TheSnackHound

XYZBikes.com, maker of very economically priced and very cool beach cruiser bikes, is offering us all $5.00 to get off of our butts.  Well, there is a little more involved than that.  You have to do more than stand up.  When you purchase one of their calorie burning products, you can use Coupon Code 5OFFXPP, and they will take $5.00 off of your order.   Many of their bikes are available for around $100, they look cool, and they ship around the country.  That may not sound like a lot of money to you, but they have bells, baskets, and decals in that price range.  So, when you buy a bike, it is like “upgrading” it for free!

I always wondered why mens beach cruisers have the high bar in the middle, where it is lower on women’s. Regular bikes have that too. Is it because women can’t swing their leg as high? If that is the case, shorter women just get a smaller bike, so it would seem that wouldn’t be a factor. Is it not due to anatomy at all, but rather just tradition? Afterall, when bikes first caught on, women wore huge hoopy skirts or bicycling bloomers and their clothes would not fit if they had a high bar right against them.  It seems to me, however, that men would want a lower bar since they have more bodyparts that could get injured in that area.  I guess that is just one of the silly things rolling around in my brain.

This coupon has caught me on the day of the year that I decide that I am going to purchase a bikini.  I have that extra little smattering of confidence once spring is in the air and I stop wearing a sweater. I seem to say to myself, “Ah, I look rather svelte and feel 5 lbs thinner in this black stretchy turtleneck more so than I do the faux angora cardigan and the snow boots.” It, of course, is just an illusion. On that, or this, particular day, I grab my wine glass, filled 1/3 cranberry juice and 3/4 seltzer water and I wander around on the swimsuit selling sites. I take it stiff. I like the cranberry juice that only has about 2 grams of sugar. Of course, if things go according to plan, I won’t order the bathing suit.  I will eat another piece of chocolate cake, because I deserve it, even though it is only healthy in moderation.

For the rest of you, I will join you as soon as I put down my cake and get serious.

There is not a day that goes by that I have not feigned surprise or shock over something. More likely, I am feigning that I am feigning surprise, which means that I am faking my faking of being surprised. What does that exactly mean? Well, double negatives cancel each other out or perhaps make a big giant toxic negative with super powers. In other words, I have no idea what I mean from a practical standpoint. Only a proverbial one.

What did I almost raise my eyebrow about today? I say almost, because although I never have had botox, I do not have the genetic makeup of someone like Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson who can noticeable raise their eyebrows. My emotionless expression was brought about reading up on Beaute de Maman, which is a cosmetics company.  What is so earth shattering about that? Well, the whole modus operandi is being a niche cosmetics company to pregnant women. So, in otherwords, I originally thought that the line included lip gloss that smelled or tasted like dill pickle ice cream.  Maybe there would be a post partum version that smelled like a really strong peppermint mouthwash to overpower and cancel out any smell of messy diapers that might be in the room. However, a pregnant friend once told me that babies don’t smell until they start eating “people food.” She didn’t really say “people food,” but as a dog person, my brain automatically translated it for me.  Oh well, at least she only had one and not a “litter” like Octo-Mom.

In real life, outside of my brain, the actual cosmetics in questions are free of certain dies or chemicals that could injure a baby. You can order now on their site.  In other words, the shards of glass that as a really fashionable single, childless gal I prefer in my eyeshadow is not present.   Maybe there are those corner guards around the edges of the compacts just so no one knocks their heads on them. Actually, it is not about actual makeup at all, but more like facial scrubs and moisturizers.  Apparently, the items are more hormonally balanced for the pregnant woman, but they also are free of chemicals, such as bisphenol A, which is found in some cardboard packaging and harmful to developing fetuses.    In other words, if you are pregnant, don’t lick cardboard.  You don’t know where the heck it has been.

In all seriousness, there are definitely chemicals in the products we put on and in our bodies that are not beneficial, at best, or harmful, at worst.  My question is: Why do we even have these chemicals in skin care products period?   It is like a woman smoking, quitting while they are pregnant, and taking up the cancer stick again.  Just something to think about.

Do you remember the diet based on the book Eat Right for Your Blood Type?  It was popular in the late 90s, or at least popular in some circles.  Basically, Peter J. D’Adamo and Catherine Whitney proposed that the best diet depeneded on what blood type you had.  Supposedly, you had different digestive capabilities than other people.  They concluded that if you your blood type was O, that was the first blood type that there was, so you should eat lots of meat and dine on saber toothed tigers and avoid wheat.  Just kidding about the tigers.  Type AB was rarer, and if you had AB blood, you should adopt a mediterranean diet of seafood, nuts, and olive oil.

A friend of mine swore by this.  Then again, the book told her to eat lots of nuts, fish, and olive oil, and isn’t that the ideal diet anyways?  I really hated a lot of the foods it told me to eat.  Supposedly, they say when the type O evolved, people weren’t farming and eating grains, they were nomadic and chasing down meat.  Grains were not allowed.  Isn’t that the Atkins diet?  Apparently, my friend descended from much more sophisticated people.

What if you had a bone marrow transplant and you started producing a different blood type than you were born with.  What diet would you go with.  Of course, I would imagine the donor would be a match, but I am just saying.

Despite some of the rave reviews the book got, I thought that this diet was a piece of crap.  Maybe some of the individual diets worked, but anyone telling me I would get in shape by eating a slab of ribs is right.  I WOULD lose the weight but it would be from not eating, not from my blood feeling harmony with the antiquity of my diet plan.

By the way, in case you were wondering, above is the New Zealand mascot for blood donation services.  I think if America had someone like him, the blood banks would be full because people like mascots.  Personally, he seems to almost be a rip off of MacDonald’s “Mac Tonight” guy.  But he’s red.  And he’s blood.  And he doesn’t have any clothes on.  And he looks more like a “Mr. Men and Little Miss” form the 70s.

“Hey, little boy, you can’t give blood…you only weigh 42 pounds!”

“But I want to be like the blood droplet dude!”

“Hmm…I wish Joe Camel was still around…these kids would go home and leave me alone.”

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Once in awhile, I have talked about all the crazy diets that are out there. I remember that my mom decided in the early 90s that she was going on the Cabbage Soup diet because Madonna allegedly did it, and she had great success. It was the blandest soup in the world, and you also had to eat one other food during the day, such as all lettuce that one day, or all beef, or all tomatoes. I don’t know what it was out to accomplish, aside from spiking cabbage sales at the grocery store, and replicating the diet of someone with influenza who drinks clear broth but has a strange food craving in the afternoon.  I don’t remember my mom losing much weight.  She may have lost five pounds, but it was probably from malnutrition and not because of the healthfulness of the diet.

Another diet I heard of was from an actress who played Karen Carpenter who only ate steamed vegetables so she could get real skinny and believable in her role, but be sort of healthy. Veggies are healthy, but if that is all you eat, maybe you would binge on pizza and potato chips after that.  I know I probably would be sorely tempted.  I did hear that if you don’t eat a food in a long time you can stop craving it, however.

One I found that actually makes sense for people who want to still be able to participate in regular life activities and not be blown over with a brisk wind as their energy is completely drained.  The Flat Belly Diet. It involves eating foods like nuts, avocados, and chocolate, that are high in antioxidants, and what I usually associate with those foods: “good fats” Like Omega 3′s.

For a very limited time, the originators are offering bloggers an opportunity to receive a book on the subject and to try and review the diet for free. That is a very generous offer. As you know, if something is a good thing, word of mouth is what helps spread the word to people who would benefit by it.  If you are like my family, however, if it is not so good, it somehow ends up being tried anyhow.

In my case, my weight isn’t far off as far as what charts say it should be, but I can never seem to get my stomach to cooperate like my legs do the past few years.  I would really like to start a diet or more so an eating lifestyle that gives me good building blocks in my food to be able to gain lean muscle and conquer the battle of the bulge.  When you are short and have a small frame, five pounds looks like you have gained 10-15.  I will let you know if I am selected to review the diet, and I hope you will do the same if you are the lucky duck that gets the chance!

The Sproutwells are featured in a series of cartoons on YouTube.  It is a fish out of water story about a mild mannered family of vegetables doing their best to live in a human neighborhood.  They are ambassadors for FreshFunds.com, a site that rewards you for buying specially marked healthy products.

The neighbors are a little suspicious of all the packages they are getting.  It makes me wonder, though.  The Baby obviously has a shopping addiction that needs to be contended with.  However, how do the Sproutwells get to participate in the program? I mean, do they get points from being themselves?  Or do the vegetables actually buy vegetables to eat?  That doesn’t seem right, does it?

I have signed up for the freshfunds site and it is really easy. You just look for point emblems on specially marked Fresh Express salads, as well as a Chiquita product or two. You can use the points to win prizes or bid auctio-style on some pretty cool stuff. What’s more, is you can use your points to donate to charity! Staying healthy is everyone’s goal, and getting more vegetables in your diet is definitely one of the ways to do it. Just don’t leave your computer running while the fridge is open. Your radishes and cucumbers might start ordering things.

Hey, here is something that you probably don’t know** (**see footnote).    It is certainly news to me.

I stumbled across FruitandVeggieville where the latest subject is those labels on fruit.  Kathleen informs us:

Fruit that was conventionally grown, meaning with chemicals, has a four digit number. Fruit that was organically grown consists of five numbers always beginning with the number 9. Other fruit that was engineered genetically have a five digit number that always begins with the number 8.

For some reason I thought the numbers merely were a convenience for the cashier, so they didn’t have to look up the stock code off of that laminated picture menu they have at the register.   Now I know!   It is so much more intricate.  It certainly will be a way for us to navigate around the produce department just merely wondering.

What this doesn’t explain, is how I ended up with an orange awhile back that had an advertisement on its label letting me know I could buy Peter Pan on DVD.   You know how important that is.  Disney will put it “back into the vault” and not let us buy it ever again.  Well, actually, they sell more in another couple years, but just want us to think that they are smashing the master reel so people cash in their life savings to buy them.    They always bluff.

Upon furter investigation, I found the International Federation for Produce Standards Site.  These people are the masterminds behind the codes.  I looked up several PLU codes.  More specifically, I went backwards and looked up the item.     There are all sorts of varieties of both natural and hybrid fruit, vegetables, and herbs.

The big mystery for me to unlock was posed to me as I wandered through the “ethnic food” aisle of the grocery store.   Occasionally I like to get Goya Pineapple or Mango Juice.   One time, sort of on a dare, I tried Guanabana juice.   A spiney green orb was on the can, one that appeared like it should never be eaten by anyone.  It really tasted bad to me.   My natural instincts did not head the warning, apparently.   Anyway, according to the site, Guanabana fruit does not exist.   There is no code for it!   At first I thought it was just the Spanish name for something else, but it is never translater, unlike pineapple.    The translation is probably “I am scarey looking, don’t eat me.  I warned you!”  Even little lizards and mice in the desert understand that language, unlike humans who would consider it a dare.

Try not to tax your brain too much.   Four digits means “conventional/regular”, 5 digits starting with a 9 is organic, 5 digits starting with an 8 is frankenfood (sort of).

**=  (A few years ago, spending a big chunk of my childhood in Wisconsin, I probably would have started this off with: Here is something that you pro’lly don’t know, hey?)

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