1.)Not everybody in the United States can afford health care and at that do not meet the certain requirements to recieve it. There have been many causes where people do not recieve medical assistant because of their well being and some end of dying because of the health care rules and obligations which in the end benefits them and only them. The health companies recieve loads and loads of money from rejecting people which saves the money and they take it. Even people who have health care run into technical difficulties. Not everything is guartaneed. In Canada they recieve a whole lot of medical attention no matter what unlike the U.S. and at cheap rates. No matter what your condition is you will be seen and helped. Just like Canada, In Europe no matter who you are, what color you are are you will be treated if you sick and on top of that it is free. The doctors are at your door to help with anything with any circumstances you are in.
2.) -Even the poorest people in Britain are healthier than the wealthest people in America.
-For every Congressmen there are four health care members
Both of these evidences were important towards Michael Moore's thesis because in American Society lots of the congressmen and health members are teaming up to make themselves wealthier while there are people in need of health issues and it causing them to become more sick and die. Britain, people are getting more help than most americans and they are healthier. Michael Moore's is saying that as americans we don't the treatment we are needed and we are spending lots and lots of money on unneccesary things.
C&D (Not Done)
3.) While watching the movie, i didn't know that you had to meet different requirements in order to qualify to get health insurance. I thought that was unfair to a lot of people and limited very few and at that even if you have health care you might recieve everything you need. I've had health care all my life and got help everytime i've been sick and needed assistant but im still woundering all they really telling and giving me everything i need in order to saty healthy. For example, there were these people who had these sicknesses and their health care said it was just "experimental" not much of a big deal and one lady actully died. I was just in shock. The story of the daughter who wasn't going to get the sugery to get her ear implant reminded me of the story of the little boy who died from eating the beef because both parents were defending their children. In the end the father was able to get his daughter's help by exposing the health company. It's funny how quickly people change their mind when people will find out the true. I never really thought health care industry was that bad until seeing that video especially comparing America to Cananda and Europe. It makes me want to move to Europe and recieve health care there because i know i would be guarauntee help when i am ill.
Monday, December 20, 2010
HW#24 - Illness & Dying Book, Part 3
Jamaica Kincaid returns to Antigua to find out her brother is dying of AIDS. While there she is dealing with her mother who she has hatred towards her all her life. Jamaica gets connections into getting her brother medicine in order for him to get live longer. Her brother takes the medication and starts to feel better and does all his old things that he used to do. While commuting back and forth to her home in Chicago and her carribbean home Antigua, Jamaica reflects back on her past life of when she was a child to when her brother came to be. She talks about how her mother dislike the memory she had and the books she read to her brother committing crimes, having unprotected sex, and drugs.
When Jamaica returns home to go to her brother's funeral she doesn't feel any kind of love for him but just sympathy as if he was somebody else. She talks about the death of a previous young boy who died and how his funeral was much different from her brother's and her relationship with her brother's father. She saw her brother's body and thought he looked nothing like himself but just a figure. Later when she returns back to Chicago getting her book together, she finds out from a woman whom she met in an AIDS group that her brother was gay and he was living a secret life to what other people thought about him.
1.)I felt i hated my mother, and even worse, i felt she hated me, too; my brother Devon, the one dying just then at that moment, was one year old and i did not wish him dead; i only wished that he had never been born. (Pg.141)
The author i think felt like her brother messed up her whole life because of his existant. He was the reason for all the trouble that she had been having and will continue to have with her family especially her mother.
2.)My friend Bud said to me her found it strange the way people in Antigua regard illness, that when a person is ill no one mentions it, no one pays a visit; but if the person should die, there is a big outpouring of people at the funeral. (Pg.146)
When i read this i thought the same thing why is it that when the person is dying noboyd cares and ingores the person knowing they are going to die but when they pass away already thousands of people quickly go to see the dead person as if they sort of cared about them.
3.)And my brother died, for he kept dying; each time i remebered that he had died it was as if he had just at that moment died, and the whole experience of it would begin again; my brother had died and i didn't love him; or, at any rate, i didn't love him in the way that i had come to understand love. (Pg.148)
She never loved her brother. I think she has confused feelings about her brother and she doesn't know if she should love for him or just feel sympathetic. I find that weird because you should love your siblings family in general.You should always have their back.
I think that if your family is dying or really sick you should always be supportive of them no matter the circumstances that they are in and to put the issues you have with others to the side. I don't think that she should blame her brother for the things that happened in her life because everything happens for a reason and i don' think it's cause her brother was born. Its just something that happen. Overall in the book if you had AIDS you were immediately cut out of everyone's life until you are physically died which is pretty harsh in my opinion. I think the book was pretty good.
When Jamaica returns home to go to her brother's funeral she doesn't feel any kind of love for him but just sympathy as if he was somebody else. She talks about the death of a previous young boy who died and how his funeral was much different from her brother's and her relationship with her brother's father. She saw her brother's body and thought he looked nothing like himself but just a figure. Later when she returns back to Chicago getting her book together, she finds out from a woman whom she met in an AIDS group that her brother was gay and he was living a secret life to what other people thought about him.
1.)I felt i hated my mother, and even worse, i felt she hated me, too; my brother Devon, the one dying just then at that moment, was one year old and i did not wish him dead; i only wished that he had never been born. (Pg.141)
The author i think felt like her brother messed up her whole life because of his existant. He was the reason for all the trouble that she had been having and will continue to have with her family especially her mother.
2.)My friend Bud said to me her found it strange the way people in Antigua regard illness, that when a person is ill no one mentions it, no one pays a visit; but if the person should die, there is a big outpouring of people at the funeral. (Pg.146)
When i read this i thought the same thing why is it that when the person is dying noboyd cares and ingores the person knowing they are going to die but when they pass away already thousands of people quickly go to see the dead person as if they sort of cared about them.
3.)And my brother died, for he kept dying; each time i remebered that he had died it was as if he had just at that moment died, and the whole experience of it would begin again; my brother had died and i didn't love him; or, at any rate, i didn't love him in the way that i had come to understand love. (Pg.148)
She never loved her brother. I think she has confused feelings about her brother and she doesn't know if she should love for him or just feel sympathetic. I find that weird because you should love your siblings family in general.You should always have their back.
I think that if your family is dying or really sick you should always be supportive of them no matter the circumstances that they are in and to put the issues you have with others to the side. I don't think that she should blame her brother for the things that happened in her life because everything happens for a reason and i don' think it's cause her brother was born. Its just something that happen. Overall in the book if you had AIDS you were immediately cut out of everyone's life until you are physically died which is pretty harsh in my opinion. I think the book was pretty good.
Sunday, December 19, 2010
HW#23 - Illness & Dying Book, Part 2
My Brother by Jamaica Kincaid
Published in 1997 by Farrar,Straus, and Giroux
I found out my brother died. I didn't know how to react to his death honestly. my husband told me my brother died, i went along with things as if it didn't happen. When my brother was alive he did unthinkable things. He was trouble and did drugs. We were two different people. He liked to read about stories in past history, all the different events and stories but his life was not a story but real life disease AIDS.
1.) When i saw him, though, lying in bed,two months before i saw him at the undertaker's, he was in his mother's house. She is my mother, too, but i wasn't taking to her then, and when i am not talking to her, she is someone else's mother, not mine. (pg.89)
It seems like Jamaica always had this amonisty towards her mother because her mother hated the fact she remebered things that she wanted people forget. When her mother and her aren't talking she specifically doesn't claim her just as her other siblings do to.
2.)I missed the place i now live in, i missed snow, i missed my own house that was suttounded by snow, i missed my children, who were asleep or just just waking around the about in the house surrounded by snow, i missed my husband, the father of my children and they were all surrounded by snow. (pg.97)
No matter by the fact how sick her brother was she always put her family first before her mom and brother. I feel like her brother having AIDS or any other disease would not make Jamaica's feelings change towards him because she left that old life and started a new one with her kids and husband.
3.) I did not love my brother, i did not like my brother, i was only sorry that he had died, i was comforted to hear other people say that they were sorry he had died. (pg.106)
Throughout the brother's past from what Jamaica is saying he did alot of messed up things and never listened to anybody which is why he got AIDS. Maybe she feels she doesn't love him because he didn't appreciate her for the things she did for him. Even after feeling better he continued to do have sex with women and other things in which he shouldn't.
I think the brother in this book is just very selfish in my opinion by the fact that he has this disease that killing and does inapproriate things with it. I feel like most of the people in the book are very numb to the situation of people getting sick and would just rather not deal with it especially in that country. Previously as in the first 1/3 of the book the actions of the people are just forgetting the dying people and moving on with your life and like i said i think that its weird that people do that. All my life you are told to be very sympathetic and caring and always visit them but in the book some people are not like that at all. All his friends and people where he lived gave him the cold shoulder.
Published in 1997 by Farrar,Straus, and Giroux
I found out my brother died. I didn't know how to react to his death honestly. my husband told me my brother died, i went along with things as if it didn't happen. When my brother was alive he did unthinkable things. He was trouble and did drugs. We were two different people. He liked to read about stories in past history, all the different events and stories but his life was not a story but real life disease AIDS.
1.) When i saw him, though, lying in bed,two months before i saw him at the undertaker's, he was in his mother's house. She is my mother, too, but i wasn't taking to her then, and when i am not talking to her, she is someone else's mother, not mine. (pg.89)
It seems like Jamaica always had this amonisty towards her mother because her mother hated the fact she remebered things that she wanted people forget. When her mother and her aren't talking she specifically doesn't claim her just as her other siblings do to.
2.)I missed the place i now live in, i missed snow, i missed my own house that was suttounded by snow, i missed my children, who were asleep or just just waking around the about in the house surrounded by snow, i missed my husband, the father of my children and they were all surrounded by snow. (pg.97)
No matter by the fact how sick her brother was she always put her family first before her mom and brother. I feel like her brother having AIDS or any other disease would not make Jamaica's feelings change towards him because she left that old life and started a new one with her kids and husband.
3.) I did not love my brother, i did not like my brother, i was only sorry that he had died, i was comforted to hear other people say that they were sorry he had died. (pg.106)
Throughout the brother's past from what Jamaica is saying he did alot of messed up things and never listened to anybody which is why he got AIDS. Maybe she feels she doesn't love him because he didn't appreciate her for the things she did for him. Even after feeling better he continued to do have sex with women and other things in which he shouldn't.
I think the brother in this book is just very selfish in my opinion by the fact that he has this disease that killing and does inapproriate things with it. I feel like most of the people in the book are very numb to the situation of people getting sick and would just rather not deal with it especially in that country. Previously as in the first 1/3 of the book the actions of the people are just forgetting the dying people and moving on with your life and like i said i think that its weird that people do that. All my life you are told to be very sympathetic and caring and always visit them but in the book some people are not like that at all. All his friends and people where he lived gave him the cold shoulder.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
HW#22 - Illness & Dying Book Part 1
Title:My Brother
Author:Jamaica Kincaid
Published in 1997 by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux
I got a phone call saying that my brother is sick and dying of HIV/AIDS. I return home Antigua to go visit him. He thought i would not come to see him but i did after all. I found out that he got the disease from having unprotected sex from multiple different women. I always told him to be careful but he always seemed to brush it off. Everyday my mother seemed to be taking care of his every need in her own way. i don't think i loved my brother, i don't know what it is was love or not. I made a phone call to get my brother medicine called AZT. My brother soon started to take the medicine and began feeling better. He gained weight and was able to do normal things. It was impossible for him to do start a family and do things he wanted to do because he had the virus but should i kill his dreams? I said my goodbyes to my brother and my mother finally returning to my onw family.
"My mother loves her children, i want to say, in her way! And that is very true, she loves us in her way. It is her way. It never has occurred to her that her way of loving us might not be the best thing for us. It has never occurred to her that her way of loving us might have served her better than it served us."(Pg. 16)
I felt like i understood where Jamaica Kincaid was coming from about her mother having a way of loving their children. I feel like some mothers feel as if the way they love their children is the best solution possible but maybe it isn't at all and i think that's why she had some many issues with her mother because of that.
"But when he lay in the hospital, none of his friends came into his room and they would say something to him. They never came in. After they had seen him they left and they never returned again." (Pg.42)
When i think of somebody being sick or dying, we greet those people and try to cheer them up and make them better no matter what disease or sickness they have. In Antigua if you contracted AIDS you are automatically abandoned and nobody pays attention to you. I find that to just be rude and disrespectful to the person why do they have to be mistreated even though they might possibly die wouldn't it be good for the person to have that special comfort?
"I missed him sometimes when i took my children to the school bus, sometimes when the snow fell; i talked about him, his life, to my husband, i talked about him to people i knew well and to people i did not know very well. But i did not think i loved him; then, when i was no longer in his presence, i did not think i loved him."(Pg.50)
It wierd how she only "loves" her brother when she sees him but other times she doesn't know exaclty if it's love or not. I don't understand that maybe that she doesn't see her brother often that's why she doesn't love him or is because of the whole relationship with her mother. WIth my sister i love her dearly and would kill for her. I feel like ever silbing should be there for each other no matter what and should love each other, that's your blood.
Reading so far, it's made me think of the other side of illness and dying such as people not caring about you and moving on with their lives. Not everybody sees this as a chance to do everything in their power to spend that special time with someone but to just continue on with their life and not have any sympathy. Jamaica Kincaid seems to do everything in her power though to make her brother better or slow donw his illness and it's something i would do for my family as well. It didn't matter how long she didn't see her brother or how much time passed she did what she needed to do to improve his life and so did his mother even if both women didn't see eye to eye for things.
Author:Jamaica Kincaid
Published in 1997 by Farrar, Straus, and Giroux
I got a phone call saying that my brother is sick and dying of HIV/AIDS. I return home Antigua to go visit him. He thought i would not come to see him but i did after all. I found out that he got the disease from having unprotected sex from multiple different women. I always told him to be careful but he always seemed to brush it off. Everyday my mother seemed to be taking care of his every need in her own way. i don't think i loved my brother, i don't know what it is was love or not. I made a phone call to get my brother medicine called AZT. My brother soon started to take the medicine and began feeling better. He gained weight and was able to do normal things. It was impossible for him to do start a family and do things he wanted to do because he had the virus but should i kill his dreams? I said my goodbyes to my brother and my mother finally returning to my onw family.
"My mother loves her children, i want to say, in her way! And that is very true, she loves us in her way. It is her way. It never has occurred to her that her way of loving us might not be the best thing for us. It has never occurred to her that her way of loving us might have served her better than it served us."(Pg. 16)
I felt like i understood where Jamaica Kincaid was coming from about her mother having a way of loving their children. I feel like some mothers feel as if the way they love their children is the best solution possible but maybe it isn't at all and i think that's why she had some many issues with her mother because of that.
"But when he lay in the hospital, none of his friends came into his room and they would say something to him. They never came in. After they had seen him they left and they never returned again." (Pg.42)
When i think of somebody being sick or dying, we greet those people and try to cheer them up and make them better no matter what disease or sickness they have. In Antigua if you contracted AIDS you are automatically abandoned and nobody pays attention to you. I find that to just be rude and disrespectful to the person why do they have to be mistreated even though they might possibly die wouldn't it be good for the person to have that special comfort?
"I missed him sometimes when i took my children to the school bus, sometimes when the snow fell; i talked about him, his life, to my husband, i talked about him to people i knew well and to people i did not know very well. But i did not think i loved him; then, when i was no longer in his presence, i did not think i loved him."(Pg.50)
It wierd how she only "loves" her brother when she sees him but other times she doesn't know exaclty if it's love or not. I don't understand that maybe that she doesn't see her brother often that's why she doesn't love him or is because of the whole relationship with her mother. WIth my sister i love her dearly and would kill for her. I feel like ever silbing should be there for each other no matter what and should love each other, that's your blood.
Reading so far, it's made me think of the other side of illness and dying such as people not caring about you and moving on with their lives. Not everybody sees this as a chance to do everything in their power to spend that special time with someone but to just continue on with their life and not have any sympathy. Jamaica Kincaid seems to do everything in her power though to make her brother better or slow donw his illness and it's something i would do for my family as well. It didn't matter how long she didn't see her brother or how much time passed she did what she needed to do to improve his life and so did his mother even if both women didn't see eye to eye for things.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Hw#21b-Comments
Raven
Raven i thought your blog was very insightful. I liked how you were in depth about all 8 things that you said about what Beth said. Two things that stood out to me was how you thought maybe that old feelings would start up when she talked about her husband but she didn't which is also what i thought about cause usually when you talk about a past family member mostly likely we would cry but she didn't at all. Another part was when you said "life is too short to hold onto grudges and dislike we may have for other people. I move past the mistakes I’ve made and I allow those mistakes to shape me", i agree with, i think that if we do hold those grudges and don't move on that can haunt us and we won't grow up as a person. Overall your post was aligned with the assignment and i like how yu referred back to your own life.
Michelle
I really enjoyed your post. The second paragraph talking about basically our time management and how us teens nowadays get distracted by it with digital things because its true. Each insight that you talked about comparing to Beth's comments were very in depth and you sumed up everything very well. One of the things i took away from your post was "at times in my life I enjoy letting myself be swallowed by my own thoughts and visions and not being able to do this terrifies me" it felt like something i would think about myself because it happens to me often as well.
This is what i wrote on Raven's blog:
Raven i thought your blog was very insightful. I liked how you were in depth about all 8 things that you said about what Beth said. Two things that stood out to me was how you thought maybe that old feelings would start up when she talked about her husband but she didn't which is also what i thought about cause usually when you talk about a past family member mostly likely we would cry but she didn't at all. Another part was when you said "life is too short to hold onto grudges and dislike we may have for other people. I move past the mistakes I’ve made and I allow those mistakes to shape me", i agree with, i think that if we do hold those grudges and don't move on that can haunt us and we won't grow up as a person. Overall your post was aligned with the assignment and i like how yu referred back to your own life.
This is what i wrote on Michelle's blog:
I really enjoyed your post. The second paragraph talking about basically our time management and how us teens nowadays get distracted by it with digital things because its true. Each insight that you talked about comparing to Beth's comments were very in depth and you sumed up everything very well. One of the things i took away from your post was "at times in my life I enjoy letting myself be swallowed by my own thoughts and visions and not being able to do this terrifies me" it felt like something i would think about myself because it happens to me often as well.
Raven i thought your blog was very insightful. I liked how you were in depth about all 8 things that you said about what Beth said. Two things that stood out to me was how you thought maybe that old feelings would start up when she talked about her husband but she didn't which is also what i thought about cause usually when you talk about a past family member mostly likely we would cry but she didn't at all. Another part was when you said "life is too short to hold onto grudges and dislike we may have for other people. I move past the mistakes I’ve made and I allow those mistakes to shape me", i agree with, i think that if we do hold those grudges and don't move on that can haunt us and we won't grow up as a person. Overall your post was aligned with the assignment and i like how yu referred back to your own life.
Michelle
I really enjoyed your post. The second paragraph talking about basically our time management and how us teens nowadays get distracted by it with digital things because its true. Each insight that you talked about comparing to Beth's comments were very in depth and you sumed up everything very well. One of the things i took away from your post was "at times in my life I enjoy letting myself be swallowed by my own thoughts and visions and not being able to do this terrifies me" it felt like something i would think about myself because it happens to me often as well.
This is what i wrote on Raven's blog:
Raven i thought your blog was very insightful. I liked how you were in depth about all 8 things that you said about what Beth said. Two things that stood out to me was how you thought maybe that old feelings would start up when she talked about her husband but she didn't which is also what i thought about cause usually when you talk about a past family member mostly likely we would cry but she didn't at all. Another part was when you said "life is too short to hold onto grudges and dislike we may have for other people. I move past the mistakes I’ve made and I allow those mistakes to shape me", i agree with, i think that if we do hold those grudges and don't move on that can haunt us and we won't grow up as a person. Overall your post was aligned with the assignment and i like how yu referred back to your own life.
This is what i wrote on Michelle's blog:
I really enjoyed your post. The second paragraph talking about basically our time management and how us teens nowadays get distracted by it with digital things because its true. Each insight that you talked about comparing to Beth's comments were very in depth and you sumed up everything very well. One of the things i took away from your post was "at times in my life I enjoy letting myself be swallowed by my own thoughts and visions and not being able to do this terrifies me" it felt like something i would think about myself because it happens to me often as well.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Hw#21-Expert#1
1.)He was the care giver of the house
2.)Her husband was creative and talented
3.)Very strong personality even with the illiness*
4.)Never mentioned the word death or dying*
5.)Even if he was sick he still did his artwork
6.)His death wasn't just a straight line
7.)Time is everything
She mentioned that he had a very strong personality when it came to the illness. He was the kind of person who just brush things off and thought that it woold go away or that he didn't need medicine. It reminded me of when my dad appendix erupted. Previous weeks later he kept saying that he had pain and my mom told him to go to the doctor but he said that it wasn't that bad and that he was ok. When he finally did go to the hospital because the pain was overbearing, we found out that if he didn't come any sooner he probably could have died. I agreed with her that most of time men do think nothing can affect them or brush things off but it's not good. I think some men do it because they believe they are masculine or prove something to other people that they can't take pain.
She talked about how through the whole experience they never said the word death or dying which i thought was very vulnerable and it kind of made me tear a little bit because when a very close person of yours is very sick and on the verge of dying you don't want to let them go or even think the worse. We just want to thik happy thoughts. Three years ago when my grandfather passed away it was so out of the blue. He was fine the whole entire day till the night time and he was rushed to the hospital. Day by day his body was shutting down but my mother and i would keep the thought that it wasn't minor and he would get better. It wasn't till the last couple days when it was going to be over that reality was settling in and we were going to lose him. Sometimes just thinking postive thoughts even though you know what's going to happen helps but in my eyes i feel like i would be lying to muyself if i said i did.
After hearing her talk it made me think a lot about death. With your own experiences it doesn't really affect you until you hear the point of view of someone else. The fact that she was there from the beginning to his last breathe was just like "wow". She said she met with a buddhist and i thought it was interesting because typically you don't think of that. She said he would do certain things like "pushing his hands away" and that actually happened. I was kind of surprised. Also that he always put his hand in a bowl of water maybe resembling being in the womb or fish which was insightful and he had a painting actually based on that which was pretty cool.
2.)Her husband was creative and talented
3.)Very strong personality even with the illiness*
4.)Never mentioned the word death or dying*
5.)Even if he was sick he still did his artwork
6.)His death wasn't just a straight line
7.)Time is everything
She mentioned that he had a very strong personality when it came to the illness. He was the kind of person who just brush things off and thought that it woold go away or that he didn't need medicine. It reminded me of when my dad appendix erupted. Previous weeks later he kept saying that he had pain and my mom told him to go to the doctor but he said that it wasn't that bad and that he was ok. When he finally did go to the hospital because the pain was overbearing, we found out that if he didn't come any sooner he probably could have died. I agreed with her that most of time men do think nothing can affect them or brush things off but it's not good. I think some men do it because they believe they are masculine or prove something to other people that they can't take pain.
She talked about how through the whole experience they never said the word death or dying which i thought was very vulnerable and it kind of made me tear a little bit because when a very close person of yours is very sick and on the verge of dying you don't want to let them go or even think the worse. We just want to thik happy thoughts. Three years ago when my grandfather passed away it was so out of the blue. He was fine the whole entire day till the night time and he was rushed to the hospital. Day by day his body was shutting down but my mother and i would keep the thought that it wasn't minor and he would get better. It wasn't till the last couple days when it was going to be over that reality was settling in and we were going to lose him. Sometimes just thinking postive thoughts even though you know what's going to happen helps but in my eyes i feel like i would be lying to muyself if i said i did.
After hearing her talk it made me think a lot about death. With your own experiences it doesn't really affect you until you hear the point of view of someone else. The fact that she was there from the beginning to his last breathe was just like "wow". She said she met with a buddhist and i thought it was interesting because typically you don't think of that. She said he would do certain things like "pushing his hands away" and that actually happened. I was kind of surprised. Also that he always put his hand in a bowl of water maybe resembling being in the womb or fish which was insightful and he had a painting actually based on that which was pretty cool.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
HW#19-Family Perspectives on Illness & Dying
When i spoke to my mom she was talking about how it is important for us to live a healthy lifestyle so we can live good lives. She talked about how she saw her father die from a heart attack, i knew talking about that she was knd of dwelling on the past and kid of sad talking about it. Going back to the anti-body discussion. When my grandfather was still alive he didn't really watch what he ate because my grandmother always cooked for him since he was blind therefore he didn't pay much attention to his body which might of led to his death. He also had diabetes so maybe that was another thing that added to it.
She also said how her mom has caridiovulsar disease and that it worries her that so many people in our family don't take the right steps to live as possible as we can. Similar to my grandfather my grandmother was the same way with her food choices it wasn't till after surgery that she started to care more about her body and she should treat it in order to stay in a good stable condition. It always after the fact that everybody wants to be healthy and what-not because their lives are on the line which is kind of sad.
She was saying that we need to eat and live healthy as best as we can. She believes death is a part of life and we must all die but its up to us to give us all the time to live as we want to as long as we take the right precautions. I agree that as long as we approach life in a positive matter and the do the right things then your life will be good and you won't have to worry about the illness and dying unless it happens to be cancer or some strange disease you couldn't prevent.
I asked my mom how does she feel about antibotics and drugs in order to help people with their illness and prevention from things. She told me that if it has to do with prolonging their life then she is all for it somehow the topic came about the governemtn and she saif The government is going to control the drugs just like they control everything else which i find to be true. Everything revolves around the government.
She also said how her mom has caridiovulsar disease and that it worries her that so many people in our family don't take the right steps to live as possible as we can. Similar to my grandfather my grandmother was the same way with her food choices it wasn't till after surgery that she started to care more about her body and she should treat it in order to stay in a good stable condition. It always after the fact that everybody wants to be healthy and what-not because their lives are on the line which is kind of sad.
She was saying that we need to eat and live healthy as best as we can. She believes death is a part of life and we must all die but its up to us to give us all the time to live as we want to as long as we take the right precautions. I agree that as long as we approach life in a positive matter and the do the right things then your life will be good and you won't have to worry about the illness and dying unless it happens to be cancer or some strange disease you couldn't prevent.
I asked my mom how does she feel about antibotics and drugs in order to help people with their illness and prevention from things. She told me that if it has to do with prolonging their life then she is all for it somehow the topic came about the governemtn and she saif The government is going to control the drugs just like they control everything else which i find to be true. Everything revolves around the government.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Hw#18-Health & Illness & Feasting
While we were enjoying our meal, i noticed everybody's plates had piles of food and that it didn't matter because it was "thanksgiving" therefore it was okay. Most of us didn't count what was in our food or what it contained and if we were eating too much or too little that can possibly make us sick. We don't pay attention to our bodies unless we have to so everybody just kep stuffing their face with a whole lot of turkey. It was towards the end when everybody was getting really full and decided to stop eating, if it was up to them they would probably continue to eat. I know for myself my plate had so much food and by the time i was done i had to unbutton my pants.
One of my mom's family friend that came over i noticed that he was kind of fat and he had two plates of rice. I thought to myself should he really be eating a second one with the weight that he has? Also i noticed that he wanted to get more food but seemed a little bit embarassed because of everyone else.There was a lot of talking at the table than what i expected to be because usually everybody is focusing on eating and enjoying the food. It didn't really matter how much you ate just as long as you had that secure feeling that you were full was good. You could have been packing a whole bunch of heart attacks coming but it didn't matter.
After everybody finshed eating, all the guys went and watched the football game debating, drinking beer while the woman were in the dining room drinking wine and talking about other stuff. Then everybody had cheescake and pumpkin pie with coffee while the kids had cucpakes to top off the whole thanksgiving feast. Everybody was not moving much everybody was pretty much relaxed since they ate so much food and just stood still.
One of my mom's family friend that came over i noticed that he was kind of fat and he had two plates of rice. I thought to myself should he really be eating a second one with the weight that he has? Also i noticed that he wanted to get more food but seemed a little bit embarassed because of everyone else.There was a lot of talking at the table than what i expected to be because usually everybody is focusing on eating and enjoying the food. It didn't really matter how much you ate just as long as you had that secure feeling that you were full was good. You could have been packing a whole bunch of heart attacks coming but it didn't matter.
After everybody finshed eating, all the guys went and watched the football game debating, drinking beer while the woman were in the dining room drinking wine and talking about other stuff. Then everybody had cheescake and pumpkin pie with coffee while the kids had cucpakes to top off the whole thanksgiving feast. Everybody was not moving much everybody was pretty much relaxed since they ate so much food and just stood still.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
HW#17-First Thoughts on the Illness & Dying Unit
I encountered illness twice with very close people in my family. One was my great grandmother, she had been sick for so many years since i was five years old. It was matter of time before she would pass away but at the same time nobody was ready for it to happen. The second was my grandfather which came to a shock to all of us. The day before he became very ill he was perfectly fine doing the usual things. Then the next day he was rushed to the hospital and each day he was getting worse. It was crazy how one day you can be perfectly fine and the next day terminally ill.
Growing up when somebody is ill or dying, you are suppose to go see them and comfort them even though you know that they are going to die which is the worst part. In my family lots of times we pray for the people who are sick and hopefully they get better(doesn't happen all the time. Following that in lots of hispanic background when people are dying or died, we have these praying session with the bible and the rosey. I never realized how in depth they go and the reason why, i honestly don't like it.
I always wondered where the social norms come from and how they came about with having funerals and seeing that constant ill person at the hospital. What if we never visited them at all or not the proper burial does that make it bad? In society being terminally ill or dying are suppose to have that their family near them and always have that comfort zone so possibly it will make them get better.
Growing up when somebody is ill or dying, you are suppose to go see them and comfort them even though you know that they are going to die which is the worst part. In my family lots of times we pray for the people who are sick and hopefully they get better(doesn't happen all the time. Following that in lots of hispanic background when people are dying or died, we have these praying session with the bible and the rosey. I never realized how in depth they go and the reason why, i honestly don't like it.
I always wondered where the social norms come from and how they came about with having funerals and seeing that constant ill person at the hospital. What if we never visited them at all or not the proper burial does that make it bad? In society being terminally ill or dying are suppose to have that their family near them and always have that comfort zone so possibly it will make them get better.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
Hw#12-Final Food Project 2-Outline
Major claim: Food production should be reformed to avoid nightmarish industrial atrocities.
Supporting claim 1: Food production is currently putting harmful foods to the world and nobody is hearing about because our minds are being corrupted.
-Talk about the meat factories
-The amount of "stress" level towards the animals
-The government trying to hide everything
-Death of the 2 year-old boy
-Abuse of the farmers
Supporting claim 2: Food production can be changed by getting better insight on our food.
-Take about alternatives of not using the "normal" food ways
-Give example from the book Omnivore's Dilemma
-Being concious of what you eat
-Spread the world to other people
-Do the unthinkable
Supporting claim 1: Food production is currently putting harmful foods to the world and nobody is hearing about because our minds are being corrupted.
-Talk about the meat factories
-The amount of "stress" level towards the animals
-The government trying to hide everything
-Death of the 2 year-old boy
-Abuse of the farmers
Supporting claim 2: Food production can be changed by getting better insight on our food.
-Take about alternatives of not using the "normal" food ways
-Give example from the book Omnivore's Dilemma
-Being concious of what you eat
-Spread the world to other people
-Do the unthinkable
Hw#11-Final Food Project 1
For a final food project i decided to change my supermarket habits when i went shopping. When i went food shopping with my mom, i told her to buy fish instead of meat because of all the horrible things i saw in the movie and what i read in the book. Walking around the supermarket i paid more attention to the labels also and instead of getting ham i decided to get turkey. I decided to become a vegetartain for a day or two days to see how it feel and try something new. At first i was scared because i was so used to eating meat but i thought "hey it won't be that bad."
For the first day i had a tuna sandwich with water and a salad with onions and tomatoes with dressing that my mom made. While i was eating my dinner, i was happy that the fact it did not involve meat and that i could eat something without feeling gulilty for the animals that were slaughtered. Unfortunetly by the second day it all changed. My mom did not cook that night and she ended up buying McDonalds. Thinking about it was digusted but at the same time i wasn't going to starve myself. I decided to get two snack wraps and fries.
When i was on my second snack wrap i was looking at the lettuce and it looked kind of old. I spit it out and threw the rest of my food out. Then i wondered this is why i decided to stop eating it in the first place. It's hard changing your diet because lots of times you still have those cravings. I feel like i can accomplish changing my diet, just have to keep that motive in my head. Before i would never think about "i should stop eating meat" but after everything in this unit, it has definetly changed my mind.
I feel like it's important to be aware what is in your food. For example, my food looked old and i didn't even notice because i was so hungry. We never take the time out to look and even be notified. "Everything is not what it seems" just like our food we don't see all the bad things that have our food has been altered into. It's not real food the food is fake.
For the first day i had a tuna sandwich with water and a salad with onions and tomatoes with dressing that my mom made. While i was eating my dinner, i was happy that the fact it did not involve meat and that i could eat something without feeling gulilty for the animals that were slaughtered. Unfortunetly by the second day it all changed. My mom did not cook that night and she ended up buying McDonalds. Thinking about it was digusted but at the same time i wasn't going to starve myself. I decided to get two snack wraps and fries.
When i was on my second snack wrap i was looking at the lettuce and it looked kind of old. I spit it out and threw the rest of my food out. Then i wondered this is why i decided to stop eating it in the first place. It's hard changing your diet because lots of times you still have those cravings. I feel like i can accomplish changing my diet, just have to keep that motive in my head. Before i would never think about "i should stop eating meat" but after everything in this unit, it has definetly changed my mind.
I feel like it's important to be aware what is in your food. For example, my food looked old and i didn't even notice because i was so hungry. We never take the time out to look and even be notified. "Everything is not what it seems" just like our food we don't see all the bad things that have our food has been altered into. It's not real food the food is fake.
Sunday, October 24, 2010
Hw#10-Food, Inc. Response
People should know where their food is coming from and especially what is in the food. There is so much cruelty towards the animals in the industrial farming and the some of the meat they aren't we are eating is not real"food" but simply small molecules being broken up in pieces. Farmers get treated so poorly and do not get enough credit for what they do while these big arigculture companies get all this money for making us unhealthy. In order for us to change for the better, we need to be smarter with our food choices, pay attention to labels and stand up for our food.
Compared to the book, i was able to better visualize the process of the animals and what really happens behind closed doors of the food industry especially the politics and the government side of things. I liked how i was able to see people's different point of views and how they felt on the food industry. In the book i was able to see Michael Pollan view and his journey through the food industry and the ideas he felt. Also the different techniques that he used along the way which i found very interesting.
After watching the movie it made me think twice about my food. Also reading the book and seeing the movie i have decide to maybe try and become a vegetarian. I think that the way they treat the animals are horrible and digusting and i wouldn't want somebody to put that "stress" on me. Today when i actually went food shopping i was paying close attention to the labels on the foods that my mom was getting and thought do they really mean what they are saying? Are they sure they included every single detail of what is IN this product? I just feel overall its open me up to other ideas and views that i've never thought before. I once said i would never stop eating meat maybe that day will change maybe not even just meat just eating better to maintain being healthy.
Compared to the book, i was able to better visualize the process of the animals and what really happens behind closed doors of the food industry especially the politics and the government side of things. I liked how i was able to see people's different point of views and how they felt on the food industry. In the book i was able to see Michael Pollan view and his journey through the food industry and the ideas he felt. Also the different techniques that he used along the way which i found very interesting.
After watching the movie it made me think twice about my food. Also reading the book and seeing the movie i have decide to maybe try and become a vegetarian. I think that the way they treat the animals are horrible and digusting and i wouldn't want somebody to put that "stress" on me. Today when i actually went food shopping i was paying close attention to the labels on the foods that my mom was getting and thought do they really mean what they are saying? Are they sure they included every single detail of what is IN this product? I just feel overall its open me up to other ideas and views that i've never thought before. I once said i would never stop eating meat maybe that day will change maybe not even just meat just eating better to maintain being healthy.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Hw#7D
Chapter#17-My Grass-Fed Meal:A Week's Pay
Precis
I decided to cook a nice meal for my close friends of mine. I made chicken, corn, and chocolate souffle which turned out to be very delicious. The chicken did taste better than supermarket chicken much healthier and so was the corn. The eggs that i used for the souffle was like magic just so it was stiff and how orange it was. Everybody enjoyed the food i made and so was i.
Gems
On page 200 what stood out was how it said "when chickens get to live like chickens, they'll taste like chickens too" i think that is true if you liet chickens do what they want letting them live freely they will taste better when you eat them. Instead of keeping them caged up all dirty your chicken taste dirty and unhealthy (well we don't know that) but still. I like the fact that the narrator felt good about him making all this food and that it was so healthy even if it was lots of money and time worth spend. Moving a step forward to living a better life.
Thoughts/Questions
Reading about the chicken and dessert he made, made me actually kind of hungry because it sounded so good and the fact that he grew it himself was cool. I wonder if it would be possible to grow farms like the Polyface in New York State, i think that it is a good idea. The way he talked about the egg, i was like "wow" i didn't know when you crack an egg that its actually suppose to stay still. Usually when i crack my eggs it's yellow and slides all over the place. It's crazy how little things like that make a difference to the way your food taste.
Chapter#18-The Forest:Survivor Food
Precis
I decided to do another search for my food which was hunting, it reminded me of my times with my mother looking for clams and mushrooms. I learned which ones to eat. I hear about this guy named Angelo who was a hunter himself and loved to cook, he would be perfect to help me out. I would soon begin my hunting skills with Angelo and learn how to pick and shoot.
Gems
On page 208, it said "we cannot but pity the boy who has never fired a gun", i thought that was interesting because like the narrator said since i don't know how to use a gun or hunt or kill does that make him or anybody else less of a man? In a male's perpective i think that they should because that is what an all-american boy is supposed to have or so it says.
Thoughts/Questions
When i think of hunting, i think that it is kind of nasty because i guess what i see movies from people killing animals. I wonder if hunting is actually healthier than polyface because we don't actually watch the animals and have a farm, so does it make it better or worse? I never really thought about hunting myself, if it so much better people nowadays should learn how to do it, so that we can eat better.
Chapter#19-Eating Animals:The Meat Eater's Dilemma
Precis
Animals suffer just like humans but why should they be discriminated also. I decided to try out being a vegetarian it was not easy for me or anybody else. In the factory farms the animals have horrible conditions and nobody see what actually happens behind closed doors, just trying to make more money as possible. I agree that the way Joel Satlin raises his farm is particulary a good thing because the animals are to live happy and not suffer so when they do die they lived a happy life.
Gems
On page 227, the diagram stood out to me because it talked about basically how they were tricking the cows into killing them. Also it continued on the next page that when they stun the cows that not all of them die and they still killed them when they were alive which shows how much cruelty there is towards the animals and how much they don't care.
Thoughts/Questions
I agree with the narrator that Joel Satlin is the best solution because wouldn't you want the chicken to live a happy life with good conditons and which makes it happy food? No they just want to do what they want who cares how they feel and be cruel to them. Reading about how they have those stunner for the cows was kind of scary and how they are lifted off the ground but the cows cannot tell as well because they don't know what's going on. Where it said "McDonalds says it's ok if they have 5 percent error rate" i was like wow these people have no hearts at all.
Chapter#20-Hunting: A walk In The Woods
Précis
I thought hunting would be so exciting. I went hunting with Angelo on a friend's forest, the first time we went I didn't catch any pig but the second time I caught one it was a very big "prosciutto". At first when I caught the pig I was happy but then when I saw Angelo cutting it up I felt bad and a little remorse. After everything the pig was just food there wasn't nothing more to explain about it.
Gems
When the narrator was talking about him killing his first pig and being excited I thought that it was cool and interesting because i think that if I was in his postion I would feel the same.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that hunting is not that bad compared to how the animals get treated in the industrial factories because they live in worse conditons plus they get treated so cruel by workers. I was wondering if the pigs that they hunted where as santiarty as the pigs that Joel Saldin has raised?Do they hunt all the foods they eat or just meat?
Chapter#21- Gathering:The Fungi
Precis
My next adventure was to find edible mushrooms and Angelo was able to help me the ones i caught were called chanterelles. Mushrooms are atcually valled fungi and they help a lot with the earth and the life cycle. I took another trip hunting for morels, at first i didn't know what i was getting myself into but by the end i was so happy it felt so good like the first time i hunted the pig.
Gems
On page 254, where they were talking about four different fungi and how each of them do something essential to our life i thought that was kind of interesting. Because peronally when i think of fungi and mushroom, its a complete turn off for me and i never really knew they had an objectibve towards us.
Thoughts/Questions
I never really thought that hunting mushrooms was such a big deal as they make it seem in the book because most people don't eat it. Are the mushrooms actually much healthier than the industrial meat and other things that people eat? Honestly i would not eat mushrooms i don't think they do anything for me or have a purpose to making me healthier.
Chapter#22-The Perfect Meal
Precis
I decided to cook a prefect meal from all my hunting gathering for all the people who contributed and helped me with it. Thinking about the whole process i thought i would be unable to accomplish it but by the end of it all the meal was great and evrybody seemed to enjoyed which made me happy as well.
Gems
"It wasn't the cooking that made it perfect, but the connection we felt with the food, with the place we live and with each other" i thought that what he said is kind of powerful because lots of times when people eat food they want to feel that connection. How can you feel that though knowing the foods you are eating contain all these bad chemicals and unhealthy substances?
Thoughts/Questions
I thought that this last chapter was a very good way to sum up everything that happened in the book. Like the author said by tomorrow he would still go back to supermarket and get his reuglar food products because it would be so hard to maintain cooking like that. If the food industry didn't make it so hard and do all these bad things we wouldn't have to go out of our way to be doing the things we do to be healthy.
Precis
I decided to cook a nice meal for my close friends of mine. I made chicken, corn, and chocolate souffle which turned out to be very delicious. The chicken did taste better than supermarket chicken much healthier and so was the corn. The eggs that i used for the souffle was like magic just so it was stiff and how orange it was. Everybody enjoyed the food i made and so was i.
Gems
On page 200 what stood out was how it said "when chickens get to live like chickens, they'll taste like chickens too" i think that is true if you liet chickens do what they want letting them live freely they will taste better when you eat them. Instead of keeping them caged up all dirty your chicken taste dirty and unhealthy (well we don't know that) but still. I like the fact that the narrator felt good about him making all this food and that it was so healthy even if it was lots of money and time worth spend. Moving a step forward to living a better life.
Thoughts/Questions
Reading about the chicken and dessert he made, made me actually kind of hungry because it sounded so good and the fact that he grew it himself was cool. I wonder if it would be possible to grow farms like the Polyface in New York State, i think that it is a good idea. The way he talked about the egg, i was like "wow" i didn't know when you crack an egg that its actually suppose to stay still. Usually when i crack my eggs it's yellow and slides all over the place. It's crazy how little things like that make a difference to the way your food taste.
Chapter#18-The Forest:Survivor Food
Precis
I decided to do another search for my food which was hunting, it reminded me of my times with my mother looking for clams and mushrooms. I learned which ones to eat. I hear about this guy named Angelo who was a hunter himself and loved to cook, he would be perfect to help me out. I would soon begin my hunting skills with Angelo and learn how to pick and shoot.
Gems
On page 208, it said "we cannot but pity the boy who has never fired a gun", i thought that was interesting because like the narrator said since i don't know how to use a gun or hunt or kill does that make him or anybody else less of a man? In a male's perpective i think that they should because that is what an all-american boy is supposed to have or so it says.
Thoughts/Questions
When i think of hunting, i think that it is kind of nasty because i guess what i see movies from people killing animals. I wonder if hunting is actually healthier than polyface because we don't actually watch the animals and have a farm, so does it make it better or worse? I never really thought about hunting myself, if it so much better people nowadays should learn how to do it, so that we can eat better.
Chapter#19-Eating Animals:The Meat Eater's Dilemma
Precis
Animals suffer just like humans but why should they be discriminated also. I decided to try out being a vegetarian it was not easy for me or anybody else. In the factory farms the animals have horrible conditions and nobody see what actually happens behind closed doors, just trying to make more money as possible. I agree that the way Joel Satlin raises his farm is particulary a good thing because the animals are to live happy and not suffer so when they do die they lived a happy life.
Gems
On page 227, the diagram stood out to me because it talked about basically how they were tricking the cows into killing them. Also it continued on the next page that when they stun the cows that not all of them die and they still killed them when they were alive which shows how much cruelty there is towards the animals and how much they don't care.
Thoughts/Questions
I agree with the narrator that Joel Satlin is the best solution because wouldn't you want the chicken to live a happy life with good conditons and which makes it happy food? No they just want to do what they want who cares how they feel and be cruel to them. Reading about how they have those stunner for the cows was kind of scary and how they are lifted off the ground but the cows cannot tell as well because they don't know what's going on. Where it said "McDonalds says it's ok if they have 5 percent error rate" i was like wow these people have no hearts at all.
Chapter#20-Hunting: A walk In The Woods
Précis
I thought hunting would be so exciting. I went hunting with Angelo on a friend's forest, the first time we went I didn't catch any pig but the second time I caught one it was a very big "prosciutto". At first when I caught the pig I was happy but then when I saw Angelo cutting it up I felt bad and a little remorse. After everything the pig was just food there wasn't nothing more to explain about it.
Gems
When the narrator was talking about him killing his first pig and being excited I thought that it was cool and interesting because i think that if I was in his postion I would feel the same.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that hunting is not that bad compared to how the animals get treated in the industrial factories because they live in worse conditons plus they get treated so cruel by workers. I was wondering if the pigs that they hunted where as santiarty as the pigs that Joel Saldin has raised?Do they hunt all the foods they eat or just meat?
Chapter#21- Gathering:The Fungi
Precis
My next adventure was to find edible mushrooms and Angelo was able to help me the ones i caught were called chanterelles. Mushrooms are atcually valled fungi and they help a lot with the earth and the life cycle. I took another trip hunting for morels, at first i didn't know what i was getting myself into but by the end i was so happy it felt so good like the first time i hunted the pig.
Gems
On page 254, where they were talking about four different fungi and how each of them do something essential to our life i thought that was kind of interesting. Because peronally when i think of fungi and mushroom, its a complete turn off for me and i never really knew they had an objectibve towards us.
Thoughts/Questions
I never really thought that hunting mushrooms was such a big deal as they make it seem in the book because most people don't eat it. Are the mushrooms actually much healthier than the industrial meat and other things that people eat? Honestly i would not eat mushrooms i don't think they do anything for me or have a purpose to making me healthier.
Chapter#22-The Perfect Meal
Precis
I decided to cook a prefect meal from all my hunting gathering for all the people who contributed and helped me with it. Thinking about the whole process i thought i would be unable to accomplish it but by the end of it all the meal was great and evrybody seemed to enjoyed which made me happy as well.
Gems
"It wasn't the cooking that made it perfect, but the connection we felt with the food, with the place we live and with each other" i thought that what he said is kind of powerful because lots of times when people eat food they want to feel that connection. How can you feel that though knowing the foods you are eating contain all these bad chemicals and unhealthy substances?
Thoughts/Questions
I thought that this last chapter was a very good way to sum up everything that happened in the book. Like the author said by tomorrow he would still go back to supermarket and get his reuglar food products because it would be so hard to maintain cooking like that. If the food industry didn't make it so hard and do all these bad things we wouldn't have to go out of our way to be doing the things we do to be healthy.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
Hw#9-Freakonomics Response
While watching the film they used a lot of surveys and what statistics have been shown with people in everyday life. One example was when they talked about different black and white names and to see if that would their determine their future and who they are as person. They randomly asked people on the street and had two different opinions by a black man and an indian man who both had different views on it. The black man agreed that it the name doesn't define who they are as a person just by where they grew up at and how they were raised like the girl Tempris. On the other hand the indian guy opposed the idea. Another example was when a school is Chicago decided if paying kids $50 dollars for getting above D's would make them do better in their classes. In some cases it was true but in most of them it was not. The black kid was actually improving in his grades but the white kid would improve then go back and forth to failing showing his really did not care about his grades because he didn't like school. Paying students can't help do better they are just going to do waht they want to do living in the present not the future.
I think that Freakonomics does serve as inspiration good example to our attempt to explore the "hidden-in-plain-sight" weirdness of dominant social practices because it shows how people react to a little rewards such as the $50 dollars for good grades and how the creator paid the girl with m&ms so she would go to bathroom not only are teens smart enough to get what they want but so are little kids. If you wnt somebody to do something most of time they want to be given something special or rewarded for their accomplishment. Looking at the film it showed the insights of other people and what they think. How to get from A to B. Relating back to the food unit it would be interesting if people where given money to eat healthier or be rewarded to eat buy the neccesity they need in order to eat right would is really work or will it fail? Only time will tell.
I think that Freakonomics does serve as inspiration good example to our attempt to explore the "hidden-in-plain-sight" weirdness of dominant social practices because it shows how people react to a little rewards such as the $50 dollars for good grades and how the creator paid the girl with m&ms so she would go to bathroom not only are teens smart enough to get what they want but so are little kids. If you wnt somebody to do something most of time they want to be given something special or rewarded for their accomplishment. Looking at the film it showed the insights of other people and what they think. How to get from A to B. Relating back to the food unit it would be interesting if people where given money to eat healthier or be rewarded to eat buy the neccesity they need in order to eat right would is really work or will it fail? Only time will tell.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Hw#7C
Chapter#11-More Big Organic:Meet Rosie, The Free-Range Chicken
Precis
I visited the "rosie farm" and found out a lot of how the "organic way" chickens were made. Even though they are proven to me more organic they are not much different to how non-organic chicken is made. Organic food is not cheap but it does provide you to be more healthy than other food that people eat.
Gems
When i was reading i thought it was interesting how all the chickens were kept in a pens and how they were not allowed to go outside once they hit a certain age which by then they didn't even feel like going outside because they were used to being trapped for so long.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that people should not have to spend so much money on buying "better foods" in order to make them healthy. I think that is unfair on our part. People want us to be healthy and not obese but they want to make food so expensive in that case make the food a decent amount of cash. When i read about how the chicken were raised they make it seem likes it's any better they are overcrowded and they get fed almost the same things as the other chickens.
Chapter#12-Polyface:Green Acres
Precis
I decided to polyface farm and boy was my work cut out for me. Being on his farm the way he did things were very naturally and nothing like the machinery and industrial the way today agriculutral companies were doing it. The way Joel Satatin grew his farm was with natural habit and not cold-hearted.
Gems
"Polyface farm raises chicken, beef, turkeys, eggs, rabbits, and pigs, plus tomatoes, sweet corn, grapes, and berries. They do all this on 100 acres of pasture mixed in with another 450 acres of forest" i thought that it was cool how he raised all this things and did not come about it in the wrong way. Also how he mentioned he was a grass farmer which is like how? when you raise all these thing but the grass is what really helps this whole process.
Thoughts/Questions
From reading the book so far, this was probably my favorite because it didn't discuss they ugly side of what is in my food but showing the postive side of raising your own healthy organic food with no bad chemicals. I think that if we had more farms like Joe that would be in better shape in food or come across it with wider arms but since the money makes the world go round it's just eat what's there and die.
Chapter#13-Grass:Monday
Precis
When it comes to grass you don't really think about it, looking at Polyface grass i learned about if from different angles not all the grasses where the same they were very unique. Joel didn't let the cows take more than one bite to allow them to grow so he would move them which would not only be healthy for them but more organic. Joel has come a long way from his father's being and is very proud of his accomplishments.
Gems
On page 152, i thought that the different grasses where interesting and show kind of what their jobs is and how different they were from each other. I liked the fact that cows no the dfference between two different grasses when we don't like it said on page 151 "These two plants are as different to her as vanilla ice cream is frm cauliflower. The cow opens her meaty wet lips, curls her sandpaper tongue around the bunched clover like a fat rop, and rips the mouthful of tender leaves from its crown" so vivid.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that it's cool how Joel the farmer is so passionate about what he does and how is particular about his food and him beinig a grass farmer. When we think of grass we don't think all the things it can do with animals and the ground and with the food that we eat but it has to do with everything we just don't know it because we are not taught about it.
Chapter#14-The Animals:Tuesday
Precis
Chickens are not just to be eaten but they help alot. Joel moves the chickens all the time just like the cows so their manure fertilizes the grass and supplies nitrogen. Joel has a eggmobile to transport eggs and clean up messes. Not only does he take care of them but he lets them be free and do what they like letting them explore their natural habitat unlike industrial factories. Each animal has their own job in what they do such as the pigs, rabbits, turkeys, and chickens. The Salatins farming is not all easy work but they do it with great pleasure and eat healthy because they want not to make more money or have more outputs just because that is their natural habitat.
Gems
I thought that it was inpressive how much progress and hardwork they did in how much they had produced. "30,000 dozen eggs, 10,000 brolers, 800 stewing hens, 50 beef cattle, 125 hogs, 1,000 turkeys, and 500 rabbits". I wish i could do something like that and no only was this so much but it was done in the "correct way".
Thoughts/Questions
How long does this really take, the whole process? I never thought that trees can help us so much with our foods with chickens, insects etc. The Salatins make these people look like amaeturs and do not what they doing. Is possible to change the industrial machinery like this?
Chapter#15-The Slaughterhouse:Wednesday Morning
Precis
Today was the day of slaughtering. I learned how to cut the chickens at the at veins and watch the blood pour out i was very timid but go used to it, i then watched them take aprt the insides. Each chicken was killed, scalded, plucked and gutted. People came to pick up their chicken while i was cleaning up. The remains of the chicken and blood was dumped and made into compost which would help with grass.
Gems
I think that it's cool how instead of throwing out all the remains of the chickens unlike the industrial who would something like that, they take everything and reuse it to make compost and grass. I never really thought of it like that. They are being green with every situation they have.
Thoughts/Questions
I never really thought that there was a technique to killing a chicken. With them they are warm-hearted unlike others who are cold-hearted. Its the way they go about the slaughting and farming that makes it different compared to others and makes it better.
Chapter#16-The Market:Greeting From The Non-Bar Code People
Precis
Polyface food makes people feel more connected to their food in a way that local supermarkets cannot. People nowadays willing to pay for something more like technology but not better foods. Our bar codes tell us nothing where our food comes from shouldn't we know as they do in Denmark? The Polyface transport a lot of food places showing people how great their food is and how the seasonal food is best eaten during what time.
Gems
I thought that it was fasinating how the people like Joel want to make people out in the world see what food were are eating and try to make a positive view to eat right and have local foods instead of buying food out of season and taking days to get shipped.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that Polyface is right about what they are saying about the food we are eating. It's like we spend all this oney on ipods and new phones but we can spare antoher extra dollar to eat the right foods. If i had the proper money i would convert to the ideas on what they are saying but for right now i can't.
Precis
I visited the "rosie farm" and found out a lot of how the "organic way" chickens were made. Even though they are proven to me more organic they are not much different to how non-organic chicken is made. Organic food is not cheap but it does provide you to be more healthy than other food that people eat.
Gems
When i was reading i thought it was interesting how all the chickens were kept in a pens and how they were not allowed to go outside once they hit a certain age which by then they didn't even feel like going outside because they were used to being trapped for so long.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that people should not have to spend so much money on buying "better foods" in order to make them healthy. I think that is unfair on our part. People want us to be healthy and not obese but they want to make food so expensive in that case make the food a decent amount of cash. When i read about how the chicken were raised they make it seem likes it's any better they are overcrowded and they get fed almost the same things as the other chickens.
Chapter#12-Polyface:Green Acres
Precis
I decided to polyface farm and boy was my work cut out for me. Being on his farm the way he did things were very naturally and nothing like the machinery and industrial the way today agriculutral companies were doing it. The way Joel Satatin grew his farm was with natural habit and not cold-hearted.
Gems
"Polyface farm raises chicken, beef, turkeys, eggs, rabbits, and pigs, plus tomatoes, sweet corn, grapes, and berries. They do all this on 100 acres of pasture mixed in with another 450 acres of forest" i thought that it was cool how he raised all this things and did not come about it in the wrong way. Also how he mentioned he was a grass farmer which is like how? when you raise all these thing but the grass is what really helps this whole process.
Thoughts/Questions
From reading the book so far, this was probably my favorite because it didn't discuss they ugly side of what is in my food but showing the postive side of raising your own healthy organic food with no bad chemicals. I think that if we had more farms like Joe that would be in better shape in food or come across it with wider arms but since the money makes the world go round it's just eat what's there and die.
Chapter#13-Grass:Monday
Precis
When it comes to grass you don't really think about it, looking at Polyface grass i learned about if from different angles not all the grasses where the same they were very unique. Joel didn't let the cows take more than one bite to allow them to grow so he would move them which would not only be healthy for them but more organic. Joel has come a long way from his father's being and is very proud of his accomplishments.
Gems
On page 152, i thought that the different grasses where interesting and show kind of what their jobs is and how different they were from each other. I liked the fact that cows no the dfference between two different grasses when we don't like it said on page 151 "These two plants are as different to her as vanilla ice cream is frm cauliflower. The cow opens her meaty wet lips, curls her sandpaper tongue around the bunched clover like a fat rop, and rips the mouthful of tender leaves from its crown" so vivid.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that it's cool how Joel the farmer is so passionate about what he does and how is particular about his food and him beinig a grass farmer. When we think of grass we don't think all the things it can do with animals and the ground and with the food that we eat but it has to do with everything we just don't know it because we are not taught about it.
Chapter#14-The Animals:Tuesday
Precis
Chickens are not just to be eaten but they help alot. Joel moves the chickens all the time just like the cows so their manure fertilizes the grass and supplies nitrogen. Joel has a eggmobile to transport eggs and clean up messes. Not only does he take care of them but he lets them be free and do what they like letting them explore their natural habitat unlike industrial factories. Each animal has their own job in what they do such as the pigs, rabbits, turkeys, and chickens. The Salatins farming is not all easy work but they do it with great pleasure and eat healthy because they want not to make more money or have more outputs just because that is their natural habitat.
Gems
I thought that it was inpressive how much progress and hardwork they did in how much they had produced. "30,000 dozen eggs, 10,000 brolers, 800 stewing hens, 50 beef cattle, 125 hogs, 1,000 turkeys, and 500 rabbits". I wish i could do something like that and no only was this so much but it was done in the "correct way".
Thoughts/Questions
How long does this really take, the whole process? I never thought that trees can help us so much with our foods with chickens, insects etc. The Salatins make these people look like amaeturs and do not what they doing. Is possible to change the industrial machinery like this?
Chapter#15-The Slaughterhouse:Wednesday Morning
Precis
Today was the day of slaughtering. I learned how to cut the chickens at the at veins and watch the blood pour out i was very timid but go used to it, i then watched them take aprt the insides. Each chicken was killed, scalded, plucked and gutted. People came to pick up their chicken while i was cleaning up. The remains of the chicken and blood was dumped and made into compost which would help with grass.
Gems
I think that it's cool how instead of throwing out all the remains of the chickens unlike the industrial who would something like that, they take everything and reuse it to make compost and grass. I never really thought of it like that. They are being green with every situation they have.
Thoughts/Questions
I never really thought that there was a technique to killing a chicken. With them they are warm-hearted unlike others who are cold-hearted. Its the way they go about the slaughting and farming that makes it different compared to others and makes it better.
Chapter#16-The Market:Greeting From The Non-Bar Code People
Precis
Polyface food makes people feel more connected to their food in a way that local supermarkets cannot. People nowadays willing to pay for something more like technology but not better foods. Our bar codes tell us nothing where our food comes from shouldn't we know as they do in Denmark? The Polyface transport a lot of food places showing people how great their food is and how the seasonal food is best eaten during what time.
Gems
I thought that it was fasinating how the people like Joel want to make people out in the world see what food were are eating and try to make a positive view to eat right and have local foods instead of buying food out of season and taking days to get shipped.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that Polyface is right about what they are saying about the food we are eating. It's like we spend all this oney on ipods and new phones but we can spare antoher extra dollar to eat the right foods. If i had the proper money i would convert to the ideas on what they are saying but for right now i can't.
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Hw#8-Growing Our Own Food
I was unable to grow my own sprout due to technical difficulties but looking at everybody's elses sprout it didn't seem like a lot of work but it was same thing everyday (go water it and put it on the shelf to leave it to grow). I think me growing my own plant is weird because i'm not a farmer and i would just regularly buy my food at the supermarket. If i was to grow my own food i think they would be spoiled or become rotten because i'm not used to it but if i was learned earlier i would be more used to it. Lots of people who were planting their sprout did not seem to happy to do the same routine everyday or very nonchalant about it. If we didn't have to do it then nobody would care.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Hw#7B
Chapter#6-Processed Food:Splitting The Kernel
Precis
We are humans eat a lot of corn directly and indirectly. I visited a mill in Iowa called a wet mill which is a huge system which breaks down the corn and breaks down the materials of it. Each part of the machine slowly breaks apat the corn into simple pieces. Cereal companies such as general mills are trying to create new inventions creating "fake food" called resistant starch.
Gems
A gem that i found was the picture on page 68 and 69 which shows what is made from corn. It breaks up what starches it is made from, the whole corn products,etc. I thought that was interesting because it shows that it does not only come from one product but from all these other things. Another thing was the how the dollar is broken up into who gets paid and where each of the money goes.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that the cereal companies creating the invention of resistant starch is kind of ridiculous and unfair to the buyers. Also how the farmers aren't getting paid enough getting more profit to other people other than the farmers making the corn.
Chapter#7-Fat Corn:Can You Eat More, Please? Part 2
Precis
It seems as the couple years that go by more and more food is being eaten. Many food companies have created a way for us consumers to buy more food than we need creating obesity and creating more problems for our health. Companies such as Coca-Cola and McDonalds create this thing to make food more supersized or bigger which makes the consumers less aware that they are eating less calories than buying two small meals.
Gems
On page 83, it said "One part of the government puts out food pyramids tellng you to eat more fruits and vegetables and fewer sweets. Meanwhile another part of the government s making it cheaper for you to eat healthy, then it makes sure that the cheapest calories in the supermarket are the unhealthiest. Talk about mixed messages!" I thought that this was very true because the government wants us to be healthy but they are giving us all the wrong foods and making money off of us.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that its unfair we as the people do not have a say with our foods and how the government makes all this money off of us. Do they eat the same foods we eat? If so, where does it comes from? I found it weird but true how we spend money on the bigger meals instead of the many little ones because we think its more calories.
Chapter#8-The Ominvore's Dilemma:Is That Food?
Precis
We as humans to need to eat a variety of things unlike herbivores and carnivores but as humans we have made it harder with ourselves with our choices in food. Today we do not know what to eat because we do not what is in our foods which is an omnivore dilemma. We have two different taste preferences sweet and bitter. We do not eat our food in the proper way and we listen to what the media has to say about everything.
Gems
"Food companies make more money if they cn get us to change our eating habits and buy their processed foods. They spend billions to create constant stream of these new foods and then spend billions more to get us to buy them." I always wonder just why spend so much money to break us down as consumers. Killing each other each day. I liked how it said "looking at food that way robs us of one of life's greatest pleasures. We should not only enjoy and appreciate our food, we should enjoy making it and eating it in the company of others."
Thoughts/Questions
After reading i never really thought as food in a way like that like not just what we were eating but how we come about it. Reading about the French and how they ate they ate their food i thought was kind of a "wow" factor or even in other countries but the way we were brought and how we use things as Americans we don't think that far.
Chapter#9-My Fast-Food Meal:Fast Food
Precis
I decided to go to McDoanlds and see the facts behind fast food. While eating my food i found put there was so much corn in all three items that i ate especially my son's "chicken nuggets". Everything took less than 20 minutes:ordering the food, making the food, and eating the food. We don't pay attention where any of this is coming from especially McDonalds.
Gems
I like how it said "after a few bites you forget what you're eating. It's not exactly food, but a kind of food substitue. So you eat moree and eat more quickly, bite after bite, until you feel not satisfied, exactly, but simply, regettably, full" i never really thought about it like that when i was reading it but when i think about it now that is how it actually happens.
Thoughts/Questions
Talking about all this fast food and McDonalds makes me not wanna eat any at all just for the simple fact that i don't know what i am eating and what the author said was true that he couldn't taste the burger but the pickles, kecthup, and mustard which i find kind of digusting. It kind of makes my stomach turn and make me think twice should i really eat this food?
Chapter#10-Big Organic:Once Upon A Time
Precis
Even though organic food is "organic" they are also industralized too. Organic food started out in the late 1960's and later became a very big deal. Organic food is not all what it seems, they is alot of processed things. Some organic food processing actually damages the working fields.
Gems
"But it turns out that plowing the land over and over damages the soil almost as much as chemical weed killers do. It kills off the nitrogen into the air. Because of this damage, industrial organic farmers have to add a lot of nitrogen fertilizer to their fields." I thought that was interesting because just cause it organic does not mean it cannot hurt the enivornment no matter what good or bad food is made something bad comes with it. Its kind of contradicting.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that this chapter was good. I feel like have learned more of not only where my food comes from but where people believe "organic" food comes from which comes off as the better healthier food but then again you do not how its made or processed.
Precis
We are humans eat a lot of corn directly and indirectly. I visited a mill in Iowa called a wet mill which is a huge system which breaks down the corn and breaks down the materials of it. Each part of the machine slowly breaks apat the corn into simple pieces. Cereal companies such as general mills are trying to create new inventions creating "fake food" called resistant starch.
Gems
A gem that i found was the picture on page 68 and 69 which shows what is made from corn. It breaks up what starches it is made from, the whole corn products,etc. I thought that was interesting because it shows that it does not only come from one product but from all these other things. Another thing was the how the dollar is broken up into who gets paid and where each of the money goes.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that the cereal companies creating the invention of resistant starch is kind of ridiculous and unfair to the buyers. Also how the farmers aren't getting paid enough getting more profit to other people other than the farmers making the corn.
Chapter#7-Fat Corn:Can You Eat More, Please? Part 2
Precis
It seems as the couple years that go by more and more food is being eaten. Many food companies have created a way for us consumers to buy more food than we need creating obesity and creating more problems for our health. Companies such as Coca-Cola and McDonalds create this thing to make food more supersized or bigger which makes the consumers less aware that they are eating less calories than buying two small meals.
Gems
On page 83, it said "One part of the government puts out food pyramids tellng you to eat more fruits and vegetables and fewer sweets. Meanwhile another part of the government s making it cheaper for you to eat healthy, then it makes sure that the cheapest calories in the supermarket are the unhealthiest. Talk about mixed messages!" I thought that this was very true because the government wants us to be healthy but they are giving us all the wrong foods and making money off of us.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that its unfair we as the people do not have a say with our foods and how the government makes all this money off of us. Do they eat the same foods we eat? If so, where does it comes from? I found it weird but true how we spend money on the bigger meals instead of the many little ones because we think its more calories.
Chapter#8-The Ominvore's Dilemma:Is That Food?
Precis
We as humans to need to eat a variety of things unlike herbivores and carnivores but as humans we have made it harder with ourselves with our choices in food. Today we do not know what to eat because we do not what is in our foods which is an omnivore dilemma. We have two different taste preferences sweet and bitter. We do not eat our food in the proper way and we listen to what the media has to say about everything.
Gems
"Food companies make more money if they cn get us to change our eating habits and buy their processed foods. They spend billions to create constant stream of these new foods and then spend billions more to get us to buy them." I always wonder just why spend so much money to break us down as consumers. Killing each other each day. I liked how it said "looking at food that way robs us of one of life's greatest pleasures. We should not only enjoy and appreciate our food, we should enjoy making it and eating it in the company of others."
Thoughts/Questions
After reading i never really thought as food in a way like that like not just what we were eating but how we come about it. Reading about the French and how they ate they ate their food i thought was kind of a "wow" factor or even in other countries but the way we were brought and how we use things as Americans we don't think that far.
Chapter#9-My Fast-Food Meal:Fast Food
Precis
I decided to go to McDoanlds and see the facts behind fast food. While eating my food i found put there was so much corn in all three items that i ate especially my son's "chicken nuggets". Everything took less than 20 minutes:ordering the food, making the food, and eating the food. We don't pay attention where any of this is coming from especially McDonalds.
Gems
I like how it said "after a few bites you forget what you're eating. It's not exactly food, but a kind of food substitue. So you eat moree and eat more quickly, bite after bite, until you feel not satisfied, exactly, but simply, regettably, full" i never really thought about it like that when i was reading it but when i think about it now that is how it actually happens.
Thoughts/Questions
Talking about all this fast food and McDonalds makes me not wanna eat any at all just for the simple fact that i don't know what i am eating and what the author said was true that he couldn't taste the burger but the pickles, kecthup, and mustard which i find kind of digusting. It kind of makes my stomach turn and make me think twice should i really eat this food?
Chapter#10-Big Organic:Once Upon A Time
Precis
Even though organic food is "organic" they are also industralized too. Organic food started out in the late 1960's and later became a very big deal. Organic food is not all what it seems, they is alot of processed things. Some organic food processing actually damages the working fields.
Gems
"But it turns out that plowing the land over and over damages the soil almost as much as chemical weed killers do. It kills off the nitrogen into the air. Because of this damage, industrial organic farmers have to add a lot of nitrogen fertilizer to their fields." I thought that was interesting because just cause it organic does not mean it cannot hurt the enivornment no matter what good or bad food is made something bad comes with it. Its kind of contradicting.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that this chapter was good. I feel like have learned more of not only where my food comes from but where people believe "organic" food comes from which comes off as the better healthier food but then again you do not how its made or processed.
Monday, October 4, 2010
Hw#7-Reading Response Monday
The Omnivore's Dilemma The Secrets Behind What You Eat by Michael Pollan
Chapter#1-How Corn Took Over America: A Field Of Corn
Precis
Corn is in lots of the everyday foods that we eat from soda to frozen dinners. Corn allows us not to feed ourselves but also that foods that we ate such as chickens, fish, and pigs. Corn all started with the Native Americans then later traveled all around the world. Not only does corn help us but we help corn also with growing and creating a new epidemic.
Gems
One thing tht stood out to me was when was in the introduction it said "The chemical is so toxic to the nervous system that no one is allowed in the field for five days after it is sprayed. After the harvest, the potatoes are stored for six months in a gigantic shed. Here the chemicals gradually fade until the potatoes are safe to eat." I found that to be very interesting how they put chemicals in our potatoes and we wait six months to eat it. It's kind of like we are eating something toxic.
Thoughts/Questions
From reading the first chapter i realized enjoyed learning how lots of the things we eat involves corn because i never realized that especially now looking at the labels and they saw things like "corn syrup" and all these diffcult names when it's just corn. I did not think corn had such an impact on our lives and how much it really helped us. Is it possible to replace all those things with corn with something and is corn really that good for you?
Chapter#2-The Farm:One Farmer,140 Eaters
Precis
I visited a farmer by the name of George Naylor, he farm consist of lots of corn and some soybeans. Many years ago, it was more such as fruits and vegetables but corn has become prominantley dominant in recent times. Corn has caused farmers to deleted themselves from the picture and have no kind of land to produce food. An average american farmer grows enough food for 140 people they don't know. Farmers and agribusiness companies have created "fake corn" to produce more corn which has cause so many farmers to drop out. There were once so many farms everywhere now you can barely find one.
Gems
Looking on page 26 and 27, i was really shocked by how much of the fruits people once grew are not there anymore. It crazy how people just make these chemicals and what-not(GMOs) and cuteverybodies farms out. Then on page 27 it shows how all around the U.S people had many farms and now there is barely. Next thing you know there won't be any farms at all. "A farm of corn and soybeans doesn't require nearly as much human labor as the old-fashioned farm full of different kinds of crops. Bigger tractors and machines, chemicals weed killers, and aritfical fertilizer made it easier for one farmer to handle more acres."
Thoughts/Questions
From reading the first two chapters i think that i do not know what us americans would do without corn. I think that farmers do not get enough credit for what they do for people to eat and should be appreciate more. When it comes GMO's i think that it's crazy at the same time kind of interesting how the agriculture business make all these new ideas on creating less and less work. It kind of reminds me of last year when we talked about the Digital Unit and how we create technology for is less stressful for a human being.
Chapter#3-From Farm to Factory: Turning Bombs Into Factory
Precis
Visiting the Naylors farm, i have learned what happens behind closed doors. Lots of farmers are putting nitrogen into farming an making corn and by doing that it creates a lot of energy burning fossile fuels. Nowadays they invest so much time using up energy than producing food calories. All of this nitrogren has just is hurting the enviroment making the agriculture business stronger and the farmers are poor.
Gems
Something that i found interesting was that it said "Buh what happens to eighty pounds of man-made nitrogen that Naylor's cron plants don't take up? Some of it evaporates into the air, where it creates acid rain. Someof it turns into nitrous oxide, a gas that increases global warming." I thought that it crazy how smething so small like changing corn and the genetics can turn into global warming making the world worse than it already is. Referring to this another "gem" i found was the nitrogen cycle and how each of the components travel everywhere not just the inside the soil.
Thoughts/Questions
Each time i read the book i find it more and more intriguing. I am getting a little more of the concept where my food comes especially corn. It seems like corn is at the ls the top of the list of money making and knocking out farmers and other vegetables and food out the way. I think that government is acutally killing us instead of making us stronger. They just want to make money so they can be rich and forget about everybody else which is selfish.
Chapter#4-The Grain Elevator:Food On The Ground
Precis
When i visited the grain elevator there was a lot of corn being unused. The grain of elevator that i saw was called "number 2 field corn" which is an excess amount of extra corn. They take the corn that is not being used and use it to feed animals who do not adapt to, fuel, exported, and high frutose corn syrup.
Gems
What stood out to me was how they had the diagram on how the number 2 field corn" was split up into which i found to be really bad. Also how they force the cows to eat corn when they do not eat that all. That's like making us eat rocks or something. It's worse for the animals.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that it kind of weird how corn is being used in everyway shape or form. I feel like the companies should make a whole new process of this or come with a different approach. It's like more money but hurting more things such as animals and the human body. Why?
Chapter#5-The Feedlot-Turning Corn into Meat:City of Cows
Precis
I bought a cow to see how it came from a farm into our stomach. Looking at the feedlot and how the #534 was getting treated made think a lot about eating beef. The cows were forced to eat corn which is not related to their diet. Giving them corn causes them to gain weight to make beef but at the same time make them ill.
Gems
What i found interesting was all the different diseases the cows and us humans can get from all this processing food like corn. It said "cattles with acidosis stop eating, pant, and drool, paw and scratch their bellies, and eat dirt. This can so weaken the animal that it can devlop diahrrea, ulcers, liver, disease, pneumonia, and feedlot polio." I thought how all things can also happen to us just because companies want to make poor decisions on how our food is taken care of.
Thoughts/Questions
SO far this chapter has really made me think twice about eating beef just for the simple fact on how the cows get treated in the feedlot and how they are forced to eat things not in the diet. Why force them to eat that when in the long run it's kind of killing us also.
Chapter#1-How Corn Took Over America: A Field Of Corn
Precis
Corn is in lots of the everyday foods that we eat from soda to frozen dinners. Corn allows us not to feed ourselves but also that foods that we ate such as chickens, fish, and pigs. Corn all started with the Native Americans then later traveled all around the world. Not only does corn help us but we help corn also with growing and creating a new epidemic.
Gems
One thing tht stood out to me was when was in the introduction it said "The chemical is so toxic to the nervous system that no one is allowed in the field for five days after it is sprayed. After the harvest, the potatoes are stored for six months in a gigantic shed. Here the chemicals gradually fade until the potatoes are safe to eat." I found that to be very interesting how they put chemicals in our potatoes and we wait six months to eat it. It's kind of like we are eating something toxic.
Thoughts/Questions
From reading the first chapter i realized enjoyed learning how lots of the things we eat involves corn because i never realized that especially now looking at the labels and they saw things like "corn syrup" and all these diffcult names when it's just corn. I did not think corn had such an impact on our lives and how much it really helped us. Is it possible to replace all those things with corn with something and is corn really that good for you?
Chapter#2-The Farm:One Farmer,140 Eaters
Precis
I visited a farmer by the name of George Naylor, he farm consist of lots of corn and some soybeans. Many years ago, it was more such as fruits and vegetables but corn has become prominantley dominant in recent times. Corn has caused farmers to deleted themselves from the picture and have no kind of land to produce food. An average american farmer grows enough food for 140 people they don't know. Farmers and agribusiness companies have created "fake corn" to produce more corn which has cause so many farmers to drop out. There were once so many farms everywhere now you can barely find one.
Gems
Looking on page 26 and 27, i was really shocked by how much of the fruits people once grew are not there anymore. It crazy how people just make these chemicals and what-not(GMOs) and cuteverybodies farms out. Then on page 27 it shows how all around the U.S people had many farms and now there is barely. Next thing you know there won't be any farms at all. "A farm of corn and soybeans doesn't require nearly as much human labor as the old-fashioned farm full of different kinds of crops. Bigger tractors and machines, chemicals weed killers, and aritfical fertilizer made it easier for one farmer to handle more acres."
Thoughts/Questions
From reading the first two chapters i think that i do not know what us americans would do without corn. I think that farmers do not get enough credit for what they do for people to eat and should be appreciate more. When it comes GMO's i think that it's crazy at the same time kind of interesting how the agriculture business make all these new ideas on creating less and less work. It kind of reminds me of last year when we talked about the Digital Unit and how we create technology for is less stressful for a human being.
Chapter#3-From Farm to Factory: Turning Bombs Into Factory
Precis
Visiting the Naylors farm, i have learned what happens behind closed doors. Lots of farmers are putting nitrogen into farming an making corn and by doing that it creates a lot of energy burning fossile fuels. Nowadays they invest so much time using up energy than producing food calories. All of this nitrogren has just is hurting the enviroment making the agriculture business stronger and the farmers are poor.
Gems
Something that i found interesting was that it said "Buh what happens to eighty pounds of man-made nitrogen that Naylor's cron plants don't take up? Some of it evaporates into the air, where it creates acid rain. Someof it turns into nitrous oxide, a gas that increases global warming." I thought that it crazy how smething so small like changing corn and the genetics can turn into global warming making the world worse than it already is. Referring to this another "gem" i found was the nitrogen cycle and how each of the components travel everywhere not just the inside the soil.
Thoughts/Questions
Each time i read the book i find it more and more intriguing. I am getting a little more of the concept where my food comes especially corn. It seems like corn is at the ls the top of the list of money making and knocking out farmers and other vegetables and food out the way. I think that government is acutally killing us instead of making us stronger. They just want to make money so they can be rich and forget about everybody else which is selfish.
Chapter#4-The Grain Elevator:Food On The Ground
Precis
When i visited the grain elevator there was a lot of corn being unused. The grain of elevator that i saw was called "number 2 field corn" which is an excess amount of extra corn. They take the corn that is not being used and use it to feed animals who do not adapt to, fuel, exported, and high frutose corn syrup.
Gems
What stood out to me was how they had the diagram on how the number 2 field corn" was split up into which i found to be really bad. Also how they force the cows to eat corn when they do not eat that all. That's like making us eat rocks or something. It's worse for the animals.
Thoughts/Questions
I think that it kind of weird how corn is being used in everyway shape or form. I feel like the companies should make a whole new process of this or come with a different approach. It's like more money but hurting more things such as animals and the human body. Why?
Chapter#5-The Feedlot-Turning Corn into Meat:City of Cows
Precis
I bought a cow to see how it came from a farm into our stomach. Looking at the feedlot and how the #534 was getting treated made think a lot about eating beef. The cows were forced to eat corn which is not related to their diet. Giving them corn causes them to gain weight to make beef but at the same time make them ill.
Gems
What i found interesting was all the different diseases the cows and us humans can get from all this processing food like corn. It said "cattles with acidosis stop eating, pant, and drool, paw and scratch their bellies, and eat dirt. This can so weaken the animal that it can devlop diahrrea, ulcers, liver, disease, pneumonia, and feedlot polio." I thought how all things can also happen to us just because companies want to make poor decisions on how our food is taken care of.
Thoughts/Questions
SO far this chapter has really made me think twice about eating beef just for the simple fact on how the cows get treated in the feedlot and how they are forced to eat things not in the diet. Why force them to eat that when in the long run it's kind of killing us also.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Hw#6-Food Diary
On Tuesday morning September 28th i had two cinnamon toast Eggo waffles in one and a glass of orange juice. The waffles have 300 calories and 100 per set of four. So i had 200 calories of the waffles because i had two sets. I also put Aunt Jemima syrup original which was 210 calories. The orange was also 110 calories as well. The reasons i ate the waffles was because i am not allowed to have any milk substances in the morning and that is why i had orange juice also. In particular when i use syrup i do not put a lot because i don't like to drown my food in it, it's just too much and a lot of sugar for me.
I did not eat anything for lunch until i got home around 4:30 and had myself a can of Chef Boyardee Ravoili with a glass of lemonade. I did not eat the any dinner that day. I think that i should of ate something for lunch its not good focusing on an empty stomache. I feel like maybe i should not have not eaten the the whole can but i was really hungry. The ravioli had 230 calories and i also noticed it said it had 490 mg of potassium. I never knew that it had so much. On the can it said that it has 1/2 cup of vegetables which i did not taste at all but i figured it is good. i had one serving which is 252 g. The lemonade i drink which was minute maid had 110 calories.
On Wednesday September 29th, i had a Sausage McMuffin and a hashbrown from McDonalds around 7:00 with some orange juice also. The sausage mcmuffin was 382.95 calories. For such as small thing that is a lot of calories. It had about 8g of fat which i did not know. I noticed when i eating it it had a lot of grease and the so did the hashbrown but it was really good. The hashbrown had 146.72 calories which i am not surprised. When i was eating it i got a lot of grease on my finger tips.
Later on that day for lunch i had a beef patty with a can of Arizona Raspberry Iced Tea. The beef patty i am not really sure how many calories but when i ate it it did not really have any grease. The Arizona Iced Tea is 93 calories which is not a lot.
I thought it would be more because the can is big, i guess not.especially since it is artifical flavor. For dinner, i had a plate of white rice with a couple pieces of canned salmon. The rice was 675.25 calories and the canned salmon was 631.06. I think for this dinner i ate pretty good since i had fish and fish is good for you and white rice because it is plain.
I think that the last two days i ate ok. I think eating McDonalds was an unhealthy choice but i did not really care because it was good and so was the hashbrown. I think the dinner i had last nite was pretty healthy but i think i had a little more than one serving for myself. Hopefully for my next meal it will be a healthier choice.
I did not eat anything for lunch until i got home around 4:30 and had myself a can of Chef Boyardee Ravoili with a glass of lemonade. I did not eat the any dinner that day. I think that i should of ate something for lunch its not good focusing on an empty stomache. I feel like maybe i should not have not eaten the the whole can but i was really hungry. The ravioli had 230 calories and i also noticed it said it had 490 mg of potassium. I never knew that it had so much. On the can it said that it has 1/2 cup of vegetables which i did not taste at all but i figured it is good. i had one serving which is 252 g. The lemonade i drink which was minute maid had 110 calories.
On Wednesday September 29th, i had a Sausage McMuffin and a hashbrown from McDonalds around 7:00 with some orange juice also. The sausage mcmuffin was 382.95 calories. For such as small thing that is a lot of calories. It had about 8g of fat which i did not know. I noticed when i eating it it had a lot of grease and the so did the hashbrown but it was really good. The hashbrown had 146.72 calories which i am not surprised. When i was eating it i got a lot of grease on my finger tips.
Later on that day for lunch i had a beef patty with a can of Arizona Raspberry Iced Tea. The beef patty i am not really sure how many calories but when i ate it it did not really have any grease. The Arizona Iced Tea is 93 calories which is not a lot.
I thought it would be more because the can is big, i guess not.especially since it is artifical flavor. For dinner, i had a plate of white rice with a couple pieces of canned salmon. The rice was 675.25 calories and the canned salmon was 631.06. I think for this dinner i ate pretty good since i had fish and fish is good for you and white rice because it is plain.
I think that the last two days i ate ok. I think eating McDonalds was an unhealthy choice but i did not really care because it was good and so was the hashbrown. I think the dinner i had last nite was pretty healthy but i think i had a little more than one serving for myself. Hopefully for my next meal it will be a healthier choice.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Hw#5-Dominant Discourses Regarding Contemporary Foodways in the U.S
Resource#1:
Fixing A World that Fosters Fat
The article talked a lot about how kids and adults nowadays are becoming more and more obsese from how the world is being portrayed such as mot advertising to execrise more and eating lots of unhealthy foods(junk food). From reading the article i think that the people writing think we are living in a time of which significant reform of U.S. foodways has already occurred but the techniques that we are using is not working such as media and other news. It seems like they always mention kids or young teens about being obese. It's always the same people. It never changes. “But the environment makes it so difficult that fewer people can do these things, and then you have a public health catastrophe” in this part of the text this is not a part of the discourse. For example the enivironment does not want to make it a part of their thing to be healthy because it is ulikely which makes it not a part of the discourse.
Resource#2:
Told To Eats Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries
From reading the article i feel like a lot what they are saying is true. People cannot rely their lives on vegetables even if it means being unhealthy.In refrigerators all over the country, produce often dies a slow, limp death because life becomes too busy. Being healthy has a cost and so does being unhealthy. Food practices of a member of our society whose worldview gets sculpted by mass-media-propagated dominant discourse are usually eat what you see on television(all the bad things). It seems that we have always come back to the topic of not eating vegetables and eating bad things such as McDonalds. The dominant discourse we set the boundaries that we are unable to eat healthy because of the busy schedule of our lives and stick to the unutrient of foods such as french fries being mentioned.
Resource#3:
Fresh Vegetables Where Fast Food Reign
I feel like if they had more of these fresh vegetables at a near neighborhood people would buy it more healthier. The people who wrote and quoted this article are trying to reform in the right direction by providing vegetables and fresher things to live great lives. “You get the food direct from the farm — they’re still cleaning it off when I get there. You can’t get more fresh than that.” I feel like very article you read no matter what always refers to vegetables and how you need to eat them which is not going to happen 85% of the time! Most of the problems is that we do not eat fresh veggies but at the same time media has to give up and let people do what they want. Why spend millions of dollars on things if people do not care that is how i feel personally.
Fixing A World that Fosters Fat
The article talked a lot about how kids and adults nowadays are becoming more and more obsese from how the world is being portrayed such as mot advertising to execrise more and eating lots of unhealthy foods(junk food). From reading the article i think that the people writing think we are living in a time of which significant reform of U.S. foodways has already occurred but the techniques that we are using is not working such as media and other news. It seems like they always mention kids or young teens about being obese. It's always the same people. It never changes. “But the environment makes it so difficult that fewer people can do these things, and then you have a public health catastrophe” in this part of the text this is not a part of the discourse. For example the enivironment does not want to make it a part of their thing to be healthy because it is ulikely which makes it not a part of the discourse.
Resource#2:
Told To Eats Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries
From reading the article i feel like a lot what they are saying is true. People cannot rely their lives on vegetables even if it means being unhealthy.In refrigerators all over the country, produce often dies a slow, limp death because life becomes too busy. Being healthy has a cost and so does being unhealthy. Food practices of a member of our society whose worldview gets sculpted by mass-media-propagated dominant discourse are usually eat what you see on television(all the bad things). It seems that we have always come back to the topic of not eating vegetables and eating bad things such as McDonalds. The dominant discourse we set the boundaries that we are unable to eat healthy because of the busy schedule of our lives and stick to the unutrient of foods such as french fries being mentioned.
Resource#3:
Fresh Vegetables Where Fast Food Reign
I feel like if they had more of these fresh vegetables at a near neighborhood people would buy it more healthier. The people who wrote and quoted this article are trying to reform in the right direction by providing vegetables and fresher things to live great lives. “You get the food direct from the farm — they’re still cleaning it off when I get there. You can’t get more fresh than that.” I feel like very article you read no matter what always refers to vegetables and how you need to eat them which is not going to happen 85% of the time! Most of the problems is that we do not eat fresh veggies but at the same time media has to give up and let people do what they want. Why spend millions of dollars on things if people do not care that is how i feel personally.
Hw#4-Your Families Foodways
Growing up in a hispanic background you learn that you eat the typical rice, beans, chicken, pork and all that good stuff but at the same time even though it's delicious, it is damaging us as well. Sometimes in different cultures you have all this great foods not just in my culture and it is bad. As generations go on and on some families try to get healthier and eat properly to live better lives which is what my mom has tried to do for herself and my sister.
From talking with my mom, she grew in a household that my grandmother would fry everything. Fried chicken, porkchops and all the things you can imagine. Even though she learned how to make the proper hispanic meals, she tries to do little things in the meals she makes to make it "healthier" such as putting vegetables etc. Seeing how my grandmother raised her, she decided to go a different route. She said "they were high in fat and it would cost more damage than good" which i find to be true. I feel like my grandmother was you basically eat what she cooked did not watch if it was healthy or not.
I think that if i would have spoken to my grandmother that she would say that basically they ate what they had and it did not matter if it was killing them or helping them. I feel like during her generation with her children (my mother) she did not understand the concept of being "healthy". From my photo above you can see that i had pancakes and sausages and some strawberries to be "healthy" trying to add some fruit in my meals even if it is a little gesture.
When it comes to my foodways i don't really pay attention. I eat whatever is insight most likely because i am hungry. Sometimes i do try to eat healthy like the way my mom cooks in the house but it does not always work. Compared to my mother or my family in general, she eats the healthiest out of everybody. She eats the smallest portion to and tries to contributes the fruits and vegetables onto her plate. I feel like it does not matter how much you try to pass down the heealthness to your children and family they won't listen unless you are very mandatory and strict about what they eat.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Hw#3- Fast Food Insights and Green Market Realizations
The differences between McDonalds and the Green Market is that one is healthy and the other is not. In McDonalds everything goes fast it's in a quick pace. You easily order and get your food. Unlike the Green Market most of the foods there are things you acutally have to cook because in McDonalds most of the foods are pre-made which makes the Green Market better food choice. Also when we went to the market everything was freshly outside. McDonalds the food is packed up in boxes or in plastic baggies like the buns and what-not. Most of the foods in the Green Market was grown on farms upstate while the food in Mcdonalds come shipped and have different chemicals. Thinking about it now, McDonalds sounds kind of nasty but the food is still tasty which is why it has a lot of business.
When i walked into McDonalds you notice everybody was in their own separate little box to have their privacy. While we were talking Andy made it a point that the colors were not loud and kind of tone down such as like yellow and read colors to try and represent themselves as "serious" and not so much a kid's eating kind of place. After you order your food all the condiments are on the side so basically there is is "self service" you take as much as you need. When i went to the market most of the people i saw were either kind of old or they were in their early probably 20's. You did not see a lot of kids my age which probably tells you that most teens do not really watch what they eat as long as it's food. Most of it does not matter. Food is food.
I normally visit McDonalds not because i choose to but mostly because of the convience. McDonalds is more closer than the market and i'm so used to it. Why change for something new? I feel like if maybe there was a green market close to my house i would make the effort to buy something there but instead i just go to Mcdonalds. I feel like they say "kids/people are obese and blah blah but nobody makes the effort to build any local green markets or healthy to improve the generation. To add to that we also should not make it so expensive. They want people to be healthy but you have to put a pretty pricey tag just to recieve it. There is always a catch to everything.
When i walked into McDonalds you notice everybody was in their own separate little box to have their privacy. While we were talking Andy made it a point that the colors were not loud and kind of tone down such as like yellow and read colors to try and represent themselves as "serious" and not so much a kid's eating kind of place. After you order your food all the condiments are on the side so basically there is is "self service" you take as much as you need. When i went to the market most of the people i saw were either kind of old or they were in their early probably 20's. You did not see a lot of kids my age which probably tells you that most teens do not really watch what they eat as long as it's food. Most of it does not matter. Food is food.
I normally visit McDonalds not because i choose to but mostly because of the convience. McDonalds is more closer than the market and i'm so used to it. Why change for something new? I feel like if maybe there was a green market close to my house i would make the effort to buy something there but instead i just go to Mcdonalds. I feel like they say "kids/people are obese and blah blah but nobody makes the effort to build any local green markets or healthy to improve the generation. To add to that we also should not make it so expensive. They want people to be healthy but you have to put a pretty pricey tag just to recieve it. There is always a catch to everything.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Hw#2 Food-Initial Thoughts
When it comes food, i eat it a lot. Coming from a hispanic family, food is very important and it is what makes us come together as one. In an hispanic background especially or even any culture food is one of those aspect that is a big deal. Even like thinking about thankgiving. Thanksgiving equals food which equals love in which we all want in life typically.I feel like if i did not have food half the time of the day, i am unhappy. I think that food is an necessity to our lives not just because we need it to survive but to comfort us also. As we discussed in class, "food and love is the kind of thing we strive and want in our lives besides money." Food fills in that emptiness in our tummys and love fills that emptiness in our hearts and in order to get that to be "full" we eat or we find someone who is compatible to ourselves to make us happy.
In my opinion, food is sacred. I think that it is sacred because i feel like it is a drive that keeps us going in life epecially myself. I found a quote that i would agree with "One of the very nicest things about life is the way we must regularly stop whatever it is we are doing and devote our attention to eating", i feel like for most people this is true unless you are a person who is afraid of food. Most people in the world if they are hungry or anything would stop anything they are doing to eat food to satify their need.
When it comes to food my priority is to eat everything as soon possible and get "stuffed". I like to have the feeling that i am about to explode from all the food that i just ate. It kind of makes me feel good but then after a while i feel fat and do the whole routine all over again. My typical meals can fail to meet my desire depending on my emotions. As Ally stated " Some people do based they're choice in food on emotions, one person may feel sad one day a crave ice cream or chocolate", I feel like this is true. I know there has been times when i have been down and food has been able to comfort in that spare time even though sometimes i do not think it is good for me.
In my opinion, food is sacred. I think that it is sacred because i feel like it is a drive that keeps us going in life epecially myself. I found a quote that i would agree with "One of the very nicest things about life is the way we must regularly stop whatever it is we are doing and devote our attention to eating", i feel like for most people this is true unless you are a person who is afraid of food. Most people in the world if they are hungry or anything would stop anything they are doing to eat food to satify their need.
When it comes to food my priority is to eat everything as soon possible and get "stuffed". I like to have the feeling that i am about to explode from all the food that i just ate. It kind of makes me feel good but then after a while i feel fat and do the whole routine all over again. My typical meals can fail to meet my desire depending on my emotions. As Ally stated " Some people do based they're choice in food on emotions, one person may feel sad one day a crave ice cream or chocolate", I feel like this is true. I know there has been times when i have been down and food has been able to comfort in that spare time even though sometimes i do not think it is good for me.
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