Education is Missing in the Lunchroom

What follows is an essay I wrote my my English 106 class:


There is no question that schools, public or private, are in place to educate children. For twelve long years, children learn facts about nearly every facet of their lives from history to geography, mathematics to biology, sex to reading and writing comprehension. Children have ample opportunities to become inspired intellectually and artistically. While education is at the core of every school, there is one place where education is sorely absent: The lunchroom.

Food, Inc. Is Being Streamed, For Free

Food, Inc. is a movie that lifts the veil on our nation's food industry, exposing the highly mechanized underbelly that's been hidden from the American consumer with the consent of our government's regulatory agencies, USDA and FDA. Our nation's food supply is now controlled by a handful of corporations that often put profit ahead of consumer health, the livelihood of the American farmer, the safety of workers and our own environment. We have bigger-breasted chickens, the perfect pork chop, insecticide-resistant soybean seeds, even tomatoes that won't go bad, but we also have new strains of E. coli — the harmful bacteria that causes illness for an estimated 73,000 Americans annually. We are riddled with widespread obesity, particularly among children, and an epidemic level of diabetes among adults.


Currently, it is being streamed FOR FREE at PBS until April 29th (http://www.pbs.org/pov/foodinc/photo_gallery_watch.php). Go watch it and tell me that it doesn't make you desire for a change in your life.


EDIT:

I've just finished watching this documentary and straight away, I purchased it. There are tremendous lies that we are being told, billions of dollars are being spent to keep us misinformed with misinformation. I cannot stress this enough: The country that I live in today is not the country that I was raised to believe it was.

Food, Inc. reminds us that in spite of the terrible things that these food companies are doing to their customers, products (the actual animals and vegetation), and the environment, the blame for this state of affairs is due to the people buying it. So buy local meats and vegetables and fruits and stop buying mass-marketed foods. Stop eating corn derivatives like High Fructose Corn Syrup. Show some concern for the other people, animals, and environment out there. Everyone likes to think that they cannot do something. That they are just one single person and their voice doesn't mean anything. Food, Inc. shows that this is not true by just looking at how Wal-Mart has stopped selling milk with growth hormone due to the amount of money their customers were spending. They sell organics due to customer desire and do you really know what this means? It means that there is a little bit less of the horrors we have allowed the food industry become.

Please, if you do nothing else between today and the 29th of April, watch Food, Inc. for free through the link provided above. The more people who watch this documentary means that the more people can realize that every time they spend their money of crap, they are voting for the company who makes that crap to make more of it... and every time they spend their money on wholesome items like locally grown produce and meats and organics, that it tells those companies who make crap to make less of it and invest in better food because the people prefer it. I know that my lifestyle, eating Paleo, may seem odd to many people (even though the science is all there as well as a great deal of common sense), what this documentary shows affects us all. I'm begging you, share the link with friends and family, print this page and hang it around the office, copy and share the link around the internet. Because if we will not save ourselves... who will?

Primal Hell for Eaters in San Fransisco on Mondays

Meatless Monday Reports:

This past week, the city by the bay raised the bar in both arenas by becoming the first Meatless Monday city! The resolution passed by San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors ensures that residents will gain greater access to healthy, meatless options while learning about the connection between what they eat and their health.
The resolution to make Mondays meatless was introduced by supervisor Sophie Maxwell, who hopes that residents will use this opportunity to make nutritious, sustainable choices. San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors agreed that Meatless Monday is a smart way to start the week, passing the resolution unanimously! According to ABC news, Maxwell’s Meatless Monday declaration will “encourage restaurants, schools and grocery stores to offer plant-based options”.

So what does this mean? For one, it means that San Fransisco is pandering to the vegetarians and are not listening to all the new research and studies proving how healthy meat is for you. For another, it means that those Primals and Paleos that are living in San Fransisco are not going to be dining out on Mondays.

Heavy Metal Wines

There are a good number of studies out there about wine that speak about the various health benefits of wine.



Polyphenals in wine are extremely healthy, there is research showing the polyphenols break down the oxidation of dietary fat, that red wine contains 5-10 times as many phenals than white and that white wine contains zero amounts of resveratrol,that same resveratrol can combat cancer and reduce the signs of aging or protect against it completely, that you get a 30% increase of antioxidant activity when you mix wine and berries together, that both red and white wine prevents cavities, the polyphenols in red wine block the formation of proteins that build the plaques long-thought to destroy brain cells and promote senility and Alzheimer’s, that the consumption of red wine seemed to increase the concentration of omega-3s which everyone should be consuming more of, and that wine gives those that drink it a better immunity and resistance to infectious cold viruses than those who do not drink.

To be honest, I could keep going, but I feel that it is not really necessary.

Dresden Files RPG - Preorder and Impressions

According to the Dresden Files twitter account,

Incredible first-day response to the preorder (and it's not over yet) -- 240+ copies of Your Story, 230+ of Our World preordered already.

I, unfortunately, have not yet pre-ordered the books, but I want to oh so very much. I have read all of the Dresden Files books and am trying to get my wife to read them as well, after all, I will need to have at least one player to play the Dresden Files RPG with me once it gets here. I am in love with the tv show, even though it had a short duration, and am naively hoping that the interest for the RPG will help to bring the show back to life with at least a second season or a movie in the same vein that Firefly had Serenity.

So, what is someone without the actual pdf's to do? Live vicariously. There is an excellent thread at rpg.net detailing the impressions of those who have already pre-ordered the RPG and have digested the pdf's as much as possible. What is nice is that Fred Hicks is involved in the thread as well, offering answers to many of the questions.

And where to pre-order this wonderful Dresden Files RPG book duo? Why at Evil Hat of course.

Here's the lowdown about this preorder:
You will get a nearly-complete version of the PDF of each book you order as soon as your payment is confirmed by the website software. Instant gratification!
Updated PDFs will be made available once a final version is achieved.
The actual books will not ship out until late June/early July.
You'll be paying up front.
If you place an order of $79 or more, you'll get free shipping in the USA. So if you get one of each book, or two copies of one, you'll qualify.
For our international customers, we've dropped the estimated weight on the books by 20%. This should save you close to $10 on the shipping costs, but they're still going to be steep. Our apologies, but that matter's out of our hands. Make sure you're aware of the customs issues you may face if ordering internationally!
We're only able to take payment via Paypal. Sorry about that if you're unable or unwilling to use that service!
For those of you who want to order locally but still get the PDFs...
We are partnering with retail game stores to make the "instant content preorder" possible through their stores. This option may be particularly cost-effective for international customers if there is a game store in their country (or in the EU) able to handle the preorder. If you'd like your store to sign on board for this, please contact them, let them know about the possibility, and point them to the Evil Hat contact page to let us know about their interest.
Right now we have the following stores on board with our instant content preorder program:
USA - Endgame (Oakland, CA); North Coast Role Playing (Eureka, CA); Black Diamond Games (Concord, CA); Gameopolis (Idaho Falls, ID); Comic Book World (Florence, KY); Myriad Games (Salem, NH); Rainy Day Games (Aloha, OR); The Dreaming (Seattle, WA)
Internationally - Leisure Games (UK); Sphaerenmeisters Spiele (Germany); Mark One Comics & Games (New Zealand)