Babbling Blueberry

I thought this was a very interesting and telling figure:

That figure says a lot all by itself, but if you’re interested in reading more, here’s the blog post that talks more about this figure and the latest farm bill.

From Freakonomics: Some guy inherited $70 million and asked some ex-street hustlers/gang members how they think he should donate it. They had very wise and well-spoken words that I should not even try to summarize because I couldn’t do it justice. But I will insert a brief quote, from Shine (but the other quotes are great too!):

“I can’t tell you how many n– -s do stupid shit because they couldn’t get no food. Lot of people rob and steal to put some food in their belly. Make sure people got food. A man stops feeling angry against the world when his belly is full. That’s what I’d tell the brother to do with his money. And, make sure the older folks got food, not just the kids.”

But at the same time, the rate of obesity in the U.S. is skyrocketing! I went to a talk yesterday Steve Schroeder at UCSF. He used to be the President and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and his talk was about how foundations can affect change in the U.S. One of the most striking things that I realized from this talk was how bogged down policy makers are because of corporations and lobbyists and that whole mess. So foundations are often better able to tackle issues that the government is afraid to take on. I’ve been thinking about getting into science and/or education policy, but maybe working with a foundation is the best way to go. I don’t know that the grip that corporations and their lobbyists have will be loosening up anytime soon.

Back to obesity. Another striking thing was a time-lapse series of maps showing obesity rates in the U.S. over time… I actually had seen this speaker give a talk previously and I had seen these same slides before and I remembered that it was striking. But even remembering that, I still couldn’t help but exclaim at how fast obesity is increasing. It’s really an epidemic. And man, things are bad in Mississippi… the speaker said that when he goes to Alabama and Georgia, they always say, “Thank goodness for Mississippi!”

So why are people hungry and getting more obese all at the same time? I think it (at least partially and probably significantly) comes back to the government and Big Agriculture and how the government subsidizes the production of corn that’s going into the production of nutrient-poor foods. And the subsidies are going into the pockets of big corporations rather than the pockets of farmers. How about this suggestion for how to use the $70 million… subsidize fruit and vegetable farmers to help them grow and fresh and nutritious food. By subsidize, I mean bypass the government completely. Then the struggling farmers who are growing actual food can be helped, people will have more affordable nutrient-rich foods, and the obesity epidemic will be slowed.

Or even better, what if we could somehow use the money to stop corporations and their lobbyists from having such an enormous influence on our country’s policies? That would be great and that would solve a lot of other problems too… health, insurance, climate change. Unfortunately, it seems like $70 million is a small drop given how much money is coming from the corporations.

The phrase is “reduce, reuse, recycle.” But in what I see written about being green, people very often forget the reduce part. One exception is the folks at Grist. Reusing and recycling is all good, but don’t forget the reducing!

Have a Happy Reduced Earth Day!

Speaking of reduced, the strength in my hands is greatly reduced. I went climbing for the first time in 5 years. I won a free quarter pass for the climbing wall at UCSF! You can read about it yourself in the Synapse… but look for the photo of May Chu in which you will find a photo of me and my prize, not a photo of May Chu. So after climbing, I’ve had trouble picking things up, I could barely eat my noodle dinner with chopsticks, but fortunately, we didn’t lose our volleyball game with my reduced grip! We won! Thunder, thunder, Thunderforce, Hooooooo! My team is the most awesome team in the whole world!

On an unrelated note, David Cook on American Idol should have sung “Close Every Door” from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. It’s my favorite song from Andrew Lloyd Weber. That would have been amazing and perfect for him and it would have really placed him high above the rest of the contestants. Actually, maybe closing every door is reducing as well. And reducing the other contestants to be non-competitive is also reducing.

Let’s all reduce!

But don’t reduce how much you donate to good causes. Like Best Buddies! Shameless plug here… My sister is riding a bike for a really long time to raise money. If you want to help her out, you can go here.

Since it seems like it’s so easy to reduce, maybe the phrase should be “reduce, reuse, recycle, then reduce some more.”

My post might need to be reduced… I’ll make the next post shorter.

I recommend reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, but I don’t recommend reading it when you’re on a trip to Cleveland.

Before reading the book, when confronted with unfresh, unlocal, not-in-season food, I ate it with mostly no issues. It’s not like I had never had yummy fresh, local, and in-season produce before or that I didn’t know intellectually that buying local foods was better. I just didn’t think too much about it and accepted that there were times for convenience and money when I had to eat the bland and mushy tomatoes and the soggy and flavorless lettuce and all the other stuff from our inefficient world food market. Well, I’m inspired by the book. I don’t want to eat yucky food anymore when the yummy food is not only yummier, but also so much better for my health, the health of farming communities, and the planet’s health. The only problem is that I came to this decision in Cleveland and in various airports where the options weren’t great. As I was reading Barbara Kingsolver’s stories about all the delicious food she was eating, I had to stare at my bland airport and Cleveland* food. I can’t believe they’re allowed to call those things that I ate salads! I think next time, I will plan ahead and bring my own fruit and veggies to snack on.

*I’m sure there are better options in Cleveland. But I was only there for less than 48 hours and I didn’t know where to look. But I did see my first McCain bumper sticker ever!

Here’s one thing that I had never thought to do before and that I was inspired to do: buy extra fresh fruits and veggies in the seasons when there are lots of options and save them for the winter months. I can stock my freezer with sauces and pestos and containers of fruits and veggies that I’ve chopped and maybe blanched and perhaps even measured out for specific recipes. Maybe I’ll try canning or making jam one day. That allows you to eat local even in the winter months. As Barbara Kingsolver said, “it doesn’t go anywhere while it’s sitting in the freezer, so the food is still local.” Or something similar to that but worded in a wittier way. The only issue is freezer space and the energy to power the freezer. But I’m powering the freezer anyway (I don’t turn the freezer off in the winter months). And I can just buy fewer processed and unlocal and packaged foods and replace those with the yummy stuff that I’ve prepared.

I’m also going to try making fresh mozzarella. It is only supposed to take 30 minutes and it involves lots of playing with gooey and stretchy substances. I love mushing and stretching stuff around, especially if it results in something fresh and yummy to eat.

There’s a website that goes with the book… they have lots of recipes and other stuff.

An article about the consequences of air conditioning on global warming.  These are ideas that I’ve been thinking for a while, but I haven’t had the data or the writing abilities to get it down.  Let’s turn down or turn of the AC.  And let’s not live in such large houses!  And Congress:  we need to legislate things to keep this planet liveable because people will not behave that way on their own.

Watch this grossness.

Dig 1 hole in Alaskan beach.
Pour water in hole.
Now you’ve got yourself some oil.

Wow, that’s terrible.  And we let that happen.

From Grist:  “Americans are said to throw away enough aluminum in three months to rebuild our entire commercial air fleet.”

“The recycling process uses about 5 percent of the energy of the original processing.”  So why are we buying new aluminum foil and not recycling used aluminum foil?

Great site: www.grist.org

It’s very informative about environmental issues and solutions in an unobnoxious way.