I'm replaying this great film noir epic, and enjoying the lush Art Deco Aztec art.
Friday, November 28, 2008
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
The Illusion of Food
This is the title of a painting that my mind has not yet created, born of a quote of my brother's. It might also be the title of a diet book that no one has written yet (so is Eat Neolithic).
The illusion:
The reality, which is lost behind smoke and mirrors and the flashing neon lights of consumerism:
Happy Thanksgiving, and I hope everyone eats Neolithic on our day of gratitude.
The illusion:
The reality, which is lost behind smoke and mirrors and the flashing neon lights of consumerism:
Happy Thanksgiving, and I hope everyone eats Neolithic on our day of gratitude.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Eating Neolithic
I'm reading Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food (a follow-up to his successful Omnivore's Dilemma from a few years ago) and I'm awed. Some interesting points:
-The American Paradox. Everyone knows that the French eat a high-fat, buttery diet and drink wine and yet remain slim and have long lifespans (the French Paradox). On the other hand, Americans, the people most obsessed with diet and nutrition, have the highest rates of obesity and chronic diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer (!).
-Our diets are precisely engineered. No other animal needs PROFESSIONAL HELP figuring out what to eat.
In order to avoid the slew of Western diseases and live healthier, longer lives, we ought to basically eat what we evolved to eat. (We haven't evolved responses to high fructose corn syrup, which has been around for about half a century, whereas the human species has consumed maize for thousands of years longer.) Eat what our Neolithic ancestors ate, he says. That means a diet of whole-grain, nonprocessed food, foods prepared according to cultural traditions that unlock key nutrients (for example, processing maize with limestone unlocks niacin), and nothing that ever passed through a factory or manufacturing facility. Would you eat something extruded through a nozzle? Squirtable Go-Gurt? Hydrogenated cardboard Pringles? Fluorescent orange plastic cheese? Splenda? Some other unrecognizable chemical compound that was made in a lab? This stuff is completely unrecognizable as food, but this is our post-industrial diet.
Neolithic or Paleolithic?
This made me think about whether a Paleolithic diet or a Neolithic one would be better.
Hunter-gatherers were the original affluent society. Before agriculture, foragers would spend 20 hours a week acquiring food, and then have plenty of leisure time left over to shoot the breeze, visit relatives, make jewelry, weave baskets, play with children, and so on. With agriculture, cultivation of crops became crucial and people spent 7 days a week, 24 hours a day slaving away on a farm. Generally, the foraging diet was more diverse and higher quality nutrient-wise than an agricultural one based on few key crops and livestock, but it probably tastes terrible. Let's see what I can gather....Insects. Raw weeds and tough, fibrous leafy greens. Okra. Bizarre seasonal fruits like durian and mango and avocado and grapes and pears that grow only at the foothills of the most remote mountains in China, but have incredible antioxidant and nutrient properties. Crustaceans. Minimally cooked.
Taste-wise, definitely go Neolithic. I'll take some stone-ground wheat bread and home-churned butter and cheese any day. Soba noodles. Beancurd, mmm. The Neolithic diet sounds yummy and feels like home. It's been 10,000 years and we're still around! Don't eat any of that processed post-industrial garbage.
-The American Paradox. Everyone knows that the French eat a high-fat, buttery diet and drink wine and yet remain slim and have long lifespans (the French Paradox). On the other hand, Americans, the people most obsessed with diet and nutrition, have the highest rates of obesity and chronic diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer (!).
-Our diets are precisely engineered. No other animal needs PROFESSIONAL HELP figuring out what to eat.
In order to avoid the slew of Western diseases and live healthier, longer lives, we ought to basically eat what we evolved to eat. (We haven't evolved responses to high fructose corn syrup, which has been around for about half a century, whereas the human species has consumed maize for thousands of years longer.) Eat what our Neolithic ancestors ate, he says. That means a diet of whole-grain, nonprocessed food, foods prepared according to cultural traditions that unlock key nutrients (for example, processing maize with limestone unlocks niacin), and nothing that ever passed through a factory or manufacturing facility. Would you eat something extruded through a nozzle? Squirtable Go-Gurt? Hydrogenated cardboard Pringles? Fluorescent orange plastic cheese? Splenda? Some other unrecognizable chemical compound that was made in a lab? This stuff is completely unrecognizable as food, but this is our post-industrial diet.
Neolithic or Paleolithic?
This made me think about whether a Paleolithic diet or a Neolithic one would be better.
Hunter-gatherers were the original affluent society. Before agriculture, foragers would spend 20 hours a week acquiring food, and then have plenty of leisure time left over to shoot the breeze, visit relatives, make jewelry, weave baskets, play with children, and so on. With agriculture, cultivation of crops became crucial and people spent 7 days a week, 24 hours a day slaving away on a farm. Generally, the foraging diet was more diverse and higher quality nutrient-wise than an agricultural one based on few key crops and livestock, but it probably tastes terrible. Let's see what I can gather....Insects. Raw weeds and tough, fibrous leafy greens. Okra. Bizarre seasonal fruits like durian and mango and avocado and grapes and pears that grow only at the foothills of the most remote mountains in China, but have incredible antioxidant and nutrient properties. Crustaceans. Minimally cooked.
Taste-wise, definitely go Neolithic. I'll take some stone-ground wheat bread and home-churned butter and cheese any day. Soba noodles. Beancurd, mmm. The Neolithic diet sounds yummy and feels like home. It's been 10,000 years and we're still around! Don't eat any of that processed post-industrial garbage.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Saturday, November 08, 2008
Some Random Things
When I came home on Wednesday night, there was a vehicle illegally parked on the sidewalk in front of my apartment building. It looked abandoned. The model? A pretty new Power Wheels, I'd say 2007 or so. How very curious --children these days leave their CARS behind.
The next day, as I was leaving the house early in the morning, I saw that it had been pushed to the curb and piled high with garbage bags. I guess no one wanted a free Power Wheel, or maybe it had belonged to the pediatrician's office next door and didn't work anymore.
Yesterday someone left a message on my answering machine saying that they had my tickets for the INAUGURATION (!) and didn't have my phone number or mailing address so they looked me up in the phone book and found my number. Hehehe
The next day, as I was leaving the house early in the morning, I saw that it had been pushed to the curb and piled high with garbage bags. I guess no one wanted a free Power Wheel, or maybe it had belonged to the pediatrician's office next door and didn't work anymore.
Yesterday someone left a message on my answering machine saying that they had my tickets for the INAUGURATION (!) and didn't have my phone number or mailing address so they looked me up in the phone book and found my number. Hehehe
Tuesday, November 04, 2008
Monday, November 03, 2008
Top 10 Best foods for your face
1. Avocado - niacin (vit B3)
2. Mangoes - vit A
3. Almonds - 150% DV Vitamin E
4. Cottage cheese - selenium (antioxidant w/Vit E)
5. Acerola Cherries - vitamin C
6. Oysters - Zinc
7. Baked potato - 75% DV copper
8. Mushrooms-Riboflavin (vit b2)
9. Flaxseed oil - 2.5 mg omega 3s
10. Wheat germ - biotin
2. Mangoes - vit A
3. Almonds - 150% DV Vitamin E
4. Cottage cheese - selenium (antioxidant w/Vit E)
5. Acerola Cherries - vitamin C
6. Oysters - Zinc
7. Baked potato - 75% DV copper
8. Mushrooms-Riboflavin (vit b2)
9. Flaxseed oil - 2.5 mg omega 3s
10. Wheat germ - biotin