So far...

As we all well know, obesity has become an epidemic. There are millions of theories floating around about causes, and so my difficulty with this project so far has been narrowing it down to three or four concrete causes. So far, I have chosen two: inactivity and fast food. I chose these two because they have the greatest amount of support behind them from many reputable sources. For example, I have read an article in the New York times about how the more commercials that an individual takes in while watching TV(and as such, being inactive) the more likely that person is to become obese. I’ve also downloaded McDonald’s nutrition facts and ingredient lists to my flash drive, and am looking forward to sorting through them. The other two causes I am leaning towards are the link between infant formula and obesity, and the fact that food now a days is mostly corn derivatives and preservatives. But like I’ve said, there are thousands of theories out there about obesities causes, so who knows what I’ll find out there…

The Man

Is no holiday safe? Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Halloween – they all have become over run by corporations and their gimmicks. Even Oreo has come out with a Spring Time cookie, complete with green frosting that stains your entire mouth green (just ask my Grandpa). But is this such a bad thing? Take Earth Day, for instance. It is the newest of the holidays to join the ranks of the bigger ones as being an excuse to sell a product, and I have a mixed reaction about it. On one hand, companies are stretching their “earth-friendliness.” In her article At 40, Earth Day Is Now Big Business, Leslie Kaufman of the New York Times sites that, “For this year’s celebration, Bahama Umbrella is advertising a specially designed umbrella, with a drain so that water “can be stored, reused and recycled”(para 3). On the other hand, I can see the advantages of having a holiday be a reason to sell a product – awareness. Leslie states that “…many corporations say that it is often the business community that now leads the way in environmental innovation — and they want to get their customers interested” (Kaufman para 14). And who among you can disagree? It may be sad that no holiday, even hippy rooted Earth Day, is safe from “the man,” but getting people aware of our Earth’s problems is how we can eventually solve them.

I'm not stupid! Thank goodness...

When a woman is pregnant, she sometimes get what is called “pregnancy brain.” She will forget simple words and tasks, like that thing that makes the stuff in the morning (i.e. coffee maker) and to put gas in her car (happened to me twice). Its been almost seven months since I’ve had my baby, but I still have been spelling things wrong and using words in the wrong context. I had been chalking it up to recovering from my pregnancy brain, but after so long it seemed a little far fetched to do so. So I thought maybe I was just getting stupid. I mean, why else would I still be making silly mistakes when I am supposedly an intelligent individual? Then, I had an epiphany: I’m not stupid, I am just more willing to make those mistakes in the first place.

I have always been a terrible speller (I blame dyslexia) and had tendency to use words in the wrong context. But I’ve also always prided myself on my intelligence. So much so, that one sure way to piss me off was to make me feel stupid. I used to hate getting corrected, so I would get crabby. A little ridiculous, right? How could I live with being crabby every time someone told me I spelt veiw wrong (which is every time)? Well I tell you, it was exhausting. In the past I had learned to just hide it – if I wanted to use a word but did not know exactly in which context to use it, I just would not use it. I never hand wrote things, that way those squiggly red lines would underline my mistakes instead of my teacher, who would no doubt judge me. But since having Jack I am less self conscious, and therefore am willing to make errors and have people correct me. I’m not going to lie, it still irks me a tad, but I am making those blunders less and less, because I am re-learning things like “I before E except after C.” So there you have it, my epiphany: I’m not dumb after all.