Monday, January 22, 2007

McTransfat America

Someone needs to be ripped a new one for this Article &
Obesity Site and you can google more easily.

In short, from TFA, the government is now classifying obesity as a disease and is now devoting millions of taxpayer dollars to 'fighting fat'. From the site, they flatly state that “Obesity is not a simple condition of eating too much. It is now recognized that obesity is a serious, chronic disease.”

...........

Ok.

First thing is first.

I am going to state a fact.

A single, simple, clear and complete FACT.

Obesity is NOT, and CANNOT BE a disease. End of story. Period. Finished. Done.

This is also where my political correctness, as sparse as it is to begin with, is going bye-bye. You have been warned.

The primary reasons for me stating so flatly that getting/being FAT (OMFG! j0 sed teh 'f' werd! OH NOES!!1) is not, in any way, a disease are numerous.

First and foremost, fat is not contagious in any way! It's NOT caused by a type of bacteria or virii! Now, the second I walk by someone wide enough to feed Africa and I suddenly find myself unable to stop stuffing Double Quarter Pounders with Cheese and extra trans fats in my face, I'll reconsider that statement.

Second, how much you eat is a CHOICE, conscious or otherwise. You make a decision wether or not to have that fifth helping of deep fried lard nuggets.

If you're a habit eater (like me) and munch while you're doing specific actions, it's a choice. If you're a comfort eater and you eat when you're sad, lonely, tired, etc... It's still a choice. It's ALWAYS a choice.

Third and final for this post, though far from the last, fat is not directly lethal.

Yes, I am perfectly aware that millions die yearly from being grossly overweight and simply being obese causes numerous health issues. There is one problem with the argument that fat is lethal.

Getting overweight is a NATURAL BODY FUNCTION to store excessive energy that has been taken into the body.

The negative health effects are ALSO natural. Too much energy has the ability to severely damage the body. Just like too much salt, iron, vitamins, or even water. Yet when someone takes in too much, or too little, of these other needed minerals/vitamins/etc. these "experts" don't call it a disease. It's called poor nutrition which leads to the excess or deficiency.

The same for FAT, it is caused by poor nutrition and/or a poor diet. Not a bacteria or virus.

Now that I've hit my major points, I'm now going to do something rare and not only stay on topic, but tie up a few loose ends related to fatness.

To keep going, I'm sure some of you are thinking "the moron never covered eating disorders!"

Well, that's what I'm going to do now.

The two major eating disorders, bulimia and anorexia, are, arguably, also not diseases. They may be caused by any number of factors. Such as poor self image, depression, peer pressure or even personality disorders.

There are arguments of eating disorders being caused by a chemical imbalance(s) in the brain.

If this is true, anorexia and bulimia are still more of a mental disorder than a true disease.

For the most part, eating disorders are still a choice, a possibly habitual, or even addicting choice, but a choice none the less.

To wrap this up, obesity is no more a disease than the sky is a banana. They are two completly different things.

The only reason that I can possibly think of for making this claim is an extension of the 'blameless society'.

These people's poor choices got them to their scale busting proportions, now they want someone or something to blame BESIDES THEMSELVES, which are the real cause of course.

The government calling fat a "disease" will now allow all these overweight people to cry "I'm a victim!" as they shovel another bucket of fried chicken into their face while they rake in the money from the government and lawsuits lodged against numerous corporations for 'allowing poor helpless people to become so overweight'.

*siiiiiigh*

To be clear and fair, I have absolutely no problem with overweight people, being that I am one of them, as well as 90% of America.

However, when they start WHINING and BITCHING, all bets are off and they need to have their skulls raped with lead.

Saturday, January 20, 2007

Picture of the Unspecific Time Period


Looks like this guy is trying to say something


I'm starting something new for my Blog. On a highly random, but hopefully at least weekly basis, I will be uploading a random picture I find interesting and/or cool from the net or even perhaps some of my own photographic works. Look for more in the future!

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

A (Late) White Christmas

Well, it’s snowing here again, a lot, and of course the town has their big salt shakers set to “über rust” out patrolling the streets.

While this is normal, I noticed something strange about them. They were NOT plowing the roads, instead they are just dumping a ton of salt on the roads and turning them into a dangerous, slushy, slippery mess.

*Siiiiggggghhhhhh*

Now ME, I would rather drive through 2 FEET of snow before I drove through 1 INCH of slush.

When you’re driving through snow, it may be slightly perilous, however as one with over 150,000 miles on my duff after a meager 7 (nearly 8) years on the road. I’ve learned more than a few things. When you’re driving through snow it is predictable, it’s consistent, and it’s not all that slippery.

Slush, however, is an entirely different story. It’s highly unpredictable in nature, it can not is slippery, but can induce hydroplaning many, many times more easily than water and it can “pull” your vehicle as you hit thicker and thinner patches of it.

I think the worst part of winter though is the salt on the roads, it’s hard on vehicles, it’s hard on cloths and shoes, it destroys concrete, it damages trees and plants and so on and so forth…

If they could find an alternative to NaCl I’d really have nothing to complain about in regards to winter… Oh wait… they HAVE! What’s that? It also causes far less property and environmental damage?!!?!?! OMFG!

Yet they STILL refuse to use it, because it’s slightly more expensive.

Way to go people, humans putting money ahead of the planet has been steadily destroying it for years, why stop now? We still got TONS of planet to trash right? After all the cancer and birth defect rates skyrocketing MUST be a coincidence and could not possibly be linked to the toxins and chemicals we keep dumping into the air, water and land.

It will be a proud day when we as a society care more for the environment and the future than our pocket books.

Friday, January 12, 2007

Well, well, well... It appears that at least a small part of the market is speaking fairly loudly about their choice of leader of the “next gen console wars”. The simple fact is that while I don’t have a broad market view, the local (and small) view is… amusing. I recently went on an excursion to the local central capitalism outlet and I saw something interesting when I visited the games section.


5 of about 6 shelf spaces filled with PS3’s


Not a Wii to be found, or DS


Or even a GameBoy Advance (Note the literally dozens of PSP’s beside them)

These pictures represent my findings at 4 separate retail outlets within a 45 mile radius of each other. Upon further investigation and according to sales reps from each location, the Wii, DS and GBA are continuing to sell out hours after they get in new shipments and it has been like this since 2-3 weeks before Christmas.

All this time, PS3’s and PSP’s are sitting on the shelves and (quite literally I might add) collecting dust. On that same note, the slim PS2 is also selling at an extremely brisk pace, but more on that later.

The Xbox 360 is still selling, quote, “Fairly quickly, but it’s slowed down since the Christmas rush and even then it was not even going half as fast as the DS Lite. It’s been more [360] games than [360] systems.”

Nintendo systems in general are the clear winners in this part of the state and even established products like the DS Lite and Gameboy Advance are selling at a pace so brisk that retailers cannot keep enough systems in stock to meet demand. While at the same time, it’s FAR from unusual to see numerous bare spots on the game shelves for Nintendo products.

Meanwhile, Sony appears to have finally given themselves a swift kick in the ba….… you get the picture. Both models of the (very) highly priced PS3 are simply not selling. I was told by all 4 retailers that I visited, that they’d had the same PS3’s sitting around since after Christmas. One even stated they had a “ton out back”. When pressed for details, the department manager stated that they had 13.

Finally Microsoft, as with the PS3, I have not properly spent enough time with this system to fully evaluate it. However, this is not a review session, this is a status report. The Xbox 360 is currently the slowest selling next-gen console. While this may seem negative, it’s not. There is a perfectly logical reason for the slower sales of the Xbox 360, it’s already fairly well established in the market having a year head start and it would be unrealistic to expect a “rush” because of that.
On that note, game sales for the 360 are far higher then both the Wii and the PS3 combined (Caution! Authors sarcasm! Probably because there are technically only TWO for the PS3 that are original?)
This bodes well for Microsoft’s newest brainchild as strong game sales could possibly return some of the massive losses that Microsoft’s gaming division has had to absorb on the initial systems sales despite the fact the console is now finally returning a profit per system sold.


While only time and actual results truly matter in the long run, these results are interesting. So, the final conclusion from my, admittedly, fairly casual research indicates that, indeed much to their fan boys delight, in defying the trend of “more power” and instead focusing on why people want to buy a game console, Nintendo has definitely gone for “The Win” in this round.

My inner fan boy couldn’t be happier. Now, if you’ll excuse me. Elebits calls.

Sunday, January 07, 2007

Well would you lookie that....

First off, Happy New Year everyone!!

This year I resolve to make a resolution I can keep! So I'm not making one!

Seriously though I'm shooting for being more active and even starting a casual work out regime including walking, running, and free weights. The goal is not to lose weight but to increase strength and endurance.

As for the irregularity of my posting (or total lack of) I've been busy and blogging has fallen pretty far down on my list of priorities because, well, it's a blog!! It's not all that important in the long run!

Right now, I've been working on finding another job mostly, and due to that, I will most likely be moving shortly so all sorts of fun happy stuff going on there. With all due luck, I have a couple of very good friends downstate who might be getting either a new neighbor or at least one more pest in their area ^_^

It's also been kinda weird outside... it's been in the 50's and 60's all week. While this would normally be considered extremely nice weather, there is only one TINY problem with it. Being of course, as I see it, is that is JANUARY in the North Country!!!! We're normally under about 2 feet of snow and temperatures hovering around 10 degrees F right now!

"But there's no such thing as global warming!" BULL! I can not recall a January this warm, ever, and neither can my grandparents. This is ridiculous, my allergies have even been acting up do to all the moisture causing mold to have a field day.

Am I complaining? YES! Not really loudly, for I am enjoying the pleasant weather, but I am probably the only nut case on this god-overtaken dirt ball that is complaining about the weather in this area as of late! ^_^

No matter, I've been taking advantage of my free time by trying to play catch-up on a number of things i have been procrastinating on for far too long. including, but not limited to a video editing project, my chainmail (I FINALLY found another tool to cut rings with after I broke my last one!), cleaning, organizing, writing, drawing, the works....

All in all, life's just been...... what's the word I'm looking for.... interesting.