I was just reading in my local newspaper The Pantagraph, this article which ran the middle of May. It asks are we getting too much information about the food we order when we eat out? New laws and regulations are coming about the require restaurants to publish nutritional facts about the food they serve. These nutritional facts range from simple calorie counts which are misleading to drawn out tables about number of not only calories, but also sodium, carbs, and fat and cholesterol. While the fact is that the more information the restaurant provides to the consumer the easier it is to make healthy choices, the more detailed information often ends up becoming more confusing thus potentially causing someone to say I don’t have time for all this, just give me the Big Mac that I always get. That Big Mac has 540 calories, 29 grams of fat (which is 45% of your recommended daily intake for fat),75 mg cholesterol (which is 25% of your daily recommended daily intake) and 1040 mg of sodium (which is 43% of your daily recommended daily intake). Ok, I admit all these numbers can be daunting, but to me they are like a big Wow put right in my face. By having this one big mac I’ve had almost half of my fat and cholesterol for the day? Wait just a minute here, I only have one sandwich at one meal here? I haven’t even had a drink to wash this sandwich down and who can go to McDonald’s and not have french fries with their Big Mac. But you’ll notice that the sandwich only has 540 calories which ok, in and of itself we can work around in a typical 2000 calorie diet. But everything these days has fat and cholesterol added to it. Now let’s add a large french fries to our sandwich. Our large fries have 500 calories, 25 grams of fat (38% of daily intake), and 350 mg of sodium (15% of daily intake). I’m more than shocked to learn that they don’t have any cholesterol. So we haven’t had to add any cholesterol, but did you notice the fat of the french fries? Between the Big Mac and French fries we have consumed 83% of our fat for the day. That only leaves us 17% of our fat to have with the remaining almost 1000 calories we still need to consume today to keep our metabolism up.
Instead of publishing all these nutrition facts which I do appreciate, but I also wish that restaurants could take some time to do research on ways they can reduce such things as sodium in their food products. Like for example how much can we cut without sacrificing taste? My bet and guess would be that at least some sodium or cholesterol could be cut. If a restaurant was able to have a research lab I bet they could cut up to 500 mg of sodium. I mean do we really need that much sodium or is it just easier and cheaper to put those pickles loaded with sodium on the burgers rather than finding a healthier alternative. I know I take my pickles of my sandwiches, but the juice from the pickles has still gotten on my food thus adding sodium I don’t need. How about making the pickles a choice that people can ask for? I know the pickles aren’t the only culprits of the sodium, but they are an easy example I can give. I just feel that there are probably simple swaps of ingredients or recipe adjustments that restaurants could make to let us have the same taste at a healthier ratio.
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General
by
DawnG
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I went to dinner tonight with my Grandma and roommates at Bob Evans. Grandma is generally one for a good laugh or story and tonight was no exception. She had on her bathing suit socks. Speaking of a good laugh, Grandma is hard of hearing and refuses to wear her hearing aids. Well, I just called her on the phone to ask her for sure when she got her socks and she thought I was asking her when she got her shots. So, I’m not sure when she got her shots nor what those shots were for, but this story of the socks is about 10 years old as are the socks themselves. My Grandparents have never been one to buy themselves anything new so Grandma had this really ratty looking old bathing suit and had been wearing it to the Y for a while. Well, Grandpa was just a tad bit embarrassed. So one day he sent her out to go shopping and told her not to come back without a bathing suit. So Grandma went out and looked everywhere for a suit and then came home. When she came home Grandpa asked her if she had bought a bathing suit and she was like yes, I sure did. I bought several as a matter of fact. This pleased Grandpa and surprised him as she had given him so much grief about buying just one, until she showed him the bathing suits she had bought. She had bought
~~Drumroll please~~~~Drumroll please~~~~Drumroll please~~~~Drumroll please~~~~Drumroll please~~~~
a pair of socks with bathing suits on them…
Well, she did buy bathing suits. And Grandpa just had to laugh about it.
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Family and Pets
by
DawnG
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Great American Meat Out- Today is the 25th anniversary of this event.Every March 20th Meatout supporters ask their friends, families, and communities to kick the meat habit, even if only for a day. Sorry, I had a hamburger for lunch, so I will try to be more conscious next year..
Proposal Day- This holiday comes about twice a year on the vernal and autumnal equinox. It is intended for those couples who are close to the wedding stage to take the leap and pop the question to that person they know to be the One.
Kiss Your Fiance Day- Today is the day for all you brides and grooms to be to forget about all the stresses of the wedding planning and just enjoy your bride or groom to be by kissing them.
National Jump Out Day- On this day kids and adults are asked to get off the couch and see how many times in a row they can jump without stopping.
Won’t You Be My Neighbor Day- Today is the day for celebrating Fred Rogers. Neighbors are encouraged to wear their favorite sweater and go visit their neighbors.
Snowman Burning Day celebrates the end of winter and welcomes spring.
Ostara, National Agricultural Day, National Quilting Day, Corn Dog Day round out the list of holidays for today.
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Digital Art
by
DawnG
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Absolutely Incredible Kids Day is just that all about the kids. The kids in our lives are tomorrow’s leaders and are the ones who will care for my generation when I hit senior citizen status. Our kids are our future, so let’s show them how absolutely incredible they are. I know my life would not be the same without my niece being such an amazing part of it. The purpose of this day and celebration is to write a letter of love and support to the children in our lives. Will you write a letter to the special children in your lives?
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Children, Holidays
by
DawnG
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St Patrick’s Day was named after St. Patrick, patron saint of Ireland. What became as a purely Catholic holiday, it became a feast day in the 1600′s and then gradually has turned into a secular celebration of Ireland’s culture. Interestingly enough the original official color of St. Patrick’s Day was blue but eventually the association with the color green grew. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Patrick%27s_Day
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Digital Art, Holidays
by
DawnG
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Napping Day was founded in 1999 and is always the first Monday after the change to Daylight Savings time. It was established by Camille and William (Bill) Anthony. The purpose of this day is to help employees catch up on their sleep. It is celebrated by allowing the employees an one hour nap usually at lunchtime. So if you are feeling a little tired at work today go ahead and take that nap. I wonder how many places of employment actually observe this. If your company does, please let us know.
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Digital Art
by
DawnG
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Today is the day to celebrate America’s favorite snack. The potato chip. The potato chip was invented in the summer of 1853 in New York when a man by the name of George Crum. George had been employed at a elegant resort and one guest in particular kept finding his french fries too thick for his liking. After the customer sent the fries back several times, Crum decided to “show him”. He cut them paper thin, fried, and salted them. To his surprise the customer loved them and they became a national phenomenon.
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Holidays, Unusual and Odd
by
DawnG
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Donald Fauntleroy Duck’s official birthday is recognized as June 9, 1934 which is the day his debut film was released, but many references since then have put his birthday to March 13, so I’m celebrating his birthday today. In the Donald Duck cartoon, “Donald’s Happy Birthday” Donald’s nephews sit in their clubhouse trying to decide what to get Unca Donald for his birthday. Behind them on the wall is a calendar which reads March 13. Bob Bishop has an interesting webpage on Donald Duck.
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Digital Art
by
DawnG
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Today is the last day in the celebrating your name week. Today we celebrate by studying our genealogy. I admit I have never studied my genealogy, other than the simple family trees we had to do in school. Other members of my family have though and I do find their findings interesting. How many of you have studied your families genealogy? Have you discovered that you were related to a famous movie producer or actress along the way? Maybe Donald Trump’s long lost relative? Who have you found in your family tree that made it all worth while to piece together? Maybe you’ve simply located a cousin that you didn’t know you had and now you’ve become the best of friends. What does your family tree say about you?
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Celebrate Your Name Week, Holidays
by
DawnG
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I’ve always been known to put things off to the last minute or be a day late and a dollar short for everything. Well, as usual, this is another example of that phenomenon. This week is Celebrate Your Name Week with today being specifically being Middle Name Pride Day. Of course this is the second to last day to this very special week. So today I’m going to ask you, what is your middle name? Do you wear it with pride? My middle name is Christine and I do wear it with pride. I am a 4th generation with the middle name Christine in my family and my niece is carrying on the tradition by being the 5th generation. How many of your friends and family members do you know their middle names? Do you have three people in your circle that don’t know your middle name? Why not share it with them and ask them to share theirs with you as well. Let’s see how many different middle names we can come up with today.
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Celebrate Your Name Week, Holidays
by
DawnG
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