Uh, oh

All those Egg McMuffins I used to grab and eat on the run are haunting me right now. According to an article on Netscape’s site, The Worst Breakfast You Can Eat:

Eat two McMuffins and two hash browns for breakfast and your arteries will remain inflamed until lunchtime, HealthDayNews reports of a new study from the State University of New York at Buffalo. Why worry about inflammation of the arteries? This is a direct pathway to atherosclerosis and heart disease.

The specific breakfast cited by the SUNY Buffalo researchers is a McDonald’s Egg McMuffin, a Sausage McMuffin, and two orders of hash browns. Total calories: 930. (It was supersized to reflect the typical amount of calories in a fast food meal.) Eat this and within an hour, it will trigger inflammation, says study co-author Dr. Paresh Dandona. What’s more that inflammation continues for three or four hours longer.

Most of us are well aware that high-fat, high-carbohydrate meals raise our cholesterol levels and send our blood sugar rates soaring. That puts us at greater risk for diabetes and cardiovascular disease. But now nutritionists are aware there is a third danger: inflammation of the blood vessels. The fats and carbohydrate sugars appear to release “free radical” molecules within the blood cells, which in turn trigger the inflammation, reports HealthDayNews.

Researchers are working on the effects of lower-calorie versions of these junk food junkies’ dream breakfasts. More information is here in the SUNY Buffalo news release, including this:

“People who experience repeated short-lived bouts of inflammation resulting from many such unhealthy meals can end up with blood vessels in a chronic state of inflammation, a primary factor in the development of atherosclerosis,” [Ahmad Aljada, Ph.D., first author on the study] said.“However, we’ve also shown in a study accepted, but not yet published, that a breakfast containing the same number of calories but derived mostly from fruit and fiber doesn’t promote the inflammatory effect.”

My fave Kashi granola bars are just looking and tasting better all the time!

HT to Introverted and Intuitive for the story.

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100 people, 100 square feet each

I’m fascinated by photographer Michael Wolf’s “100 x 100″ project, just posted online here.

It consists of 100 photographs, each of a resident of Hong Kong’s oldest public housing estate. Each resident has a room that is 100 square feet in size.

Once I started clicking my way through the collection, I couldn’t stop until I was done. Amazing.

HT to Dawn at Frugal for Life.

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Urban wildlife

Thanks to my cousin, here’s a snap of a fox lounging on a ragtop in an office building parking lot. He says that she lives in/near the building in Fort Collins, Colorado, and has pups which are rarely seen.

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I learn another new word

“Avulsion” – as in avulsion fracture of the 5th metatarsal. Mine’s on the right foot.

As explained here: “This occurs when the foot or ankle rolls in (an inversion injury). When this happens a tendon that attaches a muscle to the fifth metatarsal can pull off a piece of the bone.”

This happened on April 29 and so far it seems to be healing without complications. I’ve been wearing a black walker boot cast thing as in the picture. It’s much better than an old fashioned hard plaster cast. It is removed to sleep and bathe and change clothes. And it’s not very heavy to walk around in. Stairs are kind of scary with it, though.

Last year I learned “intra-articular” – as in intra-articular fracture of the ankle.

This learning by doing has got to stop.

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They Lied.

Hard work has killed lots of people.

Happy weekend!!

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Roots, branches, boys, men

Seven men in black

Two sons
Five grandsons

Suits
Shoeshines
Haircuts

Seven men in black
bore the casket

Stood facing us across it
for burial prayers

Left seven boutonnières
precise white flower line on top

Dignified goodbye
Rest in peace

Seven men in black

Two sons
Eagle Scouts to silver hair

Five grandsons
Rug rats to men
to husbands
to fathers

Your legacy to this world
adjourned to jeans boots
ham sandwiches
togetherness
the new crop of rug rats
romped with the dog

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The Refrigerator Saga

The appliance store finally replaced that refrigerator that was freezing everything, even the things on the fridge side that weren’t supposed to be frozen, after replacing FOUR different parts. I’m not that crazy about the replacement but it works.

And last night I learned on the local TV news that the repair guy is a convicted registered sex offender – no longer working for the company named in the story but for the service company affiliated with Appliance Factory Outlet stores. Not that his behavior was inappropriate at my house. He was courteous and seemed knowledgeable, and called the Whirlpool technical hotline in his attempts to fix the dang thing. His repair attempts were futile. Which may not be his fault, who knows?

Strange development, anyway.

I think this whole fridge deal was just snakebit from the start.

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A paycheck away

. . . from homelessness. To tell the truth I lived about that close to the edge for longer than I want to think about – and on the surface things were just fine.

OK, I never gambled away the mortgage payment, or even played games by using the mortgage payment money for something else and then had to scramble to find the money for it. I’ve always had a good credit rating.

But still. For the longest time I never had all that much put by for a rainy day. Stories like this one by Steve Lopez in the May 7 LA Times scare the hell out of me. (Photo from LA Times.)

Lee Sevilla is 71 years old, living in El Segundo, CA, with her dog Sandy. She has a part-time job, draws a little Social Security, and generates a little income from custom print-making.

And she lives in her Dodge Neon because she can’t afford an apartment.

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Good Housekeeping Tip of the Day

Always keep several get well cards on the mantel so when people drop in unexpectedly they will think you’ve been sick and unable to clean house.

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My favorite song of all time

Precious Lord, as performed by the Rev. Al Green on this CD.

The song was written by Thomas A. Dorsey (1899-1993) in 1932, following the death in childbirth of his wife, Nettie. He went on – for more than 60 years – to pursue an illustrious calling in the field of gospel music. On this CD is a short recording of him talking about writing “Precious Lord, Take My Hand,” as it is formally titled.

I love the arrangement on the Rev. Al Green’s CD. Just the right up-tempo; it’s not a dirge, it’s about going on with things. Sure, the lyrics are about the Lord leading us “home,” and you can think oh that’s about dying, which I suppose it is. But I see it as more than that.  Yep, we’re all going to die someday; but what paths are we going to follow up to that particular “going home” moment?

Al’s singing here to his Lord, asking for a hand to lead him on. Feeling happy that his guide is there, feeling good about where he will be led. Including through the next years of life.

I don’t always have a faith like that.

I do have a faith. A faith that has trouble sitting still and saying “yessir” to everything an organized religion says, an awkward sprawling undisciplined sort of faith.

“Spirituality” is such a pretentious word. Its inherent nobility is tarnished for me because it’s bandied about by so many Cosmic Foo-Foo artists and tedious agnostics. I don’t have a Spirituality, something that sounds like it would be a late-model hybrid-powered thing with XM radio, leather seats and sunroof.

I have just a modest awkward flawed middle-class mid-American female faith. Because, among other things, I know for a fact that a power greater than myself saved my unworthy little life back in March 1987, and facts are facts.

Maybe everybody’s got to believe in something, and right now I believe I’ll have another cup of coffee. (Shades of W. C. Fields!)

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May 1 – Law Day, too

Over at f/k/a . . . David G. has written a long and multi-faceted post, ending of course with some poetry, about May 1 which is, among other things, honored in the USA as Law Day. Go read the whole thing – well worth your time – but in the meantime I must share this piece of it:

This past year, we have seen a President acting as if he is unchecked by the Constitution when it comes to fighting wars and terrorism — and watched a Supreme Court that might be far too willing to agree with him. We’ve also seen members of Congress threaten to slash judiciary budgets and remove particular pieces of the Supreme Court’s jurisdiction (e.g., over flag-burning or Commandment-placement). And, of course, we’ve seen a Supreme Court-nomination process that was less than edifying in its attempts to control a candidate’s conduct once on the bench. We should remember, therefore, that our Separation and Balance of Powers do not work automatically. They need vigilance by the public — perhaps, especially by the legal profession.

Oh, yes. I fell a little bit in love with the United States Constitution – separation of powers, Bill of Rights, and all – back in 8th grade history class when we literally read every word of it aloud, which took several days of class time. I don’t remember the discussions, but I do remember the document itself. That’s when I learned that my own family’s right to attend church of a denomination that was disliked by the majority fundamentalist churches there in the Bible Belt, was protected by the First Amendment.

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