Ever watch that? Take the wives from radically different families and have them trade for two weeks. First week, guest wife has to live by host family's rules; second week, family has to live by guest wife's rules.

I know the producers go out of their way to find uncompromising extremists, because it makes for better TV. (Which is why I didn't respond when a producer contacted me about doing the show.) And every time food is an issue -- vegan mom goes into a family of hunters, for example -- they screw up by trying to change things too radically.

"Here, for your first vegan meal, try this green smoothie made from grasses I pulled out of your back yard and put in the blender." And they don't like it. No shit, who would have guessed?

If you want to change someone's opinion, you start by showing them something they can agree with. Try a "normal" salad, or even grilled portabellas. Then slowly work them up to bean sprouts and wheat grass.

When Honda decided to break into the motorcycle dirt track game, they copied the existing Harley racers (which were hard-tails) but added about nine inches of suspension. The riders hated them. So the crew put in blocks to remove all but an inch of travel and sent them back out. The riders liked them just fine. Came back for "suspension tuning" and they gave them three inches of travel. Riders liked it. Repeat ... repeat ...

By the end of the day, they had the full travel back, and set a new track record.