Reformation Polka - Apologies to My Catholic Friends

Wishing for a Great 2010 !!

Dear Friends,

I have taken note that I have not updated my blog since August of 2009 and deemed that I should do so before the year ends. Lack of updating has not been because yours truly had nothing to rant or rave about but rather was due to my laziness. I must confess that by nature I am a very lazy person; particularly, when it comes to updating and/or maintaining a journal or a facsimile of same such as a blog. Today while I have several subjects buzzing around in my head, I do not find myself inclined or prepared to expound on any of them. Therefore, I will end the year writing on a somewhat wistful note regarding the overindulgence many of us did over the holidays. Yes folks, it is that time of year when many of us are once again resolving to join a gym or start dieting in order to lose some poundage and obtain a healthier and shapelier physique.

Along those lines, I have just read an amusing article by Dan Fletcher in the January 11, 2010 issue of Time magazine. To paraphrase-be wary as dubious diets have roped in the well-intentioned for generations! William the Conqueror, after becoming too fat to ride his horse, devised an alcohol only diet in 1087. He died later that year; still being fat, after falling drunk off his horse. In 1820 Presbyterian minister Sylvester Graham touted the vegetarian Graham Diet. This was promoted as a cure for not just obesity but also masturbation. Tapeworm pills were marketed as a diet alternative in the 1900s. In 1903 nutritionist Horace Fletcher, also known as the Great Masticator, advised that one should choose their food exactly 32 times and then spit it out. Dr. George Harrop pioneered a skim milk and banana regimen. In the 1960s Dr. Herman Taller was touting his "Calories Don't Count" diet, which let followers binge provided they chased their meals with vegetable oil. In 1966 the Sleeping Beauty diet which advertised that weight loss could be achieved by means of sedation was a hit. While low-carob diets like Atkins and South Beach have earned some doctors approval and millions of followers, other modern diets are considered far-fetched. The cabbage soup diet promised that one could lose 10 pounds in a week. More challenging is the lemonade diet, which requires the brave to subside on a concoction of lemon juice, maple syrup, red pepper, and hot water for 10 days.

I confess that I need and should lose 20 to 25 pounds. However, after considering some of these diets, I am inclined to adopt the William the Conqueror diet; and since I am not an equestrian; I will herewith prepare myself a stiff drink. Wishing everyone a Happy, Healthy, and Prosperous New Year!!!

This blog was composed using Dragon Naturally Speaking software. I love this software. Most of the time, it interprets my dictation correctly and saves me mucho tedious (one figure, hunt and peck) typing.

Slim Jim or Slime Jim

I do not consider myself to be one of those fanatic vegetarians and have been known to eat a hamburger or a slice of bacon from time to time but I do believe it is important for us to make responsible and ethical decisions regarding the foods that we eat. To support those decisions and our resulting behavior, it is important that we educate ourselves on what constitutes food, how much should be eaten, where does our food come from, how is it produced and by whom? I plan to attend a workshop led by Rev. Nate Walker of the First Unitarian Church of Philadelphia to explore these very questions.

In the meantime, I came across an article in Wired Magazine (August 2009) that detailed the composition of a popular processed snack food (?) known as the Slim Jim. I am curious – am I the only one to find it disturbing and nauseating?

The composition/ingredients are as follows: Beef – but not prime, a utility cut that comes from old steers with partially ossified vertebrae; Chicken – mechanically separated poultry scrapes that are pulverized into a pink paste; Hydrolyzed Soy – also known as monosodium glutamate; Corn and Wheat Proteins – well Slim Jims are made by ConAgra, after all; Lactic Acid Starter – a bacteria/sugar substance to lower the ph level; Dextrose – serves as a food for the lactic acid starter (its alive!); Salt – one Slim Jim gives you more than one-sixth of the sodium your body needs in one day; Sodium Nitrate – an agent to prevent the meat from turning grey and hopefully prevent botulism.

Mm – is it any wonder that a Slim Jim processing plant blew up lately?

Unemployment Rate Drops ??

This past week, the unemployment rate unexpectedly dropped last month from 9.5% to 9.4%, which everyone seems to be happy about. This seems odd, since the percentage of adults without jobs actually went up.

The new jobs report shows a faster-than-expected slowdown in the pace of job losses—247,000 were shed in July, when economists had expected 325,000—and an increase in hourly wages. So this is definitely good news to be had. But as the New York Times' David Leonhardt points out that - the top line number that is getting the most attention - the first decrease in unemployment since last April—is a statistical chimera hiding an actual increase in the total number of people without jobs.

The one thing that doesn't deserve much excitement is what will probably garner many of the headlines: the drop in the unemployment rate. It happened only because more people stopped looking for work and were thus ineligible to be counted as officially unemployed. The share of adults with jobs actually fell: to 59.4 percent, from 59.5 percent.

Those people who are conveniently "ineligible to be counted as officially unemployed" are also officially ineligible for unemployment benefits, which are beginning to run across the nation as time runs out on the extensions included in the stimulus package. So we've managed to goose the employment numbers by cutting off benefits to people who don't have jobs and then denying that they exist. It's kind of like saying the cancer rate is dropping because once people die of cancer, they no longer count as having cancer.