Day 1

So I've decided to go ahead with a few minor diet changes. Originally, I planned on trying to purchase most of my foods locally, while also limiting the amount of meat I eat to around 5 or 6 ounces a day (about the size of a McDonalds burger). Well the first part of that diet proves to be very difficult especially for an American living in Germany. So while I'm still going to pay attention to where my food comes from, I'm not quite ready to take that leap yet. But what I have done is committed myself to eating lot less meat.

So here is how the first day transpired.

Breakfast: This one is an easy kill. I probably eat meat with breakfast once or twice a month. So not getting any bacon or sausage doesn't really upset me too much. But one thing I did change up was that instead of using the individual serving oatmeal, I bought one of those huge tubs of it that could literally serve an army. First off, oatmeal is pretty bland without anything in it, so if anyone has any ideas on how to spice it up, let me know. For right now, I'll stick with some brown sugar and maybe some cinnamon. Also, the instructions on the tub make at least twice as much as the small package. What's up with that? Furthermore, I've added a fiber pill to my morning routine. Needless to say, the JC processing plant is running at optimal conditions today.

Mid morning snack: Yeah, I eat one. It's better than your neighbor's cubicle for snickers or Doritos. If you like yogurts, Germans' make some great stuff. The one's I like come with a little thing of coco crispies on the side. Good stuff. I usually don't crave beef jerky before lunch, so this didn't change.

Lunch: This is where the big change is going to happen. Most of my lunches had been made up of turkey or chicken sandwiches, some chips and maybe some fruit. Well, no more turkey sandwiches, so I decided to give some tomato soup a try for the first day and wow, was I surprised. I think it was a Progresso home style or something like that, but it kicked ass. I'm a big fan of tomato soup and order it when I see it on the menu, but this was nearly as good as any restaurants soup I've had. Plus I brought a big hunk of wheat bread as well. More than satisfying.

Late afternoon snack: I started off with an orange that I planned on chasing with some diet Dr. Pepper. The soda is just ok, but I really need some caffeine with my lunch and haven't found anything better. I would go back to making iced tea, but I drink way to much of that when I make it. Literally, I can hammer down 2 quarts a day. Anyways, the office with the snack fridge had a going away today and had a few left over desserts. Desserts don't have meat! Sweet. So I helped myself to a piece of cream cheese walnut you better run a couple of miles tonight pie and a brownie that wasn't really worth it. Like you would have done any differently?

Dinner: The wife has literally been talking about my diet change more than me. Yesterday's last meal was baked chicken, baked potatoes, broccoli and a brownie Sunday (hey, I like brownies). So I decided to take the chicken carcass and try and make some soup out of it. I figure there would be at least 5 bowls of soup, and no way could anyone of them contain more than 4 ounces of meat. The soup turned out OK. I'll have to give it another shot. It seemed pretty bland to me. But that and some more bread, peaches and yes, a brownie was more than adequate.

Yeah, as you can tell, this isn't a weight loss diet. I could never do that because it would involve giving up beer, but it's an attempt to revert back to diet that wasn't so heavy on meat. I'll give it some time and see if my thoughts change.

Good New Music

We are nearly two months into 2009, and there are already a couple of CD's that are worth stealing off the internet picking up. First, there is Andrew Bird's "Noble Eagle". I love it when an artist is such an egomaniac that he or she goes it alone. My buddy always told stories about NIN's first tour and Trent would go out on stage with him and a computer and just get booed off the stage because there weren't any guitar players to rock out with. I guess people like to have guitars when they mosh. In my mind, that is the perfect concert. Tori Amos is at her absolute pinnacle when she's alone with her piano and key board. Though if you listen to her talk, she's never alone. She puts the razy in crazy. I saw Howie Day open for her in Vegas and he used some loop device and his guitar and that was it. It was enthralling. Excluding the two 250 pound lesbians making out in front of me, it's one of the best concerts I've ever seen. Plus seeing Tommy Lee hitting on a waitress before the show, really put it over the top. I put Jack White in the same group because while touring as the White Stripes, he basically goes on stage with his retard sister/ex-wife and rocks his ass off.

Bird does his best Howie Day impersonation on this album. Bird takes on this CD all by himself and is actually touring that way. You can actually download one of his concerts from NPR.ORG/music. That sight is a whole nother blog in itself. By no means is this a CD you'll want to listen to while running your 3 miles, but it perfect for an evening cocktail and a game of phase 10. Smooth, mellow and not in any way depressing. It's a hit in the Carter house.

If you looking for a work out CD, Franz Ferdinand has got it. Their music is such cliché, it's really hard to describe. If I went to clubs in Europe, I imagine this is what they'd play in the VIP area. It's simply a fun CD you'll find yourself rocking your head to. The lead singer sounds like the kind of guy you wouldn't trust alone with your wife or sister. If you like rock and roll, then you'll dig Tonight.

In other music news, the guys in TV on The Radio are black. I was absolutely shocked. I feel like Dr Dre after he discovered Eminem. I was floored when I saw them appear on SNL. I always pictured them as being trendy metro sexual type guys, but no shit; they are two black guys with crazy hair and 1 white guy who must play the drums or something. I didn't notice because I was so amazed to see to black guys performing their music.. Who knew? I haven't ripped their new CD yet, but I'll check it out soon.

The Wire, Season 1 Episode 11

I know no one is interested in reading about a canceled TV's shows first season that happened 6 or 7 years ago, but I just watched it again tonight for about the 15^th time. You know what, I finally figured out why The Wire was ten times better than any other show ever. If you haven't checked it out yet, either you're a racist or you've just been too busy reading blogs that try and 'disprove' dinosaurs. The show was unafraid to step outside the simple cookie cutter ideas that most TV shows use. Take Friday Night Lights as an example. I think it's a top 5 show right now. Solid story line with great acting and slew of hot chics. Well worth the weekly downloads. But the thing is, they are afraid to step away from the main characters. Riggins has been high school senior for nearly 5 years. But because they're afraid audiences will lose their attachment, they continue to drag it on. I won't spoil the ending to this season, but if there is another FNL season, things will be a little different. The Wire wouldn't do that. Riggins would have graduated a long time ago and would have dropped out of college like all the rest of the kids from Permian High.

The Wire was so ballsy, they were willing to step away from their main characters at any given moment. Season 4 of The Wire is the most amazing 12 episodes of TV ever. I'm not even kidding. And the main 'star' from the show wasn't even an instrumental character. They introduced 4 new characters and really took it to another level.

Yet, because this has already happened, it makes me a little sad for what's on TV now. The only shows I look forward to are The Office and Chuck. The Office has put together a strong season and I watch Chuck because its remotely funny, the chics are smoking and they load the soundtrack with good music. Otherwise, there is nothing that peaks my interest.

I did watch the premiere of 'East Bound and Down' and laughed my ass off, but I'm not sure I'm in it for the long haul. How long can swearing in front of middle schooler's be funny? I'll let you know. Otherwise, I'll keep watching old episodes of The Wire and hope that they'll remember how good TV can be.

Can My Diet Change the World?

I've been spending a considerable amount of time considering whether I should change my diet. For the most part, I think I'm a pretty healthy eater. I haven't stepped into a McDonald's or a Burger King in nearly ten years and I limit my visits to Taco Bell to about 3 times a year. For the average American, I'd say I'm doing pretty well. The things I'm thinking about changing are the amount of meat I consume and the distance my food had to travel to get to my plate.

I've read a couple things recently that got my wheels spinning. The first was the amount of meat we consume compared to what we used to consume. It's really astonishing. I for one eat about 16 ounces of meat a day. I'll generally eat a sandwich at lunch with 5 or 6 ounces of meet and then at dinner will eat a piece of chicken, fish, pork or red meat that weighs in at 8 to 12 ounces. I think I need about half that much. The second was how much cost is associated with food production that is outside of the actual production of food. Most of the cost associated with a cheeseburger is from the transportation costs, not the farmers.

Now before my ultra conservative readers get the panties in a wad, I'm not against killing animals. I'm all for it. Meat is good and in general, good for you. But the problem is, there is a huge separation between how our meet is prepared and how we visualize our meat being prepared. Take for example the average 12 ounce steak I buy from the commissary. We like to believe that some farmer and his family raised that cow from birth, maybe even gave it a cute name like 'Betsy' and when the time came; they butchered the cow and sold it to the local butcher who then sold it to the commissary. But what really happens is some huge corporate farm manned by enormous machines and illegal immigrants processed as much cattle as possible, filling them with steroids and antibiotics while feeding the cows from a huge trough. When the time came, the cattle were crammed into a huge processing plant and inexpertly butchered. That meat was vacuumed sealed and loaded onto a freezer truck. That truck was moved onto a ship or boat and then made its way to Germany. I dropped a couple of bucks on it, heated it up on the grill and called it a day.

I'm in no way considering not eating meat. I just couldn't do it. Maybe red meat, but I just can't resist chicken or pork. But I am considering buying local meat. It will cost me and it will take some getting used to eating grain fed cattle again. No more marbled slabs of goodness. But on the other hand, I'll know that my meat didn't have to be shipped from god knows where and produced by god knows who.

And it's not just meat. I'm thinking about doing the same for fruits, vegetables, cheeses and bread. All of which are available locally and haven't been as commercialized as most American food has. The vegetables will be tricky because they don't grow that many in Germany, but I think if I just focus on those vegetables grow in Europe, I'll be doing OK.

I'm thinking next Monday will be a good time to give it a shot. My breakfast won't change much since my bowl of oatmeal is pretty straight forward (well I guess it should be a German oatmeal) followed by my mid morning snack of oranges from Spain or yogurt for Germany. Lunch will change drastically from my turkey sandwich, to some combination of vegetables and baguette and maybe some cheese. Dinner will go from a whole chicken breast to a half breast with an additional vegetable to compensate.

Garmisch Vacation

The Wife, kid and I went to Garmish Germany last week.  It's a ski resort town on the border of Austria.  Its home to Germany's highest peak, Hitler's Eagle's nest and one of the more famous castle's in the world, Nieuwenstein castle. 

We're normally beach people, so this was our first vacation that didn't have sun and margaritas involved.  I've never really skiied before but prior to the trip, the wife seemed fairly certain she'd want to spend at least two solid days on the slopes.  I wasn't sure if I'd even be able to make it down the bunny hill, let alone two whole days of skiing. 

I convinced her to just give it a try for a half day and if she felt like she needed some more time cutting it up, we'd head back out the next day. 

We spent our first day visiting the castle.  I can't say it was that exciting.  Yeah the castle was cool looking, but it really isn't that old and doesn't have much history.  I'm used to crawling around 15th century castles like the ones in Turkey, so when I go into a 19th century castle that has 'central heat' I just not that excited.  Plus we were with a group of Americans'.

Do you want to know why Americans get a bad name?  Its because we're assholes.  When they ask you no to take pictures, it really means they'd like you not to take pictures.  What is so hard about that?  And what in gods name are you going to do with a picture of a mural anyways?  I couldn't think of a more boring picture.  Annoying.

Our skiing trip wasn't what the wife was expecting.  She hadn't been skiing in over 10 years but thought it might come back to her like riding a bike.  Unfortunately, skiing isn't like that.  Furthermore, we were on a no kidding mountain.  And any skiing we had done previously was mostly confined to the hills of Minnesota.  We made it through our half day in one piece, but there was definitely no talk of a second day of skiing.

The exciting portion of the trip involved Lucy and the swimming pool.  Alicia's a little apprehensive sometimes as to what she allows Lucy to do.  I on the other hand figure that she needs to learn sometime.  I didn't treat her like the baby on the cover of Nevermind, but she was hanging on to the edge of the pool all by herself and coughed up a fair amount of pool water. 

The vacation was an overall success. If you are a member of the Armed Forces and want to visit Germany and enjoy some winter activities check out Edelwiesse.

A Great Superbowl and Why Republicans are Crazy

I know, my blog sucks ass now, but I'm going to give it the old college try to update it at least twice a week.

What a kick ass superbowl. An hour before the game, I was really debating if I should take the Cards and the money line. I just had a feeling that Kurt Warner was going to pull together a special game and I didn't have much faith in Roethlisberger. Furthermore, in big games, it's always a good idea to take the team with the best player, and that was clearly the Cardinals. The Steelers designed their whole defense around trying to stop Fitzgerald and he still had a monster game. He's a Randy Moss with a clue. He's a very special talent.

I ended up teasing the Steelers (-1) and the under (52). I played a few other prop bets and only hit 1. First to throw a pick (-115). I had the first Steeler to score a TD as Heath Miller (+500) and missed that one by a yard.

It was my first superbowl on the home coach in 3 years. I spent last year's superbowl in a Pub in Poland and the year priors in JFK airport waiting for my delayed flight. Alicia made me a tray of sliders and I scrounged up some chips and dip. Aside from the game ending at 0420 it was just how I remembered. I'll miss football, but March Madness is right around the corner.

On to those crazy republicans…

First, I'll just never understand why the constantly preach tax breaks and expect that to solve basically any ailment. Aren't tax breaks the reason where in this mess? Here's the misconception about tax breaks; it increases spending by people and corporations. Well it might if you give tax breaks to a 19 year old kid with his first charge card. They'll spend all of it. But if you give it to me or to anyone else making over 100K a year, they're probably going to throw that money in the bank at least part of it. If you give it to a corporation, they're going to use it to either prop up their stock value, so they can increase the amount of capital available to them. In essence, a company reflects more profitability that actually exists, takes out additional loans based on that and ends up looking like most of the companies in the US: a CEO making $20 million in bonuses, huge layoffs, and a bunch of shareholders looking at each other asking what just happened and an unfair amount of taxes paid. Republicans have this misconception about the supply chain. Demand happens not because people have more money. It happens because they want and/or need a product Companies theoretically spend because they can be more profitable in the future. Tax breaks don't influence either of those processes.

Secondly, the GOP put out a list items they deemed wasteful from the House's stimulus package. Don't get me wrong, I think there are some wasteful items on the list, but many of the items listed by the GOP are just ridiculous. It almost makes me wonder what they'd do aside from 'tax breaks' to stimulate the economy. The dems main objective in the package was to spend government money to get the economy moving. Essentially, they are creating the demand. The GOP listed things like hybrid vehicles for the government, improving the sewer system and buildings for the centers for disease control and homeland security. Those are exactly what companies need from the government. 3M and IBM aren't going to ask for new building even after tax breaks, so if the government needs them, then people will be employed to complete those projects.

I normally hate domestic politics, but President Obama has made it fun again. What I'd given to be at his superbowl party.