So, how do you feel today? I felt pretty good until I got my hands on some advice to extend my life.

Let me put forth a disclaimer here: I believe in traditional Western medicine, but I am also open to, although I haven’t experienced much of, what folks call alternative therapies. From trigger point massage to acupuncture, natural remedies to yoga, I believe there are some great ideas and great practitioners around. And I mean absolutely no offense with the following.,..but….

Auuughhhhh!!!!!! I have just had the living poop scared out of me by a magazine purported to represent life extending alternative medicine therapies, regimens, drugs, machines, and pills the size of bagels.

I sit down to warn you about this stuff just after I tried to swallow something that promised to extend my life. By the time I got finished choking the thing down, chasing it with water, then tomato juice, then a slice of cheesecake (it was the only edible in the fridge at the time), I’d used up twenty minutes of my life and clotted my arteries sufficiently to take two months off my existence at the other end.

Between the taste of the pill and the feeling that there’s still a major league baseball stuck in my throat my life extension adventure is off to a rocky start.

It all started when my spouse went to have a treatment by our local Myofascial Trigger Point Therapist. Contrary to how it sounds, Myofascial does not mean a massaging of your face. It’s a discipline to treat muscle pain by finding the trigger points where the pain originates. Frankly, that means that the therapist can stick her elbow in the small of your back, try to shove it through to your belly button and your rib cage will stop hurting. Honest. I’ve had treatment myself, for (I love saying this) a sports injury (stop laughing). It works and works well.

So my mate was behind closed doors having her triggers popped and I picked up a magazine we will call Live Longer Than Most People. That’s not the name, but I don’t want litigation.

Purportedly, this magazine features alternative meds and natural remedies to fix everything you can possibly die from, now or in the future.

In ten minutes I learned that I have to improve the endothelial function in my arteries, better absorb Bio CoQ10 for anti-aging, take Mitochondrial Energy Optimizer, eat pomegranate supplements, use Theanine to calm my nerves, avoid benzodiazepines (eek, don’t step on the benzodiazepines), avoid the wrong form of Vitamin E (of course, I’m taking that one), swallow more butter extract, and keep from microwaving myself with my TV or cell phone. And I was just on page 32 of 94, not including the Buyers Club pages in the back.

The thing is, each article makes sure you know what kind of unhealthy pharmaceutical company drug is bad for you and tells you exactly which of their house brands of natural remedies MUST take its place or you are toast. The hell with Valium, Lipitor and soap and water. You have to use Reversatrol, Sesame Lignans and Olive Fruit Extract. I already get plenty of olive fruit extract from martinis.

From what I can glean from the articles and ads, if you take one pill from the greedy pharmaceutical companies, you have to replace it with four pills from the greedy Live Longer Than Most People people.

If you take even a small portion of their advice, you’d be in the bathroom every morning swallowing pills until lunchtime. I could live twice as long but spend months at a time gulping down handfuls of anti-mutagenic pills. If I have to live like this I want my life to be shorter than most people.

Then there was the cautionary article "Single Fast Food Meal Increases Blood Pressure." I’m sure that’s true. It should have been followed by "Single reading of this magazine monumentally increases blood pressure."

I turn the page. Look out for free radical reactions! I’m having a pretty radical reaction to this whole thing. Know what an adaptogen is? It’s an agent that strengthens the body’s response to stress. I think a stopreadingogen can do the same thing.

And how ‘bout those new machines you need. Blood testers, capsule filler machines, Dr. Fung’s Tongue cleaners (ick), pill grinders, and a Gauss Meter to detect radiation from my phone, photocopier and (omigod) my computer. Hell, I should be dead by now.

Did you know that premature labor is associated with gum disease? At least I don’t have to worry about that, or the fact that the boswellia plant provides optimum prostate health. Of course, I could get a whole bunch of other ugly maladies if I don’t use Live Longer Than Most People Toothpaste.

The magazine recommends several diets as well, with the hallmark of all of them starving yourself to death. Try the Ultra Low Calorie Diet—basically, not eating. My idea of ultra low calorie is pizza without pepperoni.

I was told to try the UltraSimple Diet, which advocates getting rid of extra body fluid. I get rid of extra body fluid every time I guzzle a few Yuengling Lagers.

By the time I got to the back of the book I discovered that readers are invited on a special Live Longer Than Most People Cruise. Along with a trip to the tropics, there will be anti-aging lectures, Live Longer Than Most People gift baskets, and "insider secrets to significantly extend your life span." Wow, I’m busy imagining the midnight buffet, with all-you-can-swallow capsules, pills and Pomegranate Oils.

What else can they have? Nightly in the lounge, Miracle Cures trivia? Excursions to Island health food stores?

There’s even a Live Longer Than Most People Credit Card (bet there’s no extra long payment terms) with Merchandise Rewards. Don’t ask.

But on just about every page in this magazine there’s a question.

LLTMP Magazine: Are you overdosing on Lipitor?

FJ: In their view, yes.

LLTMP Can you manage stress without drugs?

FJ: Probably not.

LLTMP: Are you swimming in radiation emissions?

FJ: Absolutely.

I can’t decide if I should go to the emergency room or suck down some olive fruit extract at Cloud 9. Instead, I’m going to finish the rest of the cheesecake. Well, at least I’ll get my butter extract.