kirstie alley is full of shit

Anyone who knows me, knows that I have admired Oprah Winfrey for many years. I am particularly enamoured with her philanthropic work, although her determination to overcome adversity and become the architect of her own massive success is also quite admirable. In the last couple years, though, the sheen has worn off as she more frequently and enthusiastically embraces the superficial on her show (and in her magazine, which I stopped reading about a year ago). More importantly, I am deeply disappointed when she exhorts to her millions of fans -- many of whom hang on her every word -- that emulating said superficialities will improve their lives.

She embodies contradiction. And she should know better.

Building schools for girls in Africa improves lives. Rebuilding homes in the Gulf Coast improves lives. Allowing audience members to help their communities with the aid of $1000 debit cards improves lives. Increasing the literacy of millions of otherwise bookless TV zombies improves lives. She knows these things: she's done them all and more.

So, when she spends a ridiculous amount of time over a couple years glorifying Kirstie Alley's weight loss extravaganza, I have to wonder a couple things. First, how is she able to conveniently forget her own experience with years of yo-yo dieting? Second, how much money is Jenny Craig, Inc. paying to have their name sprinkled so liberally on one of daytime TV's most watched television shows? Third, in the year 2012, what will the Oprah show episode be like when Kirstie comes back to wage her next inevitable battle of the bulge?

Oprah is guilty of perpetuating the false hope that weight loss is possible (when 95% of the time, it's not), and that it solves all of life's problems (when 100% of the time, it does not). So when I started to watch yesterday's TiVo'd Oprah show -- the one highlighting Ms. Alley's bikini entrance -- I deleted it after only watching the first few minutes. Thinking I'd done my duty for Size Acceptance by rejecting the show outright, I moved on to the computer to check email and read some news.

But there she was again. I might have let the whole thing slide were it not for this article. In it, Ms. Alley simultaneously flaunts her newly-svelte body and claims she's not defined by it.

"I think women -- I don't think we ever feel like we're good enough. We don't feel like we're thin enough or pretty enough or smart enough or work hard enough. And we are good enough... . The bikini thing is neither here nor there, other than the fact, you know, I am 55 years old. So I thought -- come on, we are all good enough. And we look good enough. And we are not our bodies." - Kirstie Alley

Hogwash. Poppycock. Balderdash.

How is it possible to say you're good enough after spending two years chastising yourself in a veritable media blitz? It's not. It's all horseshit. Bullshit. Publicity. And the happy "look, I lost weight and look fabulous and YOU SHOULD TOO!" routine is just one more hammer banging away in a universe of hammers that pound the message that thin=happy+healthy and fat=unhappy+unhealthy and there's nothing in the middle. It doesn't matter that nothing in life is that straightforward.

And I again dissolve into the continuation I don't have the time or energy to follow-through on. So, I'll end tonight's rant on a note mentioned before in this space. John Tierney of the New York Times wrote a nice piece called "Fat and Happy" that mentioned this great concept identified by George Armelagos, an anthropologist at Emory University. Speaking of popular preference for body types, he calls the relatively recent desire for thinness the "King Henry VIII and Oprah Winfrey Effect." This is how it's explained:

"In Tudor England, it took hundreds of gardeners, farmers, hunters and butchers to keep Henry VIII fat. In America today, anyone can bulk up without help, but it takes a new set of vassals - personal trainer, nutritionist, private chef - to keep Oprah from looking like Henry VIII."

this is painful

Today's song count is 4148. Sunday's was 4083. At this rate (32.5 songs per day), and using my estimate of 40,000 total songs, it will take me three years, one week, and two days to get everything uploaded. Ack.

I have two problems hindering my speed. Whenever iTunes is importing a CD, it slows everything else down. Really badly. Very frustrating and it reduces my productivity on all projects. Also, every now and then when I insert a disc, iTunes asks me to choose which disc it should reference. Unfortunately, the options are often identical with no way for me to tell what differentiates them or -- more importantly -- which one reflects the correct information for my specific CD.

Tonight's touble child was Jack Johnson's "In Between Dreams." The prompt showed me the same three choices, but when I picked one, the track list was completely wrong. I removed and re-inserted the disc hoping to get the prompt again to choose a different one, but it now automatically associates this disc with my incorrect choice. So, either I do some research and find out how to fix this problem (which requires far more work than I want to do), or I let the stupid thing upload with the wrong track list and manually fix everything afterwards (which is even stupider). ACK!

Someday, probably three CDs away from having everything transferred to the computer (November 15, 2009), I'll figure it out. Tonight's additions are as follows (in absolutely no order and with no reasons):

• Wilco "Yankee Foxtrot Hotel"
• Sting "The Dream of the Blue Turtles"
• Cheap Trick "Authorized Greatest Hits"
• Montell Jordan "This is How We Do It"
• Robert Downey Jr. "The Futurist"
• Pete Belasco "Get It Together"

Ah, the pain I must endure for my music. Now, onto the next blog entry. Two in one night!

4083

Not blogging much these days. Stuff going on. Y'know. I've actually been spending a lot of time doing chores around the house, and preparing for Christmas. The vast majority of our shopping is done, and stocking assembly has begun in earnest. The list of things left to get is incredibly small, so I'm very excited.

We've also made a slight change in the manner in which we'll be giving gifts this year, which will ultimately allow us to finish our preparation even earlier than normal. This will allow us even more time to fully enjoy the holidays without any of the gift-related stress. It is indeed the most wonderful time of the year (favorite version, Andy Williams, though I love the warbly happiness of Johnny Mathis's interpretation).

This year's addition to my holiday music collection started early with the purchase of three albums -- a reissued/remastered classic that I never got the first time around, a new release from a seasoned veteran, and the ethereal sweetness of a newer artist (well, "newer" relative to the first two artists).

Although Bette and Herb are on CD, I procured Sarah through iTunes. It was daring and bold and unconventional for me to go virtual on that one, because for some inexplicable reason, it just feels like my holiday music collection should be tangible. Obviously, I got over it by about a third, so perhaps by 2008, I'll have kicked the CD habit altogether.

These newest additions have all been added to my iTunes library, but I've only listened briefly to bits of the songs. For as much as I love holiday music, I'd still like to have a little time to savor autumn (my favorite season). I'll have plenty of time to saturate the air around me with Christmas tunes in the weeks before December 25th. That said, I did listen to the entirety of Sarah McLachlan's "Christmas Time is Here." It is stunningly beautiful and a respectable tribute to the Vince Guaraldi classic.

Adding these new purchases to the collection was the simple part. And I can rest easy knowing that -- when I'm ready to delve head-first into the Holiday genre shuffle -- I'll be prepared. Considerably more challenging is converting the rest of my music collection to digital form. I'd delayed doing this in the past because of an inadequate computer system. That has been resolved, and now the time must be spent importing CDs.

As of today, when I was only able to import six CDs (other chores and a nap induced by an oncoming cold beckoned), my iTunes library numbers 4083 songs (note: approximately 1000 of those are Christmas songs). By my no-doubt-inaccurate guesstimate, if I am able to get everything from all my CDs and records onto the computer (sometime before I die of old age), that number should rise to about 40,000. I'm curious to see how close I come to being correct on that estimate. But it's going to take a very long time (and the addition of a new piece of equipment) before I'll know. Drops in a bucket. Watch for updates to see the number grow.

Post-script: I went heavy on parenthetical phrases this entry. What gives?

testing 1, 2, 1, 2

I'm on the new beta version of Blogger which allows me to label my posts, thereby grouping similar posts. Cool, eh? But because I'm in full Saturday morning chore mode, and we have company coming over for Round 3 of the Lost Season 2 catch-up viewing, I don't have a lot of time for silly things like reading instructions. So, I'm just going to think up a few quick labels and make this post part of all of them.

Post-Lost tonight, I may come back to try a new post. Isn't the anticipation just too much?

warped

I don't know which is worse -- the lengths to which the beauty industry goes to create an unrealistic image presented as the ideal, or some of the idiotic comments that follow this clip on the YouTube page.



Today is Love Your Body Day. I say, love it every day.

the men of television

I should probably be reading the stack of books that continues to accumulate in my section of our library. Or even, less esoterically, the pile of entertainment rags adorning the coffee table. Instead, there are a few television shows that have really caught my attention. Bones, a carryover from its first season last year, is still a favorite. And I just love the new Sci-Fi Channel series, Eureka. I haven't missed an episode.

Alas, there is a bigger quandary. The leading men of these shows are the unwitting participants in a fantastical duel for my attention. Move over, Dr. McDreamy (I've never seen one minute of Grey's Anatomy), Sheriff Carter and Agent Booth are here!

Sure, they're easy on the eyes; handsome in conventional ways. But there's more there there. Could it be the man in uniform phenomenon? Nah, the FBI guy just wears a suit. It's more that. They're both funny. And smart. With warmth that just exudes from what is undoubtedly their own personalities.

OK, so they're well-written characters portrayed by good actors... who just happen to be seriously hunky. A third clearly in the running -- although too skinny to earn this last descriptor -- is Dr. Gregory House. He is the king of well-written, well-acted, and he's sexy in that I-know-he's-really-got-a-British-accent-under-that-American-one way. Scrawny, really, but funny.

"Is this an intervention? You're a little late since I'm not using drugs anymore. I am, however, still hooked on phonics."

But all three of them are really funny. When Jack's daughter, Zoe, grabbed a wheat grass for herself and scolded her father for drinking too much coffee, his response was, "I'll stop drinking caffeine when you stop drinking the lawn."

Why am I blogging about this? Perhaps it's because I'm dealing with the anxiety of Eureka's season finale. It's just wrong for a show to END at the beginning of October! But hey, Mr. Monk left me weeks ago. I'll just have to suffice with my favorite FBI Agent, the cranky Doctor, and iTunes downloads (and SciFi webisodes) of the Sheriff for now.

growing strong

Some words of wisdom and a quick link to a neat photo project. First the wisdom:

"Good timber does not grow with ease. The stronger the wind, the stronger the trees." - J. Willard Marriott

And now the photo project:



Cool.

the playlist

We spent the weekend with family to celebrate three birthdays (father, husband, and brother) which fall within five days of each other. Ted also brought me to a magic place to get me my anniversary gift to replace my original 40 GB which recently decided it didn't want to cooperate anymore. Thank you, honey! I set it up tonight, and am almost so excited to test it out in its car and office settings, that I might take a midnight drive to work. Then again, maybe not.

Anyway, it was fun to have much of the family together for chatting and barbecue (nephew Dan quite adeptly manned the grill) and our family's famous Cox Chocolate Cake with Peanut Butter Frosting. I'll upload current pictures later this week. Well, hopefully. Take everything I say with a grain of salt, as I still haven't finished the Seattle & Alaska trip installments (see here and here)!

In the interim, here is the list of songs originally compiled for Caitlin's correspondence book. I got so carried away, it ended up being a 4-CD set, which I also burned and sent in similar goodies boxes to nephews Andrew and Josh. Spreading music love everywhere I go. I'm digging on this list. Here goes:

Hockey Monkey
James Kochalka Superstar

Steady As She Goes
The Raconteurs

Exeter, Rhode Island
Jennifer O'Connor

Holla!
G. Love

Alright
Supergrass

Sewn
The Feeling

The King Is Half-Undressed
Jellyfish

David
Nellie McKay

Change The World
Nellie McKay

Mary Shut the Garden Door
Donald Fagen

I Don't Feel So Well
Vienna Teng

Chicago
Sufjan Stevens

Push Th' Little Daisies
Ween

Nemo
Umphrey's McGee

Put Your Records On (Acoustic)
Corinne Bailey Rae

A World That Passed Me By
Chris Difford

Everybody But You
Dave Barnes ****

**** This is the song that I'd mentioned earlier. It should be a HUGE pop hit. I predicted it on August 24th. Let's see if the rest of the world comes around to it. By the way, poor video quality, but a good way to convey the song in this medium. ****

Don't Wake Me
Toby Lightman

The Mess
Fivespeed

Sails
Megan Slankard

Until You Came Along
Golden Smog

I Can't Get Behind That
William Shatner featuring Henry Rollins

Liar
Rollins Band

The Diary of Jane
Breaking Benjamin

Why Me?
Planet P Project

Nobody Not Really
Alicia Keys

Keep On Hoping
Raul Midon & Jason Mraz

Chasing Strange
Lizz Wright

Heaven or Las Vegas
Cocteau Twins

Black Swan
Thom Yorke

Elvis Is Everywhere
Mojo Nixon

Connecticut's For F***ing
Jesus H Christ and The Four Hornsmen of the Apocalypse

_Title Unknown
_Artist Unknown

Barely Breathing
Duncan Sheik

The Reluctant Deity
Fernando

Get Up
Amel Larrieux

For a Change
Chris Difford

James River Blues
Old Crow Medicine Show

Thinking About You
Fred Eaglesmith

Greyhound
Dave Barnes

Here (In Your Arms)
Hellogoodbye

Watch Your Step
Anita Baker

River
Madeleine Peyroux f/k.d. lang

Through Glass
Stone Sour

Blue Caravan
Vienna Teng

Burning In the Sun
Blue Merle

Love Me Like You
The Magic Numbers

All These People
Harry Connick, Jr. f/Kim Burrell

Tears, Tears, & More Tears
Elvis Costello & Allen Toussaint

I'm Gonna Love You Anyway
Buckwheat Zydeco

Pontchartrain
Vienna Teng

La Vie en Rose
Edith Piaf

Call Me When You're Sober
Evanescence

Fighting For Your Life
David Mead

All Fired Up
The Brand New Heavies

The Word
Prince

'Bout a Thang
Tonéx

Half My Height
Sunday Runners

Mama's Room
Under the Influence of Giants

One Last Time
Frog Holler

Seether
Veruca Salt

Paperback Bible
Lambchop

The Incredits
Michael Giacchino

I tried to focus mostly on new music, but couldn't resist the occasional flashback. The "Title Unknown" by "Artist Unknown" is a song in my iTunes library that had its data scrambled during a bad synchronization. Because I love new music and seek it out all the time from various sources, I don't always know the artists' names until I've had a good chance to listen to and absorb them into my psyche. I came to really love this song after it scrambled, and so I have no idea who it is. It doesn't help that the song is not sung in English. So, I've thrown down a challenge to Andrew, Caitlin, and Josh that if they can find the information for me, I'll reward them warmly (I think I said I'd give 'em a buck!).

Enough chattering tonight. Maybe I'll be better about posting this week. Maybe I'll finally catch up on vacation stories. Maybe.

kudos to kim barto

Ms. Barto wrote this editorial for the Asheville Citizen-Times and hits several nails on their heads. Thank you, Kim, for saying succinctly and eloquently that which many people have struggled to encapsulate (of course, I'm referring to myself here).

Here. I'll save you needing to click the link.

The American obsession with weight loss is unrealistic; moreover, it’s also harmful

by Kim Barto
CITIZEN-TIMES.com (Asheville, NC)
September 14, 2006

You won’t believe this, but Spain’s top fashion show recently rejected models for being too thin. That’s right—somewhere in hell, a snowball is having the last laugh.

The show’s organizers told the Associated Press that they want to encourage an image of health and beauty instead of emaciation. Hopefully, this unprecedented action will start a trend. As long as the starvation look is in vogue, millions of women and men will suffer from disorders such as anorexia and bulimia.

America is obsessed with dieting, and it’s taking a toll. The country that invented the fast-food greaseburger has now seen the rate of eating disorders double since the 1960s, according to the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. Up to 60 percent of high school girls diet, and even more worry about their weight.

The Eating Disorders Coalition estimates that millions of Americans are diagnosed annually, and anorexia nervosa has the highest mortality rate of any mental illness. Worse, the patients keep getting younger. Something is deeply wrong with a society that fosters self-loathing in seven-year-old girls.

The problem is the prevailing attitude that equates thinness with good health and happiness. Combine this with a grossly distorted view of what is normal, and it’s no wonder that so many people hate their bodies.

In reality, a wide variety of body types are normal, depending on one’s bone structure, metabolism and genetics. It is fruitless and misleading to expect everyone to conform to the same weight. Whether you are naturally muscular, chunky, twiggy, curvy or tiny, trying to change your body can be frustrating and even dangerous.

When people try to make the body thinner than it is genetically programmed to be, it retaliates by becoming ravenous and vulnerable to binge eating, according to ANRED (Anorexia Nervosa and Related Eating Disorders), a nonprofit organization against eating disorders.

Ninety-eight percent of dieters regain all the weight they manage to lose, plus about 10 extra pounds, within five years.

The editors of the New England Journal of Medicine concluded in 1998 that, “(s)ince many people cannot lose much weight no matter how hard they try and promptly regain whatever they do lose, the vast amount of money spent on diet clubs, special foods and over-the-counter remedies, estimated to be on the order of $30 billion to $50 billion yearly, is wasted.”

There is no magic pill to keep weight off, no matter what the advertisers would have you believe.

Those that are effective are only minimally so, and they often carry serious health risks. Remember Fen-Phen?

What a paradox, that dieting should be such a lucrative industry in a country with such high obesity rates. Someone is obviously profiting from fat phobia in a big way. Take a nation of insecure people, bombard them with images of impossible beauty standards, and they will greet the latest fad with open wallets.

Couldn’t those billions of dollars be better spent? Instead of trying to buy happiness, think of all the good that money could do if diverted to cancer research or stamping out hunger.

Rather than focusing on weight loss at any cost, we should aim for good health at any size. Too many dieters harm their bodies and psyches by skipping meals, purging and popping pills in the quest for skinniness. We should eat for nutrition and well-being, not solely to lose weight. Amidst all the deprivation and guilt associated with eating, we often forget that fresh, simple food is a joy in itself.

Likewise, our use of language reinforces the idea of exercise as a punishment for the body. Instead of saying “feel the burn” or “no pain, no gain,” try “feel good.”

Exercising releases serotonin, the brain chemical that causes you to feel happy. Find an activity that you enjoy, be it swimming, cycling or salsa dancing — it doesn’t have to be a torture session on the Stairmaster.

When you make time to be active, feel your body growing stronger and stay away from the scale. Movement is supposed to be fun. If you doubt this, go outside with your kids, assuming they’re not video game addicts, and watch them play tag in the backyard.

Better yet, join them!

America needs a change in mindset — let’s embrace diversity of size and question the source of our insecurities. Find the weight that’s healthy for you, individually, without comparing yourself to the skeletal models on TV. Life is too short to hate your body.

Kim Barto is a senior at the UNCA majoring in photography with minors in mass communication and French. She also works in human resources for the U.S. Forest Service. Her columns appear on alternate Thursdays. Horray for Kim!

i love you, too, john

I was lucky enough to get whiff of him slightly before the listening world latched on, so it still feels like he's "mine" (even though he's now officially huge). I was lucky enough to go see him in concert a few summers ago, dragging along my niece (who wasn't exactly kicking and screaming) and her father (who wasn't exactly sure why he was there). I just finished being lucky enough to watch his entire concert from Webster Hall in New York City streaming live on the internet, and I am reminded what an amazing show he puts on. I wish I had been in the room, too. And I was futzing around on his blog, and found his confession of love. So the least I can do is give him a little plug on my own blog, right?

Go buy this album now. By whatever means possible. And if you don't have Room For Squares, Heavier Things, Try! (with the trio), or anything he's ever touched, buy them too. Any time a songwriter can score a Grammy on his second album (the one notorious for being afflicted by the Sophomore Slump), it's proof that the talent is genuine and deep.

heavy

This is the Damon family. My friend, Hildi (right) married the sweet and dutiful brainiac, Pat, 19 years ago. Their daughter, Mikayla is 14, and their son, Jan-Christian is 12. This picture was taken the day that Pat was deployed to Afghanistan with the Army National Guard in January. Hildi'd sent me this picture along with five others, all of the kids being alternately goofy and pensive. As you might imagine, everyone was sad to see him go.

I just found out today that Pat died in Afghanistan. And every time I think of any aspect of the situation, I literally shake my head in a combination of utter disbelief and a gargantuan lack of comprehension. I can't fathom how or why it happened. I couldn't possibly begin to know what Hildi, Mikayla, and Jan-Christian are going through. And although it doesn't surprise me that Hildi effected a meeting with the President and that during that meeting she spoke the hard truth to him, I simply don't know from where she gets the strength and courage to do it. I just don't. Can't. Anything.

Hildi and Pat took me into their home for a little while before I moved to Seattle. The lease on my apartment was up before my job was over, and they were kind enough to let me pitch camp in their guest bedroom. If fish and houseguests smell after three days, I must have been rank (there nearly a month). They were only ever good friends and gracious hosts.

Pat seemed quiet around people who didn't know him, but he was an excited and unending source of information (and a bit of a ham) to those of us who did. And all I can do is shake my head and offer well-intentioned but ultimately unhelpful condolences to my widowed friend and her fatherless children.

I also found out today that my friend, Michelle, and her entire community have had a jarring loss. Two women were killed and two others wounded by a man who entered an elementary school and started shooting people. Today is the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, and it's shocking how much has not been done there since. My friend, Donna, is boarded into her home in Florida waiting for Ernesto to show up. The news tells mind-boggling stories about one man pretending he killed a little girl and another man arrested for setting up marriages between little girls and older men. Some days, it's too much to absorb.

The world aside, my thoughts keep coming back to Hildi. And Essex, Vermont. And a naive wish that I could recapture the innocence of youth and spread it like peanut butter over everyone's wounds.

exploring nutmeg

Too frequently, the one day a week we both have off is occupied with a variety of chores. It is rare that we spend that day without a list, a schedule, a project, a visit, or a plan. Yesterday -- although prompted by a chore -- we decided to have such a day.

Our first stop was the Tanger Outlets in Westbrook to buy a couple new pairs of pants for Ted. That chore completed, we wandered around the Borders outlet, procuring four books between the two of us (that's 3 for Ted, 1 for me). From there, we hit the first matinee of Little Miss Sunshine. Were it not for us laughing and Typhoid Mary in the front row coughing violently, the theater would have been silent. Of course, there were only about 12 people there. Irrespective of the surroundings, I really enjoyed the movie. Along with the laugh-out-loud funny parts, there were at least three tears-streaming-down-my-face crying parts, too.

From the theater, we went on a search for a place to have lunch. After escaping Westbrook (where we'd been told there was a muster that day and parts of town were closed off), we headed for Clinton, but didn't stop until Madison where we found Lenny and Joe's Fish Tale. The place was hopping, the fried clams were good, and there was a small carousel. It was fun to watch the kids spinning around on giant frogs and cats while grabbing rings (although the rings were plentiful and not brass, so neither much of a challenge nor particularly special).

We decided to stay off the highway, wandering down Route 1. We made a spontaneous stop at Bishop's Orchards in Guilford, sniffing our way through the fresh produce. They had the biggest basil plants I've ever seen, and so aromatic! We bought apricots and limes, and wandered around looking for the animals. We found a few goats hanging out in a pen in the distance, but nothing else.

Even with the occasional rain shower, it was a nice day -- a cool and pleasant relief from the recent heat wave and perfect for driving with all the windows open. We stayed on Route 1 until we lost it somewhere in New Haven. Yes, we lost a road while we were driving on it. Go figure. Anyway, an opportunity to rejoin the highway presented itself, and so we abandoned the search for Route 1 and took the speedy way home. There, we caught up on some TiVo, napped, enjoyed a simple dinner of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and called it a day.

We've complained a lot about living in Connecticut. Too expensive. Too stressful. Too everything. But it was nice to roam through the towns along the shore and enjoy the scenery.