It’s up on the podcast page on this site and on major platforms. Be sure to subscribe! I wrote a short post about the food choices pyramid back awhile ago and this material greatly expands on those ideas. Episode #1 and this one are introductory episodes that you’ll want to listen to in order to have a clear perspective on my foundational ideas. After that you can certainly pick and choose according to your interests. (All of them will be fascinating, of course.)
Last Tuesday I had some fairly minor foot surgery and have been limping around in a surgical shoe ever since. For vast stretches of time I’ve been lying on the couch with my foot elevated on a stack of pillows, a position that makes it very difficult to type. (That’s my excuse, anyway. When my son was going through his cancer and experiencing terrible back pain, he wrote all of his end-of-semester papers while lying back in a recliner and balancing a small laptop on his knees. If he could do that, surely I can type while on the couch!)
So what did I do? Well, I spent a vast amount of time watching cooking videos on YouTube. What’s been really amazing to me is how easy it is to get sucked down the rabbit hole of similar content, all guided by YT’s genius sidebars. You watch one video on a specific subject, and now you have tons more to watch on the same subject. I knew this marketing strategy well and have seen it at work in my life before, but I’ve never spent such an extended period of time letting myself just take it all in, drooling. (Well, drooling metaphorically.) Here’s a rough throughline of how I’ve gotten to know a whole host of cooking people I didn’t even know existed, starting from well before the surgery, showing how researching just one recipe can lead you far astray:
Ho-kay. I’ve been diving down rabbit holes all over the place this morning as I try to come to some conclusions about these rather weird substances called “sugar alcohols” or “polyols,” with the most commonly used ones being sorbitol, xylitol, and erythritol. Can you just buy a bag of a powdered polyol and put it in the place of sugar in your pantry and your food? Is that change going to make you into the person of your dreams? Well, sigh, as is so often the case, the answer is no.
Somehow, we have to manage to do two contradictory things at once: Passionately enjoy and pursue the present, with whatever challenges and pleasures it holds, and at the same time keep at least a corner of our minds focused on what comes next.
I’ve been pondering this lately because, and I’m sure you couldn’t possibly have guessed this, I’ve been listening to Liz Craft, a TV writer and producer and the sister of Gretchen Rubin. I reference her podcasts all the time,
I thought that I had covered the major fad diets out there but realized that there are a few more to aim at. Before I plunge into more of these scams, I figured it would be a good idea to write more generally about how to make informed decisions about your health or anything else. Ridiculous new ideas are coming down the pike every day. Here are some guidelines you can use:
Now you know what I’m going to say:
If it’s a fad, forget it.
And if there were ever a fad diet, Whole30 is it. It has become especially popular among young(er) people, with Facebook groups and the whole nine yards. Meanwhile, actual nutritionists and dieticians, people who study science, are clutching their heads and moaning.
I could just re-write the posts I wrote on the food-sensitivity tests for my material on this eating plan, but I won’t, because there are some additional fats in the fire (ha!) here. First, let me tell you a story:
So, this woman I know said that she had been in a town where she had lots of old friends, and a group of them decided to go out to dinner.
A short post today in which I publicize my other blogs and platforms and encourage you to subscribe. Here goes:
1. Are you subscribed to this blog? You may have stumbled upon it in a Google search. If so, and you’d like to get e-mailed updates, be sure to use the signup form on the sidebar. Whenever I post something new you’ll get a brief e-mail with a link to the actual post. This happens 3-4 times a week at most, and the posts themselves are fairly brief. I try to keep things no longer than about 1,000 words. You’ll get the title and the first line or so. If that doesn’t grab you, just delete that e-mail, and another one will show up in a few days that you may like better.
As we head further into the holiday season I think it’s a good time to launch my series on respecting food roles. Indeed, sometime over the next few weeks you’ll see this entire site transform before your very eyes! The banner will change from its leafy tendrils to a food-related theme and the name will change from “Intentional Living” to “Respect Food Roles.” And what are those roles? Glad you asked. As I’ve thought about that question I’ve come up with only two legitimate ones:
I try to keep politics off of this blog (but you can head over to Intentional Conservative or my personal Facebook page to read what I have to say on the current state of affairs). I will just explain here that I got acquainted with Tom Nichols when I first started reading about the upcoming election in the spring/summer of 2016. He showed up in this article on The Federalist Blog (which is not the same as The Federalist Society, btw). Wow, I thought, What clarity, and what courage. I’ve been following him ever since. He suspended his blog about a year ago and he writes very few articles these days, but man! Whenever he does so I am so on it. I also periodically go onto his Twitter account when I feel the need for a blast of fresh air and common sense. He’s one of those people who gets attacked from all sides, so he must be doing something right—right?
Hi folks! I’m finally back to the blog after five weeks off. My last post was written on May 14, three days before we departed on our big trip to France. My intentions were good about writing some posts from the road, but that never happened. I think I started one post early on and never came back to it; after that I just let it slide. When we got home I had tons of ideas I wanted to write about, but they weren’t the kind of thing that lends itself to an article. Rather, I’m working on a short book, tentatively titled “The Intentional Traveler: An Insanely Detailed and Practical Guide” or some such. Originally I thought of it as a Kindle single and a downloadable PDF, thinking that I’d shoot for about 10,000 words. Well, I’ve written only two sections and am already well over that mark. There’s just so much about traveling, just as there is about life in general, that never gets discussed. Well, I’m your person on the spot for that. I always want to know that backstory, the details, the procedure. If you’ve ever read one of my recipes you’ll know that my notes are sometimes as long as the recipe itself. I want you to know all about how to make it!
