Food Safety News
Well, it would seem that the contaminated wheat gluten has now made it into fish food at fish hatcheries and farms in the US and Canada. Again, the stated risk to humans is low, but nobody knows what the risk actually is given that there aren't long-term tests in humans on the effects of melamine. So we've now got melamine in pork, chicken and fish, as well as pets. I had given some thought to roasting a chicken for dinner today, but methinks I'll stick to some rice and veggies.
There was also a sizeable beef recall this week due to E. coli contamination.
Being thin isn't good enough.
You can still have problems with internal fat stores. Squishing your heart, kidneys and pancreas with fat aren't a good thing. I'm willing to bet that a diet at about 10% fat, which is low enough to reduce atherosclerotic placque deposits in your arteries is probably also a low enough fat intake to help reduce the internal fat stores.
A Better School Lunch
Not surprisingly, school kids who eat a more healthy school lunch didn't gain excessive amounts of weight when compared to kids who ate the usual school lunch stuff. The healthier lunch involved more fresh fruits and lots of veggies. The kids on the "good" lunch gained 1/2 pound less than their "normal" lunch counterparts. 44% of these kids were considered overweight or at risk of becoming overweight at the start of the study. Weight gain was expected since they're all growing, but there's something to be said for healthy weight gain in a growing child and becoming obese. I hope this study and others like it cause some serious changes in the school lunch program. Yes, it will be more expensive to feed the kids better food, but let's think about that. You're going to grumble about money when the outcome is healthier kids? Ok. You do that. Then again, the folks who make these decisions also decided to cut out the physical education programs and now can't figure out why kids are fat and inactive. Hmmmmm....
Bad Brain!
For some reason my brain is deciding to be difficult today. I woke up at 5am with a headache, which lingered until just recently and hovered around the 5-7 severity scale. I broke down and put on the A/C since I was fussy and feeling crummy. Now I'm watching Mildred Pierce and trying to restrain myself from slapping Veda.
I like Mildred for the most part. She let Veda get away with far too much, but she was certainly ambitious, capable and driven. I'm not sure she ever had an end goal though and perhaps that is where she went wrong. If all you want is "more", you'll never be happy because there will always be "more" to get. Having a more specific goal and developing a plan to reach it, might have kept things from getting out of control. Then again, telling Veda "no" at least once would have helped. That little brat effectively ate up the proceeds of all the restaurants and became quite the social climber. Of course, she didn't understand a darned thing about the work that went into getting her any of those things she demanded that she get. Without that understanding, she placed very little value on any of it.
Mr. Toad!
I have found where the house toad lives. He's all dug in underneath one of the phlox plants. At first I thought he was dead since he didn't move at all when I uncovered him. He didn't blink and he didn't even appear to breathe. I poked him a bit and he still didn't move. Finally he twitched a bit. I covered him back up and left him be. I didn't ask him if he had had any wild rides. I'll keep him as the guard toad and he can pee on anybody who bothers me.
Thief!!
On Thursday, there was a loaf of bread in this container, awaiting a trip down to the compost bin. On Friday, there was no bread. There was, in fact, no evidence of the bread at all. Something came up, grabbed it and carted it off. I figure it was probably a raccoon, but it could have been a coyote.
There was also a sizeable beef recall this week due to E. coli contamination.
Being thin isn't good enough.
You can still have problems with internal fat stores. Squishing your heart, kidneys and pancreas with fat aren't a good thing. I'm willing to bet that a diet at about 10% fat, which is low enough to reduce atherosclerotic placque deposits in your arteries is probably also a low enough fat intake to help reduce the internal fat stores.
A Better School Lunch
Not surprisingly, school kids who eat a more healthy school lunch didn't gain excessive amounts of weight when compared to kids who ate the usual school lunch stuff. The healthier lunch involved more fresh fruits and lots of veggies. The kids on the "good" lunch gained 1/2 pound less than their "normal" lunch counterparts. 44% of these kids were considered overweight or at risk of becoming overweight at the start of the study. Weight gain was expected since they're all growing, but there's something to be said for healthy weight gain in a growing child and becoming obese. I hope this study and others like it cause some serious changes in the school lunch program. Yes, it will be more expensive to feed the kids better food, but let's think about that. You're going to grumble about money when the outcome is healthier kids? Ok. You do that. Then again, the folks who make these decisions also decided to cut out the physical education programs and now can't figure out why kids are fat and inactive. Hmmmmm....
Bad Brain!
For some reason my brain is deciding to be difficult today. I woke up at 5am with a headache, which lingered until just recently and hovered around the 5-7 severity scale. I broke down and put on the A/C since I was fussy and feeling crummy. Now I'm watching Mildred Pierce and trying to restrain myself from slapping Veda.
I like Mildred for the most part. She let Veda get away with far too much, but she was certainly ambitious, capable and driven. I'm not sure she ever had an end goal though and perhaps that is where she went wrong. If all you want is "more", you'll never be happy because there will always be "more" to get. Having a more specific goal and developing a plan to reach it, might have kept things from getting out of control. Then again, telling Veda "no" at least once would have helped. That little brat effectively ate up the proceeds of all the restaurants and became quite the social climber. Of course, she didn't understand a darned thing about the work that went into getting her any of those things she demanded that she get. Without that understanding, she placed very little value on any of it.
Mr. Toad!
I have found where the house toad lives. He's all dug in underneath one of the phlox plants. At first I thought he was dead since he didn't move at all when I uncovered him. He didn't blink and he didn't even appear to breathe. I poked him a bit and he still didn't move. Finally he twitched a bit. I covered him back up and left him be. I didn't ask him if he had had any wild rides. I'll keep him as the guard toad and he can pee on anybody who bothers me.
Thief!!
On Thursday, there was a loaf of bread in this container, awaiting a trip down to the compost bin. On Friday, there was no bread. There was, in fact, no evidence of the bread at all. Something came up, grabbed it and carted it off. I figure it was probably a raccoon, but it could have been a coyote.
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