What A Day! Three Amazing Television Appearances Sharing About My Healthy Low-Carb Adventures

When I woke up this morning, I had no idea what surprises were in store

I gotta tell you, I love my job. Blogging, podcasting, and writing books full-time for a living is one of those careers where the thrill and adventure of never knowing what super-exciting thing is gonna happen from day to day is what makes all the headaches it brings worth it. Just as that CareerBuilder.com/MSN column about me that ran last week sorta came out of the blue as a huge blessing to the work I am doing here, so too did not one, not two, but THREE opportunities to be on television for me today. The adrenaline is still rushing through my veins from such an exhilarating experience. Lemme tell you about it!

Jamarcus Gaston from local CBS affiliate WSPA-TV’s “Scene On 7″

It all started yesterday morning when a local television reporter named Jamarcus Gaston arrived at my door to film me for his “Cool Jobs” segment. I thought blogging was an apropos occupation of the “coolest” kind, so I contacted them just last week about what I do. They agreed it was a pretty nifty job and put together a really nice package for their “Scene On 7″ program on the Greenville/Spartanburg, SC CBS affiliate WSPA-TV Tuesday night at 7:30PM:

I couldn’t have been more pleased with the way this turned out and am sincerely appreciative of Jamarcus for his professionalism and kindness towards me in the 30 minutes he spent shooting footage me on Monday. But this was the only television exposure I was expecting today when I woke up. And yet there my cell phone rang at around 10:00AM from a “Blocked” number. I never know what that means when I answer, but I’ve learned to take just about every call since you never know who will be on the other end of the phone.

FOX News business analyst and “Your World” host Neil Cavuto

This time it was a gentleman who said he was from the Fox News Channel in New York and he asked me if I still had my “Livin’ La Vida No-Carb” web site. I immediately responded, “Yes, I still run Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb.” He said the host of “Your World with Neil Cavuto” would like to have me come on the show today to talk about President Barack Obama’s decision to freeze budgetary spending on all non-essential programs and compare it to going on a diet. Say what?! Odd doesn’t even begin to describe this, but I kept listening.

The show’s booker and I chatted for about 15 more minutes and it seemed Neil was trying to take a rather different angle with a political/economic issue on his program (something he does quite often, I’ve been told) by making an analogy between weight loss and lowering budgetary expenditures. I said a few things to him and they agreed to have me come on the show LIVE via satellite from my local FOX affiliate at 4:00PM. I must have received upwards of a couple dozen calls back on my cell phone from him checking in with me, two of which occurred right in the middle of my upcoming podcast interview with Matt Stone from 180 Degree Health. Sorry about that, Matt! He understood that this was a chance that doesn’t come around too often, so you do what you gotta do.

The more I started thinking about the analogy, some thoughts came to mind: calling for a freeze on spending as President Obama has suggested is like telling an overweight person to keep their caloric intake at the same level hoping to lose weight. Of course, you can’t do that and expect to see changes happen. You must make cuts in your diet like sugar, flour, starchy carbs from your menus just as you need to cut spending to fix the budget woes. And going through a recession economically isn’t time to throw in the towel and give up no more than seeing a weight loss stall or gain should lead to doing nothing about your diet. And one final thought I had was earmarks in a budget are like adding “cheats” to your diet. They are destructive to your overall purpose of shedding the pounds and improving your health.

So, it wasn’t a perfect analogy, but I had to make it work for the exposure. I didn’t think I’d be nervous at all since I’d done a lot of television and there was nobody else in the studio with me but a big camera staring me in the face. But with the earpiece in and the microphone hooked to my tie, I could feel my heart thumping loudly and it literally felt like it was gonna come out of my chest. I don’t know why my body reacted that way because I talk to people all the time on my podcast show and in person without a hitch. Strange what our bodies do under stress even when it’s GOOD stress. I think it went well overall and I’m working on getting video of it posted online for you to see. The audio of my DVR recording was really poor quality, so I’ll keep trying to put it on YouTube sometime soon.

My local Greenville, SC FOX affiliate WHNS-TV FOX Carolina

Meanwhile, there was a reporter from the FOX Carolina studio who was so impressed by my appearance on Neil Cavuto’s show that she asked me if I’d like to do a feature story on their 6:30PM and 10:00PM news tonight. Really? Uh, sure. After a few minutes of getting my heart to stop racing from my first national television appearance, I was ready to share about my weight loss, my career, my new book 21 Life Lessons From Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb, and my passion for helping people get healthy. They sent in a very nice cameraman named Dow to conduct the interview and he expressed an interest in my books. I gave him my card, told him to e-mail me, and I’d send him my books. It was a fantastic chance to share with so many people what a positive and healthy low-carb experience looks like! Again, I’ll work on getting video of this posted on YouTube very soon.

WHEW! Anybody got some oxygen for me because I’m wore out after a whirlwind day of television surprises. And it’s not over yet! My scheduled appearance on the nationally-televised CNBC show dLife is set for this Sunday, January 31, 2010 at 7:00PM ET. I told you about the taping of this segment last month and it’s set to air on Sunday. It was gonna be my national TV debut before today, but I’ll take two for the price of one in the same week! This too will be going online soon after it airs in case you miss it. Hopefully you can watch or DVR it on Sunday.

Gonna get some rest tonight because it has been a busy and fun day for me. Didn’t get much work done other than this blog post and recording that one podcast interview with Matt Stone. And believe me, I’ve got plenty to do tomorrow, but for now I’m trying to enjoy the moments like these I am blessed with and soak them in for all they are worth. I’m humbled that there is such an interest in the work I do and am grateful to the hundreds of thousands of readers, listeners, and viewers who allow me to play a small role in their lives. THANK YOU for giving me this privilege to do what I do every single day and feel fulfilled in so many ways. God bless you!