Here is a really fantastic way to accomplish TWO things:
1. Control the portion size of home baked cookies
2. Have cookie dough (rich with whole grains and low in sugars, no doubt ) ready to go at any time, so you can bake 2 or 20 cookies and enjoy fresh-baked yumminess in minutes.
Pulled this off the Fooducate blog:
An Awesome Portion Control Trick For Fresh-Baked Homemade Cookies
So, you like to bake – but you have a problem. Yes, I know that problem well.
You bake a couple dozen cookies and then they stare at you from wherever you have put them. Haunting you…… Just one more, you say, as you eat two more.
I have this rule about baked goods that I only eat ones that I have baked (or that someone I know has baked). These keeps me from eating stale, terrible, supermarket cookies when I see them.
This rule has helped me drop some unnecessary pounds and now I savor my baked goods. BUT, if I have them around I can’t stop eating them.
So, with the help of a reader’s comment, I came up with this handy method of having my cookies without overindulging. Check this out:
I put my finished oatmeal raisin cookie dough into an ice cube tray! And, then I froze them and dumped them out into a freezer bag. Now if I want a fresh baked cookie, I heat up my oven, get out a baking sheet, and bake a reasonable number for my family.
This would be even better if I had a toaster oven because I wouldn’t have to heat my whole oven for such a small load.
I put on my apron when my children get off the school bus and pretend I have been baking all afternoon. Take that – Martha Stewart!!
Grab Bag De-Stress Checklist:
Grab Bag Wow Moment:
Art flowing in human form….
Grab Bag Breakthrough?
The cancer drug Bexarotene, approved for over 10 years in the U.S., has just been shown to make dramatic improvements…..
… in mice with Alzheimer’s.
From ScienceDaily.com:
Neuroscientists at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine have made a dramatic breakthrough in their efforts to find a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. The researchers’ findings, published in the journal Science, show that use of a drug in mice appears to quickly reverse the pathological, cognitive and memory deficits caused by the onset of Alzheimer’s. The results point to the significant potential that the medication, bexarotene, has to help the roughly 5.4 million Americans suffering from the progressive brain disease.
Bexarotene has been approved for the treatment of cancer by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for more than a decade. These experiments explored whether the medication might also be used to help patients with Alzheimer’s disease, and the results were more than promising.
Grab Bag Product of the Week:
This credit card case sells for $19.95 at Victorian Trading Co. I can think of a few people who might have INVENTED this.
Grab Bag Scorekeeper:
I love to play lots of games with friends and family. This free app, for iPone or iPad, will be GREAT to keep all my WINNING scores .
Grab Bag Brain Flex:
Flex your gray matter a bit. Three categories of qualifiers are presented in each stage, and you must assess if the shapes, letters and numbers that appear are consistent with the rules. THEN, the rules switch locations, and you have to remember the new placement and associated rules.
Just try it… you’ll see after the first 2 rounds what’s required. It’s a good one..
I took a week away last weekend from blogging for the best of reasons.
I had the privilege of supporting my daughter and son-in-law in the labor and delivery of my granddaughter.
Although I have taken on this support role a few times before, never has it been for my daughter, and this was a unique moment for us all.
The result was the most precious of gifts.
“A baby is God’s opinion that life should go on.”
~Carl Sandberg
Here is that opinion, at 6 days old…
Grab Bag Postcard Post:
I don’t know about you, but I LOVE receiving mail that:
A) I’m not expecting
B) Isn’t addressed to “Occupant”
C) Doesn’t have to be paid
D) Isn’t from a government office or a lawyer
And I bet all your friends, family and loved ones are like me… so make us HAPPY!
Use the Instagram app on your iPhone or Android to take pictures and send a REAL postcard with the added Postagram app (both Instagram and Postagram are free…. and Postagram comes as an app or can be used on your computer at Postagram.com). Click the photo to link to Postagram.
Not only does it send a very cool black postcard with your picture and personal message, but the recipient can then pop the picture out and save it! Cost is 99¢ per postcard…. payoff is worth WAY more than that.
Grab Bag Contrast Caution:
If you have had or are contemplating any radiology contrast studies using iodine, you might want to be aware of this possibility, an issue I just read about through PeoplesPharmacy.org. While there may be a low incidence of occurrence, if it’s you, it’s 100%.
Q: To diagnose my appendicitis a few years ago, I had a CT scan with contrast. When my energy didn’t return after the surgery and my weight started dropping rapidly, I underwent tests that resulted in a diagnosis of Graves’ disease.
I was facing losing my thyroid either by surgery or radiation when, for no apparent reason, I began gaining weight and my thyroid tests came back to normal.
Evidently either the radiation or the iodine used in the contrast CT caused a temporary hyperthyroid condition. If I had not taken a longer time than usual to decide between surgery and radiation, I would not have a thyroid and would be on medication for the rest of my life.
Could the iodine or the radiation have caused this?
A: A new study in the Archives of Internal Medicine (Jan. 23, 2012) suggests iodine-containing contrast material used in CT scans and cardiac catheterizations is linked to a higher risk of thyroid disease. Either hyperthyroidism (Graves’ disease) or hypothyroidism might develop.
People undergoing imaging tests with contrast should have their thyroid function carefully monitored afterward.
Grab Bag Depression Session:
You may have heard the news this past week showing some amazing results for severe depression with a drug called Ketamine, a drug that is used in veterinary medicine (the common term “horse tranquilizer” is Ketamine), as well as for human analgesia and anesthesia, and is often used recreationally .
Here is an excerpt from an article on the topic, written by Dr. Keith Ablow, a Johns Hopkins-trained psychiatrist and media contributor on the topic:
More data is now available—this time from the Ben Taub General Hospital in Houston, Texas—suggesting that the “club drug” ketamine can rapidly relieve symptoms of major depression.
Ketamine, or Special K as it is known on the streets, when used illicitly, can cause feelings of unreality and hallucinations. Its side effects—even when given in a medical environment (where it is given intravenously)—can include psychotic experiences, bladder problems and heart problems.
The truly astounding benefits reported by some of the depressed patients in Texas (and previously reported by researchers at Yale University), however, mean it is time to ramp up research into whether intravenous doses of ketamine, administered by doctors, will prove to be a very powerful new tool in fighting major depression and, perhaps, other conditions including panic disorder and obsessive-compulsive disorder.
Ketamine is turning out to provide windows of hope into the future for people who have struggled and seen only darkness for months or years. Some of these patients have not benefited from psychiatric medications or even from electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). Some of these patients were contemplating suicide and were relieved almost instantly of the desire to end their lives. They feel hopeful, again. They feel motivated, again. And the relief from a single dose of ketamine can last for weeks. This opens up the possibility that those who were hostage to nearly unbearable suffering could have the weight lifted from their shoulders by seeing a doctor for a weekly dose, or even a dose every two weeks.
It is possible that experiencing a period of well-being for a week might be enough, in and of itself, to give patients hope and keep them moving toward recovery.
Potentially even more important than the discovery that ketamine seems to work as well as it does, researchers at Yale have already identified the chemical pathway and a key enzyme involved in the way that ketamine actually restores connections between brain cells. This enzyme, called mTOR, is critical in the synthesis of a protein nerve cells need to repair the fluid-filled “touch points,” called synapses, at which they exchange chemical messengers. Knowing this means that studies should be undertaken to see whether ketamine can also prevent relapses to depression in those who have recovered, or worsening of depression in those who have moderate symptoms.
Ever seen the television contest show, The Amazing Race? Well, this is that show… for the rest of us. If you’ve ever fancied yourself a contestant on such a show but would rather pass on the global travel with a backpack, the camera crews, and 3 weeks out of your life, have I got something for you!
Click on the logo here to learn more about GUR
Coming to a city near you, the Great Urban Race wants YOU and a partner (or a “family” group with 1 member under the age of 18 forming a 2,3 or 4 person team) to team up and solve 12 clues to reach the finish line. As they say, “part adventure, part party”, these events are focused on fun, but offer some challenging and entertaining puzzles to solve.
Link to the website by clicking the logo above to see the schedule, look at sample puzzles, clues and challenges like these:
Top 25 finishing teams qualify for the National Championships on November 10th in Las Vegas. There is money involved ($50 per person entry fee, $300-$100 prizes for 1st three finishers, chance at $10,000 grand prize).
Metaphorically speaking, when we close our vision to everything but one goal, one target, we “lose sight” of “the bigger picture” and other possibilities that may lie on the horizon.
Here is an example of how our brain does just that, in a very literal sense.
Below, click on the image, and you will link to a page where you will see this image as a rotating array of blue crosses and 3 yellow dots. Fixate on the center (watch the flashing green spot). Note that the yellow spots disappear once in a while: singly, in pairs or all three simultaneously. In reality, the 3 yellow spots are continuously present, honest!
You can play with background color changes, size of dots, speed of rotation… and you’ll be surprised at how even large dots can disappear entirely when we have “tunnel vision”.
Metaphorical moral of the exercise…
Occasionally lift your gaze from your target and scan the horizons of life, or you just might miss something really obvious
Grab Bag Nutrition Tips:
Quoted here before, I will again pass on some wisdom from Michael Pollan, award winning (multiple and prestigious) author and UC Berkeley professor. Here, fitness coach Chelsea Bush adds some clarification and interpretation to some of Pollan’s most important rules:
Rule 13: “Eat only foods that will eventually rot”
Sometimes things become such a staple in our diet that we forget they aren’t actually food. When we stop eating real, rot-able food, it seems that we—just like the major food manufacturers—only care about the bottom line. But in our case, it’s the wrong bottom line… we go for the cheapest, fastest food we can find, with little regard to how it lowers our quality of life, or how much time and money we’ll pay later to fix the damage.
A few more rules of thumb for finding real food: “If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t” and “shop the peripheries of the supermarket.”
Rule 48: “Consult your gut”
Pollan finds that we are visual eaters: we dish up according to the space we have to fill on the plate, not in our stomach. We also eat everything we’re given. That’s why dishes and portion sizes are getting bigger without protest from us. We’re being tricked into consuming more.
Today I stopped at a frozen yogurt place for a cup of frozen yogurt with fruit, but there were no cups—only 24-oz and 32-oz buckets. (A tricky way to get customers to take more, since they charge by weight!) I considered Pollan’s observation and put only a cup’s worth of yogurt and kiwis into my gigantic bowl.
When dishing out, Pollan says hunger, reason or hand size should be your guide: “eat when you’re hungry,” “stop before you’re full,” and “never eat a portion of animal protein bigger than your fist.”
Rule 60: “Treat treats as treats”
Food marketers want us to believe that we get pleasure from eating foods that are bad for us (the old “you deserve it” trick). Having one “cheat day” a week helps curb overindulgence.
Pollan also offers a more structured variation of the rule: “No snacks, no seconds, no sweets except on days that begin with the letter S.” If you must snack (I must), have dried fruits, granola or a handful of nuts.NOTE from LK: I snack a LOT… but always on nuts, dried cranberries, etc.
Grab Bag Tips and Tricks Part 2:
1. How to fold a fitted sheet:
2. Use hotel shower caps as impromptu shoe bags to keep dirty soles from rubbing on your clothes.
3. Add plastic cups into a muffin tin, securing with magnets in the bottom of the cups to prevent tipping, and you’ve got a great little arts and crafts caddy.
4. Label the mess of stereo or computer cords with bread tags:
5. Part cupcake, part ice cream cone, all fun… bake cupcakes directly in ice cream cones, top with ice cream:
6. There’s no magic to microwave popcorn…. put some kernels in a brown paper bag and nuke that bad boy… cheaper, healthier:
7. A tension rod can be installed in a closet or under a sink to hang spray bottle containers, saving shelf/floor space:
8. Make your own cookie bowls… flip over a muffin pan and place cookie dough over the tops and bake.. fill the cookie bowls with fruit or ice cream.
9. As summer approaches, if you still own an ice cube tray, fill with aloe vera gel and freeze to use to relieve sunburn pain (but all you readers are surely getting appropriate sun exposure and using healthy sunblock when needed, right?).
10. Go to your local home improvement store and grab some rain gutters, affix them to a sunny wall and enjoy a harvest of great veggies, safe from most pests and easy to tend.
Grab Bag Group Effort:
Gotta think THIS took some practice…
Grab Bag Brain Game:
Vocabulary is always a great thing to exercise, and the SAT prep is one of the best lingual workouts you might find. It’s not pretty and exciting… no bells and whistles… but it’s certainly worth some of your time to brush up on the richer side of vocab, without the stress of looming SAT scores haunting you at night.
The Consumer Electronics Show is running right now in Las Vegas. Much of what is shown there makes its way into the lives of mere mortals like us in the near future.
Like eye-controlled computing. Here’s what Time’s Techland had to say:
Forget the mouse, just look directly at whatever you want to manipulate on your screen. That’s the promise of Tobii’s eye-tracking technology. It won’t be affordable enough as a consumer product for a couple years but once it’s here, we may wonder how we ever lived without it. Try looking at something on your screen and then move your mouse cursor to the same spot. See how much faster your eyes move?
Availability: Medical use in about a year, consumer use about a year after that.
Remember when offices offering full body scans started popping up on street corners more than a decade ago? I remember being told by a wise doctor; “The technology is fine. It’s our interpretation of it that is going to present problems“.
Because we had no comparative studies of similar imaging, no body of evidence on which to rely, the medical community was and is often in the unfortunate position of over-diagnosing problems or attributing blame where none truly belongs, based on these new fantastically detailed images.
$90 BILLION
Take, for example, the issue of back pain. Every year Americans spend nearly $90 billion treating back pain. Yes. That’s billion with a “b”. That’s about what we spend on cancer treatment.
Journalist and neuroscience major Jonah Lehrer profiled this topic in Wired magazine. Here is an excerpt that might give you pause when considering an MRI to diagnose the cause of back pain:
The lower back is an exquisitely complicated area of the body, full of small bones, ligaments, spinal discs, and minor muscles. Then there’s the spinal cord itself, a thick cable of nerves that can be easily disturbed. There are so many moving parts in the back that doctors had difficulty figuring out what, exactly, was causing a person’s pain. As a result, patients were typically sent home with a prescription for bed rest.
This treatment plan, though simple, was still extremely effective. Even when nothing was done to the lower back, about 90 percent of people with back pain got better within six weeks. The body healed itself, the inflammation subsided, the nerve relaxed.
Over the next few decades, this hands-off approach to back pain remained the standard medical treatment. That all changed, however, with the introduction of magnetic resonance imaging in the late 1970s. These diagnostic machines use powerful magnets to generate stunningly detailed images of the body’s interior. Within a few years, the MRI machine became a crucial diagnostic tool.
The view afforded by MRI led to a new causal story: Back pain was the result of abnormalities in the spinal discs, those supple buffers between the vertebrae. The MRIs certainly supplied bleak evidence: Back pain was strongly correlated with seriously degenerated discs, which were in turn thought to cause inflammation of the local nerves. Consequently, doctors began administering epidurals to quiet the pain, and if it persisted they would surgically remove the damaged disc tissue.
But the vivid images were misleading. It turns out that disc abnormalities are typically not the cause of chronic back pain. The presence of such abnormalities is just as likely to be correlated with the absence of back problems, as a 1994 study published in The New England Journal of Medicine showed. The researchers imaged the spinal regions of 98 people with no back pain. The results were shocking: Two-thirds of normal patients exhibited “serious problems” like bulging or protruding tissue. In 38 percent of these patients, the MRI revealed multiple damaged discs. Nevertheless, none of these people were in pain. The study concluded that, in most cases, “the discovery of a bulge or protrusion on an MRI scan in a patient with low back pain may frequently be coincidental.”
Well, this is a bummer. My advice?
In general:
1. Think carefully about who is giving advice. If you call a roofer because you have a leak, he’ll be looking at your roof. If you call a plumber he’ll be looking at your plumbing. Are you speaking with an orthopedic, a chiropractor, a neurologist, a massage therapist, a surgeon…? Their answers can often be vastly different, as different as their training of diagnostics and treatment. So do plenty of internal investigation with your body before you pick up the phone.
2. Switch perspectives for a moment. Be sympathetic to the environment of the professional giving advice. They have numerous issues to consider when rendering opinions, just one of which is giving you the best possible advice. Sadly, they often have a ubiquitous insurance/legal cloud hanging over their decision-making process. Number crunching has given them stats and charts and “general” guidelines. If they don’t follow those, and you later take issue with that, they could be liable for malpractice. Trouble is, you’re not a chart or a graph or a number. So what’s diagnosed for many may not be right for you. And it may not have been right for a load of those that went before you, either, as was shown in this study on back pain.
3. Remember that you are not obliged to fill that prescription, take that x-ray, book that surgery. I’m not advocating a unilateral dismissal of rendered medical opinions, but I am encouraging you to be the most active and informed member of your healthcare team. Decisions are ultimately yours; in preventative behaviors, diagnoses, and treatments.
4. For back pain in particular…. SIT LESS. MOVE MORE.
Let me repeat… SIT LESS. MOVE MORE.
Sitting may be the worst thing we can do to our backs.
Grab Bag Tips and Tricks Part 1:
Got some of these sent to me recently… and they look pretty useful. I tried the first one here. Works like a charm, and preserves far more of the berry:
1. Hull strawberries with a straw:
2. Rub a walnut over scratches in furniture to disguise dings and scrapes:
3. Crayons on your TV or computer screen? Use WD40 to remove:
4. No browned apple slices here… cut the apple and put it back together with a rubber band:
5. Tidy up the linen cupboard by storing sheet sets inside their pillow cases:
6. Need to share your voice messages, recordings or music from your phone? Try using a bowl as an impromptu amplifier:
7. Store gift wrap up and out of the way by stretching wires across the walls of a closet near the ceiling:
8. Find small lost items like earrings by putting a stocking over the end of the vacuum hose:
Grab Bag “Moral Molecule”:
Make the world a better place through brain chemistry today. Paul Zak, PhD, shares how he discovered the “Moral Molecule” and how we can release more of it in ourselves and others:
To help save the economy, the Government will announce next month that the Immigration Department will start deporting seniors (instead of illegal’s) in order to lower Social Security and Medicare costs.
Older people are easier to catch and will not remember how to get back home.
Believe me… music can change everything when it comes to exercise. It is a language the body hears innately. Sometimes this can produce unwanted interference (no music for me in Pilates… my body and brain need to make their own music together when things get challenging).
But many times we need some inspiration. Look to Pandora to fuel your next walk/run/gym experience. Here’s what Blood Sweat and Cheers has to say about using Pandora for inspired sound tracks that will have you rocking through your next workout:
Pandora’s new intelligent workout stations know not only the songs and artists you like but the attributes behind those tunes — which it uses predict the perfect next track.
It starts with pre-programmed stations built around workout types — “Hard Rock Strength Training,” “80s Cardio” and “Yoga Workout” to name a few.
Then Pandora’s cyber brain learns from the plays on your smartphone or web-connected device, factors in your thumbs-ups and thumbs-downs and uses the attributes of your selections to spit out gem after gem.
So get the Pandora app on your mobile device, search for the stations listed in Pandora’s intelligent workout stations you find in the link above, pop on the headphones or connect to a sound system and start rockin’ yourself to health, my friends. If nothing else, do as my friend Kristi and I like to do and push the furniture aside, crank up the tunes and dance your heart healthy.
Grab Bag Namesake:
The curators at LaylaGrace.com have lovely traditional taste, and their offerings will surely have something for nearly everyone.
Specializing in Home & Bedding, Children, Women and Gifts, LaylaGrace.com has put together great collections for our viewing (and buying) pleasure.
(In the interest of full disclosure, I have NOTHING to do with the naming, content or success of this site )
Are you more into modern lines? LaylaGrace just opened a sister site for the more contemporary home decor fare, ZincDoor.com:
Grab Bag Munching H₂O:
Beautiful, healthy skin requires protection from the elements, adequate sleep for repair, and nourishment – mainly from the inside. And let’s not forget water… the panacea for all things that go bump on your forehead. But is the proverbial 8-glasses-a-day really the best thing? Not according to Dr. Howard Murad, founder of Murad skin care. Here is his take on the issue from TotalBeauty.com:
You’ve heard the eight glasses a day rule a trillion times, we know. But it turns out your body doesn’t retain a lot of that water, since it goes right through you during your frequent bathroom breaks. The secret to retaining water is by eating it, says Dr. Howard Murad, M.D., founder of Murad, Inc. and author of “The Water Secret.”
Murad suggests noshing on foods that have large quantities of H2O, such as watermelon (97 percent water) and zucchini (95 percent water). Cells can more easily absorb the water in food since it comes along with other nutrients that the body needs to absorb. As a general rule, start eating more fruits and vegetables, which have higher percentages of water than processed foods and meat.
Grab Bag Art Imitating Life:
Photorealist painter extraordinaire Dennis Wojtkiewicz has painted slices of fruit that would fool most of us into assuming these are photographs. An impressive attention to detail:
Grab Bag Brain Game:
A standard looking Word Search game, but this one requires you to search for one specific word at a time, honing your letter pattern skills:
If you haven’t seen this TV series, which started in 2008, I recommend it highly. It is well beyond television drama… this is a sociology experiment, and we get to watch.
You can stream the first 3 seasons on Netflix, the fourth season on videobb.com, and get up to date before the fifth (and last) begins sometime this year.
The best line in all of recent television history came from this AMAZING (and often disturbing) TV series, which I have fallen for in a BIG way….
“You don’t need a criminal lawyer. You need a criminal… lawyer”.
If you’re into DIY craftiness, or want to be, this site is AWESOME.
You can find tutorials to make and/or links where you can buy the bazillion things profiled here. Personally, I love to see how resourceful humans can be.
On a more practical note, I think our species has WAY too much time on its opposable thumbs when I see some of these things…
Lots of food packaging does it’s best to convince you that the contents are tasty AND healthy.Fooducate is an app for your Android or iPhone that tells you the truth by giving each product a grade and sharing high points and/or concerns:
Download the app and start by scanning bar codes right in your kitchen. If you find your Frosted Fruities are flunkies, Fooducate offers suggestions of healthier alternatives.
So how do they grade products?
How do you recommend one product over the other?Fooducate uses evidence based science to analyze the nutrition label and ingredient list of each product in our database. The analysis takes into account “nutrients to encourage” such as fiber, “nutrients to limit” such as saturated fat, sodium, and sugar, as well as information from the ingredient list. Based on this nutrient analysis, we are able to recommend better options.
And to dispell any concerns that certain products are favored, here’s what they say:
How do you maintain your objectivity?We started this service as a means for us to choose the best foods for our children, families, and friends. Fooducate is not affiliated with food manufacturers. We do not sell any pills, supplements, or diets. There are no external factors influencing our process other than the nutrition analysis we perform.
Give it a go… it’s kind of addicting. I’ve played with it for a couple of days and I just want to scan every bar code in the kitchen now. I have the free app, but I’m thinking I’ll plonk down the $2.99 (on sale from $3.99 right now) for the ad-free version just to keep these folks encouraged.
And … let us remember… the HEALTHIEST of foods rarely carry any bar codes at all.. that’s why Fooducate will not award an A+ to any packaged product
Grab Bag Sprout Sense:
2011 was a banner year for E. coli. In Germany, the deadliest strain of E. coli in modern history was first discovered in a batch of tainted raw sprouts. 4,000 infections and 50 deaths later, this version of the bad bug still has experts scratching their heads.
They don’t know where it came from, and they’re not sure why it’s so virulent…. it is EXCEPTIONALLY good at clinging to the human GI tract. They also can’t be sure it won’t make an appearance here in the U.S.
Raw sprouts have been the source of at least 30 salmonella and E.coli outbreaks in the U.S. since 1996. If you want to enjoy sprouts, blanch them for 1 minute in boiling water before you eat them.
And do remember to cold-water rinse and lightly scrub all other produce… even if you will not eat the skin/rind…. a knife blade cutting into produce can transport bacteria from the outer surface to the flesh inside (this is the likely cause of the listeria outbreak in Colorado cantaloupes last year).
Fun challenge here… you have ample amount of time to study images…. but you don’t know what questions will be asked.
Absorb all you can and then see if you can answer random questions about the image you just studied.
Grab Bag Funny-Wise-Ironic Stuff:
I hope congress had a nice holiday, with each day of rest filled with the knowledge that they have, in whole or in part, shirked their responsibilities as they try to position themselves for undeserved re-election.
But we should not be surprised…. the very wise men below were on to this congressional nonfeasance HUNDREDS OF YEARS AGO.
When will we wake up?
Hello, term limits? Are you anywhere out there?
1. In my many years I have come to a conclusion that one useless man is a shame, two is a law firm and three or more is a congress. ~ John Adams
2. If you don’t read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper you are misinformed. ~ Mark Twain
3. Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But then I repeat myself. ~ Mark Twain
4. I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle. ~ Winston Churchill
5. A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul. ~ George Bernard Shaw
6. A liberal is someone who feels a great debt to his fellow man, which debt he proposes to pay off with your money. ~ G. Gordon Liddy
7. Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner. ~ James Bovard, Civil Libertarian (1994)
8. Foreign aid might be defined as a transfer of money from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries. ~ Douglas Casey, Classmate of Bill Clinton at Georgetown University
9. Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. ~ P.J. O’Rourke, Civil Libertarian
10. Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else. ~ Frederic Bastiat, French economist (1801-1850)
11. Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it. ~ Ronald Reagan (1986)
12. I don’t make jokes. I just watch the government and report the facts. ~ Will Rogers
13. If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it’s free! ~ P.J. O’Rourke
14. In general, the art of government consists of taking as much money as possible from one party of the citizens to give to the other. ~ Voltaire (1764)
15. Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn’t mean politics won’t take an interest in you! ~ Pericles (430 B.C.)
16. No man’s life, liberty, or property is safe while the legislature is in session. ~ Mark Twain (1866)
17. Talk is cheap…except when Congress does it. ~ Anonymous
18. The government is like a baby’s alimentary canal, with a happy appetite at one end and no responsibility at the other. ~ Ronald Reagan
19. The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of the blessings. The inherent blessing of socialism is the equal sharing of misery. ~ Winston Churchill
20. The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin. ~ Mark Twain
21. The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools. ~ Herbert Spencer, English Philosopher (1820-1903)
22. There is no distinctly Native American criminal class…save Congress. ~ Mark Twain
23. What this country needs are more unemployed politicians. ~ Edward Langley, Artist (1928-1995)
24. A government big enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take everything you have. ~Thomas Jefferson
25. We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office. ~ Aesop
MAY WE SEND THESE OUT INTO THE WORLD, WITH HOPES THEY WILL BE FRUITFUL AND MULTIPLY.
Grab Bag Krilling Me Softly:
The gift of health….
In choosing to supplement your diet with Omega-3 fatty acids, many choose fish oil capsules. You might want to consider the latest research on krill oil as a preferred supplement. This research was reported by NYU Langone Medical Center’s website:
Therapeutic Uses
Based on its omega-3 fatty acid content, krill oil would be expected to have many of the same effects as fish oil.
A few studies have evaluated krill oil specifically. In one double-blind, placebo-controlled study, 120 people with high cholesterol were given krill oil, fish oil, or placebo. The results over 3 months showed that krill oil (taken at a dose ranging from 1-3 g daily depending on body mass and which group the participants were assigned to) improved all aspects of cholesterol profile as compared to placebo, and it was more effective than fish oil (taken at the fixed dose of 3 g daily). Krill oil also reduced blood sugar levels. Though these results need to be confirmed by independent trials, they are certainly promising.
Another double-blind study compared krill oil against fish oil for treatment of symptoms of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) and dysmennorhea (menstrual cramps). This study suffered from many problems in design and reporting, but appeared to show that krill oil was more effective than fish oil for treating both of these conditions.
Grab Bag Human Beauty:
The gift of dance…
Grab Bag Green Gold:
The gift of thin….
It’s been AT LEAST a month or two since I have sung the praises of green tea. Can you tell yet that it is a part of my every day life and I think it holds amazing health benefits??
So here I go for the upteenth time…
Read what RealAge.com has to say about drinking green tea and reducing belly fat. At the bottom of the article I have reminded you of my very favorite green teas and where to get them:
Here’s an easy way to turn a routine workout into a powerful waist-whittler: Drink green tea.
A Drink for a Smaller Waist
That’s right. Ditch the Gatorade and instead sip several mugs of the green stuff throughout the day. Research shows that the wonder duo of green tea and exercise may target belly fat better, so it shrinks more easily than with exercise alone.
Fat-Busting Brew
In a study, overweight adults who engaged in an exercise program for 12 weeks lost more belly fat if they also drank green tea daily. The green tea seemed to boost overall weight loss and triglyceride control in the study group, too. The magic amount of tea needed for the effect? Enough to get about 625 milligrams of catechins plus a little caffeine every day (roughly 7 cups daily). Start drinking green tea and use our free online Waistline Tracker to chart your progress.
The Power of Green
Researchers think that catechins in green tea might blast tummy fat by acting on enzymes that influence the body’s calorie- and fat-burning mechanisms. And catechins and caffeine together may boost the body’s metabolism. Brew up a pot of tea the next time friends visit and you can all enjoy these extra benefits as well:
I make a big pot of Gyokuro green tea every morning (about 6 cups worth). I buy my Gyokuro at Teavana (in store or online). Click the pic for a link:
If you want a GREAT bagged green tea, buy the Costco Kirkland brand. I’ve tried ‘em all… there is no better in bags that I have found. Click the pic for a link… other online retailers sell this if you’re not near a Costco…
Grab Bag Ponder:
The gift of wisdom….
FIVE BEST SENTENCES:
1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealth out of prosperity.
2. What one person receives without working for…another person must work for without receiving.
3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.
4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.
5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work, because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work, because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation!
For all those kids from the 30′s, 40′s, 50′s, 60′s and 70′s… you’ll remember when. For all of you born later…. here’s a glimpse of what it was, way back when:
First, we survived being born to mothers who may have smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant.
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn’t get tested for diabetes.
Then, after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.
We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets, and, when we rode our bikes, we had baseball caps, not helmets, on our heads.
As infants and children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes..
Riding in the back of a pick- up truck on a warm day was always a special treat.
We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle.
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this.
We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter, and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And we weren’t overweight.
WHY?
Because we were always outside playing…that’s why!
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.
No one was able to reach us all day. And, we were OKAY.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of scraps and then riding them down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes.. After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.
We did not have Play Stations, Nintendos and XBoxes. There were no video games, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVDs, no surround-sound or CDs, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet and no chat rooms.
WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!
We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth, and there were no lawsuits from those accidents.
We would get spankings with wooden spoons, switches, ping-pong paddles, or just a bare hand, and no one would call child services to report abuse.
We ate worms, and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.
We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and -although we were told it would happen- we did not put out very many eyes.
We rode bikes or walked to a friend’s house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.
Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn’t had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!!
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!
These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors ever.
The past 50 to 85 years have seen an explosion of innovation and new ideas..
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.
If YOU are one of those born between 1925-1970, CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good.
While you are at it, forward it to your kids, so they will know how brave and lucky their parents were.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn’t it ?
) ready to go at any time, so you can bake 2 or 20 cookies and enjoy fresh-baked yumminess in minutes.
