Octopodial Chrome

Kelly Pless went from 220 pounds to 125 (from very fat to really rather hot) via a simple formula: eating less and exercising more. One key approach she took was to look at portions and to listen to when she was actually hungry, as opposed to eating because she wanted to or was expected to.

Dr. Kent Sepkowitz, a physician from New York, argues that the recent E. coli outbreaks argue for more contaminated food. His thesis is this: that our food (and environment) is too clean, which means that when we do end up encountering a pathogen our crippled immune systems can’t handle it, and we get nastily sick.

I dunno if he’s correct: if there were more dirt in our food, mightn’t we just be exposed to nastier pathogens more often?

In this modern world of telecommuting, of moving wherever one’s job takes one, of families and friends scattered across the continent, we lose track of the people we know. In a world of suburbs, automobiles and freeways we lose track of people unlike us. Noonhat aims to fix that. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer examines the idea: set 2–4 random people up for lunch together and see what happens. It’s an opportunity to get to know one’s fellow man and to network. Also, it beats eating alone.

Right now you can sign up anywhere in the US, but it appears to be most heavily used around Seattle; perhaps my blog readers can evangelise it somewhat.

Well, it had to happen eventually: the first of my friends has turned 30. My frequent beer touring (2005; 2006; and 2007, which I neglected to write about) and college buddy Darren Antoniello is thirty today.

I don’t know how it happened; it seems just yesterday that we graduated college; it’s hard to believe that we started college over a decade ago. I remember how much we teased Darren when he turned 20 months before the rest of us; back then age was welcomed but now it doesn’t seem nearly as funny.

This year Darren & I have crossed paths incredibly often. First he was in town late in the spring or early in the summer on a business meeting; then I saw him in Chicago. Shortly after that we went to the Oregon Brewers’ Festival, which was a blast: we hiked from downtown to the rose garden and zoo up in the mountains; we drank lots of good beer; we ate some fine food; we drank lots of good beer; we saw the Simpsons premier—oh, and before I forget, we drank lots of good beer. The very next weekend he and our fellow college pal Phil came into town. We went and saw a concert at Red Rocks (wish I’d blogged about that; ’twas an experience) and the next day went on a beer tour with my brother John. It was very cool for the three of us college roommates to be sleeping under the same roof and hanging out together again after so long.

And now Darren is 30, and soon enough I’ll be, and Phil will be; in time even Phil’s wife (who’s younger than us all, and whom we teased for being 17 when we were freshmen together) will be. Time flies.

I’ve said it before, and will say it again: the only thing worse than getting older is the alternative.