Category: Eat, Drink, and Move That Body!

Let me tell you a little about myself.

I was never an athletic child by any stretch of the imagination. Being short compared to my classmates, I usually scored poorly on any physical fitness test that measured my cohort by age as opposed to height: my legs were shorter so I couldn’t run as fast; my arms were shorter so I couldn’t climb as well. I was in 5th grade before it dawned on our Phys Ed teacher that setting the chin-up bar for “average height for xth grader” skewed his results for anyone on my side of the bell curve. He added one of those folding gym mats to make up for the difference, and suddenly 6 girls could do the flex arm hang that never could before! He probably took credit for improving our strength too.

Through Junior High and the first year of High School, I did bike a lot. There were actually places I could go on my bike, such as the library, park district, a grocery store, several friends’ houses, and a small shopping center. This was no longer true when we moved to Texas. My physical activity was largely limited to walking around the school. Nonetheless, my BMI on graduation day was 21.2* — well within normal range.

I went to college, and had a bigger campus to walk around. I also had to take a few PE classes, which is where I met the first truly competent coach I ever personally encountered. At the time, she was the head Women’s Volleyball coach, and she took the time to point out what I was doing wrong, and more importantly how I could do better. I was still not very athletic, but at least I wasn’t a hazard in the gym. However, like most other college students, my diet was not what anyone would consider spectacular. Somehow, I managed the 4 years only gaining 5 pounds, for a BMI of 22.2. This is, by the way, my current weight and BMI.

A year later — in the middle of grad school — I got married. By then my BMI was up to 23.6 — still normal, but I was still getting heavier. Then one night, I got home from choir practice to find my new husband watching one of those talk shows, and I became familiar with the work of Joyce Vedral. She’s looking pretty good for a senior citizen, isn’t she? Trust me, she looked terrific then too. Within days, I bought one of her books, the one she wrote with Jean Claude VanDamme’s wife. Well, I started weightlifting. And because we had a number of activities, we ate more fast food than was really good for us. I bulked up, but not in a good way. I moved on to one of Dr. Vedral’s other workouts, but not before my BMI was up to 25.4. I was able to delude myself that a lot of it was muscle. And hey, BMI is a crock, right? Right? Besides, I’ve got one of those relatively wide Eastern-European frames and will never ever be model-skinny. Right?

I got out of school and started working full time. I ended up in one of those apartment offices that always has some sort of food thing going on: cookies for guests; popcorn with the manager in the afternoons; lunch with “the girls”; stopping for a snack on the way to make bank deposits. Oh, and then we’d all decide to diet together — which usually meant a trip to Sam’s Club where we would buy a big salad bag and a monster sized bottle of reduced fat ranch dressing. By the time the lettuce got brown and disgusting, we had usually given up anyway. I still walked some, and we had fencing class once a week. We probably had fast food of one flavor or another 4 days a week for dinner. During this time, my BMI fluctuated between 26.3 and 28.1. I looked like a little sausage, especially in that “modular clothing” that places like “Units” used to sell. I had become convinced that diets were a waste of time. And then I got pregnant.

My official post-pregnancy weight is only 3 pounds more than my official pre-pregnancy weight. That sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, my BMI was still way too high at 28.7! Like Scarlett O’Hara and many other women, I resigned myself to the idea that most women don’t get their old bodies back after having a baby. I bought size 12 jeans and decided to live with it. For most practical purposes, I had stopped working out except for an occasional walk around the block pushing the stroller — weather permitting.

One fine morning, my husband arrived home from work — he was by then working in an Emergency Room — and announced we were going on a diet. He had been keeping track of the progress made by the head of the local Nephrology residency (a kidney specialist) on one of those low-carbohydrate diets. Here’s my husband’s results. Frankly, he looks even better now. I got back down to college weight, and we did not do any kind of exercise at all.

We didn’t add exercise to our routine until several years later in 2001, when we bought a decent stationary bike. Although I was skeptical at the time, it has more than paid for itself since we didn’t have to buy a gym membership (or two). I started doing Joyce Vedral’s Fat Burning Workout and some flexibility training while he biked. I have since switched to a military workout, and experimented with the shovelglove. I tend to develop some less-than-feminine-looking muscles, so back to the military workout for me. He uses weights while I bike. We both watch CNBC while we work out.

I lost the weight, and I kept it off long enough to make me (according to a prominent “fat acceptance” blogger) “literally a freak of nature.” Although my BMI did creep back up to 24 for a bit — still “normal”, still lookin good, just not as firm as I’d like — I’m now back down to college weight and in better shape than I have ever been. Because I have much better muscle tone than I did in college, I wear a size 2 jean now. Frankly, I don’t think I have ever worn a size two before, even in Junior High! And we’re about to step up the workout routine; maybe I’ll get back to High School weight.

Next time, I hope to talk about being a freak of nature, the truth about fitness, and why most diets fail.

In the meantime, a little background reading in lieu of “in closing”: Children who sleep less weigh more; inexpensive recipes for the New Year; I hate to say it but Kate’s right about Weight Watchers and Jill has some insights of her own to add, too; BlogHer on the diet rabbit-hole; and heck, she’s still big but she looks like she lost 20 pounds just by getting a bra that fit! Thanks, Carson!

* I realize BMI is a controversial measurement. I am using it to avoid this kind of reaction. By expressing my weight as a ratio with my height, you can start to think of it in terms of what you would weigh at these levels instead of focusing on my relative lightness.

Hey guys. I know this is a pretty cool time in your lives: you are legally grown-ups; you are making new friends, some of whom are from wildly different places than you; you are either deciding what you want to do “when you grow up” or actively working towards it; some of you are living on your own — or at least not with mom and dad — for the first time.

Now don’t get me wrong. I know your point of view is very different from mine. I read that list Beliot College makes every fall, even if I think they could have made better points. I was in college when you were born! However, there are some things that don’t change, no matter how much they should change.

And the one biggest thing that hasn’t changed but should is that you will know people who drink too much. Some of those people will do really stupid things as a result. Some of those people will die. Some of them will sadly cause someone else’s death. Some of them will have other horrible results.

There is a very good chance that one of the people you know who will drink too much is you.

Hey, I’m not so old that I don’t know the score. What, you don’t think I drank my share of beer in college? I know. Your friends are drinking and you want to fit in. Or maybe you’re pledging a frat/sorority and hey, you are willing to do whatever the pledge captain says. And for the first time in your life, there’s nobody you have to call and check in with, nobody who will care if you don’t drag your butt into bed before 3 AM if at all. You control your own schedule — except for that one 8 AM class that you had to take — and you are responsible for your own decisions. Nobody is blaming you for saying “I can have a beer if I want to, and nobody is going to stop me!”

I’m not going to put on the holier than thou and talk about how the legal drinking age is still 21. That notwithstanding, you’re legally an adult at 18, and entitled to make your own decisions, no matter how stupid. Nor am I going to preach about drunk driving. If those gory films in driver’s education didn’t persuade you that it’s a bad idea that can get you arrested or get you into a horrible wreck, nothing I can say is going to change your mind.

What I am going to say is to please use your head. Moderation is a good thing. Unlike that casserole your mom used to make, there is no rule that says you have to finish that mug of beer or bottle of hard liquor. It’s ok to not “have seconds,” let alone thirds and beyond. It’s ok to say “I’m fine, maybe I’ll have another one later.” You can use that 8 AM class or your job — it turns out over half of you have at least part time jobs, good for you! — as a perfectly valid excuse for why you won’t be having another drink. Do you honestly think your Dad has never said something like “Sorry guys, I’d better not have another. Gotta work in the morning”?

Please. Don’t be the guy who made the papers by dying of alcohol poisoning. Or the girl who wrapped her car around a telephone pole and killed her best friend. Or the guy who fell down the stairs and broke his leg, but didn’t notice until he tried to walk away. Or the girl who woke up with no underwear and no memory of the prior evening. Or the guy who woke up with some girl he doesn’t even know. Or the girl whose friends and family are begging her to get help, at least go to an AA meeting. Or the guy who is flunking all his classes because he spends too much time drunk and not enough time studying.

These things happen every year on college campuses across our nation.

Please, don’t let it be you.

****

This has been my personal message to all the college students of the world. Please feel free to send a link to this article to friends, family, and other people you care about. If you choose to forward the text instead, please note that it is written by Bridget Magnus of ShortWoman.com and Central Sanity, all rights reserved by the author.

Sometimes it takes the BBC to tell us the bleeding obvious: “Too much food, alcohol and sun has fuelled a massive rise in some forms of cancer, warn UK experts.” They’re British, so save the pedantic comments about spelling. There’s a lot to be said for “Moderation in all things.” Now, science confirms it!

Speaking of too much food, a new study suggests that feeding lots of “diet” foods to kids may cause overeating as adults. The working theory is that they “are conditioned to associate certain tastes – be they sweet or salty – with low-calorie foods, [so] they will begin to overeat at later meals to compensate, even if the sweet and salty treats are calorie-rich.” But by the time puberty is reached, “they likely used other cues, such as texture and portion size, to determine more correct calorie intake.” Granted, the research in question was done in rats, but in an age where we are becoming increasingly concerned about childhood obesity rates, this research may mean rethinking weight control for kids. The scientist in charge of the research concluded “Use nutritious, healthy food with calories and make sure the calories are balanced to the amount of activity level of the children.”

Of course I think we are all better off eating “nutritious, healthy food with calories” as opposed to the chemistry experiments that allow us to eat “low calorie” versions of cookies, candy, and high fat/sugar things.

And as for Cute Fuzzy Animals, today I received an email. I don’t normally forward such things, but I have verified this particular story via Snopes:

Hi, all you animal lovers. This is pretty simple… Please tell ten friends to tell ten today! The Animal Rescue Site is having trouble getting enough people to click on it daily to meet their quota of getting free food donated every day to abused and neglected animals.It takes less than a minute (How about 20 seconds) [actually it takes about 5 seconds, I tried it] to go to their site and click on the purple box “fund food for animals” for free. This doesn’t cost you a thing.

Their corporate sponsors/advertisers use the number of daily visits to donate food to abandoned/neglected animals in exchange for advertising.

Here’s the web site! Pass it along to people you know.

http://www.theanimalrescuesite.com/

AGAIN, PLEASE TELL 10 FRIENDS

Snopes points out that CharityUSA runs a family of sites that allow you to “donate” money for free by clicking a simple link, in addition to several online stores that allow you to both give money and show your charitable pride.

If you want to tell 10 people, that’s fine. If you’d rather put this information on your own site, that’s even better. But in any event, get clicking!

In closing: Bush 41, proud father?; if the economy is so great, how come fewer Mexican workers in the United States are sending money home; the CSM reports that experts say if you want to fly and get there on time, it will cost you extra; the new environmentalists on the block, Christian Evangelicals; a HUGE new planet has been found; and finally, Support Our Constitution.

I have two health-related items to share with you today.

The first is about the sun. Yesterday was the Solstice — that’s the day with the most sunlight all year (in the Northern Hemisphere, anyway) — and many people are engaging in outdoor activities. Sunscreen is vitally important if you are going to be outside during daylight hours, and that advice applies to kids as well as adults. Unfortunately, not all sunscreens are created equal, and some “either fall short of their claims or contain unsafe ingredients….” So what is a sun-conscious consumer to do? We already read labels and look for protection against both UVA and UVB, we look at the active ingredients, yet the label may be wrong!

Luckily, there is a new website in town that has done the important work of figuring out what the labels actually mean, and what the products actually do. You can find their summary here.

The second item is about new reports showing that hormone treatments for menopausal women maybe aren’t as bad for you as was feared a few years ago, and there are new guidelines reflecting that thinking. One thing that I will point out that I suspect you will not see mentioned elsewhere is that what modern medicine calls “Hormone Replacement Therapy” or HRT is actually Hormone Substitution Therapy. If you want the super long with a hundred pages of footnotes version, you’ll want to read this book. The 60-second summary is that human hormones can’t be patented, so drug companies make synthetic hormones out of things like horse pee that they can patent, except it’s not quite as good for you. If there is an interest in some middle ground of additional info, leave a comment and I will reply with some web resources.

In closing: Larry Kudlow is not better than Ezra; by way of follow up, Hillary and the Left; an article connecting the dots between the USDA, big Agriculture, and our ever bigger butts; a petition from Candlelighters; new CAFE standards (which aren’t law until the President signs them so keep your fingers crossed) would require both cars and SUVs to get 35 MPG by… say they didn’t mention a year; it looks like Dick Cheney thinks he’s above the law, Congressman replies Are Not! (ok, he puts it nicer than that); results of the Schneier movie plot contest; who knew Sci-Fi Heaven was in Riverside, CA; and Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs is kind enough to give us the 50 best anime of all time.

Regular readers know that I don’t normally resort to ranting about personal experiences. In fact I can only remember doing it once before, about a banking experience a few months ago. The same disclaimers apply more or less: the events I am about to describe did occur; my reporting of said events may be colored by my outrage; management is welcome — encouraged, in fact — to reply. When I have verified the origin of such a reply and the authority of the sender to make it, I will post it in an update to this post.

Saturday evening (June 16, 2007), I settled into a chair on the patio of one of what had been one of my favorite restaurants, Kona Grill. This little chain has about 15 locations in 10 states, and is traded on the NASDAQ under the ticker KONA. We liked this place so much, we have probably eaten there 3 times in the last 4 weeks. I have never had a bad meal there. I was looking forward to enjoying a glass of wine and some of their fabulous appetizers such as avocado egg rolls and tuna wasabi. Hey, it’s fusion cuisine, don’t knock it ’till you’ve tried it!

We enjoyed some drinks. We had some appetizers. We had some very nice sushi. It was a lovely evening, sitting in 99 degree weather with the misters going.

After we ordered dessert (ok it was another appetizer) is when things got strange. Between songs on their stereo, the volume went up. It wasn’t just tweeked a little; it got quite a lot louder. This is something that has happened before, and in the past a nice word to one of the staff members was all it took to bring things back to a reasonable level. The volume control is right by the bar, so the bartender is the person in control of it. The bartender happened to open a window less than 10 feet away from us, so we took this as an opportunity to catch his eye.

Imagine our surprise to instead receive an obscene gesture.

I could hardly believe what I had just seen. However, before I could say anything my husband exclaimed that he had seen the same thing I had seen. Now I was mad. And I probably overreacted, shouting something to the effect of “Turn down that stereo and don’t you dare shoot us the bird!” I think our waitress must have been just coming out the door at the moment; my husband told her to get a manager right now. He showed up within 60 seconds, and that was the last thing the manager did right.

We explained what had happened to the young man in the light blue shirt and pink tie that claimed to be the manager (alas, no name tag, no corporate logo, and no name offered). There are many things he could have said at that moment. Things like “let me find out what happened and I’ll be right back,” or “I agree that’s totally unacceptable, sir,” or “I understand why you are unhappy sir,” not even “I’m terribly sorry, how can I make this up to you, sir?” Instead he explained that it’s policy to keep the music on the patio loud, and as for the bartender he said — and I quote — “What do you want me to do?”

My thoughts: be a manager; it’s your job. The manager gets to decide what to do, but he has to do something. Instead, all signs were that he was going to do nothing.

My husband said “What I want you to do is fire him, but I know that’s not going to happen. He’s going to deny he did it, and you need him pouring drinks on a Saturday.” The manager admitted that was so (causing me to wonder what a bind they would have been in if the bartender had called in sick). We don’t want money off our bill (it wasn’t offered); we don’t want empty apologies (not that any were forthcoming); we want this to never happen again. We are grown-ups and know that everybody gets mad at people sometimes. This bartender’s urge to insult could have been handled in his apron, under the bar, or several other places where customers did not have to see it, and we said so.

The manager continued to condescend to us as our dessert arrived, but by then neither of us particularly had an appetite. He left, and I don’t honestly remember whether the volume of the music ever went down or not. Shortly after, my husband saw a not-obscene but clearly hostile gesture towards him personally, an effort to goad us. Just the kind of guy a lady wants mixing her drinks.

Not long after, our waitress came by with the check, sat down with us at our table, and personally apologized for what had happened. She mentioned that she had talked to the bartender, who claimed the initial gesture had not been at us — as if that somehow made it acceptable. Ok, so he admits he made an obscene gesture where customers (and their children) could see it. Nice. And he gets to keep his job, in a town where guys are pushing one another under the bus to work a busy bar on a Saturday night.

For the record, we paid our bill in full, with a generous tip. Our receipt has a hand written note from our waitress, Tiffanie, reading “I’m very sorry! Thank you!” At least one person understands customer service. What a shame it isn’t the management.

*** Important Update June 18, 2007 *** Within 12 hours of posting this item, I received a comment from a man who identifies himself as the bartender. Please check it out for yourself. As much as I appreciate hearing from him, it is clear that the incident in question has filtered through management, inasmuch as it is highly unlikely that he was an established reader horrified to find himself my topic.

*** Update Two June 19, 2007 *** This morning I received a personal email from the District Manager. It appears to have been sent shortly after I went to bed last night; we all know that restaurateurs often work brutal hours. He expressed his regrets both at the events that occurred and management reaction to them. Furthermore, he expressed his intent to share this incident with the management team in an effort to improve customer experiences. On site management is still silent; corporate policy may be that once Head Office gets involved, they are to let it be handled from above. This is understandable, and almost certainly how I would want things done if I managed a multi-location business.

*** Update Three, later June 19, 2007 *** I have now also received an email of apology from the General Manager of the local Kona Grill (who outranks the fellow in the blue shirt from Saturday). He assures me that he has spoken both to the manager on duty about his action/inaction, and the bartender about his actions. Further more he tells me “appropriate corrective measures” are being taken, and my account of the incident is being shared with the entire staff “as a serious reminder that we cannot afford to fall short of expectations.” I must absolutely commend pretty much everybody except the shift manager Saturday for responding to customer complaints. According to the timestamp on this email, it was sent less than 24 hours after this post.

You know what? So many smart people have already weighed in on this. The USDA has decided, in the wake of several unrelated food contamination incidents, not to test all slaughtered cows for BSE, the “Mad Cow Disease.” More importantly, it has decided to take court action to prevent meat packers from independantly having their slaughtered cows tested at their own expense.

Here is the source article. I was first alerted to this travesty by Seeing the Forest. Here’s what Shakesville has to say. And here’s Daily Kos. But the granddaddy of commentary on this steaming cow-patty is this item, which includes the money quote:

First, observe the contempt for liberty. When E. coli conservatives say self-regulation is preferable to government, they’re even lying about that. Second, observe the contempt for small business. When a small company want to – voluntarily! – hold its product to a higher standard, the government blocks it, in part because bigger companies have to be protected from the competition, in part because a theoretical threat to the bottom line (false positives) trumps protection against a deadly disease.

There’s your conservatism, America: not extremism in defense of liberty. State socialism in defense of Mad Cow.

All I can imagine is that the meat packing industry is deathly afraid of what might be found if there were widespread testing. Put that in your free market and smoke it.

In closing: the United States is so desperate for combat soldiers we are sending amputees back to combat; the ACLU has figured out what I said over a week ago, that the new immigration reform bill would create a “no work list” that we can only hope is as accurate as the “no fly list”; investors hope a new forum for doctors will churn out profitable ideas rather than grounds for litigation; how curious that the college enrollment rate and the employment rate for recent high school grads are both down; and finally water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink… unless you pay for the privilege.

… to Niemoller.

When it was melamine in the cat food, I said nothing, for I did not use that brand of cat food.

When it was anti-freeze in the toothpaste, I said nothing, for that brand of toothpaste is supposedly not even imported to this country.

But now it is fugu in the monkfish, and even though I have probably not had monkfish in 20 years, I’m saying something. I’m not even sure how one would confuse the two!

Here are some pictures of fugu. Here are some more. The Wikipedia article on them includes this picture:

Ok, now here are some pictures of monkfish. They aren’t even close to the same shape! The official NOAA FAQ on monkfish includes this picture:

I’ve left that picture bigger than the other to illustrate a point: Monkfish are a lot bigger than fugu, as this restauranteur and Julia Childs illustrate.

Now, even before this news broke, the United States was asking for changes to the “food safety relationship” with China. And predictably, China doesn’t like it. However, like it or not some changes are critical inasmuch as big agri-business is fighting efforts to put country of origin labels (“COOL”) on food.

So my question is this: how much tainted food does one country have to send us before we start wondering if maybe we should stop letting them send food at all?

In closing: Europe and Japan will likely have more economic growth than the United States this year, so much for being strangled by socialism and high taxes; Congressmice are catching heat about the immigration bill, maybe it will do Trent Lott some good to answer his own phone; Al Gore is “on fire” now that he isn’t running for anything; opposition to the Iraq war is at an all-time high, and all the American people got was a minimum wage hike from their Congressmice (yes I’m still mad, can you tell?); oh yeah, and it turns out “intelligence experts” knew how bad things would get over there; it’s long and long-winded but don’t miss George Lakoff debunking all the spin guys like Harry Reid have been spewing about the war funding bill; and finally one person in Congress who isn’t a Congressmouse. I’m glad I had a chance to vote for him.

Today’s news includes an admission that yes, Laura Bush has had a small skin cancer removed. I’d like to take a minute to quickly discuss the proper care of something I know you have, skin.

My sincere apologies if you are in fact a burn victim with no skin. Moving on.

The nice people at the Skin Cancer Foundation have this to say about the type of cancer Mrs. Bush had removed: it is the second most common form of skin cancer, and ” Like all skin cancers, chronic overexposure to the sun is the primary cause of nearly all cases of squamous cell carcinoma.” It is worth noting that your face is a prime area for such cancers because unlike most other body parts, it is almost never covered by clothing.

Taking care of your skin is not difficult, but it does take a few minutes every day and a little thinking ahead. To me that seems a small price to pay for both preventing cancer and looking good. In fact, I’m going to give you both versions of Skin Care for Humans, the lazy version and the deluxe version.

The lazy version is for you if I can only get you to spend an extra 60 seconds on your skin each day: when you clean your face daily (you are doing that, right? I mean otherwise… ew), use a good quality facial cleanser instead of soap; use a moisturizing sunscreen or sunscreen with moisturizer designed for use on your face each and every day.

When selecting your products, remember that you only have one face. Don’t accept anything inferior to Avon or Neutrogena, even if you are trying to be budget conscious. I like SkinMedica products, personally. Did I mention that I’m a thirty-something woman who gets carded regularly? As for your sunscreen, it should specifically say it blocks both UVA and UVB rays and have an SPF of at least 15. I specify a moisturizing sunscreen because it reduces the number of products used by combining two things everybody needs. And yes, you need sunscreen every day, even in Seattle, even if you are “just going to and from the car.” If you spend 5 minutes outdoors 12 times a day, that’s still an hour; you wouldn’t spend an hour in the sun without sunscreen, would you? And the nice folks at Cancer Research UK tell us that “Untreated glass, water and clouds are not good shields against UV radiation,” and “Even on overcast skies, 30-40% of UV will still penetrate through cloud cover.”

Now then, if I can get you to spend 5 minutes a day on your face, here’s the Deluxe 4 Step Skin Care for Humans Plan. Follow these steps twice daily:

Clean. Good quality facial cleanser. Use your hands instead of a washcloth, because the lines in your hands are just exactly abrasive enough to get stuff like dirt and loose skin off your face without ripping healthy skin cells off your face. Pat dry with towel when you are done instead of rubbing, for the same reason. Folks with facial peircings have already figured this one out the hard way.

Tone. Ideally, your toner should be made by the same company that made your cleanser. The purpose of toner is to bring your face back to a normal pH after cleaning or other treatments, and prep it for the next step.

Serums and/or eye cream. A serum is nothing more complicated than a skin treatment. There are more serums out there than you can shake a stick at. You have anti-oxidant serums such as vitamin C, and you have retinol based serums, and hydroquinone serums for getting rid of dark spots, and acne serums with ingredients like benzoyl peroxide or salicytic acid. Basically anything you would apply to your face to address a problem goes here. Make sure you let this product dry before doing anything else.

Sunscreen/moisturizer. Suncreen during the day; moisturizer at night. You don’t need sunscreen at night — the mass of the earth does a good job of blocking all the sun’s direct light — so why put it on?

I hope this is helpful. Take care of your skin; it’s attached to you.

China Follow Up: Chinese middle class fights back, making it clear that even people with an oppressive government can (and do!) fight back when necessary; the Chicago Tribune onthe ecologic effect of cheap Chinese goods such as cashmere; the AFP in a news item that doesn’t even mention China but illustrates the economic effect of cheap Chinese goods; a Chinese spin on the soup kitchen, or a publicity stunt?; and finally the Chinese experiment with a city run on cheap migrant labor is a failure, but the migrants are too poor to leave the sinking ship. A choice quote:

Among Chinese economic planners, Shenzhen’s recipe is increasingly seen as all but irrelevant: too harsh, too wasteful, too polluted, too dependent on the churning, ceaseless turnover of migrant labor.

“This path is now a dead end,” said Zhao Xiao, an economist and former adviser to the Chinese State Council, or cabinet. After cataloging the city’s problems, he said, “Governments can’t count on the beauty of investment covering up 100 other kinds of ugliness.”

Gee, sounds like they have figured out what Americans have not.

In closing: Wil Wheaton’s Security Theatre Experience; a news item not to be underestimated, Japan rolls back pacifist pillars; CNN brings you 6 strategies to survive the coming real estate bust, particularly if you are in one of the 10 housing markets they think is poised to fall in 2007; and finally don’t blame Taco Bell for the problems of big corporate agri-business.

The world is making my brain hurt today. Between Republicans blaming Democrats for a Republican aide outing a Republican pedophile, The President being pleased with the economy despite the fact that job growth was only a third of what it needed to be in September, news that four times as many Iraqi cops have died in the last 2 years as American soldiers, the continued assault on Constitutionally protected rights and Constitutionally mandated division of governmental powers, and all the other stuff going on, it’s hard to single out one most important thing. So I am going to take a deep breath and talk about something else. And since we all eat food, it is relevant.
I like food. And I like to think I am a decent enough cook. By this I mean that I can generally follow a good recipe, and I can make food that does not involve boxed dinners, packets of seasoning mix, or canned soup. Although I use several internet recipe sources, that only is a useful strategy if you know exactly what you want to cook in the first place. Go ahead, google for “chicken recipes” and find yourself buried under millions of links. The fact of the matter is that there’s nothing like looking through a good cookbook to give you new ideas and help you through “well, I went crazy at the Asian market, now what do I do with this stuff I bought?”

Although I own quite a few cookbooks, there are really only a few that get used often. Please allow me to share them with you.

Such a list would be incomplete if I did not start with the classics: The Joy of Cooking. This is my go-to book for classic recipes (biscuits, quiche, pretty much anything “basic”) and general information about any given foodstuff. All the directions are straightforward, although you will want to read through a recipe in entirety before getting started, as ingredient lists are presented on an as-needed basis. A new edition comes out at the end of the month, so think Christmas present for anybody you know who will be moving out on their own soon (getting married, graduating college, whatever).

How to Cook Everything is a worthy successor to Joy and Betty and their ilk. This book does contain some advanced recipes in addition to some very basic ones. There are many recipes that are vegetarian/vegan, or can easily be made so by omiting optional ingredients, using olive oil instead of butter, etc.. There’s also a basic version.

I so wanted to love Alton Brown’s cookbook. But frankly, the layout sucked. It’s hard to read, let alone cook from. There’s lots of great information on the science behind cooking, but relatively few recipes. Maybe this will be fixed in version 2.0, but I’m not lining up to pre-order it. Alton, sweetheart, it is clear from recent episodes of your show (two episodes on water? Please!) that you are having a hard time with ideas. May I recommend you pick up a copy of either of my first two selections and work your way through the veggies chapter? That will keep in you new episodes for at least a couple years! I mean can’t you think of a half hour worth of things to say about rutabagas?

Well, I just panned one celebrity cookbook, so it’s only fair I rave about a different celebrity cookbook. Ted Allen’s cookbook is well worth buying. Mine came with a plastic book cover that wipes clean from the inevitable things you will get on it. He covers everything from how to have a cocktail party to how to cook things outdoors to what to do if you invite vegans to dinner.

My last favorite must have item is an apparently out-of-print cookbook by the California Culinary Academy entitled “Cooking A to Z.” Beautifully illustrated, encylopedic format to help you easily find what you need, concise information about any ingredient or techinique, and good recipes as a bonus.

If you want to get into cuisines of the world but don’t know where to begin, this last title is a good place to start: The Frugal Gourmet on Our Immigrant Ancestors: Recipes You Should Have Gotten from Your Grandmother. This book is no substitute for books that specialize in one ethnic food at a time, but it will get you started, and show you what shelf of Borders you should be browsing for more information on your favorite cuisine.
In Closing, IgNobel prize winners for 2006 include researchers who published a paper called “Termination of Intractable Hiccups with Digital Rectal Massage”; a disturbing trend, nutcases storming schools (where they do not belong, so measures designed to stop students with guns will have little or no effect) and specifically targeting girls (what’s up with that? Welcome to the Middle East or the Middle Ages?); and an all too true cartoon.

Yes yes, I’ve said it before, but there’s yet another new study — actually a study that looked at 30 studies published over the last 40 years — that supports what I’ve been saying for a long time. Americans drink lots of sugary sodas with no nutritional value, and as a result gain weight. Did you know that an extra can of soda daily can cause you to gain 15 pounds in a year? And that’s a 12 ounce can, not the 20 ounce bottle you’ll find at most convenience stores. Maybe you weren’t aware that on average Americans get 8-9% of their total calories from sugary beverages.

Super-sized cheesy poofs and snacky cakes are part of the American obesity problem, sure. But 8% of your calories coming from sugary drinks could sure explain why your pants are a bit tight.

Oh, the USA Today version of the article includes quotes from two scientists who are paid by such “impartial” groups as the American Beverage Association that amount to “Waah! They didn’t use the two studies that say what we wanted them to say!” Nope, in the Associated Press’s words, they only used “40 years of nutrition studies that met strict standards for relevance and scientific muster.” (Emphasis mine)

Want a healthier diet? Not ready to run out and buy a copy of Diet for a Dead Planet? Start by cutting the soda. Maybe it won’t cause the pounds to melt away, but getting rid of the calories that come from sugary drinks has to be a good start.

In closing, The BBC confirms that employers don’t want to hire people who can’t use the language properly; Windows users, get that security update ASAP; “Polite Advice for Mainstream Journalists”; Maya’s Granny offers concise wisdom on why Lieberman lost; Seeing the Forest has an interesting view on the draft; and finally American Academy of Pediatrics offers more advice parents can’t follow, “warn[ing] parents against placing children in shopping carts and… advising they look for alternatives.” Alternatives? Like what? Having groceries delivered, or maybe pushing a stroller in addition to a cart? Even coverage of the study says “that child restraints in shopping carts are just part of the solution and that shopping carts need to be redesign to prevent them tipping over and the current safety standard strengthened to prevent such injuries.” Of course they don’t mention paying attention to junior while you shop. These are the same people who recommend that children under the age of two not watch any tv under any circumstances, effectively meaning no tv for the whole family if “the baby” is awake. Too bad if your pre-schooler wants to watch Sesame Street. Too bad if you want to see the news.