better than prozac.

why i eat local, organic food

i came across a thoroughly disturbing story in today's New York Times, about how increased globalization is driving up imports of tainted food (tainted with "filth," bacteria, illegal pesticides, etc, and not just from China.

Nancy M. Childs, a professor of food marketing at St. Joseph University in Philadelphia, said the quality problems were an inevitable result of companies pursuing the cheapest possible products.

“As long as we are pushing for the lowest price all the time, driving our supply chain, you get more efficient,” she said. “But at a certain point there is no more efficiency and you sacrifice quality.”

While Americans increasingly buy their groceries from Wal-Mart, you'll find me at the farmer's market.

more craigslist mischief in seattle

while "420 chicago" and the like continue to be popular referrers to "better than prozac," the craigslist-related mischief continues. I gotta give this mean lady props for creativity in her revenge scheme: place an ad in craigslist that says:

“House being demolished. Come and take whatever you want, nothing is off limits. Items outside and garage will be open for access into house. Please help yourself to anything on property at 1202 East 64th Street. Tacoma"

when the address is that of your aunt, with whom you have a major beef. Oh, and the house was left bare. Everything - including the kitchen sink - gone.

neither paper nor plastic

I found an interesting story about the environmental impact of grocery sacks. Apparently, neither paper nor plastic is a good choice - both are terrible for the environment, in different ways.

Since I have switched to using re-used paper grocery bags for containing the trash, it's probably the most responsible choice for me, but I think I have waited long enough to buy proper cloth shopping bags as I am making my effort to reduce my carbon footprint. So far, the bus is working great - I'm saving money, exercising more (hello, James Street!), reducing stress, listening to more music (since I can't talk on the phone) and dedicating more brain power to my poetry and other creative pursuits, all in the process of saving the world in my own little way.

scientologists agree: tom and katie are not freaks

i admit to being a people magazine whore, but don't usually use this forum to gossip. However, the latest load of nonsense coming from the Tom Cruise PR machine is too weird to pass up. In this People Magazine story, TomKat does not just get their usual army of famous Scientologists that we are all sick of hearing from (Leah Remini, doesn't get written about unless she is talking about TomKat, Jada Pinkett Smith, John Travolta, etc.), they pull in SMART Scientologists (apparently there is such a thing - that should be the headline) Terry Semel (Yahoo! exec) and Sky Dayton (founder of Earthlink and Helio) to testify that Tom and Katie have an idyllic marriage and she is not being controlled or held prisoner by her insane husband. My favorite quote, by Mr. Dayton:

"When you come over, the first thing [Katie] does is say, 'Are you hungry? Let me make you something,' " their friend, Internet mogul Sky Dayton, tells PEOPLE.

A favorite pastime is family movie night: "Tom and Katie will get in the kitchen and make this amazing popcorn with chocolate," Dayton says. "Suri is there playing. Kate feeds her a bottle and then Tom feeds her."

You have GOT to be fucking kidding me.

As a PR lady, I have to say, WTF? Who is advising this desperate form of spin control? Listen up: most people think that Scientologists are weird and that Scientology is a cult.  So weird people from a cult attesting to the normalcy of anything is ridiculous by definition, no matter how smart the weirdos are in their business lives.

most beautiful bulldog

As an alumnus of a school that gets very little national recognition, I was delighed to see the good ol' Drake and the quasi-famous Drake Relays commanding number-one status on Yahoo's "Most E-Mailed" stories.

The Drake Relays, now in the ninety-eighth year, were always a highlight of my college experience. While major feats of athleticism were happening in the colleseum, the entire student body was in a constant state of inebriation for a week, which is the best state to be in, in the middle of the state of Iowa.

phony

ok, so i thought i had the "phony-est" job on the planet... not so much. apparently you can pretend to be interesting with the right mobile content.

portland envy

i love seattle. but i really love portland. and here is one of the many reasons why.

while seattle can't get it's shit together to complete a single transit project, from the monorail, to the 520 bridge, which is sinking and unable to handle the volume it carriers daily, the alaskan way viaduct, etc. portland has just added another, futuristic transit option to its already extremely kick-ass set of options, including a light rail and a reliable, clean and easy bus system.

and they do this all with one of the most progressive tax structures in the country. 

The baby is America, on which Bush has a frightening grip.

craigslist = babylon

apparently, the seattle police are expanding their craigslist beat...first, busting people for selling weed on craigslist, and now, apparently, arresting purveyors and customers of "erotic services."

don't these guys have something else to do? is there not real crime happening every day? craig newmark, the owner of craigslist says, "We are a democracy ... and we find we can trust our community," he said. "I don't know what the situation is like in Seattle, but we would prefer that [police] go after violent criminals or crooked congressmen."

amen!

'scuse me while i geek out

caution, this is a doubly-geeky post as it involves both npr and my nerdy job.  apparently, the sectarian violence is so terrible in iraq, that sunnis and shiites not only live segregated in bagdhad, which used to be fairly well integrated, but they must cloak their identities for survival when visiting certain areas of the city. as reported on npr earlier today, a tactic i found especially interesting is that they will change their ringtone to a "safe" religious anthem to cloak their religious identity. this takes mobile phone personalization to a whole new level.

i find myslef similarly watching how i ring when i have to be professional, fearing that my ghostface killah ringtone might draw ire or make me seem too much like someone's kid... even though everyone knows that all around the world today, the kilo IS the measure.