There's a great scene in the Woody Allen movie, Annie Hall. Both Woody's character and his girlfriend, played by Diane Keaton, are in psychotherapy with different therapists, and the scene is a split-screen where you see both characters with their respective shrinks. On the left side, Woody is saying to his shrink, "We hardly ever have sex." The therapist asks, "Well, how often do you have sex?" and Woody moans, "Only three times a week." Over on the right- hand side of the screen, the Diane Keaton character is complaining to her shrink, "He wants to have sex all the time!" Her therapist asks, "Well, how often do you have sex?" and she wails, "All the time! Three times a week!"

Which brings us to low carb diets.

I'm frequently asked about high protein / low carbohydrate diets, and the thing I'm always struck by is that, when I ask those questioning me how they define "high protein," the answers sound a lot like the scene from Annie Hall. What constitutes "low" or "high" protein (or carbohydrates) really depends on what your reference point is. Time and again I hear speakers and writers, especially in the mass media, misrepresent folks like Barry Sears (he wrote "The Zone") as advocating a "high protein" diet. Why is it misrepresentation? Because Dr. Sears recommends a distribution of about 40 percent carbohydrates, 30 percent protein and 30 percent fat. Is that a "high" protein diet? Well, if you're a government agency or a traditionally trained dietitian, and you believe that folks should consume about 12 percent of their calories from protein, sure it is. I prefer to think of it, as Dr. Sears does, as a "protein-adequate" diet. In fact, if you notice, the main source of calories from his diet is from carbohydrates (40 percent when I last looked).