Mari, I especially like your points about alcohol. The idea has proliferated that women with breast cancer. SHOULD NEVER AGAIN DRINK ALCOHOL. But the data does not support that conclusion. I read the studies after my own diagnosis and there was a clear connection between excessive alcohol consumption and breast cancer, but there just wasn't one for social drinking. However, the authors of the paper, wanting to be as provocative as possible, said that if they just continued the curve the way it had been going they could infer a connection between social drinking and breast CA. This actually makes me very angry and I would have put it in my book on breast CA, but didn't have the resources to do all the relevant research. However, if anyone with breast cancer is reading this, it's OK to keep having your glass of wine with dinner. My radiation oncologist confirmed that the data does not say what people, including physicians, are saying it does. And now that I think about it, this would be a great column.
Thank you for sharing your expertise here, Theresa. I sometimes think that health authorities want to scare people into the right behaviors, so they exaggerate or make up the dangers of activities (eating the occasional sweet is another) that could actually be enjoyed in moderation with no problem. I wish they trusted us more to understand nuances and exercise self-control. In my case, I enjoy drinking wine, but not drinking to excess, so I don’t do it. I think it is the same for most of us. We don’t need to be scared into compliance!
Fun story: I've been taking a particular brand of meds for hay fever since I was maybe 12. Around 15 years later, I got my prescription for the summer, picked up my pills, and found they suddenly had a huge black box warning saying "ON NO ACCOUNT CONSUME ALCOHOL WHILE ON THIS MEDICATION".
Apparently, every time I'd spent an evening in a beer garden since I was 16 or so, I'd been dicing with death! Either that, or that label was randomly added by some joyless busybody.
I live in a city where many or most dogs are less for pleasure than for status and ferocity (nearly all pits), and male dogs are not neutered, as a cultural thing.
A cat person, pets have been a great pleasure - my husband once remarked that cats were one of the best things about living on Earth when we did -
except as they serially die and rip your heart out; I used to marvel at all the neighbors who were forced to use their lunch hour to return home to let out their dogs. But I figured the dogs gave them great pleasure at night when they were watching TV.
After a dog-less couple of decades my parents, despite my father’s grumbling, inherited my brother’s dog after a hurricane flooded him out. They also inherited the newer dog regime of: dog lives inside with you, your pal. That dog faithfully followed Mother around and was a marvelous companion to both, really a joy. It was adorable how, when they left the house and returned having forgotten something, they would find the dog had immediately taken my father’s recliner which it otherwise never got.
Not a real smart dog (King Charles) - he was a runner and once ran to a neighbor’s yard, jumped in their pool, and instantly began to drown, only didn’t because somebody happened to look out the window. But calm and content indoors.
A relative and her new husband had been married one month when they brought home a twice-returned “rescue” puppy. It seems like it’s made their lives much more difficult. Much running back and forth from work, or leaving events to run home and check on the pup, whom they can see crying on the camera. Travel will be trickier and less spur of the moment. I know all this is regarded as practice for having children, by some … and then there’s the expense. Fortunately everyone is rich now.
(He does not seem like he will ever be a chill indoor dog. To each their own. A sweet next door neighbor had 3 dogs, Katrina rescues, who never did stop going berserk if you came to their door; add in the yelling, er disciplining by her supposedly “alpha” husband and it just seemed easier to stay away. I learned later when they moved they’d had two cats cowering in a back bedroom the whole time they lived there - I was astonished, never knew!)
In some ways, pet ownership has grown more fraught in the USA because you can no longer leave your dog in the backyard. So the dog’s waste rules people’s life like the Divine Office.
In my apartment I have a view of the life of an urban dog and it is dull-seeming.
There is an unresolvable cognitive dissonance in folks whose idea of leaving a light footprint on the Earth involves eating no meat (however mistakenly, cows in particular filling a grassland niche) while owning lots of dogs. Cat food is more worrisome to me, for other reasons.
Overall I used to hope that people’s feeling for cats and dogs was a laudable sentiment that would transfer to and protect wild animals but I know now that was foolish.
There are, Google tells me, 900 million to a billion dogs on the planet. There are 200-250,000 wolves. There are 5,574 tigers which will unavoidably go extinct. Last year, in North Dakota, something cool happened for people who dislike the Endangered Species Act: the Greater Sage-Grouse became extinct in that grassland state, so no one there need worry about it anymore.
Nonetheless, I’ve noticed the internet has golden retrievers trending, and I will definitely watch when prompted.
Thanks for this thoughtful comment about the role of pets in our lives! I have always had dogs, and when I couldn’t have them because I lived in an apartment, I had a dogsitting business so I could be with them! But not everyone is equipped to handle the extra work they require, and not everyone is equipped dog is right for every family (as our bad experience with Lulu several months ago shows). I definitely feel sorry for those cats who had to cower in the bedroom!
And I agree about the benefits of grazing cattle. Cows are a crucial part of the Alpine ecosystem here. They spend their summers high up in the mountains, where it’s cooler and where there are fewer flies. In return, they help to maintain the turf, which helps to prevent mudslides. Everyone benefits—even me. I may be a vegetarian, but I LOVE Alpkäse, the cheese made from the milk of high-altitude cows.
I like that you are a cheese-eating vegetarian and am by inclination a vegetarian as well; my consumption of beans in particular is considered exceptional lol. I eat only because others like, maybe 12-16 ozs. of supposedly well-treated chicken* per year, and could easily give up pork altogether if I weren’t cooking for someone else (it’s the leftover grease I consider most valuable there, e.g. for flavoring green beans, but I could do without).
But I feel when I look at a field of cows, those guys have a great life. They seem happy, and if one could be so happy at the expense of an abrupt end I would take that bargain!
There too, I don’t precisely ever crave beef but I sometimes feel my brain on beans and bread is getting foggy and the remedy is a cheeseburger.
I would be interested to know what sort of vitamin or supplement you take, if any, to maintain your energy/mental acuity.
*A truck stacked full of chickens looking out at the world for the first and possibly last time, makes me so sad. I guess one betrays that one didn’t grow up on a farm by such a feeling, but I can’t help it.
If reincarnation were real, I would sincerely hope to come back as a Swiss cow. Really! They lead such an obviously blessed life, until the inevitable end.
I do take supplements: a multivitamin called Vegetaria Depot (whatever that means). Interestingly, it included no vitamin A. The makers correctly assume that we vegetarians get plenty of vitamin A from our diets. And I have recently started taking L-Lysine to prevent cold sores from developing. It works!
As for the leftover pork grease for flavoring, I hear you, sister. The only meat I miss is bacon, and I used to love cooking eggs in bacon fat. So delicious!
That KC cavalier had started out as my then-little niece’s longed for dog. (After a first failed attempt by Santa to please her with an animatronic stuffed dog that could walk on a leash, which she was clearly told to bring to show off to us that Christmas Day. “It’s not real, it’s plush,” she explained. What are you going to call it? we asked. After a moment, utterly deadpan, disinterested: “Plushie”.)
Real or real-ish dog acquired, I decided for her birthday to give her a dog toy. I repaired to the fancy dog store, was looking at a throwing device of some sort. The clerk asked what kind of dog. KC cavalier, I said.
Oh, he said, his face clouding as he discouraged me from buying it or any toy. They are for sitting, he said.
Mari, I especially like your points about alcohol. The idea has proliferated that women with breast cancer. SHOULD NEVER AGAIN DRINK ALCOHOL. But the data does not support that conclusion. I read the studies after my own diagnosis and there was a clear connection between excessive alcohol consumption and breast cancer, but there just wasn't one for social drinking. However, the authors of the paper, wanting to be as provocative as possible, said that if they just continued the curve the way it had been going they could infer a connection between social drinking and breast CA. This actually makes me very angry and I would have put it in my book on breast CA, but didn't have the resources to do all the relevant research. However, if anyone with breast cancer is reading this, it's OK to keep having your glass of wine with dinner. My radiation oncologist confirmed that the data does not say what people, including physicians, are saying it does. And now that I think about it, this would be a great column.
Thank you for sharing your expertise here, Theresa. I sometimes think that health authorities want to scare people into the right behaviors, so they exaggerate or make up the dangers of activities (eating the occasional sweet is another) that could actually be enjoyed in moderation with no problem. I wish they trusted us more to understand nuances and exercise self-control. In my case, I enjoy drinking wine, but not drinking to excess, so I don’t do it. I think it is the same for most of us. We don’t need to be scared into compliance!
An excellent point! Bullying is also not a good behavior change strategy long term. Thanks!
Fun story: I've been taking a particular brand of meds for hay fever since I was maybe 12. Around 15 years later, I got my prescription for the summer, picked up my pills, and found they suddenly had a huge black box warning saying "ON NO ACCOUNT CONSUME ALCOHOL WHILE ON THIS MEDICATION".
Apparently, every time I'd spent an evening in a beer garden since I was 16 or so, I'd been dicing with death! Either that, or that label was randomly added by some joyless busybody.
I live in a city where many or most dogs are less for pleasure than for status and ferocity (nearly all pits), and male dogs are not neutered, as a cultural thing.
A cat person, pets have been a great pleasure - my husband once remarked that cats were one of the best things about living on Earth when we did -
except as they serially die and rip your heart out; I used to marvel at all the neighbors who were forced to use their lunch hour to return home to let out their dogs. But I figured the dogs gave them great pleasure at night when they were watching TV.
After a dog-less couple of decades my parents, despite my father’s grumbling, inherited my brother’s dog after a hurricane flooded him out. They also inherited the newer dog regime of: dog lives inside with you, your pal. That dog faithfully followed Mother around and was a marvelous companion to both, really a joy. It was adorable how, when they left the house and returned having forgotten something, they would find the dog had immediately taken my father’s recliner which it otherwise never got.
Not a real smart dog (King Charles) - he was a runner and once ran to a neighbor’s yard, jumped in their pool, and instantly began to drown, only didn’t because somebody happened to look out the window. But calm and content indoors.
A relative and her new husband had been married one month when they brought home a twice-returned “rescue” puppy. It seems like it’s made their lives much more difficult. Much running back and forth from work, or leaving events to run home and check on the pup, whom they can see crying on the camera. Travel will be trickier and less spur of the moment. I know all this is regarded as practice for having children, by some … and then there’s the expense. Fortunately everyone is rich now.
(He does not seem like he will ever be a chill indoor dog. To each their own. A sweet next door neighbor had 3 dogs, Katrina rescues, who never did stop going berserk if you came to their door; add in the yelling, er disciplining by her supposedly “alpha” husband and it just seemed easier to stay away. I learned later when they moved they’d had two cats cowering in a back bedroom the whole time they lived there - I was astonished, never knew!)
In some ways, pet ownership has grown more fraught in the USA because you can no longer leave your dog in the backyard. So the dog’s waste rules people’s life like the Divine Office.
In my apartment I have a view of the life of an urban dog and it is dull-seeming.
There is an unresolvable cognitive dissonance in folks whose idea of leaving a light footprint on the Earth involves eating no meat (however mistakenly, cows in particular filling a grassland niche) while owning lots of dogs. Cat food is more worrisome to me, for other reasons.
Overall I used to hope that people’s feeling for cats and dogs was a laudable sentiment that would transfer to and protect wild animals but I know now that was foolish.
There are, Google tells me, 900 million to a billion dogs on the planet. There are 200-250,000 wolves. There are 5,574 tigers which will unavoidably go extinct. Last year, in North Dakota, something cool happened for people who dislike the Endangered Species Act: the Greater Sage-Grouse became extinct in that grassland state, so no one there need worry about it anymore.
Nonetheless, I’ve noticed the internet has golden retrievers trending, and I will definitely watch when prompted.
Thanks for this thoughtful comment about the role of pets in our lives! I have always had dogs, and when I couldn’t have them because I lived in an apartment, I had a dogsitting business so I could be with them! But not everyone is equipped to handle the extra work they require, and not everyone is equipped dog is right for every family (as our bad experience with Lulu several months ago shows). I definitely feel sorry for those cats who had to cower in the bedroom!
And I agree about the benefits of grazing cattle. Cows are a crucial part of the Alpine ecosystem here. They spend their summers high up in the mountains, where it’s cooler and where there are fewer flies. In return, they help to maintain the turf, which helps to prevent mudslides. Everyone benefits—even me. I may be a vegetarian, but I LOVE Alpkäse, the cheese made from the milk of high-altitude cows.
I like that you are a cheese-eating vegetarian and am by inclination a vegetarian as well; my consumption of beans in particular is considered exceptional lol. I eat only because others like, maybe 12-16 ozs. of supposedly well-treated chicken* per year, and could easily give up pork altogether if I weren’t cooking for someone else (it’s the leftover grease I consider most valuable there, e.g. for flavoring green beans, but I could do without).
But I feel when I look at a field of cows, those guys have a great life. They seem happy, and if one could be so happy at the expense of an abrupt end I would take that bargain!
There too, I don’t precisely ever crave beef but I sometimes feel my brain on beans and bread is getting foggy and the remedy is a cheeseburger.
I would be interested to know what sort of vitamin or supplement you take, if any, to maintain your energy/mental acuity.
*A truck stacked full of chickens looking out at the world for the first and possibly last time, makes me so sad. I guess one betrays that one didn’t grow up on a farm by such a feeling, but I can’t help it.
If reincarnation were real, I would sincerely hope to come back as a Swiss cow. Really! They lead such an obviously blessed life, until the inevitable end.
I do take supplements: a multivitamin called Vegetaria Depot (whatever that means). Interestingly, it included no vitamin A. The makers correctly assume that we vegetarians get plenty of vitamin A from our diets. And I have recently started taking L-Lysine to prevent cold sores from developing. It works!
As for the leftover pork grease for flavoring, I hear you, sister. The only meat I miss is bacon, and I used to love cooking eggs in bacon fat. So delicious!
That KC cavalier had started out as my then-little niece’s longed for dog. (After a first failed attempt by Santa to please her with an animatronic stuffed dog that could walk on a leash, which she was clearly told to bring to show off to us that Christmas Day. “It’s not real, it’s plush,” she explained. What are you going to call it? we asked. After a moment, utterly deadpan, disinterested: “Plushie”.)
Real or real-ish dog acquired, I decided for her birthday to give her a dog toy. I repaired to the fancy dog store, was looking at a throwing device of some sort. The clerk asked what kind of dog. KC cavalier, I said.
Oh, he said, his face clouding as he discouraged me from buying it or any toy. They are for sitting, he said.
Ha! “They are for sitting”: I love it!
<3
😘 back at you, Edie!