Everyday Systems

I saw a post in which the poster stated she had left No S for fast weight loss. I understand that sentiment. Then I started thinking about diets I have tried besides No S. And yes, some have come in the middle my No S journey, on and off journey. So here they are:

Low Carb (of course)
Paleo (see above?)
Vegan (boy did I miss beef)
Slim-fast (boy did I miss beef)
The Abs Diet
Raw Food Diet (boy did I miss beef)
Body for Life
No dairy/gluten diet
The Drinking Man's Diet (Truthfully, I have had about three screw drivers and ten rum and Cokes in the last three years. So really?)

And who knows what else.

Please list the diets you have all tried. I find it interesting.[/quote]

Weight watchers (got to goal but then couldn't be bothered counting points)
Low carb
Atkins
Paleo
Gluten free
Celebrity slim
8 hour diet
Calorie counting
Naturally thin program by Bethany frankel

Funny thing is I'm not even looking to lose weight just maintain and I'm still so diet obsessed. It ridiculous

I was on Weight watchers for 3+ years, lost 150 of the 180 pounds I'm aiming to lose and then I just hit the wall. After that, I tried low carb (ha ha eat all you want, just no carbs, and still lose weight, a siren song for folks who overeat).

The problem was that I wasn't dealing with my overeating. I've been practicing NoS for a few weeks and OMG it makes so much sense to me. Food tastes so good now!

I forgot weight watchers. I am a dork.

There isn't enough time or space here for my personal list.
Over the past 55 years I've tried almost EVERY

..........diet; diet club; weight-loss plan; way-of-eating; lifestyle; non-diet;
including Therapy, weight-loss drugs and bypass surgery......

What I've learned is that every one of these work for Someone,
but none of them work for Everyone.

After many, many years of weight-loss struggle,
I've arrived at a normal weight, and
For the past 8 years I've been struggling to maintain in that range.

Low carb under the following guises: Atkins; Protein Power; Blood Type Diet; and Paleo.

They all worked beautifully in the diet phase but fell apart in maintenance (or maybe it was I that fell apart!)

Eventually, after a few times through, they became slow to work in the diet phase, too. That effortless low-carb "whoosh" is kind of a one-shot deal -- your body figures out how to hang on to the pounds much faster than your mind figures out that there must be a better way!

I've done the paleo thing too...it does work but my stomach gets upset...I did low fat when younger...when it was the fad...it worked but then but I guess I didn't think how awful the food tasted...I think the more diets you do the harder no s becomes... they all work and usually more quickly than no-s. All of them are impossible to maintain too. If no-s goes too slow you turn to one that worked in the past forgetting you never could maintain it.

Here is the list:

Liquid diet with supplements ( where I drank their 'special' lemon tea whenever I am hungry)
Nutri-System
3-day diet
Vegetable soup diet
Low carb/ No carb
Medication/ Supplements (e.g. Green coffee bean, white kidney bean, etc)
Vibration belts
Patches to "melt the fat"
Body wraps
Acupuncture

I can't believe I have tried so many diets.
What a waste of money

The first one was 40 years ago. I don't remember the name. I do remember that it started on a Monday, had a lot of hard-boiled eggs and had no fruit until Saturday, when it prescribed a fruit salad. I inhaled that salad!

I've actually been terrible at sticking to diets. Escalating amounts of sweets were the usual downfall. But here are some of the approaches I've tried.


Intuitive Eating, or the like for much of the time in between these other efforts, but never succeeding in stopping when full- nor waiting to eat until I was hungry, come to think of it.

Lemon water with cayenne and molasses fast
Macrobiotics
Price-Pottenger
Volumetrics
The Zone Diet
40*30*30
WW
The Omega Diet

There may have been more I read about but never seriously tried.

To tell the truth, those diets did influence the way I eat now, and I'm glad of it. I think I eat more freggies, whole grains, and good fats because of them, though I guess other people make the changes without them. Or manage just to eat less of other stuff.

Hello--
It seems I'm in good company here.

It started with the Atkin's Teenage Diet when I was in 7th grade (? not sure, but it was many decades ago).

Atkin's Teen-Age Diet (I might be wrong on the name)
Weight Watchers
Calorie counting/restriction
The Cabbage Soup Diet
Body for Life
Atkins (many times)
Weight Watchers (in my late 30's)
The Blood Type Diet
No sugar diet (don't know the name)
Intuitive Eating

The problem with all of them, that even with success (as in Atkins and Weight Watchers), following them for any continued length of time was unsustainable. They were unsustainable by the amount of mental effort you had to keep up to keep up with the diet: counting calories, points, carbs--not to mention all the "OFF LIMITS" foods you were banned from. None of them really dealt with approaching food in a sane way---determining what the proper amounts were---and we do not eat in a clinical setting. After decades of following diets, who knew what feeling full was? What real hunger was? Relationships with food became all mired up in guilt, fear. For crying out loud! Food is supposed to be enjoyed and nurishing. Maybe a little mindfulness--but none of the psychological craziness the diet industry lobs on it.

Wow, good discussion!

usual suspects, low carb, paleo, and recently a vegan experiment. Most of these have been pursued with the mind-set of experimentation; I'm not overweight and exercise a lot so it's been more of a 'see where this takes me' type attitude. BUT, all of the above are ultimately limiting, and often result in some pretty bad 'lapses'- for eg I will go low carb strictly for a week or so then just binge on ice cream and nonsense like that, where as a more moderate approach, (read: No S) rarely leads to that behaviour, if at all.

I think actually too much experimentation with these can create as many bad habits as they eradicate.

No matter how surprised people are by the idea of eating three meals a day, since it doesn't match our culture now, I wonder in what culture paleo or veganism would not be a hassle, unless you are very much in love with the principle. I was always in love with the idea of being in love with them. What a virtuous person I would be if I stuck to veganism! Alternatively, how great it would be to be at one with my ancient athletic human ancestors! And the fact that I would look so 20th- century great made me feel even more smug. But with either one, you are going to encounter so many foods you shouldn't eat, and not all of them junk foods, unless you believe the guru in your camp. Can it really be that so many people eating a wider range of foods even before Frankenfoods were wrong? Can those metaphors really sustain the majority of people to face down the constant exposure to forbidden foods? Statistically, they do not, though they each have their mostly armchair adherents. Those with true health issues that are alleviated by the eating regimes have a higher success rate, thank goodness for them. But for the hoi polloi? The results speak for themselves.

My first diet with a name and program was Pritikin. That dates me.
Then I remember my own low calorie inventions. Then there was the Grapefruit Diet, the Rice Diet, Diet Center, Dexatrim and starvation diet, Slim-fast, Special K, Thin Within, The 5 Day Miracle Diet, Intuitive Eating, Atkins and Weight Watchers. Hmm,,,,there were probably more. My goodness!....

The Rice Diet you say, Kittykat? Oh yes indeed... I tried that when I was a teenager. After three days I started reflexively vomiting up the rice. It took me a decade to be able to eat rice again. I still don't exactly love it.

The Atkins Diet also made me vomit after about a week. Something about eating the same foods over and over again really throws my body for a loop.

I'd also like to give a shout out to metabolife. Too bad that stuff started killing people.. I remember dropping 20 pounds in 6 weeks when I took it. I was able to stick to a super low calorie diet like never before - temporarily of course. The weight predictably came piling back on after I stopped calorie restricting due to pregnancy - and it wasn't all baby weight either.

But I often wish the original metabolife was still around (and that it was safe of course) ... *sigh*

And of course there's Weight Watchers.... yeah, we've all been there.... Who hasn't, at some point in their lives, paid Weight Watchers?

Weight Watchers
South Beach
Atkins
Medifast
Nutri-System
Paleo/Primal
Whole 30 - Version of Paleo/Primal
Body for Life


They all have one thing in common - they play towards my perfectionist - all or nothing mindset. For years, I would find myself starting one of these diets on a Monday morning and telling myself that this time I would stick with it. It was always motivated by either weight gain or some event coming up that I wanted to slim down for. It was never long term and most importantly it was never based on habit.

The most damaging diet above was probably Body for Life, because it encouraged a free day in which you could binge. And I did. So for years, I had this boom or bust, binge mindset. I still do.

I've tried:

Weight Watchers
Zone
South Beach
Atkins
Perfect Health Diet
Anabolic Diet - low carb M-F, high carb weekend
T diet - no food on Tues. and Thur.
Nutri-System
Paleo/Primal
Pasta diet
Vegetarian
Protein Power
Calorie counting

They all worked at first. But I could not maintain with them due to boredom.

What's worked for me in maintenance has been eating what I like NOS type combined with an hour of daily exercise.

I'm currently slowly building up to the daily hour and hopefully duplicate my previous success.

Hi,
I have pursued two diet plans in full earnest and 3 a haphazard fashion. Here is the list:

General Motors Diet
21 days to slim diet plan
Clean and Lean diet plan
Five two diet
Alkaline diet

Like to hear others thoughts on these plans, and new ideas too.

Hi! The ones I have tried besides this diet are: 1) Weight Watchers (I lost some weight, but I hated counting points), 2) Paleo/Primal (I still 'sort of' eat this way, because I like it, but I sometimes eat 'forbidden' foods, like grains), 3) Calorie Counting (I will confess, I'm still doing this for now, even though I don't enjoy it. Has it worked? Sort of. I've lost 35 pounds since my son was born in 2011, but I still have 30 pounds to go. I just have a hard time sticking to my calorie limit. The thought of 3 or 4 plates a day-- I have to eat smaller meals because of reflux-- seems so freeing, but part of me feels like I still need the fence of calorie counting).

Hi clarinetgal, stay focused and motivated, and in no time you’ll reach your target weight.

No S is pretty much it for me. No matter what else influences me, it's the core.

Thanks, Ahen! I'm a mother of 2, also!

I've never actually listed my diets! These are loosely in order of 20 plus years of dieting, starting in high school.

American heart association diet for pre open patients? Or some craziness that I tried in high school ( strictly spelled out meals of things like cottage cheese and canned beets) bleh.

Low fat

Slim fast! No explanation needed here! Oh dear.

Calorie counting (many short-lived times) notebooks, fitday.com, myfitnesspal

Weight watchers ( not bad, helped me lose baby weight 3 times, but even after that weight gone, still disordered food relationship and a bit overweight, fluctuating)

South beach ( wanted to chew my arm off. Induction phase with no grains, starchy vegetables, or fruit. No thank you! )

whole foods, plant-based, no added refined oils)- I still don't eat meat, which has become a permanent lifestyle choice for several reasons. But I still stress eat, eat at inappropriate times, inappropriate amounts, too many sweets, just as I always have.

Vegan ( still overeating junk and processed foods while trying to avoid animal products

All these diets, all these years and weight staying within 10 pound range ( thankfully). Without the disordered eating I have no idea what I'd weigh.

How could I have forgotten this gem I tried a few years back?

Dr. Siegel's Cookie Diet!! What a terrible idea. How realistic is it to eat six terrible tasting cookies each day?


http://www.cookiediet.com/

Those cookies aren't cheap either.

I've never been able to stick to a weight loss diet for more than a week or two, but have been able to stick with No S for about 5 years now I think (maybe 6? I'll have to check). I was also a vegan in my youth but that wasn't a weight loss thing.

I have tried:

Raw food vegan - lasted less than a week, couldn't stand life without hot comfort food and coffee. I liked the green smoothies though and still have those sometimes.

Low carb - my DH does vegetarian low carb every now and then to drop a few pounds. I have tried it with him but discovered I feel terrible without carbs (moody, lethargic etc.).

Calorie counting - I can do this for maybe 2 weeks but then get so hungry I eat everything in the house.

Schwarzbein principle - this is actually quite sensible (all about balanced meals of real food), but still a bit too stingy on carbs for me. She taught me the importance of eating enough fat and protein for better moods and hormone balance.

ETA: Forgot to mention, recently tried the "fast diet" for 3 weeks with my DH (aka 5:2) where you eat 500 cals or less two days a week (the fast days). This is kind of a thing in the UK at the moment because of the BBC documentary about it. We both felt TERRIBLE on the fasting days and took more than a day to recover each time. I also felt like it derailed No S for me a bit because S days became super pig out S days to make up for the fast days LOL.

I've never really needed to lose much weight, just the same 2-3 kgs that drop off and sneak back every few years (usually when I slack of on No S!).

vegetarian low carb? Yikes! That sounds very challenging.

Vegetarian, general reduced calorie.

Got out a paleo book from the library but then woke up and remembered that I like being able to eat with others and started doing No-S instead.

Emily

I've tried:
Calorie restriction in college
then after my first kid found No S
Then fell off
Then tried it again, couldn't stick after my second
Tried low carb/primal diet and lost 10 lbs there, but couldn't stick. Kept those 10 lbs off though! I went back on it, lost another 6 lbs, but gained it back when I went back off and then decided to go low carb instead of primal. Didn't stick and I said F it! Going back to No S I should have never left it in the first place

I think sometimes doing the other things and failing helps our determination when we find something reasonable.

1st off I have to say its so nice to see other people who have tried and failed one diet after another the way I have. It installs the fact diets are impossible to do forever. Any who here goes.

1. My first diet I was 11 and it was in a magazine lose 10 pounds in a week! (grapefruit for breakfast, tuna fish for lunch type diet yuck!)
2. Then I counted calories lost and gained about 30lbs.
3. I did the fat free thing
4. Weight watchers ( I did loose about 25 of the 35 I was trying to loose but, like everyone else, I just got to a point were couldn't count points anymore! Then slowly gained in back)
5. Zone
6. Eating in moderation
7. Only eating 1 a day ( then after a few days binging on everything cause I WAS STARVING!!!)
8. Eating Clean
9. Low carb, by far the fastest weight I've ever gained back. I just couldn't eat like that forever! I'm sorry but it sucks when everyone ordered pizza and you have to eat salad! I remember doing it for 2 months and I'd lost weight but i was miserable. I had broke down and made myself a BLT on bread, my Husband walks in and says "hey I thought you weren't eating bread?" I started bawling! To this day I have a hard time eating eggs for breakfast, the kinda make me gag. I blame it on low carbing
10. Paleo, again missed bread and pasta
11. Blood type diet, which for me is strict Vegiterian, I could prob stick to this however I live with 3 meat loving Men and I'm not making 2 meals for dinner. That would get old real quick and expensive!

Just remembered my first diet, way back in my 20's -- I was living in Germany and it was in a German women's magazine, the apple-and-egg diet. For breakfast and lunch you had an apple and an egg prepared any way (apple omelet, apple soufflee, apple and egg salad anyone?) and for dinner two apples and two eggs! You were only supposed to do it for three days -- and after three days, I was really, really ready for some schnitzel, as I recall! The funny thing is, I didn't have a scale and so I don't know if it worked or not!

JustForToday wrote:
And of course there's Weight Watchers.... yeah, we've all been there.... Who hasn't, at some point in their lives, paid Weight Watchers?

!! So true. So true.

I love this thread and seeing JW’s great post reminded me of the best diet for maintaining weight loss was one I also was on in my early 20s. It consisted of coffee, Top Ramen (twice a day) and cigarettes. Amazing! Why was this not sustainable?

8 years ago I did Weight Watchers (as referenced above, apparently the diet gateway drug for many). That worked for a year but I’m now keenly allergic to any kind of tracking/counting/math related eating. I tried again five times after that, how sad. No dice.

Three years ago I did a elimination diet trying to get a handle on asthma. That led to eating a pretty strict vegan diet for two years. I felt great on it and was at a very healthy weight when I was faithful to careful eating. Doh. I also felt like a social pariah. It was exhausting having to explain myself through every meal. My meat and potatoes husband is patient but pretty much jumped for joy when I told him I needed to branch out after that.

My co-worker convinced me to try Paleo this past January. Not only did I gain weight but it seemed like more of the same in another direction. Husband said perhaps you should try to just eat normal? Just a suggestion????

I’m 49 which means there has been ample ways in my life to experience food. Even though I’ve only been on No-S for a few weeks. there has been harmony in my house over meals. I am already looking forward to just cooking and enjoying food again. Hurray.

Yes, that's the key, eating normal. I've already mentioned above what I tried (Paleo was one of them), and I don't WANT to be the person at the restaurant who mercilessly grills the waiter, and I don't want to have to turn down food at social situations, because I'm on a special diet (although if I ever develop a disease or medical condition where I have to eat differently, it will be a different story). Everything in moderation.

I lost lot weight after my first baby. Only ate ham, grapes and Turkish delight!
Then did really well on diet pills in the days when doctors would just prescribe them. Since then every possible diet, no fat, low carbs, no sugar, fat points, calorie counting, grapefruit diet, apple before every meal diet, cabbage soup diet etc etc. still overweight - that says it all really. A lifetime of food obsessions, denial and excess. NoS holds the key I hope
The only thing I have ever found to be really transformative but I was unable to sustain was no sugar. It seemed that if I could stop sugar completely for a week then somehow my whole body started to relax, and my appetite dropped. But I have never been able to keep this going. Now on noS with the restriction of sugar in the week I am starting to feel some of that inner calm. It is my hope that I will settle sugar wise at weekends too. Such that I can still enjoy one piece of cake but no excess.





Tessy

clarinetgal wrote:Yes, that's the key, eating normal. I've already mentioned above what I tried (Paleo was one of them), and I don't WANT to be the person at the restaurant who mercilessly grills the waiter, and I don't want to have to turn down food at social situations, because I'm on a special diet (although if I ever develop a disease or medical condition where I have to eat differently, it will be a different story). Everything in moderation.

The eating normal is the best part of the no-s diet for me. I've handled 2 social situations with no issues so far. I simply filled my plate with regular food, and no one noticed I was avoiding the sweets!

Tessytwinkle, give it a good long time for S days to calm down. At the same time, no need to push sweets on yourself. You'll eventually find the balance between restraint and simple waiting for maximum enjoyment.

Thank you oolala. I long for that day

I forgot. My wife and I were on NutriSystem about 20 years ago. Lost lots of weight on the miniscule portions of course.

But it didn't prepare me for real life so of course once I quit the weight came all back on, plus some.

I figure this is a good thread for my first post!

Happily the only diets I spent money on were Weight Watchers and Atkins (and with Atkins it was just the book.) WW was effective but I hated counting points, and same with Atkins but worse because of the heavy, protein-laden diet.

I've known about No S for nearly ten years now. Looking back at my weight loss patterns I was always healthiest and happiest when the loss of weight was incidental to my lifestyle; ie when I was working a lot so my meals were regular and walking a lot. My body loved that. So did my mind since I wasn't stressing about my diet. No S reflects that way of living for me so it just makes sense to go back to it.

Tessytwinkle wrote: The only thing I have ever found to be really transformative but I was unable to sustain was no sugar. It seemed that if I could stop sugar completely for a week then somehow my whole body started to relax, and my appetite dropped.

I have found this too! Without sugar you learn to appreciate the natural sweetness of real food more and get in touch with your natural appetite. I can now eat plain goat's yogurt as a dessert with no fruit or honey added. I never thought that would happen LOL

I don't actually like conventional sugary dessert foods anymore, on S days I tend to have dark chocolate and dates and maybe some lara bars or something. I can eat a whole bar of dark chocolate and a pack of medjool dates to myself though so I'm still not so good on the moderation thing

Oh my goodness I love dates!! I like medjool but my favourites are degle nour dates but natural ones not in glucose syrup - yum I could eat dates all day. Had forgotten about them, will try them for my weekend treat, although like you Bonnie may have trouble with moderation

I don't believe that it is typical for a man dieting that much, but some of the highlight of more than 10 Years of dieting:

1. "Die Burger Diät" (The Burgerdiet) - Not a diet per se, but a journal of a man losing 35 pounds (77 pounds) in six month by eating exclusiv at McDonalds (around 1500kcal per day) - Funny thing i lost the biggest amount of weight with this (before NoS) = 21 kg.

2. Paleo - In my book it's pseudoscientific BS. Around 99% percent of it's claims you could/should get by decreasing the sheer amount of food consumed in the SAD.

3. The Master Cleanse - Yeah, right....

4. Vegan - "I didn't climb to the top of the food chain to eat plants!"

5. 4-Hour Body (Slow Carb) - Tim Ferris is what we call a "Dampfplauderer" in germany. Lots of talk to sell a crappy product (and a lot of stuff around his product). Let's face it: it is low-carb+beans

Germanherman, how exactly does one go about eating low carb in Germany? I was doing primal diet before I went there before last Christmas and there was just no way it could be maintained. My host family eats very traditional German: Brötchen for breakfast, meat with cabbage and potatoes for lunch and then Schnitten (bread with stuff on it) for dinner. It was insane. I was so friggin bloated by the end of that trip.

Rea, one of the first low carb books written was by a German named Wolfgang Lutz, "Leben ohne Brot" (Life without Bread) in 1967. If you eat only the wurst and leave out the bread at breakfast and supper and the potatoes at midday, you're good to go!

German bread is so good, though -- aren't we lucky that No S allows it!

germanherman wrote:
1. "Die Burger Diät" (The Burgerdiet) - Not a diet per se, but a journal of a man losing 35 pounds (77 pounds) in six month by eating exclusiv at McDonalds (around 1500kcal per day) - Funny thing i lost the biggest amount of weight with this (before NoS) = 21 kg.

This kind of makes sense to me -- although I don't think McDonald's is probably the best place to practice it. Over the years I've read several times that one way to eat less and lose weight is to limit variety. Eating only at McDonald's would certainly limit the variety in your diet. The more variety there is in a meal -- or in your diet in general -- the more you're going to eat.

I compare it to Thanksgiving. We eat a lot because there is a wide variety of food to eat on Thanksgiving. Compare that to any other Thursday (or Monday if you're Canadian) throughout the year.

I think we've added another variable or confounding factor to this. We eat from a number of cuisines. We may eat German for breakfast, Mexican for lunch and Thai for dinner. All of those different tastes could lead to us eating more than if we concentrated on just one cuisine or limited what we ate routinely.

When I was growing up, we didn't have this amount of variety. Chinese was chop suey and Italian was spaghetti or pizza or lasagna -- and we didn't have those often. Day in and day out it was pretty much standard midwestern fare.

I've read about a lot of diets, but tried few. I think the only ones I've tried were Weight Watchers years ago and a vegan diet, which was more for health than weight loss.

JustforToday made an interesting comment concerning Atkins (Low Carb). Being sick (vomitous) after low carbing. The last two evenings (not this evening), I ate very low carb and was nauseated after each meal. I am glad I am not the only one.

Rea wrote:Germanherman, how exactly does one go about eating low carb in Germany?

Easy: Living alone in a cave...

From a social perspectiv low-carb is pretty much the opposite of traditional german eating (we are the proud potatoe-nation!!!!!), so you will always get in awkward situations when eating primal around others.

My regular breakfast was eggs+something (baccon, fruits, nuts, spinach etc.). Yes, everyone at the table thinks you are a moron to eat that way (maybe rightful so...) while they enjoy what they grew up with: müsli, bread, milk, fruitjuices, fruits, Brötchen (buns/rolls ?).

Lunches were easier: Skip the potatoes, the rice or the pasta. Sometimes it's pretty hard because they are the main dish...

And dinner was Salat or some low-carb snacks.

But the social pressure is just one of many reasons why i dumped Primal/Paleo /low-carb.

@jw

What kind of german bread do you mean?

German "Schwarzbrot", prussian "Pumpernickel" or any other non-white bread we got...

All of them, Germanherman! -- my favorites were Dreikornbrot and little rolls called "Voegele" (I lived in Baden). I also liked Sauerteig. Here in the US, I can get black Vollkornbrot from Aldi sometimes -- it's a treat!

1. Weight Watchers
2. Calorie Counting via MyFitnessPal

I have always had success losing weight on WW. Usually about 20 lbs and then I stall. I just can't keep counting everyday. And its not even just the counting, its the measuring. Its not a way for anyone to live.

For some reason I thought that MyFitnessPal would be different. You know cause its on my phone and so easy to access that the calorie counting wouldn't get old. I was soooo wrong.

I've had a few false starts on No S. It actually makes me sad that I could be healthier now if I had stuck with it. But better late than never.

Speaking of other diets:

My mom swears by South Beach. You know because her doctor told her to do it .

When she told me that eating pineapple is basically the same thing as eating a candy bar, I wrote that diet off. Seriously, I know that pineapple has a lot of sugar in it, but it is by no means as calorically and nutritionally empty as a candy bar.

I will never understand these diets that never let you eat certain foods ever again for the rest of your life. Who can live like that?

My DH is trying a diet called "Eat to Live". I haven't read the book, but you basically eat only vegetables and very little of anything else...

Zoid, South Beach is the only formal diet I have ever done. But I couldn't reconcile the idea of never eating another chocolate chip cookie ever. I did lose 15 pounds on it though, but then regained 25 of course!!

South Beach, like Atkins, is another low carb approach. Except with South Beach, instead of a picture of a smiling Robert Atkins (I have a lot of respect for the good doctor actually...), South Beach gives you the scent of the tropical air, sandy beaches, Art Deco architecture, and beautiful people.