I just added a new blog to my list which [GASP] has nothing to do with health and nutrition! It's POLITICAL in nature -- EEEEEW! ;-)
I friggin' HATE politics. But this guy is sane and reasonable, educated and well-read and a good writer on top of everything else. He has experience of the world and a good argumentative style. And i just LUUUUV how he rips trolls a new one. Dear god, how i'd love to turn him loose on a few jerks i know....
Stonekettle Station: it makes me feel better after reading facebook!
Sunday, July 21, 2013
Saturday, July 20, 2013
Mercury direct again -- here's hoping it will help!
...because the stoopid has been really thick lately!
Everyone in professional media seems not to have gotten the right kind or amount of attention during their formative years, because the clamor to get their fifteen minutes of fame has become deafening in these our times. Of course, an awful lot of amateurs are even worse.
Ladies and gentlemen, ANYONE can be (and almost everyone probably is) a racist, sexist, agist, religion-ist -- you name it. This just means that one makes a series of presumptions about people based on nothing but one's perception of what they MAY be like, because of the demographic to which they belong. Things like individual bearing and mien, how people dress and speak, influence us as well. This is deeply ingrained -- instinctive. It's adaptive and protective ... and often counter-productive.
What gets nasty is when unevolved people act on their instincts. When people with an axe to grind buy the airwaves and serve up the hate and fear in supersize portions. When selfish fucktards aren't knocked back into the primordial ooze in which they belong, because other selfish fucktards have seized power which they're not qualified to wield -- because when you live in a SOCIETY you have an obligation to behave in a SOCIAL manner. Breakers of the social contract should not be allowed to benefit from it.
Way too many people are ANTI-SOCIAL in every definition of the word. It's disgusting. GROW UP.
Everyone in professional media seems not to have gotten the right kind or amount of attention during their formative years, because the clamor to get their fifteen minutes of fame has become deafening in these our times. Of course, an awful lot of amateurs are even worse.
Ladies and gentlemen, ANYONE can be (and almost everyone probably is) a racist, sexist, agist, religion-ist -- you name it. This just means that one makes a series of presumptions about people based on nothing but one's perception of what they MAY be like, because of the demographic to which they belong. Things like individual bearing and mien, how people dress and speak, influence us as well. This is deeply ingrained -- instinctive. It's adaptive and protective ... and often counter-productive.
What gets nasty is when unevolved people act on their instincts. When people with an axe to grind buy the airwaves and serve up the hate and fear in supersize portions. When selfish fucktards aren't knocked back into the primordial ooze in which they belong, because other selfish fucktards have seized power which they're not qualified to wield -- because when you live in a SOCIETY you have an obligation to behave in a SOCIAL manner. Breakers of the social contract should not be allowed to benefit from it.
Way too many people are ANTI-SOCIAL in every definition of the word. It's disgusting. GROW UP.
Monday, July 15, 2013
hearing what we want to hear
I've been re-reading Adele Hite's "As the Calories Churn" series -- and it's time for another episode, dear! ;-) ... SO many quotable moments here! I was tempted to take a chunk out of her first article, which talked about how our dietary guidelines don't just ignore the science, but virtually put their fingers in their ears and say "lalalalala" to drown out the truth of our problem....
But continuing on through the first and into the second installment, i was inspired by a whole 'nother idea: that when people read studies or the articles, discussions and twitter-storms that follow, how often their personal predilections cause them to zero in on PARTS of the message that jibe with their very own desires!
It's human nature. The previously-fat-deprived individual hears the Good News a la Atkins, and the immediate take-away is, "i can eat all the bacon i want!!! :-D" -- except Atkins never told us to stuff ourselves with ANYTHING. He said to eat till we're satisfied, and pay attention to our bodies' cues so that we'll get ENOUGH, but not overload. Conversely, the carb-addicted individual will read the voices of reason in the paleo-blogosphere and hear, "carbs are GOOD for you -- you just burn them off, and they aren't stored as fat", whereas if they were paying attention to the fine print, they'd have noticed that the caveat that causes their interpetation to be true is IF THE CARB-EATER IS BURNING GAZILLIONS OF ENERGY UNITS while in serious athletic training ... and even then candy is not an appropriate source of carbohydrate. Sedentary individuals need not apply (this factoid to their personal experience).
The Oscar Wilde's maxim, "nothing succeeds like excess" is a very popular concept when it comes to indulging our hedonistic whims, but it really isn't as good a personal motto as "discretion is the better part ofspeeding valor" (oops, i was telling you my DRIVING motto, not my LIVING one). I've always been fond of "procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday," too, and other Archie-isms....
"Truth" is likely to lie somewhere between what we HATE and what we want to hear.
On a more Ernest note -- doggone it, once i start down that Wilde road it's hard to turn back -- on an EARNEST note, once we have hit that midlife speedbump, the time for manic abandon is pretty much over! The bacon or sweet-potato (or beer) orgies that we used to be able to indulge in our twenties with NO repercussions, and which we were able to recover from pretty quickly in our thirties, can now cause a lot more lasting damage. A wheat, lettuce or cheese binge can make me miserable for a week.
I've digressed, which easily happens when i get in a whimsical mood. ;-) But yeah -- it's a temptation to read what we want to, when ambiguous research reports come within our radar. If the message tends toward ANY extreme, we should look on it with much more cynicism than may come naturally. Any GOOD study is likely to tell us nothing that's entirely new or revolutionary; people HAVE been doing "good science" for a long time, even if the media pass it along very poorly, and bloggers do marginally better/worse. The best we can hope for are refinements of what we already know.
But continuing on through the first and into the second installment, i was inspired by a whole 'nother idea: that when people read studies or the articles, discussions and twitter-storms that follow, how often their personal predilections cause them to zero in on PARTS of the message that jibe with their very own desires!
It's human nature. The previously-fat-deprived individual hears the Good News a la Atkins, and the immediate take-away is, "i can eat all the bacon i want!!! :-D" -- except Atkins never told us to stuff ourselves with ANYTHING. He said to eat till we're satisfied, and pay attention to our bodies' cues so that we'll get ENOUGH, but not overload. Conversely, the carb-addicted individual will read the voices of reason in the paleo-blogosphere and hear, "carbs are GOOD for you -- you just burn them off, and they aren't stored as fat", whereas if they were paying attention to the fine print, they'd have noticed that the caveat that causes their interpetation to be true is IF THE CARB-EATER IS BURNING GAZILLIONS OF ENERGY UNITS while in serious athletic training ... and even then candy is not an appropriate source of carbohydrate. Sedentary individuals need not apply (this factoid to their personal experience).
The Oscar Wilde's maxim, "nothing succeeds like excess" is a very popular concept when it comes to indulging our hedonistic whims, but it really isn't as good a personal motto as "discretion is the better part of
"Truth" is likely to lie somewhere between what we HATE and what we want to hear.
On a more Ernest note -- doggone it, once i start down that Wilde road it's hard to turn back -- on an EARNEST note, once we have hit that midlife speedbump, the time for manic abandon is pretty much over! The bacon or sweet-potato (or beer) orgies that we used to be able to indulge in our twenties with NO repercussions, and which we were able to recover from pretty quickly in our thirties, can now cause a lot more lasting damage. A wheat, lettuce or cheese binge can make me miserable for a week.
I've digressed, which easily happens when i get in a whimsical mood. ;-) But yeah -- it's a temptation to read what we want to, when ambiguous research reports come within our radar. If the message tends toward ANY extreme, we should look on it with much more cynicism than may come naturally. Any GOOD study is likely to tell us nothing that's entirely new or revolutionary; people HAVE been doing "good science" for a long time, even if the media pass it along very poorly, and bloggers do marginally better/worse. The best we can hope for are refinements of what we already know.
Saturday, July 13, 2013
another good MR activity
Another week is left of the Mercury Retrograde, and it seems like a good time to talk about supplements again. Since my husband retired, we've been on the go a whole lot more, and the traveling-light times have given me more insight into what's ESSENTIAL for me, and what seems a lot more optional.
When i used to drive to New Orleans and spend a month at a time away from home, i used to take the whole collection. There was no reason not to -- my Cross Country has a lot of space, even when traveling with the dog (and his big crate) and the canary (RIP to my little Pip, who lasted a long time for such a little guy). Going to Texas, too, i didn't try to take just the bare necessities, because i was usually gone a good two weeks and had plenty of room. But on our train trip at Christmas, the Low-Carb Cruise, and various long-weekend kinds of excursions, it seemed ridiculous to take the 20 bottles that sit on my bathroom counter while at home. Some things i REALLY missed while we were away, and some things i ran out of mid-trip and was surprised not to be able to easily replace.
Good-quality cod liver oil falls into that last category. As discussed some time ago, vitamin A is something i MUST supplement and CLO is a stellar choice which balances it with D, and gives the omega-3s a boost at the same time. Before the winter trip, i ordered capsules of what i THOUGHT was the perfect alternative to the liquid stuff that lives in my fridge at home, but it was NOT. Before i take another trip, on which it will be difficult to carry the liquid, i need to find something better -- but in the meantime, i luv me my Carlson's!
I ran out of my systemic enzymes on the ship, and we stayed longer in TX afterward than i expected, so i was without those till i could order more and have them delivered at home. While i was away, i strained a knee which refused to return to normal till i had been a week back on a good serrapeptase supplement. LESSON LEARNED the painful way -- and that certainly teaches one in a manner that's hard to forget.
I've played with reducing my iodine intake, because i'd heard that megadoses are necessary for replenishment of one's stores, but after that a maintenance dose is all that's needed. I don't believe that any more. Splitting the difference between the 50mg mega and the 12.5mg maintenance seems to be the answer for me. Iron, too -- there's so much ferrophobia in the paleo blogosphere it almost makes me angry! It's clearer than the water of Montauk Spring that when i supplement i'm fine, and when i don't i shed like a big dog! I've gone through the supplementing/not-supplementing cycle SEVERAL times, and it NEVER FAILS. Case closed. Bless his little heart, Dr. Jayson Calton* chatted with me on the cruise, and gave me a good tip about taking my iron in isolation -- he DID NOT freak out and caution me about the DA-A-A-ANGER of supplementing this stuff like the make-believe authorities online do. :-D
I'm less sure about things like copper, selenium, K2, zinc and magnesium. I take the first two because i understand that they're needed to balance iron and iodine, respectively. The last three i take because i want to make sure i get enough, and most people don't. Whether any of these are things i do or don't absorb well ... i don't really know! They are just-in-case supps. I believe i also need B12 in the sublingual methylcobalamine form i take, but haven't given it the same kind of testing i gave iron.
Having decent energy levels is SO CRITICAL for my well-being, anything like zinc and B12 that help the thyroid and hormone conversion/usage, i don't want to mess with! I think they're helping, so i don't want to play around with them and risk crashing. I HAVE played with some other things that fall in the maybe-helpful category, and ... well, they really seem to deserve their own paragraphs....
Months ago, i tried tyrosine and stopped again because it seemed that instead of making me energetic it seemed to just make me jittery. Reflection and retrial has given me food for thought -- tyrosine appears to be a good thing on those days when i HAVE to be doing physical "work." When we have a long list of places to go, people to see and things to do -- activities that tend to wear me out -- tyrosine helps me cope, and i tend to return home without the excessive fatigue i used to experience. So tyrosine apparently helps me utilize energy better, but it's not so good to use for mental, sitting-down work.
Carnitine, i was pretty certain, helped with energy but being another damned pill i frequently didn't take enough, i suspect. Well, when i ran out of the last caplets, i ordered a bottle of the high-potency LIQUID, and ... YES. It DOES appear to be better-absorbed and more effective. I've become an enthusiast of the liquid supplement by Now (citrus flavor), but i find it better to take in two half-doses instead of the recommended dose all at once. Wooo's training taught her that carnitine competes with thyroid hormone for receptors, and it's therefore not recommended for hypothyroids -- i suspect that there's more to the mechanism than appeared in her textbook; don't quote me as an authority, but my experience seems to imply that carnitine MIGHT just spare thyroid in its job of escorting fat into cells for burning as fuel.
My raw thyroid glandular supplements are essential [full stop]. No compromise possible. Ditto for the pregnenolone.
Betaine-HCl, like melatonin and my favorite antihistamine (benedryl), is something i keep on hand because they belong in the sometimes-badly-needed category. Licorice root, too, seems to be helpful in times of stress. Mucuna SEEMS to help with essential tremor. Just like echinacea, goldenseal, zinc lozenges have their moments, when infection makes a rare appearance.
I've got it down. For now. Till something ELSE changes. ;-)
______
* Ph.D., FAAIM, DCCN, CMS, CISSN, BCIH, ROHP, A.M.P -- this guy works with real-life human patients, and i feel confident that he actually HELPS PEOPLE....
When i used to drive to New Orleans and spend a month at a time away from home, i used to take the whole collection. There was no reason not to -- my Cross Country has a lot of space, even when traveling with the dog (and his big crate) and the canary (RIP to my little Pip, who lasted a long time for such a little guy). Going to Texas, too, i didn't try to take just the bare necessities, because i was usually gone a good two weeks and had plenty of room. But on our train trip at Christmas, the Low-Carb Cruise, and various long-weekend kinds of excursions, it seemed ridiculous to take the 20 bottles that sit on my bathroom counter while at home. Some things i REALLY missed while we were away, and some things i ran out of mid-trip and was surprised not to be able to easily replace.
Good-quality cod liver oil falls into that last category. As discussed some time ago, vitamin A is something i MUST supplement and CLO is a stellar choice which balances it with D, and gives the omega-3s a boost at the same time. Before the winter trip, i ordered capsules of what i THOUGHT was the perfect alternative to the liquid stuff that lives in my fridge at home, but it was NOT. Before i take another trip, on which it will be difficult to carry the liquid, i need to find something better -- but in the meantime, i luv me my Carlson's!
I ran out of my systemic enzymes on the ship, and we stayed longer in TX afterward than i expected, so i was without those till i could order more and have them delivered at home. While i was away, i strained a knee which refused to return to normal till i had been a week back on a good serrapeptase supplement. LESSON LEARNED the painful way -- and that certainly teaches one in a manner that's hard to forget.
I've played with reducing my iodine intake, because i'd heard that megadoses are necessary for replenishment of one's stores, but after that a maintenance dose is all that's needed. I don't believe that any more. Splitting the difference between the 50mg mega and the 12.5mg maintenance seems to be the answer for me. Iron, too -- there's so much ferrophobia in the paleo blogosphere it almost makes me angry! It's clearer than the water of Montauk Spring that when i supplement i'm fine, and when i don't i shed like a big dog! I've gone through the supplementing/not-supplementing cycle SEVERAL times, and it NEVER FAILS. Case closed. Bless his little heart, Dr. Jayson Calton* chatted with me on the cruise, and gave me a good tip about taking my iron in isolation -- he DID NOT freak out and caution me about the DA-A-A-ANGER of supplementing this stuff like the make-believe authorities online do. :-D
I'm less sure about things like copper, selenium, K2, zinc and magnesium. I take the first two because i understand that they're needed to balance iron and iodine, respectively. The last three i take because i want to make sure i get enough, and most people don't. Whether any of these are things i do or don't absorb well ... i don't really know! They are just-in-case supps. I believe i also need B12 in the sublingual methylcobalamine form i take, but haven't given it the same kind of testing i gave iron.
Having decent energy levels is SO CRITICAL for my well-being, anything like zinc and B12 that help the thyroid and hormone conversion/usage, i don't want to mess with! I think they're helping, so i don't want to play around with them and risk crashing. I HAVE played with some other things that fall in the maybe-helpful category, and ... well, they really seem to deserve their own paragraphs....
Months ago, i tried tyrosine and stopped again because it seemed that instead of making me energetic it seemed to just make me jittery. Reflection and retrial has given me food for thought -- tyrosine appears to be a good thing on those days when i HAVE to be doing physical "work." When we have a long list of places to go, people to see and things to do -- activities that tend to wear me out -- tyrosine helps me cope, and i tend to return home without the excessive fatigue i used to experience. So tyrosine apparently helps me utilize energy better, but it's not so good to use for mental, sitting-down work.
Carnitine, i was pretty certain, helped with energy but being another damned pill i frequently didn't take enough, i suspect. Well, when i ran out of the last caplets, i ordered a bottle of the high-potency LIQUID, and ... YES. It DOES appear to be better-absorbed and more effective. I've become an enthusiast of the liquid supplement by Now (citrus flavor), but i find it better to take in two half-doses instead of the recommended dose all at once. Wooo's training taught her that carnitine competes with thyroid hormone for receptors, and it's therefore not recommended for hypothyroids -- i suspect that there's more to the mechanism than appeared in her textbook; don't quote me as an authority, but my experience seems to imply that carnitine MIGHT just spare thyroid in its job of escorting fat into cells for burning as fuel.
My raw thyroid glandular supplements are essential [full stop]. No compromise possible. Ditto for the pregnenolone.
Betaine-HCl, like melatonin and my favorite antihistamine (benedryl), is something i keep on hand because they belong in the sometimes-badly-needed category. Licorice root, too, seems to be helpful in times of stress. Mucuna SEEMS to help with essential tremor. Just like echinacea, goldenseal, zinc lozenges have their moments, when infection makes a rare appearance.
I've got it down. For now. Till something ELSE changes. ;-)
______
* Ph.D., FAAIM, DCCN, CMS, CISSN, BCIH, ROHP, A.M.P -- this guy works with real-life human patients, and i feel confident that he actually HELPS PEOPLE....
Friday, July 12, 2013
for the birds
Today has been a PERFECT summer day in the midwest. It hasn't been too hot but is definitely summery. The sun has shone, the breeze has blown, then stilled and come back again. After i did my morning reading and spent a couple of hours in the kitchen and garden, i sat down in the back yard with a book and a cold drink and turned the sprinkler on the petunias, crepe myrtles, tomatoes and sunchokes.
My chair turned toward the area being watered, i actually neglected my reading because of the impromptu performance going on in front of me. First it was the robins harvesting worms that came toward the surface of the soil in response to the sprinkler. Their appetites (and their families') being satisfied, they and their colleagues decided that it was a nice day to take a shower. A really stunning cardinal spent quite awhile perched on the netting protecting the 'chokes, letting the water get to all his feathers, then repositioning himself to shake it off and preen on the juniper in the sunshine. Another bird which i'm too ignorant to identify came next, bathing and flapping, then nervously flying away. A final robin returned and picked up a worm-to-go -- carry-out for the feathered set!
Sitting here watching it all, i thought to myself -- i'm a friggin' GODDESS, as far as the plants and animals in my yard are concerned! Having enough myself, i'm able to spare sustenance and tend the earth, so that the flowers are encouraged to put out new blooms, the trees are taken care of, the shrubs are watered and placed in sunshine, the birds fed, and even the buggies in the composter get theirs. I love and send blessings even to the dogs barking two houses over.
Life is good.
My chair turned toward the area being watered, i actually neglected my reading because of the impromptu performance going on in front of me. First it was the robins harvesting worms that came toward the surface of the soil in response to the sprinkler. Their appetites (and their families') being satisfied, they and their colleagues decided that it was a nice day to take a shower. A really stunning cardinal spent quite awhile perched on the netting protecting the 'chokes, letting the water get to all his feathers, then repositioning himself to shake it off and preen on the juniper in the sunshine. Another bird which i'm too ignorant to identify came next, bathing and flapping, then nervously flying away. A final robin returned and picked up a worm-to-go -- carry-out for the feathered set!
Sitting here watching it all, i thought to myself -- i'm a friggin' GODDESS, as far as the plants and animals in my yard are concerned! Having enough myself, i'm able to spare sustenance and tend the earth, so that the flowers are encouraged to put out new blooms, the trees are taken care of, the shrubs are watered and placed in sunshine, the birds fed, and even the buggies in the composter get theirs. I love and send blessings even to the dogs barking two houses over.
Life is good.
consumer warning! media ignorance causes ranting behavior in bloggers!
An important news release from autodescribed authorities in a highly-respected ivory-tower institution has proclaimed ... the same old bullshit!!!
grrrr....
Use of "artificial sweeteners" (funny, that ingredient NEVER appears on labels, though i often see aspartame, sucralose, saccharin, acesulfameK, etc) is correlated with the existence of FAT PEOPLE! Says onetalking head obesity researcher, "Studies in mice and rats 'subjects' have shown that consumption of noncaloric sweeteners dampens physiological responses to sweet taste, causing the [subjects] to overindulge in calorie-rich, sweet-tasting food and pack on extra pounds."
WHERE DO I BEGIN??? Variations on a theme of this have been posted all over facebook and the blogosphere. In the case of the former, it's some of the more intelligent info that A FEW of the people i know EVER post. Amongst the latter, there are two sub-groups: of one, i'm not at all surprised because it's typical of why i don't read THEIR blogs, but ... i AM a bit puzzled why the ones i regularly read might feel this is worth repeating.
This is not the first time i've made public my opinion about "artificial sweeteners" (<-- fyi, massive understatement). These products range from widely-toxic to slightly-irritating -- why the temptation to lump them all together? I can think of a couple of reasons, and they say ugly things about the state of research.
Either the Insulated Ones of Organized Academia are so tunnel-visioned they don't appreciate that toxicity is a spectrum, or they have so much contempt for the people they're in business to "help" that their attitude oozes all over every condescending word they utter. Go back to the third paragraph above and re-read the quote -- i barely edited the Purdue University bitch who made the pronouncement (i changed her "mice and rats" to "subjects" and changed "animals" to the same word, in brackets). Dare i insinuate the obvious -- "packing on pounds" is NOT what LAB RODENTS are capable of doing -- but of course, "packing on ounces" just doesn't have that pejorative ring.
I'm kinda inclined to think the problem with the thinking of such researchers (and the media "personalities" who parrot them) is THIS -- they believe that the obese are evil disgusting gluttonous lazy hedonistic horrible animals who DESERVE nothing tasty (which is why it's awful that they can improve their health with bacon, butter and steak). They BELIEVE that fat people should be sentenced to a boot camp where some obesity-resistant fashion model can yell at them while they're driving up stress hormones and ruining their joints (AKA "burning fat") on a treadmill for hours every day. They believe that the sin of being overweight should be penanced away with self-flagellation, mental anguish, a low diet of bread and water, and dried peas in the shoes.
Ooh, sounds vaguely reminiscent of something ... how about the "Dark Ages" and Inquisition?
Fuck 'em.
I apologize to the "nice ladies and gentlemen" who read here. I thought of using a euphemism, but the strength of my anger and contempt couldn't be expressed even by "piss on the self-righteous assholes." ;-)
The people i know who STILL struggle with their weight, and do so valiantly and self-denyingly day-in-day-out DESERVE the solace of an occasional "sweet." On a hot summer day, after chores in the garden or doing housework, or cheering their kids at a ball game, you can bet the farm that a cold diet soda is an appropriate treat for the sugar-avoider.
grrrr....
Use of "artificial sweeteners" (funny, that ingredient NEVER appears on labels, though i often see aspartame, sucralose, saccharin, acesulfameK, etc) is correlated with the existence of FAT PEOPLE! Says one
WHERE DO I BEGIN??? Variations on a theme of this have been posted all over facebook and the blogosphere. In the case of the former, it's some of the more intelligent info that A FEW of the people i know EVER post. Amongst the latter, there are two sub-groups: of one, i'm not at all surprised because it's typical of why i don't read THEIR blogs, but ... i AM a bit puzzled why the ones i regularly read might feel this is worth repeating.
This is not the first time i've made public my opinion about "artificial sweeteners" (<-- fyi, massive understatement). These products range from widely-toxic to slightly-irritating -- why the temptation to lump them all together? I can think of a couple of reasons, and they say ugly things about the state of research.
Either the Insulated Ones of Organized Academia are so tunnel-visioned they don't appreciate that toxicity is a spectrum, or they have so much contempt for the people they're in business to "help" that their attitude oozes all over every condescending word they utter. Go back to the third paragraph above and re-read the quote -- i barely edited the Purdue University bitch who made the pronouncement (i changed her "mice and rats" to "subjects" and changed "animals" to the same word, in brackets). Dare i insinuate the obvious -- "packing on pounds" is NOT what LAB RODENTS are capable of doing -- but of course, "packing on ounces" just doesn't have that pejorative ring.
I'm kinda inclined to think the problem with the thinking of such researchers (and the media "personalities" who parrot them) is THIS -- they believe that the obese are evil disgusting gluttonous lazy hedonistic horrible animals who DESERVE nothing tasty (which is why it's awful that they can improve their health with bacon, butter and steak). They BELIEVE that fat people should be sentenced to a boot camp where some obesity-resistant fashion model can yell at them while they're driving up stress hormones and ruining their joints (AKA "burning fat") on a treadmill for hours every day. They believe that the sin of being overweight should be penanced away with self-flagellation, mental anguish, a low diet of bread and water, and dried peas in the shoes.
Ooh, sounds vaguely reminiscent of something ... how about the "Dark Ages" and Inquisition?
Fuck 'em.
I apologize to the "nice ladies and gentlemen" who read here. I thought of using a euphemism, but the strength of my anger and contempt couldn't be expressed even by "piss on the self-righteous assholes." ;-)
The people i know who STILL struggle with their weight, and do so valiantly and self-denyingly day-in-day-out DESERVE the solace of an occasional "sweet." On a hot summer day, after chores in the garden or doing housework, or cheering their kids at a ball game, you can bet the farm that a cold diet soda is an appropriate treat for the sugar-avoider.
Thursday, July 11, 2013
nine days left
We're in the middle of one of the three Mercury Retrograde periods which happen every year. That's when, from Earth's perspective, Mercury appears to be moving backward in the sky -- an illusion of course caused by M's smaller and faster circle around the sun than ours. Astrologers decided millennia ago that Mercury-ruled activities were likely to go awry at this time, and that it's also a good time for "looking backward."
So look backward. Go somewhere there's NO extraneous noise, leave your ipod and phone and internet behind. Turn off that television which is ALWAYS on in the other room, and the radio, too. Listen to nothing but your own thoughts (and your own body) for an hour. And no "self talk" -- just shut up and listen. No distracting snacks or beverages. No other person. No distractions, period.
This activity is close to meditation, but no cigar. You're not trying to still the mind or solve a problem or pep-talk yourself. BE "bored" for a little while.
It's pathological to need constant outside stimulation. How did our world come to this?
So look backward. Go somewhere there's NO extraneous noise, leave your ipod and phone and internet behind. Turn off that television which is ALWAYS on in the other room, and the radio, too. Listen to nothing but your own thoughts (and your own body) for an hour. And no "self talk" -- just shut up and listen. No distracting snacks or beverages. No other person. No distractions, period.
This activity is close to meditation, but no cigar. You're not trying to still the mind or solve a problem or pep-talk yourself. BE "bored" for a little while.
It's pathological to need constant outside stimulation. How did our world come to this?
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