Sometimes I really wonder what planet I'm living on.
Today I cut through the main lobby of 30 Rock. I hadn't done that -- walking from the ice rink to the side entrance on 49th Street -- in a long time. The 49th Street entrance is opposite the bank of elevators which leads to NBC's and Channel 4's (WNBC)studios. Otherwise known -- for decades I think -- as the studio entrance. There's one on the 50th Street side as well.
So why am I telling you this? Why should you care? Because what happened next is a primer on how much our world has changed.
There was a group of maybe 20 people lined up on the short flight of stairs leading to the elevators. And a person I couldn't see addressing the group in a very loud voice. "Be sure to remove your belts before going through the metal detectors. And take out all loose change......" And on and on and on. All of it the now familiar instructions we hear and see as we go through airport security. And I mean ALL of it.
An errant thought crossed my mind. Women now know enough not to wear underwire bras when they fly because they set off the alarms. But to see a TV show? So when the alarm on the NBC metal detector goes off because you're wearing your usual underwire bra -- does someone with a TSA uniform -- errr NBC uniform -- come out of woodwork and wand you and pat you down to be sure that's all you in the underwire? Do you have to explain about breast enhancement??? And while I'm at it -- what about knee and hip replacements? The TSA folks wand, poke and pat little old ladies with metal hips unmercifully at airport security.
It would be laughable if it weren't so earnest. The very Soviet-style world we thought we overcame when we won the Cold War. We DID win it didn't we?
Come on guys. IT'S A TV SHOW. Not a jetliner loaded with fuel flying over the Atlantic. Or DisneyWorld.
I'll go along with searching purses and backpacks. Almost every building does that now. Not like a few years ago when only the state and federal courthouses did -- looking, I presume, for something logical-- like guns and knives. Hell -- DisneyWorld does it. I mean, gee. You can't be too careful around Mickey and Minnie.
But back to NBC and taking off your belt to see a TV show.
Y'know -- maybe it was all part of a reality TV show. Because it doesn't take much imagination to visualize what might happen to some members of the hip hop generation when they take off their belts. And then NBC might have another issue -- with the NYPD for indecent exposure. When those 4 sizes too big pants siting uneasily below the hip line --- now bereft of the one thing keeping them there -- fall off completely.
Maybe I should have stayed around for the "floor" show.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
On (Czech) Language
It’s another day in black and white up here. Snow again turning everything –even the evergreens – to grey.
I could be studying my Czech language lessons. Or getting my income taxes in order. Or looking for work. Or even giving in to snow-bound cravings and eating Hershey dark chocolate kisses unfortunately left over from Christmas. I could be – but I’m not.
Instead I’ve been reading back articles in the Prague Monitor,
an online newspaper I get in my email box every weekday. No, not what I could be reading or maybe should be reading – important news stories like why the hapless Greek economy ruined a recent Czech government bond sale.
No – I’ve been reading about the use of language in Prague. Czech language. Standard American vs Southern American vs British English. And the merits of editing what you say for the sake of understanding.
Now I don’t even live in Prague except for a few months in the summer – and a few, scattered weeks in fall or spring. But even for those short stays, I find myself editing my English for my Czech friends – as Prague Monitor writer Emily Prucha found herself doing in her combined Czech-American family.
Prucha wrote that Americans find their brand of English – especially when spoken with regional accents and idioms (she’s from Virginia) – sometimes incomprehensible to Czechs who – if they’ve studied English formally have usually been force-fed the grammar and vocabulary of British English. So almost without conscious thought now, I will use “flat” for apartment and “lift” for elevator and try to keep my Lower East Side-influenced northeastern slang to myself.
But Prague isn’t the only place where British English is catching on. It’s happening here too. There are now many British and British-trained news reporters and analysts working in the US. Or as foreign reporters where cost-cutting media companies have closed overseas news bureaus. And many Britishisms that would actually be incorrect in American English are creeping into the everyday language. One of the most obvious: "gone missing" for when someone disappears without a trace or explanation. Young American reporters think the phrase sounds cool and sophisticated -- along with some others like "on holiday" and even occasionally "flat".
Words, after all, define us. My friends and I went through college saying “caio” to each other and thinking that simple Italian word (learned from Gina Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren – not generations of Italian immigrants) somehow gave us a kind of world-weary European sophistication.
Not surprisingly in our much more interlaced world today – ciao is again a college favorite – along with any other country’s words which can make a Brooklyn or Mississippi or even Boston (mine) accent sound like it’s circled the globe.
So – ciao bambino! I’m about to go missing and maybe on holiday as well. You’ll find me at some pub with a pint, some bangers and mash and my mates – some of whom may be a bit dodgy. Like me.
I could be studying my Czech language lessons. Or getting my income taxes in order. Or looking for work. Or even giving in to snow-bound cravings and eating Hershey dark chocolate kisses unfortunately left over from Christmas. I could be – but I’m not.
Instead I’ve been reading back articles in the Prague Monitor,
an online newspaper I get in my email box every weekday. No, not what I could be reading or maybe should be reading – important news stories like why the hapless Greek economy ruined a recent Czech government bond sale.
No – I’ve been reading about the use of language in Prague. Czech language. Standard American vs Southern American vs British English. And the merits of editing what you say for the sake of understanding.
Now I don’t even live in Prague except for a few months in the summer – and a few, scattered weeks in fall or spring. But even for those short stays, I find myself editing my English for my Czech friends – as Prague Monitor writer Emily Prucha found herself doing in her combined Czech-American family.
Prucha wrote that Americans find their brand of English – especially when spoken with regional accents and idioms (she’s from Virginia) – sometimes incomprehensible to Czechs who – if they’ve studied English formally have usually been force-fed the grammar and vocabulary of British English. So almost without conscious thought now, I will use “flat” for apartment and “lift” for elevator and try to keep my Lower East Side-influenced northeastern slang to myself.
But Prague isn’t the only place where British English is catching on. It’s happening here too. There are now many British and British-trained news reporters and analysts working in the US. Or as foreign reporters where cost-cutting media companies have closed overseas news bureaus. And many Britishisms that would actually be incorrect in American English are creeping into the everyday language. One of the most obvious: "gone missing" for when someone disappears without a trace or explanation. Young American reporters think the phrase sounds cool and sophisticated -- along with some others like "on holiday" and even occasionally "flat".
Words, after all, define us. My friends and I went through college saying “caio” to each other and thinking that simple Italian word (learned from Gina Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren – not generations of Italian immigrants) somehow gave us a kind of world-weary European sophistication.
Not surprisingly in our much more interlaced world today – ciao is again a college favorite – along with any other country’s words which can make a Brooklyn or Mississippi or even Boston (mine) accent sound like it’s circled the globe.
So – ciao bambino! I’m about to go missing and maybe on holiday as well. You’ll find me at some pub with a pint, some bangers and mash and my mates – some of whom may be a bit dodgy. Like me.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Childhood Obesity and Death
What does it take to wake up America to the dangers of obesity? Otherwise loving and often overly protective parents seen oblivious to the problem. Maybe because at least some of these parents fall into the obese – or at least overweight – category themselves?
Well there’s now a major study, published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine, that tracked a large group of American Indian children for an average of 24 years. The findings? That obesity, pre-diabetes (glucose intolerance) and hypertension in childhood were strongly associated with increased rates of premature death. Specifically – the heaviest kids were more than twice as likely as the thinnest ones to die before they reached 55. That’s 15 to 20 years below average American life expectancy. And typically, say the experts, American Indians are about a decade ahead of other Americans in terms of obesity numbers. Right now nearly a third of all American children are either overweight or obese. You can see where this is going….
There’s never been a good excuse for ignoring obesity. But at least if you’re an adult – you’re making your own, presumably desired, decisions. That’s certainly not true for children. And millions of kids are being doomed to an early death simply because their parents, extended families and school teachers – those most responsible for protecting and directing them – are not doing their jobs.
Never mind the impact on our already fractured health care system. Think of the impact on a kid’s life. Years of taking pills or struggling with insulin shots. Heart attacks that can ruin lives even if they don’t kill. Cancer with all its implications. Strokes.
Do you really want the worst for your child instead of the best?
Habits instilled in childhood last a lifetime. It’s a lot harder to think thin for the first time when you’re 40 than when you’re 10. Healthy food in reasonable portions combined with daily exercise is not exactly a recipe for purgatory. In fact the exercise is called play when you’re a kid. Remember?
So parents and teachers – belly away from the food bar and invest a little healthy living in your kids’ future. And maybe in the process those of you who are making bad decisions about your own lives – will add a few good years onto them.
Well there’s now a major study, published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine, that tracked a large group of American Indian children for an average of 24 years. The findings? That obesity, pre-diabetes (glucose intolerance) and hypertension in childhood were strongly associated with increased rates of premature death. Specifically – the heaviest kids were more than twice as likely as the thinnest ones to die before they reached 55. That’s 15 to 20 years below average American life expectancy. And typically, say the experts, American Indians are about a decade ahead of other Americans in terms of obesity numbers. Right now nearly a third of all American children are either overweight or obese. You can see where this is going….
There’s never been a good excuse for ignoring obesity. But at least if you’re an adult – you’re making your own, presumably desired, decisions. That’s certainly not true for children. And millions of kids are being doomed to an early death simply because their parents, extended families and school teachers – those most responsible for protecting and directing them – are not doing their jobs.
Never mind the impact on our already fractured health care system. Think of the impact on a kid’s life. Years of taking pills or struggling with insulin shots. Heart attacks that can ruin lives even if they don’t kill. Cancer with all its implications. Strokes.
Do you really want the worst for your child instead of the best?
Habits instilled in childhood last a lifetime. It’s a lot harder to think thin for the first time when you’re 40 than when you’re 10. Healthy food in reasonable portions combined with daily exercise is not exactly a recipe for purgatory. In fact the exercise is called play when you’re a kid. Remember?
So parents and teachers – belly away from the food bar and invest a little healthy living in your kids’ future. And maybe in the process those of you who are making bad decisions about your own lives – will add a few good years onto them.
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Health Care Reform 2.0.3
Look. This is getting ridiculous. I’ve just been reading some of the details of President Obama’s new 10 year budget proposal. Which projects a deficit equal to 11% of our Gross Domestic Product for next year (2011) and even 10 years down the road envisions a deficit worth 5% of GDP. This bleak estimate doesn’t allow any room for new domestic programs of any kind.
Hello? Is anybody with a half a brain out there paying ANY attention?
Yes, yes I’m getting to health care reform. Right now. It seems obvious – what with the loss of the Democrats’ super majority in the Senate and the seemingly total inability of the White House or the Democrats in Congress to explain what is really in the 2 multi-thousand page reform bills – that we aren’t going to get much reform in this administration.
So here’s my what you might call "meat cleaver" approach. Starting with a lot less use of the real meat cleaver and a lot more black beans and rice.
Yes, America, we need a National Food Police and Exercise Agency. NFPEA. With absolute, dictatorial powers.
I don’t care how old you are --- you will start eating properly. Limited consumption of red meat. Or really, any meat. No sugar in children’s cold cereal. Much less salt in all restaurant, prepared and even home-cooked meals. (Watch out Grandma! That big flat screen TV on the kitchen wall is now watching how you make your chicken soup!) Portions a third to a half smaller. That includes those huge cups and cones of ice cream at the DQ. Reasonable amounts of vegetarian style entrees making sure there is adequate protein (like the beans and rice combination) and only enough olive oil and garlic sauce on the pasta and veggies to coat the penne – not drown it.
No McDonald’s burgers. Or any other fast food burgers or fried chicken or fried fish. Absolutely no French fries. No fried food of ANY kind – except as a very occasional treat. And whole wheat or multi-grain bread. The first edict from the NFPEA will make eating Wonder Bread and all it’s gluey offshoots an imprisonable crime.
Along with the food reform will go exercise. Every American of any age will be required to do at least enough exercise to work off more than the calories he or she eats. For those currently healthy enough to do it, that exercise will be aerobic, heart-healthy fast walking, running, biking, swimming or sweat-worthy classes. Or heavy labor. Or both. And flicking the remote at the TV does NOT count as heavy labor. (Nor does walking 3 steps to the kitchen to refill the bowl of potato chips.)
I think you get the picture. With no possible lobbying from insurance companies or doctors or hospitals ---how can you lobby against better health – Americans will slowly get thinner and healthier. The incidence of diabetes will start falling instead of increasing. Heart disease will begin to disappear. Cancer rates will drop. And kids who used to be thin and active and healthy will no longer leave the pediatrician’s office with a diagnosis of high cholesterol and high blood pressure.
In just a few years we will have accomplished health care reform without any political wrangling in Congress. And Americans – now actually able to see the rest of the world over their bellies – will start noticing what really goes on in Washington. And what doesn’t.
Health care costs will drop drastically and some expensive specialists may have to drop down to the primary care level – where they are actually needed.
It’s a simple little system. Eat less, eat better and exercise. Really now – why would we need the White House or Congress to mandate that?
Hello? Is anybody with a half a brain out there paying ANY attention?
Yes, yes I’m getting to health care reform. Right now. It seems obvious – what with the loss of the Democrats’ super majority in the Senate and the seemingly total inability of the White House or the Democrats in Congress to explain what is really in the 2 multi-thousand page reform bills – that we aren’t going to get much reform in this administration.
So here’s my what you might call "meat cleaver" approach. Starting with a lot less use of the real meat cleaver and a lot more black beans and rice.
Yes, America, we need a National Food Police and Exercise Agency. NFPEA. With absolute, dictatorial powers.
I don’t care how old you are --- you will start eating properly. Limited consumption of red meat. Or really, any meat. No sugar in children’s cold cereal. Much less salt in all restaurant, prepared and even home-cooked meals. (Watch out Grandma! That big flat screen TV on the kitchen wall is now watching how you make your chicken soup!) Portions a third to a half smaller. That includes those huge cups and cones of ice cream at the DQ. Reasonable amounts of vegetarian style entrees making sure there is adequate protein (like the beans and rice combination) and only enough olive oil and garlic sauce on the pasta and veggies to coat the penne – not drown it.
No McDonald’s burgers. Or any other fast food burgers or fried chicken or fried fish. Absolutely no French fries. No fried food of ANY kind – except as a very occasional treat. And whole wheat or multi-grain bread. The first edict from the NFPEA will make eating Wonder Bread and all it’s gluey offshoots an imprisonable crime.
Along with the food reform will go exercise. Every American of any age will be required to do at least enough exercise to work off more than the calories he or she eats. For those currently healthy enough to do it, that exercise will be aerobic, heart-healthy fast walking, running, biking, swimming or sweat-worthy classes. Or heavy labor. Or both. And flicking the remote at the TV does NOT count as heavy labor. (Nor does walking 3 steps to the kitchen to refill the bowl of potato chips.)
I think you get the picture. With no possible lobbying from insurance companies or doctors or hospitals ---how can you lobby against better health – Americans will slowly get thinner and healthier. The incidence of diabetes will start falling instead of increasing. Heart disease will begin to disappear. Cancer rates will drop. And kids who used to be thin and active and healthy will no longer leave the pediatrician’s office with a diagnosis of high cholesterol and high blood pressure.
In just a few years we will have accomplished health care reform without any political wrangling in Congress. And Americans – now actually able to see the rest of the world over their bellies – will start noticing what really goes on in Washington. And what doesn’t.
Health care costs will drop drastically and some expensive specialists may have to drop down to the primary care level – where they are actually needed.
It’s a simple little system. Eat less, eat better and exercise. Really now – why would we need the White House or Congress to mandate that?
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