What is a garage for?

Garage. There are houses that have them and others that don't. Some have "wanna be" garages, they're called carports. A roof with no walls or a door. Essentially an umbrella for ones vehicle.

Then there are real garages...single, double, two and a half car, three car, two door, three door, single wide door, standard door or even a high bay doored ones. Garages are used to store what? Stuff you can't fit anywhere else in your house? Or outdoor essentials such as lawn mowers, bicycles, snow throwers or bar-b-que grills. What about your automobiles?

I see them used more as storage locker for junk and stuff that never gets used, or as a sitting room complete with television and stereo surround sound. If you wanted a rec room why not just leave off the overhead door and make a solid wall?

For those who live in climates that are prone to weather such as hail, snow, sleet wouldn't it make sense to park your autos inside the garage? Or do you look forward to going outside each winter morning to scrap the ice from your windows and get inside a cold interior. Using your garage to park your car inside out of the elements would solve this!

I'm the type that feels embarrassed when my garage door is open and everyone can see my garage when it is in a messy state. What are my neighbors thinking as they ride or walk by..."Look at that mess, is the inside of the house just as bad?"

Or when I pass by a house with an opened garage and everyone is sitting in the garage watching television....what's wrong with the living room? Is it so full of crap you can't sit down as an individual or group? Or are you longing for the days of a drive in theater...if so why aren't they watching the TV from inside their car?

I just don't understand. But next time there is a thunderstorm and it pelts your car with hailstones leaving little dents across it. Don't forget you do have a garage filled with all that useless stuff. Which remains safe inside while your car gets totaled sitting outside in the driveway. What am I missing? Shouldn't all that stuff be in your basement or attic instead?

Basements, why don't you have one? You have one but you don't use it? Maybe I better not get started on that topic right now.

Corn – America’s Bane?

I think it is important to take notice when the price of seed corn reaches a price that farmers cannot afford to purchase it to plant. What causes the price of corn higher on the front end (for planting) than more than what it yields on the back end (harvesting)?

Ethanol. This craze for maze to make ethanol has turned the food production system onto a mess. Arguments on both sides of the debate whether or not corn is a viable resource for the production of ethanol. So tout it uses more energy to produce than it yields. Couple that with the amount of acreage now being devoted to it; is placing great strain on the rest of the agriculture grown for food. Land once used to plant wheat, barley soybeans and oats are being used exclusively for corn.

This trend is driving food pricing askew, flour prices are soaring and creating a greater food shortage for the low income consumers.

Corn is everywhere in our lives. We used it as a fuel additive, sweeteners, fillers, feed for livestock and as an additive to treat our roads as a de-icer.

As a sweetener it is contributing to our national surge in the amount of adults with type 2 diabetes. Where natural cane sugars were once used, corn as a sweetener is now preferred because it is cheaper and more profitable. The food industry has been marketing corn and corn byproducts to us for decades.

Processed foods contain corn as a filler to stretch the core ingredients allowing for greater profitability. We feed our lives stock corn instead of the grasses they were created to eat. This creates the need for supplements and antibiotics because corn isn’t sustaining enough by itself.

Think about it, when you eat corn with a meal, does it digest in your system or does your body pass it along with the other wastes your body discharges? An ultra sweet cob of corn, steamed to the proper temperature dipped in fresh butter with a sprinkle of salt is delicious but it does the body little good. As a fiber it contributes little, other than a little gastric distress in some.

Corn is a multi billion dollar industry, it reaches all walks of life around the globe yet it provides little of the needed nutrition we require. Why do you think corn isn’t found as a wild crop? There are other grains far better than corn for consumption by animals and humans.

My Cat Is Fat

Well she is, though not in an obese way, just a full sized loving ball of fur. Actually we have two cats, sisters. One is lean and the other chubby. One prefers canned food, the other dry. The lean one is the one who will only dine on canned food. While her plumper sister nibbles just enough on the canned food to get a taste. She prefers the dry, snacking a few times a day, not gorging herself by any stretch.

So the other day I opened a new pail of litter to fill their litter boxes, inside I found a sample pack of food, dry of course. Nothing new about this, it is an effective way to get product into the hands of pet owners who will of course let their pets try it.

There is nothing to lose on the owners part, if the cat doesn't like it so what. If they do, then there is another food they'll eat if their primary choice isn't available. Our cats will only eat one type of canned food, but don't seem to be too fussy about the dry stuff.

This sample however drew their attention immediately. I don't know if it was the smell or what, but I used it as a treat. All I had to do was move the bag and they knew I had it in my hand. So while I was letting them snack on a few kibbles from the sample pack I read the ingredients.

Two of the first three ingredients were corn. The first being processed chicken by products...probably things like feathers, feet, heads, beaks and other innards we humans won't consume willingly or knowingly. Corn, well we are learning that corn causes us to get fat. It is used in one form or another in just about everything we eat that is processed. Whether it be a corn based filler, or a corn based sweetener is doesn't do the body good. Just hollow calories which turn into fat.

I don't recall seeing any of the animal documentaries about cats, large or small, wild or domestic that preferred to graze on corn. They killed rodents and other animals for substance. Lions and Tigers attacked and killed the farmers, not strip their fields of their crops. Feral cats hunt and kill birds and mice, they do not raid feed sacks full of grains.

So, I know one reason what contributes to my cats as well as my own midsection...Corn. Will I purchase this dry food based on the sample and my cats like for it? No, probably not, I love my cats and I want them to live a long healthy life. I might as well watch their diet as well as my own.

Death by Convenience

During a recent visit to the local grocery emporium to purchase the necessary foodstuffs for a week’s survival I came across something that caught my eye and had me wondering…”Why?”

Food has always been at the forefront of packaging trends for both shelf appeal and convenience of use. What has transcended is we now expect everything to be packaged for convenience. Gone are the days of cooking from scratch (well almost) and repackaging our own foods for our convenience.

Remember when your mom cut up carrots and celery and placed them in either a little plastic bag or plastic ware container then neatly placed into your school lunch sack or box? I know I am dating myself here remembering lunchboxes, but now all of this is done for us. We can purchase meals ready to eat, just like those used by the military only less healthy for us.

Now the item that caught my eye on this particular trip was little transparent “yogurt style” containers that had less than a handful of foodstuffs in them. Nuts, fruit, dried vegetables…”healthy foods”.

What we failed to comprehend as those who purchase these items is they are spending more for less. This handful of nuts for example retails for $1.99 or simply put two dollars a mouthful. A large bag of mixed nuts and a box of Ziploc sandwich bags (which can be reused for dry foods such as nuts) lowers the per serving price significantly…extremely affordable even in this time of high food prices.

Let me drop the other shoe…the container these convenience foods are packaged in for the most part are not reusable and add tremendous amounts of garbage to our landfills.

Is convenience worth it? Clearly the headlines will read “Death by Convenience”…Packaging…higher price for smaller quantities. More refuse to fill our landfills. Foods that have been and are now becoming clearly know as not good for us because of the use of highly profitable (for the food companies) ingredients ( ie…corn in its various forms).

Are you ready to buck the trend? Save money? Become more responsible for your health and the health of the environment you live in? Then it is time to start looking at ways to reduce the amount of convenience packaged foods you purchase. Dig out those old plastic ware containers you use to use.