Why Not A Nice Ratatouille?

This was all inspired by this product:

And this question:

WHY???????

A lifetime ago, I taught fitness classes at the YMCA. During my tenure there, I cannot count the number of people who used to ask me for weight loss advice and/or personal training secrets. My answer was always the same, “Eat less and exercise more. If you burn more calories than you take in, you’ll lose weight. If you don’t, you won’t.” Out of the innumerable askers, a very numerable minority took me up on it: one. Only one person out of the throng responded to the harsh reality that 1500 calories = 1 pound, no matter how you slice it or dress it up. Everyone else went for a gimmick (“Ooh, if I do a boot camp, I can eat whatever I want!” “If I only eat protein, I can eat as much as I want!” “If I starve myself for 10 days, then I can eat whatever I want for 5!”).

It’s a human trait to try to find the path of least resistance. It seems to be an American trait, however, to so stubbornly pursue shortcuts. We seem to have been so pampered, we’re on the verge of become imbecilic brats who can no longer understand what it is to take medicine that doesn’t taste exactly like an Orange Julius.

The dressing up of the problem, then, has become big business. Want to get into a good school? It can’t be that the answer is to work hard, be as well-rounded as possible, and let the chips fall where they may; instead, you must game the system in the specific way these handy dandy books’ll tell you. Want to lose weight? Drink this magical elixir (juice) with these magical pills (speed) and watch your appetite disappear (while your blood pressure skyrockets)! Too much trouble to dress yourself? Never fear! Now you don’t have to even go through the trouble of putting on a velour track suit; now there are Pajama Jeans!

I’m not going on another anti-consumerist rampage here. My problem is actually the lack of understanding we as a country show that sometimes medicine is medicine. And that’s not always that bad. There are ways to make it palatable without losing what it is in the first place.

To wit: a French friend of mine was talking to me about the huge business that is recipes for children’s food here. She said she’d been over to a friend’s house and said (very well-meaning) friend was showing her a trick to get her kid to eat carrots: just roast them with honey on top. My friend was perplexed and asked the best question ever: “Why not a nice ratatouille?”

What an excellent question, and an excellent response to all this craziness. Instead of going overboard on gimmicks and tricks and trying so hard to never ever have to realize that something might be unpleasant, why not use a simple method to make it palatable? Want to look better when you roll out of bed? Get nicer pajamas. Better yet, stop caring so much whether or not anyone sees you in pajamas. Want to get better grades? Go to class, take notes, then do the assignments. Want to lose weight? Keep going to the gym, then skip a meal once in a while (or cut back on the ones you already eat). Why not a nice ratatouille indeed?

Sarah Palin Secretly Thinks Jokes About Molesting Willow Are Teh Funneh

‘Kay, so anyone who’s not up on the Palin-Letterman feud, buckle in, cause I got a lot to say about it. Here’s what happened:

The Palins visited NYC, and attend a Yankees game with Giul911ani. Letterman, to paraphrase, said the following about their trip:

1. The best part was that they got to go to Bloomingdale’s to update Sarah’s “slutty flight attendant” look.
2. The worst part was keeping their daughter away from Eliot Spitzer.
3. The most surprising part was when their daughter got knocked up by A-Rod during the 7th inning stretch.

The Palins got livid, and released the following statements:

“Any ‘jokes’ about raping my 14-year-old are despicable. Alaskans know it and I believe the rest of the world knows it, too.”

- Todd Palin

“Concerning Letterman’s comments about my young daughter (and I doubt he’d ever dare make such comments about anyone else’s daughter): ‘Laughter incited by sexually-perverted comments made by a 62-year-old male celebrity aimed at a 14-year-old girl is not only disgusting, but it reminds us some Hollywood/NY entertainers have a long way to go in understanding what the rest of America understands – that acceptance of inappropriate sexual comments about an underage girl, who could be anyone’s daughter, contributes to the atrociously high rate of sexual exploitation of minors by older men who use and abuse others.’”

- Governor Sarah Palin

First thing’s first. Read that statement given by Sarah Palin again. Sweet weeping Jayzus on a popsicle stick, have you ever SEEN so much punctuation trying to reign in a pointless ramble (aside from here)?!?! The unnecessary parenthetical, followed by a colon followed by her quoting herself within her own statement. Of course, there’s then the dash, the repetition and artless nature of her speech…the whole thing is seriously mindblowing. It reads like someone who not only doesn’t speak English well, but just doesn’t understand the nature of language and communication (i.e. that it should convey to someone else your interior monologue, rather than just reflect it directly). Now, I ramble. I know this. But in official capacities, I tend to err on the side of brevity if I want to be taken seriously. I mean, really. An elected official sat down to write an official statement, and this is what she came up with. Let me edit this fer ya, elite that I am: “Any time a member of the bi-coastal elites uses his or her celebrity to make light of the tragic molestation and sexual exploitation of minors in this country, I take serious offense, but never more so than when the victim of the satire is my own young daughter, who merely wanted to see New York, not enter the political arena. Mr. Letterman should be ashamed of himself.” KTHXBAI.

Anyway, given Sarah Palin’s total lack of understanding of the basics of communication, even with her precious journalism degree, I am starting my own “birthers” movement, postulating that Sarah Palin was born a turtle, and is therefore ineligible to be Governor of Alaska. Run with it, kiddos!

So, anyway, in true Letterman form, he spent 7 minutes smacking them down, claiming the jokes were about Bristol, saying they were tasteless, and driving home the point they were jokes. To which the Palins followed up yet again, with Todd issuing another terse, simple, but to-the-point statement, saying that, since their 14-year-old was the only daughter on the trip with them, they’d assumed the jokes to be at her expense (truth be told, so did I).

Sarah, no longer to be trusted around the writing bit, responded via Meg Stapleton, Sarah’s spokesperson:

“The Palins have no intention of providing a ratings boost for David Letterman by appearing on his show,” Stapelton said in an email to ABC News. “Plus, it would be wise to keep Willow away from David Letterman.”

So jokes about Willow getting molested really are hilarious. But only when her parents do it. *shudder*

Coed Boardrooms Make More Money

I think I must be dreaming. Could this study really have been done, published, and publicized?

In case you’ve missed the unfortunately named Katty Kay on her media junket, she’s a BBC journalist who’s recently co-written a book with Claire Shipman called (in part) Womenomics. In it they do actual studies (as re-reported by the illustrious Economist) that prove that the companies that employ the most high-ranking women make the most money. More incredibly, they have found that the companies do better if they don’t pretend the women are no different than men in management style or priorities. Their conclusion is that the economy would exclusively benefit from employing more women in high-ranking jobs, paying them equally, and allowing them to be women.

I can vouch that I would have been much more productive these past months had I been allowed to work from home until a spot for my baby in a good daycare had opened. It would have spared me countless hours of worry, not to mention trips to pediatricians and specialists (her unhappiness in the bad environment manifested itself in failing health). Plus, working from home could have provided me a way to work flex hours, thereby increasing my workday and my productivity.

In Spain, this is usually allowed (I encountered, amazingly enough, a uniquely American situation), and actually taken to the next level: applying the same rules to men. Paternity leave was just the latest in what has been a part of the culture. Men in my university routinely take charge of their young children, taking them to and picking them up from daycare, and bringing them into the office or taking days off to care for them when they are sick. It yields an environment that rewards the whole family for being a family, and makes the workers feel more wholly appreciated.

So, yes, it seems like a dream that someone has proven that this method is more efficient and productive. Especially as I’m job hunting. So, thank you, Katty Kay, for my future interview’s talking points.

Cheerios Are Officially A Drug

What I’ve always suspected turns out to be true, according to the FDA: Cheerios is classified as a drug. Of course they are. Just look what the kids do for them:

Citing a clinical study, the product labels also claim that eating two servings a day of Cheerios helps to reduce bad cholesterol when eaten as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol, the FDA letter says.

Those claims indicate that Cheerios — said by General Mills to be the best-selling cereal in the United States — is intended to be used to lower cholesterol and prevent, lessen or treat the disease hypercholesterolemia, and to treat and prevent coronary heart disease.

“Because of these intended uses, the product is a drug,” the FDA concluded in its letter.

As a relatively new mom, I’d already figured this out. My child, born and womb-bred in Spain, has no interest in Cheerios, while her cousins go batshit nuts if they’re out. There can be only one explanation: The addiction was formed in the womb. Mom ate ‘em, baby’s addicted. It works. Just ask crackheads.

Occam’s Razor, Fugue-ish Feeding, And Why I Love Dissent

Suffice to say, I have just had it with all kinds of medical practitioners. Midwives, nurses, doctors, and specialists…I’ve been awash for the last month in all their sage wisdom.

“Your daughter needs to eat more carbohydrates. She must have potatoes during every meal and desserts after. And, no, rice and beans don’t count as carbohydrates.” “Your daughter needs a tube in her ear to prevent ear infections.” “Her ears are fine.” “She has thrush, which could signal an autoimmune deficiency.” “She absolutely does not have thrush, and she’s perfectly healthy.”

This has all put me in the mindset of Dr. House, especially as I keep repeating the same medical history to each so-called “specialist.” So here’s the mystery we’re trying to solve:

My baby’s spent the first 7 months of her life in the 10-25% of weight, and the 50-75% height. When she started at daycare, she was upset. Really upset. Like, hunger strike upset. She refused all nourishment all day, and any given to her was promptly vomited back up. When I would pick her up, she would only accept breast milk, since she was looking for comfort. This went on till her first birthday, and still does to some extent (she will throw up any breakfast she eats upon entry through the door). It has, up till now, taken a month straight of visits to specialists to explain to her doctors, then, why she has dropped to the 3% in weight and 10% in height (or lower).

Also, they can’t figure out how she keeps catching ear infections.

Egads, man, when did the simplest answer to something become so goddamned elusive? I couldn’t understand this until listening yesterday to the latest “specialist” in baby care, but now I think I get it: They cannot tolerate variations on a theme.

The doctor was pounding me with rapid-fire questions for a half an hour, trying to get me to give her an example of my baby’s daily diet. Thing is, she doesn’t have a set schedule, and her tastes change daily. The doctor could not compute this, and got more and more agitated until she started barking orders at me, telling me EXACTLY what she had to eat and when. Why does my baby have to eat cereal for breakfast and not rice and beans, if she so desires? I got no answer. She did, however, go on to tell me my daughter was likely vitamin deficient, or otherwise malnourished, without a single test result to look at…just because she was confounded by a baby who ate what she wanted when she was hungry.

My husband and I have always been against excessive schedule-making when it comes to parenting, but never have I been more against it than I am now. I used to just think it was healthier for a child to be able to be flexible as far as nap times and meal times go (especially since we are public transportation junkies), but now I think it’s healthier for society in general. This is part of a larger parenting quibble we have with traditional parenting mores: “Because I said so” is a ridiculous answer to any question.

The progressive dumbing-down of societies (all this happened in Spain, but it could be anywhere) is becoming so rampant, it’s starting to terrify me, and I just see this manner of illogically foisting rules on people over whom you have authority as a highly contributive factor. Why not encourage a child (or patient) to know the reason he does what he does, or doesn’t do what he doesn’t do? Kids actually like information (hence the ubiquitous question, “Why?”), and sometimes light-hearted reasoning can really help (My nephew, who won’t eat almost anything given to him, finally ate his fish sticks when I explained that protein is what your body utilizes to grow. The terrifying prospect of being shorter than his baby cousin suddenly spurred his appetite to never-before-seen heights.)

In short, if my child’s doctor doesn’t like my daughter eating dahl for breakfast, then

Palin Vs. Johnston In Greatest White Trash Cage Match Ever!

One side’s boasting a recent meth lab arrest. Pretty good, but the other side fires back with a sister-in-law repeatedly breaking and entering for the purpose of robbery. One side blabs to the tabloids, another shoots it down, and the first side goes on that bastion of journalistic integrity (“The Tyra Show”) to defend his “good” name.

Here’s the part that kills me. If you have any political advisors whatsoever, they all tell you the same thing about this sort of deal: Just say you don’t comment on your child’s personal life. Period. Done. End of story. Or you say that your children are trying to find their way in a compex and very adult situation the best they know how. What you DON’T do is the following: shoot back with claims that he’s lying about the whole thing. For chrissake, does no one in the Palin camp understand how to keep scandal OUT of the headlines? Oh well, here’s hoping they never learn, since this is fucking hilarious.

“Levi has never lived under the same roof as Bristol or any of the Palins,” Palin spokeswoman Meghan Stapleton told CNN.

In an interview that aired in full Monday on the Tyra Banks Show, Johnston said he moved in to the Palin household shortly before the birth of son Tripp last December.

“I just wanted to be there for her when she had the baby,” Johnston said, adding the two were allowed to share a room.

“Do you really think the governor and Todd would have allowed that,” Stapleton said in an e-mail.

Screw? Sure. Have a baby? Absolutely. Be forced into the public eye at the GOP convention? Most assuredly. But LIVE TOGETHER??? There’s no WAY Mother Of The Year, Sarah Palin, would let her young daughter take such a serious step with an eqyally young and stupid boy.

I tend to believe this, though. After all, this was the only move I thought Sarah Palin made in this whole debacle that sounded both logical and good for her child and grandchild. So of course it had to be balderdash.

Personally, I just think Palin’s getting worried Michele Bachmann is taking her wingnut white trash mantle, and is trying to claw her way back on top. Here’s a hint: Less talk about your mundane teenage pregnancy scandal, and more talk of armed revolution!

The Octuplets Have A Shitty Mom. Also, Sun Rises.

Call this the shock heard round the world: One of Nadya Suleman’s fired volunteer nannies is speaking out (I know, I know, how do you fire volunteers, right?), and she’s pulling no goddamned punches.

“This woman does not care for these kids,” Linda West-Conforti said on the talk show. “She is in [it] for the paparazzi, the media…Nadya only fed her babies … when a film crew was in her house,” West-Conforti said. “That’s the only time that woman ever volunteered to feed a child. And I tell you what happened: During one episode she was done feeding … she picked up the child [and] gave it to me on my chest. She didn’t burp it; she didn’t change the diaper; [she] walked out of that room and [didn't see] her for another 12 hours.”

Now there are a lot of reasons this doesn’t surprise me. Who, after all, but a narcissist would so purposefully have so many children while being totally unsure of how to provide for them (and deprive her parents of a retirement in the process)? The main reason, though, is the following: It almost always holds that people who proclaim themselves to be expertly adept about something are, in fact, really awful at it.

Have you ever met a self-proclaimed pool shark who doesn’t scratch on the 8? A “ladies’ man” who doesn’t go home alone? An expert in French who doesn’t freeze up when the Metro attendant asks them how many tickets they’d like?

I suppose I’ve grown hyper-sensitive to it, since, being a liberal and all, I get accosted by womyn all the time. No, not “women”…womyn. They are constantly telling me what great feminists they are, and what a horrible example of a female human I am. I’ve been told what I should read, watch, listen to, and think about things on many, many occasions. While infuriating in its antithetical nature, I’ve gotten to the point where it makes me laugh. Especially because, almost invariably, these pillars of the feminist community are completely under the thumbs of some man somewhere, or, worse yet, are hoping to be. “I can’t believe you would say you think that model’s too fat for the runway! She’s got womanly curves, and she’s rightfully proud! Now excuse me while I go scope my Women’s Studies class for a sensitive man who’ll support me the rest of my life.”

Which brings me back to parenting. I have no doubt that, were I in the United States, I would be getting a lot more schooling than I do now, and I receive plenty via the phone/internet. What I’ve found, unsurprisingly, is that those who are the most adamant about their advice being the way to go are the ones who are least capable of doling it out. I suppose it’s a defense mechanism; confronted by their own lack of knowledge about something so fundamental and important, they overcompensate by trying to assert that they really know everything there is about it.

So, yeah, OctoMom, OctoPussy, Crazy Baby Lady, whatever you want to call her…the minute I read her quoted as saying this: “Everything I do, I’ll stop my life for them and be present with them. And hold them. And be with them. And how many parents do that? I’m sure there are many that do, but many don’t. And that’s unfortunate. That is selfish.” Yeah, that just REEKS of bullshit.

Speaking of which, I have to go report to two self-proclaimed genius physicists about their self-proclaimed groundbreaking research skills.

Can Michelle Obama Teach Americans To Eat Right? Prolly Not.

Don’t get me wrong: I hope she succeeds in her stated goal to encourage healthful eating across the United States. And I really think, if anyone can do it, she can. (Can anyone remember such a collective swoon happening in the States at a couple’s physiques as has happened with these two? Seriously, it’s like we all have a touch of the vapors when they bare the tiniest bit of skin.)

It’s just that, as I’ve said many times before, the notion that being American means overindulging in everything is soooo ingrained, it seems impossible to extricate from our collective consciousness. Her idea to highlight overindulgence in local produce seems smart, since it’s not taking away anything (just modifying it), but it’s still a tough sell. Wearing our hyper-consumption of bacon grease (and spare tires) like a badge of honor has become de rigeur. I hope it changes, since it’s not only wildly unhealthy but also seriously costly to the American taxpayer (yes, more so than smokers or drug addicts), but I lack the hope these guys have.

Part of the reason? They’re already catching flack from our fucking Congressmen about the “tiny portions” they’re being served at the White House dinners. If these guys (who, I hate to say it, are actually role models to a lot of people) can’t suck it up and set an example, I just don’t know if this idea can sell.

It’s not just about the food either. It seems to be a generally accepted notion in the U.S. to sort of expect free lunches, if you will. The legends of people pulling themselves up by the bootstraps aside, we seem to expect to just be given things without working very hard or long at them. It could be my generational lack of patience with everything (blame Sesame Street!), our proliferation of easily-available fast food, or who knows what; cutting corners to get ahead just seems to be the new American dream. Sure, we want the chiseled bodies of our new leaders, but we don’t soooo much want to put in the hours at the gym or eat like they do.

Part of this also stems from our reluctance to tell people they’re not special in some way. From high school teachers no longer being able to correct grammar, to the SAT’s being easier to ace, we seem to be unable to tell our children that everything they do and are isn’t exceptionally perfect, lest we damage their self esteem. I understand this desire. Really. I constantly tell my daughter how wonderful she is, and I loathe the notion that one day she won’t feel that way. But my greatest hope is for her to one day truly accept herself, scars and all, and I know that me constantly denying she has any faults won’t help.

So, yeah, there are a lot of reasons I think Michelle might fail. But, then again, I had many more reasons I thought I’d never see a president elected who is smart, handsome, and in love with his family, so fuck do I know, right?

Motherhood: 1 Year In And Counting

So I’ve not been blogging the past few days, since I was busy celebrating my one-year-old’s first birthday. For ALMOST A WEEK??? you ask. It may sound excessive, but only to those without kids. Those with them, whether or not they agreed to the over-festivities marking the 1-year anniversary of their stint as sleep-deprived vomit sponges, will understand. But, it is for those without that I am chronicling the most important thing I’ve learned over the past year. And for my daughter to read one day, so I can make her feel king hell guilty about the saccharine nightmare into which she’s turned her mother. Anyhoodle (see???), here we go.

The old “Golden Rule” (Do unto others as you would have them do unto you) is ridiculous. Well, I’ve always thought that, since my opinion of myself and how I should be treated ain’t that high. As for a guideline on how to treat others, though, I sincerely do not believe you can do better than by treating everyone around you as if they have a baby attached to them. Not in a stroller, but in their arms.

As a Baby Björn addict, I am perpetually walking around with my daughter’s sweet face directly under mine, and it never ceases to amaze me the good it brings out of people. Cars stop for us to cross the street, seats on public transportation are never a problem, and brass musicians performing in enclosed spaces lower their volume at our approach. In general, the populous I have encountered is a totally different one than other people see. And, from my point of view, though, everyone waves to, chats with, offers to help, and visibly brightens their brethren. It’s, for lack of a better word, lovely. Really.

And it doesn’t just apply to others. I am different with people when I’m with her. I’m just different in general. My whole attitude becomes, not only friendlier, but much more chin-up than it otherwise would be. Even in my situation now, working for the worst bosses I’ve ever had by a long shot (which is saying a lot, considering I also worked for a drug addict who videotaped his female employees in the bathroom for his own in-house wanking material), and enveloped in financial, bureaucratic, and other such nightmares. Getting to realize that, at the end of the day, none of that is quite so fascinating as a lip balm container…well, it’s been remarkably enlightening, to say the least. Not to mention it’s relieving to not worry about your own petty shit quite so much.

Well, I’ll Be Shitbagged and Dragged To Fucktown…

It’s anti-cussing week, cunt faces! Oh, for fuck’s sake…

This kind of bullshit always reminds me of Spalding Gray’s take on cursing, and the one that I am teaching my own young-and-moldable mind:

“But Dad, ‘oh my’ is not a bad word, is it?”

“No Forrest, I’ve told you over and over that there are no bad words. A word only starts to take on a good or bad meaning when it’s used in context, and we’ll discuss that one later. Also, ‘oh’ and ‘my’ are two words, not one.”

“But my teacher said we could not say, ‘Oh my God.’”

“Forrest, you can say any word you want. You can say ‘God.’ You can say ‘my.’ You can say ‘oh.’ You can say ‘God my oh.’ Now let’s go over the lesson again. What might your teacher think is a real bad word? Let’s take a really good bad word. Let’s take ’shit.’ Well now, we don’t have the word ’shit’ yet, do we, so we’re going to have to make it up. Create it. Done. Now, I’m going to write the word ’shit’ in the air. It starts with the letter ’s.’ Now is ’s’ a bad letter? Does it smell? No. My first name begins with ’s.’ It’s kind of a nice snaky letter. Now we make the ‘h.’ Anything bad about that? No. Now we have ‘i’ and now ‘t.’ There it is Forrest, there’s the word, s-h-i-t, written in the air. Now please don’t mistake the word for the substance in the toilet. The substance in the toilet is the thing-in-itself. It smells and it has some offensive properties. Don’t confuse the word with the substance. The word is only a signifier. Now Forrest, the Bible had it somewhat wrong, or at least the Book of John did. The Book of John says, ‘In the beginning was the word.’ The opening of Genesis is more right on. It says, ‘In the beginning God created . . .’ Now, you can forget about God for the time being and just think of the act of creation. That’s all verb. That’s all action. So we have the act, the creation, and then we have the substance created. That’s what we call the thing in and for itself, and then we have the name. You see, only after it’s something does it get named. Now look, wait, I’ve got another idea. Let’s try writing the word ’shit’ with a stick here in the dirt. Will writing it in the dirt make it a dirty word? No, because we have to carve the dirt out with a stick in order to make the word. So it really is an absence of dirt, isn’t it?”

I couldn’t agree more. There is no such thing as an inherently bad word; words only have the power you give them. The ones that derive from hatred (slurs, for example) incite hatred, and are therefore inappropriate. Those that derive from scatological/sexual origins, though, are only evil in the eyes of the puritanical and judgmental.

In the interest of “equal time,” though, LA County Supervisors, I propose a week devoid of stupid words like “cussing.” That word makes my teeth grind.