!  I am not going to count the F-ing calories, but my edumucated guess is that on a good day, eating just veggies, "beans", and a little meat, I'll consume 1500-1800 calories.  Probably enough to get my body all panic-y and thinking about flipping into starvation mode.  That's the beauty of Tim's plan.  One "binge day" per week.  He suggests Saturday, and, sir, I concur.  That day you can eat whatever you want.  Pig out.  Consume 5,000 calories if you're so inclined.  (I like the idea of Saturday since it will give me Sunday to poop out all that nastiness and won't interfere with my work week!)  This tells your body, "oh, ok, no starvation here, this dude's a pig!"

I've started this crazy eating plan today, and I'll tell you, getting up and eating first thing was not easy.  I had 3 eggs with about 2 cups of asparagus and maybe 1/2 a cup of onions.  Surprisingly, it was pretty good.  I spiced it up a bit with some pepper and garlic powder, and it was all kind of yummy, and filling.

The other part that I'm going to have trouble with is all the water.  Everything I have ever read tells me to drink lots and lots of water when trying to lose weight, and this book is no exception.  I've downed about 16 oz. since I woke up (about an hour ago) so I think I can manage, I just tend to be a 1 to 2 bottle of water guy, and have to become a 6 to 10 bottle of water guy...or get bigger bottles.

All this talk of water...now I've gotta pee, so I'll wrap this up.  Bottom line, get this book.  Go!  Now!  Let me know what you think, how you're doing, etc., and I'll do the same.  Check here for weekly updates on my progress.  (I'm also taking pictures of what I eat, tracking measurements, etc., but I won't share that data until I'm done...in about a year.)