Response to Kat's Blog

While reading Kat’s blog about the meal she prepared and her agreement with Michael Pollan, I kept thinking, “Wow, this chick can cook!” Not every girl I meet knows how to cook a steak. I always thought that part of cooking a meal was the man’s responsibility, but apparently not anymore. Kat clearly points out that she used no processed foods in the meal she made, which in the article she has linked to, tells just how bad these processed foods are for our bodies. Throughout Kat’s blog, everything was clearly described and pointed out. Even little details such as how long it took to cook each part of the meal she made and what not.

I do agree with Kat’s stance on processed foods, which is the same as Michael Pollan’s views. Processed foods are one of the main causes behind the Western diet’s chronic diseases associated with it. Those who eat processed foods eat them because they are easily found and do not take long to make. Although these processed foods are easily eaten, they are not good for us at all. They are made with many chemicals and “nutrients” that have all been developed at a lab, which are not usually found in nature. These foods are referred to as “fake foods” by Michael Pollan, and he goes on to say, in order to change our diet and the health problems associated with it, we need to move towards ‘real foods.”

Post 4: Phelps' Endorsments

Michael Phelps is known as one of the best Olympic swimmers in history. Phelps endorsed huge products and companies such as Subway, Visa, Speedo, and even Kellogg’s cereals. Many people looked up to Phelps for many different reasons, which helped his endorsements, but after a leaked photo of him smoking marijuana, this may have changed. After this photo of Phelps smoking the illegal marijuana out of a bong at a college party, many of Phelps’ endorsements disappeared and the companies did not want any part of him. Kellogg’s canceled their contract with Michael Phelps, but it seems the others stayed with him. It was a smart choice for Kellogg’s to get as far away from Phelps’ as possible because Kellogg’s targets children to eat their cereals, and mothers will not want their children seeing this photo of Phelps doing illegal drugs, then telling their children to eat this cereal. If the kids listen to Phelps and eat the cereal he says to eat, they may even start doing illegal drugs as well.

Now the Olympic committee is considering banning Phelps for four years. As NOTW.com said, “he made his choice, and with this choice comes the consequences.” Even when Michael’s career may be over, his three other main endorsement contracts still remain strong, Subway, Visa, and Speedo.

These three huge companies must trust Phelps enough or he is making them enough money that this mishap does not bother them at all. If I owned such a huge company as Subway, where advertising makes you money, I would not be putting Michael Phelps in magazines eating a five dollar footlong meatball sub. I am not sure what these companies are thinking, but it is not up to me to decide who they pay millions of dollars to endorse their products.

Response to Ms. Reynolds blog post #5

After reading Amy Reynolds’ post five, I feel I have a better understanding of both sides of a major controversial issue, abortion. Amy looks at both sides of the argument, pro-choice and anti-abortion. Pro-choice is for women to chose to end their pregnancies, and anti-abortion, just as it may seem, is against abortions. Anti-abortion groups believes that a developed brain and body means a human, and if a woman has an abortion, they are killing a human, murder. I agree with Amy on her stance of this issue - pro-abortion. Women have the decision to do what ever they feel is best for themselves, which may include having an abortion.

Amy clearly states both sides of the argument, including the positives and negatives of each article she chose. One article seemed to have more information and was more convincing, while the other had simply scientific information and no other convincing information. These authors of each article have very strong feelings for their beliefs which is most likely why much of the useful information is left out. The only side we read about is the side the author agrees with and not the side that they feel is wrong. With this in mind, it can be very hard to read articles or even books that are on current controversial issues.

Post 3: "Real" food vs. "fake" food

Orange juice is a healthful drink full of nutrients and health benefits. Whenever I would go to my grandparent’s house for breakfast, they would always squeeze fresh oranges for orange juice. I would love going to my grandparents house simply because I love how the fresh-squeezed orange juice tastes. Now that I am away at school, working full time all summer long, and doing many activities, I rarely get a chance to go to my grandparents house and get fresh-squeezed orange juice. Although I am enjoying school, my job, and everything else I do, I truly miss enjoying a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice that tastes so fresh and rejuvenating. Lately I have started drinking bottled orange juice. This is usually from concentrates filled with sugars and preservatives to make sure the taste is the same after a few weeks on the shelf. I know that the bottled orange juice is not nearly as nutritious for my body as fresh-squeezed orange juice, but I still enjoy drinking it because I like the taste.

Real orange juice can easily be differentiated from bottled orange juice. Fresh-squeezed orange juice smells like what it came from - oranges. The “fake” orange juice is still orange juice, but it has many other additives that give the color of a lighter orange, where real orange juice is strictly a vibrant orange. The label on the bottled juice says a bunch of stuff that really makes me question what is in the orange juice. If it was really orange juice, none of the marketing slogans would have to be on the bottle; people should know that orange is healthy for them, and the bottle doesn’t need to reiterate that fact.

Michael Pollan writes about exactly this point in his controversial book, “In Defense of Food.” Pollan says to eat healthier, don’t buy items that have slogans on the box, bottle, or whatever packaging the item comes in because it most likely means that the item has nutrients and other stuff added to it that are not at all healthy for you. Fruitpages.com says that the bottled juices are heated, or pasteurized, which also kills special nutrients. This is exactly why Pollan says stay away from pre-made drinks and foods. Eat fresh food and you will be as healthy as can be.

Response to Mr. Ticknor’s blog post #2:

Mr. Ticknor writes about how the fast food giant, McDonald’s, has two of basketball’s best players endorse their food. Lebron James and Dwight Howard definitely do not show how McDonald’s is great for your health, being professional athletes who most likely rarely eat a Big Mac from Miccy D’s. Although Lebron James was quoted to say he endorsed McDonald’s to help out the Ronald McDonald House which helps children with disabilities pay for health bills, it still looks awkward for him to be indulging in a Big Mac. Mr. Ticknor put it the best way, “Nothing says top physical fitness like a Big Mac.”
While reading Mr. Ticknor’s blog about two professional basketball players endorsing McDonald’s and their high calorie food, I almost laughed. I didn’t know about this endorsement, but now that I am aware of this, I too am asking myself, “What are they thinking?” There is no way that those two basketball players eat McDonald’s! McDonald’s must be targeting a young athletic audience when having Lebron James and Dwight Howard endorse them, even though those young, athletic people most likely will not eat at McDonald’s because of the horrible health problems that McDonald’s food can cause. McDonald’s is straight up not good for you, no matter what you order, and athletes do realize this if they want to be in good shape; McDonald’s will not be their first choice for fast food.

Post 2: Prepare a Meal

When I get hungry in the dorms, I will usually prepare a small meal or sometimes just a snack. Today I have a craving for some high sodium Ramen Noodles. Ramen Noodles can easily be a meal for any one on a college budget. The first step to making Ramen Noodles, the fast way, is to hit the bag of Ramen very hard to break up the noodles. Once the noodles are completely crunched apart, open the bag and pour the contents into a bowl or cup. Take out the flavoring packet and pour them over the dry noodles. Now pour water over the noodles until water is slightly above the noodles. With water and the seasonings on the noodles, place the bowl in the microwave for four minutes on high. While waiting four minutes, do some homework or random activity, which makes the Ramen Noodles taste that much better after the wait. Once the microwave makes the annoying beeping noises, remove the bowl of Ramen Noodles and let stand until cool enough to indulge in.
When Michael Pollan writes about how Americans have switched over to eating more processed foods than natural foods in his book, “In Defense of Food,” I agree it is due to that fact that Americans are very lazy and careless when it comes to buying eating food. People do not want to spend time in a store searching for the healthiest meal that will most likely cost more. They will just find the cheap food and prepare a meal very fast, which I did with my meal of Ramen Noodles. There are many other websites that give ideas for cheap meals, and all include ingredients that are cheap and almost all are processed such as cheese sauce and cream of chicken soup.

Water Skiing Demo Speech Self Eval.

When I demonstrated how to get up on water skis, all main points were touched on, even though there are not many steps to follow to accomplish the hard task of getting up on two skis. I went through each step, from putting on the skis to actually skiing around on two skis. I acted as I was teaching someone to ski, which I do quite often throughout the summer, and know how to affectively show others how to do.
I look at skiing as being a very fun and energetic sport, so I tried to convey that point in my speech by laughing and telling a few humorous stories to keep the audience feeling positive towards the great sport. I could tell while watching the video of myself that I was nervous by my body movement from side to side, and my quick eye contacts with the audience. I usually do not sway when I talk to others as I did during my speech, or quickly look up and down at the audience.
The only good way to teach someone how to water ski is to show the one wanting to learn first. I did this in my speech by using a ski handle to show the direction I would be getting pulled out of the water, and how the handle effects good water skiing form. It would have been better to bring in a pair of water skis, but I did not have easy access to water skis being 200 miles away from home where all my equipment is stored.
Looking back on my speech topic, I would definitely repeat it if I had a chance because I know water skiing very well and can easily walk through the process, step by step, of getting out of the water to skiing behind the boat. If I did do this speech again, I would try to bring in a pair of water skis to add some visual assistance to the audience to more easily describe the process of water skiing as a whole. I also may show a quick video of a certain type of skiing, such as hydrofoiling, to wrap up the process.

Peer Response #1

After reading Frank Behling’s initial post, I agree completely with what he believes. Frank agrees with Michael Pollan about the way Americans have changed the way we eat over the past century or so. Food companies add nutrients to foods that lack certain nutrients, then call the reengineered food something else, such as butter, although it is really just many chemicals, margarine. The food companies do this to try to make a cheap product that has all the same benefits as a similar, natural food. Then once this food is said to be equal to its natural counter part, a “Healthy For You” label is slapped on the box, although it may not be healthy for you at all, according to Michael Pollan.

This first blog post is clearly laid out and can be clearly understood. It can easily be seen that Frank definitely agrees with Michael Pollan about how healthy processed foods are for the human body, and why these processed foods are engineered. Frank links to an article criticizing the amount of food scientists deemed to be “healthy” for humans. This list includes many natural foods such as carrots, whole grains, and fruits, all of which most people already realize to be “healthy”. Between this other article and the post, I also agree with Frank. People need to stop eating processed foods so companies quit manufacturing them, and leave science for discovering what foods are healthy and not to make healthy foods.

Post 5: Compare Two Opposing Articles

These two images show Arctic sea ice extent from January 1, 1990 (left), and January 1, 1999, (Right) respectively. These images were created using data from the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program's (DMSP) Special Scanning Microwave Imager (SSM/I). Click images to see larger pictures. Credit: NASA.

As time passes, more research is being done on global warming and its relation the melting ice caps on the North and South Pole. I found two articles on the internet relating to both sides of this following ongoing argument: are the ice caps melting, and are they the cause of global warming? This topic extremely controversial and continues to cause millions of dollars of research to be used to prove one side or the other.

The first, and more convincing article, is written by NASA, and states that over the past 40 years, the ice caps on the North and South Pole have been rapidly decreasing in area http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/environment/Perrenial_Sea_Ice.html. NASA researchers have found that the ice caps are decreasing at nine per cent per decade, and by the end of this century, there will be very little left of the ice caps. Also, studies have proven that the summer temperature on the ice caps have risen by 2.2 degrees Fahrenheit per decade, which makes me trust this article because it is not only done by NASA, which is more scientifically centered than the opposing article, but also gives numbers instead of just words to prove a point. 

The opposing article talks about how the ice caps are actually growing in size over the past thirty years. The researchers have looked at the satellite photos of the ice caps at the North and South Pole and have found that in 1979 the area of the South Pole ice cap was 15.9 million square kilometers, and in 2009 the total area is 16.3 million square kilometers http://www.globalwarminghoax.com/comment.php?comment.news.125 This is a difference of approximately 400,000 square kilometers, or about twice the size of Texas. Unlike the NASA article, this article does not seem to have any research done other than looking at satellite photos, which tells me this is not a reliable study.

Post 1: Response to In Defense of Food

Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food is very a controversial book, but Pollan does bring up many strong points about today’s status of processed foods and lack of nutrients within most foods. In the first few pages of the book, Pollan explains that with the rise of more processed foods, the rise of more chronic diseases in humans come with it. In the January issue of American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, a study was published about linking lung cancer to processed foods. Although this study was done on mice, it is a sign that we should stop, or slow down, eating processed foods due to their high inorganic content.
A great example of a highly used processed food is margarine. Margarine is what Pollan refers to as a “spreadable vegetable oil.” To me, this does not make much sense. How can an oil become spreadable if oil is liquid? Supposedly developed in the 1950s sometime, margarine has changed its label many times to advertise the newest vitamin or fat it contains. It is these types of processed foods that have caused massive health problems not only in Americans, but in people all over the world. We, as eaters, get all of this news about the newest foods and studies about foods instantly with technology of the twenty-first century. From television commercials to the newspaper, people are telling us to eat more this and less of that. Pollan describes this and wants to get his message across that not all these studies are correct because they have tested only a handful of patients with very rigorous guidelines. Once people realize that most of what they are eating on a daily basis and what people tell them to eat is not good for their health, they will stop eating poorly and become much more healthy.