Category Archives: Social Issues

You Catch More Humans with Honey than with Vinegar

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Jenny and I have a confession to make: we are both sugar addicts.

We know it’s wrong, and we’ve talked about trying to cut back, but we don’t want to stop, and no one around us is quitting either. But now that gestational diabetes has forced Jenny’s hand, we are both revisiting the whole issue of sugar.

I don’t know about you, but I eat sugar throughout the day. For breakfast I drink coffee with flavored, sweetened creamer, orange juice, and fiber cereal coated in sugar. For dinner I might enjoy a meal that seems not to contain much sugar, but I’ll want some cookies or a bowl of ice cream for dessert. If we’re eating out, I love to enjoy a Coke, and not just a 12oz can, either. At work overnight, I drink more coffee with flavored, sweetened creamer, a bagel (not too bad), a banana (fructose, a simple sugar), and yogurt (sounds healthy, but makes the healthy stuff more appealing by adding sugar). If I’m “lucky”, someone will drop off a cake or something in the breakroom for us. When I go too long without sugar, I start craving it and searching for it – maybe a few M&Ms, or a little candy bar, or some chocolate trail mix, or a swig of eggnog.

Jenny is going through sugar withdrawal. She’s handling it well, but it’s surprisingly difficult. Her body is accustomed to running largely on sugar, which provides quick energy. Now she’s making her body run more on other sources, such as protein and complex carbohydrates that take longer to break down. It’s a weird feeling, she says. The only reason I’m not going through withdrawal with her is because I’m trying to eat up most of the sugar in the house myself. To get rid of it, you see. I hate to waste food. Actually, the truth is that I know I’ll have just as much trouble if/when I cut back on the sugar. Sounds like an addiction to me.

If you Google “effects of sugar”, you’ll find tons of information about how harmful sugar can be. I don’t know how much of it is true, but much of it makes sense. Our bodies don’t seem to run as well on sugar as they do on other fuels. Some research suggests that sugar suppresses your immune system, accelerates aging, and contributes to cancer and heart disease, among many others.

I am curious about how I would/will feel if I quit or cut back significantly. I’ve finished off the Dr Pepper. Once I finish the ice cream, maybe I will find out. I suspect that after the initial few days of unpleasantness, I would be in for a pleasant surprise.

Insights from Gas Buddy

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Here are a few things I’ve picked up so far from using GasBuddy:

  1. Gas prices move en masse at all stations, but some stations are generally cheaper relative to the others in the area. In north Euless where we live, the stations on Harwood are 8-10 cents cheaper than the ones on Mid-Cities or 121. The higher-priced stations are closer to or provide easier access to Grapevine, which is more affluent than Euless. Their location could explain the price difference. Even if you don’t check GasBuddy all the time, you can still use it to find the station near you that generally costs less.
  2. If gas prices are trending up, fill up more often to take advantage of the lower prices before they rise again.
  3. If you’re into foo-foo gasoline (mid-grade or premium), pay attention to those prices in particular. Some stations charge 10 cents extra for each step up from regular, but others add 15 or even 20 cents. That difference can add up.

What’s Wrong with the Drug Companies

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Brenden is a very healthy little boy except for one thing, a chronic case of diaper rash. His poor booty has been every shade of red you can imagine. Suspecting a yeast infection, his pediatrician prescribed a special ointment. Unfortunately, our insurance doesn’t cover it. The cost is around $250 for an 8oz tube that might last a week or two. Once the pharmacist broke the bad news to Jenny, she prepared to leave. Then the pharmacist pulled her close and showed her the list of ingredients for the ointment:

  • Triple Paste, an excellent diaper rash cream that we were already using
  • Vaseline
  • Monistat

“You can make this yourself using over-the-counter ingredients,” the pharmacist said. So we did. We already had the Triple Paste. Jenny bought a tube of store-brand Monistat for about $4 and decided the Vaseline wasn’t really necessary. Total cost: $4 instead of $250.

I’m not saying all drug companies are evil or that all drugs are simply combinations of cheap OTC products. I am saying that it’s really hard not to hate the drug companies as an industry when they combine such cheap, simple ingredients and sell them for over 50 times what the drug cost to produce.

From Normal to Cover Girl in 1min 14sec

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Dove has a great program called Campaign for Real Beauty that seeks to change our definition of beautiful. One tool is a video called Evolution that shows how lighting, makeup, and Photoshop can transform a normal-looking woman into a model on a billboard. Pretty amazing, eh? Almost any image you see of a woman in a magazine has been digitally altered, sometimes extensively. Kudos to Dove for speaking the truth.

Liberty and Responsibility

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The Obama administration is proposing some new rules for certain federal and other employees to prohibiting texting while driving. Some states already have some restrictions in place regarding the use of cell phones while driving, both for talking and texting. The Dallas Morning News posted a good article on the proposal.

A couple of people I know from work strongly oppose such a law, claiming it’s yet another example of big government interfering with personal liberty. Presumably, in their view, people should have the right to make bad decisions even if those decisions hurt other people. Although I can see their point, I strongly disagree with them.

The primary purpose of law is to force people to behave responsibly when they refuse to do so voluntarily.

People make decisions based on a variety of motivations, such as love, hate, duty, fear, peer pressure, and greed, to name a few. In the case of texting while driving, just like drinking while driving and any number of other choices, positive motivations such as love and duty have failed miserably. Human beings in general just don’t care enough about strangers to stop doing many activities that put others at risk. If our goal as a society is to eliminate the damage caused by people’s stupid choices, legislation and punishment seems to be the only viable solution. Like it or not, the fear of punishment is often the only reason that sinful people like us will do the right thing.

What do you think?