"It is horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save the environment." Ansel Adams

     It is also horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save our health.
     I have been listening to the speakers at the Food Revolution Summit (www.foodrevolution.org), which lasts from April 27 to May 5th.  It is, as always, extremely interesting.  There are three experts speaking per day.
     Some of the sound bytes I've picked up are that:
          1) Chronic illnesses are food borne.  You eat yourself into them, you are going to have to eat yourself out.
          2)  Being healthy in today's world is a revolutionary act.
          3)  Big food industry know that their days are numbered.  We are at a tipping point. Health care costs are tipping us over the top and educated consumers will make the difference.

     There were interesting discussions on GMO and Monsanto and its co-horts.  I did not know that 250,000 farmers in India commit suicide every year thanks to Monsanto's strong-arm tactics. This is per Vandana Shiva, PhD, director of the Research Foundation on Science, Technology, and Ecology.

     Doesn't it make you angry that Big Food can label GMO food, or make products GMO free, for people in European countries as they require it, but won't do it in the USA?  Why are Americans second class citizens?  How can GMO foods be released to the public without any independent food-safety research?  Get educated, get angry, and act.  Vote with your wallet.  Money rules where business is involved, and each person's spending contributes, good or bad.
 
     Here is a good blog from Dr. Mark Hyman.  He was one of the speakers at the Summit.  It is entitled "Fed Up", and discusses food terrorism, food deserts, and cooking our way out of disease and obesity.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-mark-hyman/healthy-foods_b_3125098.html?utm_hp_ref=healthy-living 

     Well, I'm off of my soap-box for now and am heading out to enjoy the day as snow and cold are coming back tonight and tomorrow. 

     Get fed up, and eat healthy.

Serendipity

     By coincidence I recently read two good books, not knowing in advance that their subject matter involved dying.
     The first book was Kent Haruf's most recent book, "Benediction".  I requested it as I very much enjoyed his previous books, "Plainsong" and "Eventide".  His writing lends a quiet dignity to his characters and captures the essence of a place and the people residing there.  This particular book happens to be about the death of an old man in a small town on the eastern plains of Colorado, and about the people in the town who help him and his family cope.  Haruf's writing is thoughtful and descriptive.  I really feel that I know the town of Holt, CO, and its people. I can imagine exactly what they are doing today on a lazy April Sunday.
     The second book, "The Fault in our Stars" by John Green, is a novel for young adults.  I requested this book as I had read a brilliant quote by the author and wanted to read more of his writing.  It is  the star-crossed love story of two teens with cancer who met at a cancer support group.  It is smart and sarcastic and touching. It feels real. These characters and the author are much more intelligent than I am, but it is a riveting read. I need to re-read this one to get every last detail it has to offer.
     The first book is the sun and the moon rising every day and the rotation of the planets.  The second book is a shooting star.  Both have import. Both give perspective. I recommend them.

"A wise old owl sat on an oak; The more he saw the less he spoke; The less he spoke the more he heard; Why aren't we like that wise old bird?"---Edward Hersey Richards

     Last night I took Charleigh out back in the dusky half light for her last walk.  If not for the scolding of a pesky magpie, I would not have noticed the great horned owl perched in my neighbor's cottonwood as it witnessed  day's end along with us; or more likely it was day's beginning for him.  He was a silent sentinel wonderfully camouflaged by his absolute stillness.  He must hate those noisy crows and magpies who are forever betraying his invisibility.

     This morning I took Charleigh on an early quick walk.  We saw a beautiful hawk observing the dawn,  and later more than a dozen deer grazing in the empty elementary school yard just a block from our house.  It is so easy to forget that there is a whole world of activity going on even when people are not present....especially when people are not present.

Learn to love the fool in you..

A thought to ponder for the weekend....have a great one.

 

"The English winter---ending in July, to recommence in August." Lord Byron

     Here's a picture I took yesterday.   It is beautiful, I know, but I am so ready to put away the mittens, gloves, hats, boots, winter coats, and yaktrax for another year.  By tomorrow, there should be no traces of snow left.

May the wind be always at your back, and the monsters live far, far away.

                                                         From the London Marathon last weekend

     Last Saturday my running group ran to remember Boston.  Here is a picture.  I'm under the banner.

   
     Three of the runners were actually at the Boston Marathon  There were so many lucky people that day.

I'm off to see the blizzard...

     18 degrees out and snowing hard this morning, but I took Charleigh for a one mile walk.  That is not enough for a big dog like her, but it will have to suffice.  We were the only pedestrians out, so maybe we are crazy.  Everyone else who had ventured out-of-doors was pushing a snow shovel or snow-blower.  As for me,  I am going to let my snow melt on its own.  After all, it is the end of April.  April blizzards bring May flowers, right?

     The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has released the 2013 Dirty Dozen list.....the most pesticide contaminated foods we can buy. They are:  apples, strawberries, grapes, celery, peaches, spinach, sweet bell peppers, nectarines, cucumbers, potatoes, cherry tomatoes, and hot peppers.  If possible, you may want to buy these foods only when produced organically.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/22/dirty-dozen-foods-list-2013_n_3132788.html?utm_hp_ref=healthy-living

It is Earth Day, Earthlings!

 
  Today is the 43rd celebration of Earth Day.  Revel in nature's wonder, and contemplate the repercussions of your every action on it.
      Physicist Stephen Hawking says that if humans do not migrate from the planet within 1000 years, we face extinction.  Mass space migration of billions of people is not a likely scenario, in my honest opionion.  We need to act now to save the home we've got.

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-04/stephen-hawking-says-we-have-get-rock-within-1000-years

     This is one of my favorite quotations, and I really believe in its wisdom:

"In our every deliberation, we must consider the impact of our decisions on the next seven generations."---From The Great Law of The Iroquois Confederacy

     Have a conscious life.

Good job of almost focusing!

This is today's "Overboard" comicstrip.  Louie looks just like my Charleigh-dog, and acts just like her, too.  I'll have to remember this....."Good job of almost focusing, Charleigh. Good job."

Hands, touching hands, reaching out, touching me, touching you.

     There are a couple of things I would like to share about Boston before going into the weekend.  The first is a comic symbolizing good winning the race over evil.


                   Photo found on Florida Today.  Shared from Distant Runners


     Secondly, I didn't know that this song, Sweet Caroline, was an eighth inning tradition at Fenway Park  Hearing it always brings me back to the summer of 1970 when "good times never seemed so good.". However, I had forgotten the full meaning of the lyrics. Please listen. (email subscribers will need to go to the blog to see the video).

Good morning sunshine!

     April in Colorado can be so beautiful.  The sun is finally back so we can enjoy the outdoors.  I took Charleigh  for a decent-length walk for the first time in days.  The sun melted the ice on the walkways. By the time we returned home, Charleigh had mucky dirt icicles covering her belly. She was a happy girl. 

.

South Valley Park

     This described me the first half of this week:

Boston on my mind.

     Boston is ever present on my mind, as it should be.  One of my wandering thoughts is about the irony of it all, the irony of life. It makes my heart ache.
     The violence and heartbreak started shortly after "heartbreak hill."
     This year, mile marker 26 was dedicated to the memory of the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting victims....the race directors even used an air-horn rather than a gun to start the race as a sign of respect.
     One of the 3 deceased victims was an 8 year old boy, Martin Richard. Here is a photo of him holding a "No More Hurting People" sign.  Life cannot get more incongruous than this.
 
                                                                     George Takei 
     
     Another thought regards our collective loss of innocence and wonder.  We need to expect good.  We can't live our lives bundling our children and ourselves in cotton wool. The good in the world outweighs the bad.  Heroes exist.
     One of Dean's favorite quotes was by John Shedd:  "A ship in the harbor is safe--but that is not what ships are built for."  He was always much better than me at living this.  I was always more the bundled-in-cotton-wool type. I fear we are in danger of enveloping our entire country in cotton wool....afraid of letting our children play outside...afraid of strangers and of unknown packages on the sidewalk....bogged down by security.  Jack London said, "the proper function of man is to live--not to exist."  I am struggling with this and questioning it in my own life right now.

                                       Dare to be different


     The marathon is an example of ordinary people doing extraordinary things.  The Boston marathon on 4-15-2013 exemplified this. We must remember the heroes....those who get up, again and again, and who persevere.  Dean was my hero.

     Lastly, and I know I am stating the obvious here,...terrorism=cowardice.

"No just cause can be advanced by terrorism."---Koffi Anan

"How do you defeat terrorism?  Don't be terrorized."---Salman Rushdie

"No more hurting people.  Peace."---Martin Richard

   

   

"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner, Beyond Words Gibson's Daily Running Quotes

     I did watch the 117th running of the Boston marathon yesterday, on-line, live.  It was so exciting. Dick and Ricky Hoyt, Team Hoyt, ran their 31st Boston, and a bronze statue in their honor was unveiled in Hopkinton where the race starts.


     American Shalane Flanagan came in 4th for the women, Kara Goucher was 6th.  Jason Hartmann from here in Boulder was 4th for the men.

     Who would have imagined possible the devastation that followed just a few hours later on such a joyful and accomplishment-filled day. The Boston marathon is an event all runners dream about.  This act of terrorism will not change that.  Boston will come back stronger than ever.


Boulder Running Company- Littleton


Upworthy

"If you're trying to defeat the human spirit, marathoners are the wrong group to target." - Mighty Brighties

The Gentleman's Game.

Way to go Mike!

     We went to a CSU-CU Rugby game this past weekend.  It was CSU's last regular home game for the season, and CSU tromped them.   Great game!

     It was interesting to watch as an objective observer, (one who doesn't know the rules or what is generally going on other than which direction the ball is being carried).  The players are all so young, there are seas of testosterone flowing, and shaving off chest and back hair is evidently popular.

"Rugby football is a game I can't claim absolutely to understand in all its niceties, if you know what I mean. I can follow the broad, general principles, of course. I mean to say, I know that the main scheme is to work the ball down the field somehow and deposit it over the line at the other end and that, in order to squalch this programme, each side is allowed to put in a certain amount of assault and battery and do things to its fellow man which, if done elsewhere, would result in 14 days without the option, coupled with some strong remarks from the Bench." -P. G. Wodehouse Very Good, Jeeves (1930)


     The Boston Marathon takes place this morning.  You can watch it live at http://watchlive.baa.org/  I'll be watching as it is going to be cold and snowing here all week.  I think we will be skipping spring this year and going straight to summer later on.

. 

Detours

     Kristen Armstrong's latest blog post, "Detours", refers to Emily Perl Kingsley's 1987 essay, "Welcome to Holland."  You have probably read it before, but it is worth reading again.  It is about raising a child with a disability, but can apply to all the other unexpected unchangeable situations that arise in life.


 WELCOME TO HOLLAND

by
 Emily Perl Kingsley.

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

     Here is the link to Armstrong's post called "Detours." http://www.runnersworld.com/runners-stories/detours

How animals eat their food.

     Here is a funny video to start your Friday......  

     And here is a video about the McGovern Report, which in 1977 released the first dietary guidelines for our country.  This is the story behind these guidelines and explains why, to this day, the decades of science supporting a more plant-based diet have yet to translate into public policy, and how congress let the foxes run the hen-house.

(email subscribers will have to go to my blog to watch the videos)

Dare to be different

(A 2010 study showed that children increased their vegetable intake after watching Popeye cartoons.)

How fun is this? I would take the stairs!

     Dance and piano lessons combined.  Maybe Gene Kelly got his start this way.
     (email subscribers need to go to my blog to view the video)

If it weren't for me.....

One More Mile Running Apparel


     I could have told them this:  
     A study reported in Runnersworld.com  shows that postmenopausal women burn less fat than younger women using the same energy intensity. It supports the idea that older women will have to work out a little harder to get the same results. I guess this should be incentive??
http://www.runnersworld.com/weight-loss/study-postmenopausal-women-burn-less-fat

Thoughts for the weekend..

Buddhism

“We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.”

     Today's interesting blogs:

     Did your cat ever sit on your chest, get in your face, and smell your breath?  They like to do that, but it always leaves you wondering what they are smelling.  According to this blog from www.medicalnewstoday.com, the chemical signature of exhaled breath is unique to each individual. This can be used in diagnosis.  Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners have been doing this for a long time.   Dogs and cats can be trained to distinguish patients with certain types of cancers.  Portable non-invasive mass spectrometers are being developed to test exhaled breath, and will be competitive with blood and urine testing to aid in diagnoses in the future.
      http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/258612.php

   
     The next interesting article comes from www.runnersworld.com regarding the activitystat hypothesis.  According to this, there is a more or less fixed level of activity humans accomplish in a day;  that if you do a long workout in the morning, you will curtail your activity for the rest of the day. The article discusses a study done on school-age children in phys-ed classes trying to increase that fixed activity level.  It seems that with specialized instruction, the activity levels didn't change much, but the health outcomes improved.
      The part that interested me was the idea of having an internal activitystat.  I've noticed it in myself.  On the days I workout, I have no desire or energy to do yardwork or active house-cleaning, for example.  It is comforting to know that it isn't just my own laziness holding me back, but my internal activity-clock. I am always looking for ways to increase my own activity levels. It looks like quality, rather than quantity may be the answer.  
     http://www.runnersworld.com/health/school-phys-ed-and-activitystat-hypothesis


     Lastly, here is an article from www.sportsgeezer.com regarding the controversy of stretching...pro or con.  This reflects research showing that static stretching can leave you weak.  It can decrease strength by 5.5%.  I am torn....flexibility is important as we age, as is strength.  Yoga, which accomplishes stretching, has been around for centuries.  I think I will continue with doing occasional stretching.
     http://sportsgeezer.com/2013/stretching-leaves-you-weak/

Cash and competition.

     In today's Sportsgeezer blog I read about an interesting research study.  I wish I had had an employer that would have offered this, or that my insurance company would do this.  Money always works as an incentive, and the camaraderie of team competition really ups the ante.

     A multi-institutional study offered two groups of overweight people money for meeting their monthly weight loss goals. In the first group, each individual was given $100/month for meeting his or her goal.  In the second group, teams of five people were given $500/month if they met their monthly goals, plus were given the balance of money from the teams not meeting their goals.  As you can guess, at the end of the six-month study, the individuals on the teams lost seven pounds more than those in the individual group.

     Next, I feel they should study whether the competitors continue to lose weight, if they keep the weight off, and how that affects the employer's bottom line regarding health care costs.  I surmise a positive result, especially if the team competition leads to on-going group support.

http://sportsgeezer.com/2013/key-to-weight-loss-cash-competition/

http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/news/News_Releases/2013/04/volpp/