Writer’s Diet Plan, Part 2
My son probably has the best eating habits of us all. He doesn’t have a sweet tooth, so that makes it easier for him for than my daughter and me. He isn’t tempted like we are. He rarely eats bread or carbs unless they’re “healthy carbs”, never has soft drinks. He uses no salt, butter or margarine, less processed and red meat than turkey, chicken and fish. He eats nuts, whole grains, fruits and vegetables. And he mostly cooks for himself when he’s at home (rather than traveling), even takes his own lunches to work. Sometimes his girlfriend cooks, and she’s a vegetarian. Apparently beer is considered an acceptable food. All these kids are “gym rats”. They’ve incorporated hard exercise into their routines so it’s a part of their lives. They feel better when they work out. And boy, do they all look great.
My son probably has the best eating habits of us all. He doesn’t have a sweet tooth, so that makes it easier for him for than my daughter and me. He isn’t tempted like we are. He rarely eats bread or carbs unless they’re “healthy carbs”, never has soft drinks. He uses no salt, butter or margarine, less processed and red meat than turkey, chicken and fish. He eats nuts, whole grains, fruits and vegetables. And he mostly cooks for himself when he’s at home (rather than traveling), even takes his own lunches to work. Sometimes his girlfriend cooks, and she’s a vegetarian. Apparently beer is considered an acceptable food. All these kids are “gym rats”. They’ve incorporated hard exercise into their routines so it’s a part of their lives. They feel better when they work out. And boy, do they all look great.
I stopped consuming soft drinks (on a regular basis) a long time ago. I might have one a week at our local movie theater —or if I go to our local Mexican restaurant that has the best Dr. Pepper in the world. I’ve never eaten much pasta, potatoes, rice, or bread. Possible lactose intolerance has kept me away from dairy products for the last year. So that lets out ice cream —except Breyer’s Lactose Free Vanilla, and only once in a while. I felt like sweets and chocolate were my last remaining vices, so I was holding onto them for dear life. Maybe I was having too much of a good thing. Perhaps I should have simply cut down. But more drastic measures will be necessary to lose weight rather than simply maintain.(My son says I just need to exercise regularly. I whine that we have an active lifestyle, but he reminds me —one of his favorite arguments —“If ranch work kept people in great shape, there wouldn’t be any fat farmers”. Point taken). I’ve been off sweets now for about four days. So far so good. Mind over matter. Other platitudes. I’m trying to convince myself I don’t miss it or want it. I’m exercising my willpower to the best of my ability.
My father went cold turkey on cigarettes after 30 years of smoking. He quit before I was born. People now understand the strong addictive qualities of nicotine. Dad lived another fifty-eight years after that. When people asked him the secret of his healthy, independent, long life, he’d always claim it was the fact that he had quit smoking. If he could do that, surely I can give up chocolate. By the way, Dad always claimed that the best diet was taking both your hands, grabbing the edge of the table, and pushing yourself away. My father was a wise man. He was also thin, even though he had dessert after both lunch and dinner his entire life. Go fig.
Zack thinks he’s figured out the perfect diet. The only problem is that it doesn’t work for anyone but Zack. He rises early and usually has a banana and chocolate milk, maybe a few waffles if he’s really hungry. He might watch an old movie or the TV news for a while. It’s still very early when he walks around and works outside. Many things continue to be a great effort for him, so he probably expends many more calories than the rest of us, just doing normal things. And I believe he’s blessed with a metabolism that’s always in high gear. He has a sensible lunch but often consumes mostly protein. I must remind him to eat vegetables (which he actually does like), and other than the breakfast banana, he thinks fruit is poison and avoids it like a plague. He rarely overeats.
Zack drinks soft drinks or sweet tea (with REAL sugar), always has dessert, and I’m not talking one little cookie. This man can put down a coupla handfuls of frozen M&M’s without a thought—or several small, helpless candy bars, homemade cookies or brownies. He often snacks on a soft drink with dessert at various times during the day. He very rarely eats after 5 PM (unless it’s one of these sugar-filled snacks . And with all these relatively bad habits, he stays even or loses weight. he claims it’s the calories he expends during the day. And of course he teases me constantly about “his diet”. If I were on Zack’s plan, I’d weigh 400 pounds.
Here I am trying my level best to eat healthily, all the while living with thin Mr. Sweet Tooth, baking for him, buying his candy, ENABLING HIM, watching him eat all the things I Iove (which I’m denying myself). It’s beyond exasperating and is just another example of the fact that life is quite simply not fair.
Gene Ellis, Ed.D is a Bosque County resident who returned to the family farm after years of living in New Orleans, New York, and Florida. She’s an artist who holds a doctoral degree from New York University and is writing a book about the minor catastrophes of life. Check out Genie’s blog at http://rusticramblings.wordpress.com/
Controlling America: Regulation vs. Deregulation of Electricity and Other Industries
The trouble is that the corporate sector no longer has the “conscience” about over-pricing goods and services that it did years ago. Once upon a time in American, deregulation was good. But that was then and this is now.
The trouble is that the corporate sector no longer has the “conscience” about over-pricing goods and services that it did years ago.
Once upon a time in American, deregulation was good. But that was then and this is now.
While we must advocate some sort of oversight of the electric industry, we should remain proponents of less government rather than more. During the Eisenhower administration of the 1950’s and until recently the GOP platform was less government in state and local issues. Today, however, the GOP is trying to assert government’s power into almost every issue and activity — while at the same time pushing for deregulation of various industries.
While the law of “supply and demand” of basic economics certainly dictates some of the cost index of all products, recently, due to the deregulation of the utilities industry, electric retail costs have “gone through the roof,” as have the costs of daily living expenses. We need to find and develop alternative sources of energy, but that’s years down the road. How many people will lose their jobs and homes during the next decade or two?
There are many examples that show how government regulation of industry is bad for the economy in general. Look what happened in California re: the electric industry, which I won’t go into here.
However, we can NOT believe that it is in the best interests of consumers to permit the travesties in pricing that are occurring due to relentless profiteering, lax legislation and void of some reality-based oversight. The trouble is that the corporate sector no longer has the “conscience” about over-pricing goods and services that it did years ago. Today, with the outsourcing of American jobs and services to lower their costs while gouging out higher prices for goods and services, corporations only seem to care about ensuring infinite profits. Affordability has taken a back-seat to profit-making and excellent customer service is becoming extinct.
If we agree that we don’t want the government to regulate industry pricing, then at least we need to come up with some other alternatives that will regulate pricing more fairly. There appears to be a need to set pricing guidelines in various industries to ensure that costs to consumers remain fair. It becomes increasingly apparent that most corporations will not regulate themselves; rather they seem hell-bent on profiteering above all else.
Sky-high costs of goods and services are not unique to the energy industry. Several years ago, for example, due to lax legislation and little oversight, the insurance industry in Texas doubled overnight the cost of homeowner’s insurance. Currently, Texas homeowners pay the highest insurance costs anywhere in the nation. While publicly chastising the industry for this maneuver, the Texas Department of Insurance (TDI), the governor and state legislators have ignored this urgent issue.
The truth is that today, without some sort of reality-based price cap or regulatory oversight system, our economy will suffer even while various industries continue to reap huge profits.
What happens when Americans can no longer afford to pay their daily living expenses, let alone for elective goods and services? For now, the price-gougers are content with short-term excessive gains. Future generations of Americans will have to deal more properly with the issues of deregulation and profiteering.
The greed for increased profits will ensure that many Americans will lose their homes to foreclosures and that millions will be forced into bankruptcy. Meanwhile the laws continue to favor the credit card/financing industries, and more people are being forced to pay high interest rates for credit—along with high monthly fees and penalties when they get behind in payments. Meanwhile, credit is easier to get today than ever before, ensnaring more struggling people.
In his farewell address on January 17, 1961 former President Dwight Eisenhower, noting the possibility of a conglomeration of military and corporate might and special interest profiteering, tried to warn all Americans by stating,
“The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every statehouse, every office of the federal government……..The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.”
Eisenhower knew then that influential men of government and industry often are weak-spirited and may become significantly misguided by their lust for money, and that “The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present…. and is gravely to be regarded.” What Eisenhower called the industrial division during his time period has evolved into the wealthy and powerful corporate sector.
Today, the corporate sector wants “hands-off” Capitalism when things are going well, but when there is an economic turn-down, corporations look to Socialism, e.g., government intervention and taxpayer bail-outs. Such a perspective is irresponsible and detrimental to an ailing economy.
How long can this go on? Already more people have lost their jobs and homes than since the days of the Great Depression. We must review the issue of regulation vs. deregulation and determine what is in the best interests of the American community at large, something the government and most corporations prefer not to do in this time when profiteering is proliferating, and so much in vogue.
(Peter Stern, a former director of information services, university professor and public school administrator, is a disabled Vietnam veteran who lives in Driftwood, Texas.)
