Waddling Around Stumptown: Where Does the LARD! Go?

Many of you readers have asked, "Jack, where the hell did all the LARD! go?" Well, one of you has asked that, and I have to admit, from time to time, I wonder that myself. I mean, it's just gone. You sure-as-sugar-on-a-powdered-donut don't see posters around town like this one either!

So, I got to thinking to myself and answering me out loud down at the Radio Room one day. I was trying to remember back to something I was supposed to learn in school three or four times, back when I was studying up for my private ticket. I wondered myself into a second IPA and when Bar-Am showed up, she was carrying the asked-for pint and an unwelcome phone. "It's for you, 'Jackie-boy'." She winked and handed me the blower.



"Don't say a word, Jack. There isn't one to say. I understand that you are on your second beer and you've only waddled 7.33 miles. Jackie-boy, what can I do?" "Well, er..." "It's a rhetorical question, Jackie-boy. Rhetorical. I can cajole, but I can't, no I won't coddle. You will or you won't lose that last pail of LARD! I can only advise." "Wail!" "OK, I can do a little more than that, I can answer your reader." "How do you know a reader asked..." "Facebook page monitoring, Jack--remember Boleyn's-Eye-View (® Boleyn Enterprises) satellite surveillance system? It monitors Facebook over your shoulder, Jackie-boy." "I'm cooked." "No, but you'll be baked-by-brew if you drink anymore of that high-powered beer!"


"I continue. That LARD! you've been losing doesn't just come off in chunks and end up in a frying pan, you know. You see, you have metabolized the LARD! to provide the energy to keep that LARD!-ass body of yours functioning. By creating a calorie deficit of about 3,600 kilocalories (what you non-scientists call 'calories') from your diet, you burn a pound of LARD! creating heat, CO₂, and water. So as Bill Nighy croons to you, LARD! IS all around you. It's more complicated than that and I'm making the assumption that you are eating a balanced diet so that you are not metabolizing muscle. So far, Jackie-boy, you've created a deficit of 162,000 kCal, so give yourself a pat on the diminished, but still substantial, remaining gut. To express it a different way, Jackie-boy, you've biochemically transformed enough LARD! to bring about 16.2 kilograms of water from freezing to a rolling boil!"

© probably scienceblog.com
"How does this happen, you ask? It's not eluted by beer, I'll tell you that. It involves lipolysis, glycolosis, ß-oxidation, the Kreb's Cucle, and the Electron Transport Chain. Once inside the mitochondrial matrix, fatty acids undergo β-oxidation. During this process, two-carbon molecules, acetyl-CoA, are repeatedly cleaved from the fatty acid. Acetyl-CoA can then enter the citric acid cycle, which produces NADH and FADH₂. NADH and FADH₂ are subsequently used in the electron transport chain to produce ATP, the energy currency of the cell. Thirty-six of those babies come out for every molecule of LARD!"


"Wow, that seems impressive!" I signaled Bar-Am for another tall cold one--after all, I was sounding like a biochemical wonder. She wagged her head from side-to-side, pointed up at a small camera over the bar, and suddenly, Professor Javier Boleyn's face appeared on the TV screen over the bourbon. In High-Def! "Remember, I work for him, Jack. Sorry." The professor's voice now filled the room. "TBC--The Boleyn Channel, a new enterprise, Jack. I continue, encore. Your waddling is admirable, Jackie-boy. I've seen you, or had reports from all over town."



I know you aren't letting any moss gather on your, ah, paths. And I notice that you respect the moss of others as well." "I try. I sort of like it when the moss grows in the street names that are embossed on the curbs. Some of those are more than 100 years old. They're replacing them now, but they still put the street names in the concrete and they put the date in too--so you know when it was originally done and replaced." "Quaint, I'm sure. What else have you observed?"



"Well, I'll tell you. I think people sell our town short in terms of its ability to attract fame and fortune. I waddled by this the other day, and I'll leave it to you to figure out who, other than the R. Starr of the Fab Four would be setting the brake on a Rolls in good old Stumptown, US of A!"