Last month I met up with an old friend at a professional conference and mentioned in passing that I was starting Atkins soon. This very overweight friend has seen me lose a lot of weight of through general low-carbing so she was interested in what I was doing to lose the stress weight I've recently put back on. She asked a lot of questions about Atkins and I answered to the best of my memory of the book.

She decided to do it, too, but I don't think she read any of the Atkins books. She's been Facebooking about it and while I'm not responding, I'm reading her family/friends reactions:

"Atkins is bad for you, as are all diets of that ilk."

"You're going to start to smell bad soon."

"Weight loss is all about portion control!"

"It's good for a quick slim-down but is not sustainable."

"I lost a lot of weight but then gained it back because who can live like that?"