medical, personal

Yes, I’m Fat

In an article on BBC News website over the weekend one woman talks about how she feels about being fat. I found it interesting because so much of what she says chimes with how I feel. Here are some of the things she says and which I share (plus a few tropes of my own).

Feeling good about your body isn’t always easy when you are overweight.
. . .
Quite literally, I am the elephant in the room.
. . .
I am fat, there’s no getting away from it.
. . .
I don’t think there’s a single part of me … that is small.
. . .
Society has its own sort of perception of people like me – we are disgusting, fat, slothful, lazy, incompetent, stupid.
. . .
[H]ow could you be that fat? The answer is simple – a lack of control, a lack of confidence …

Yes, I have a lack of self-control; it isn’t good enough now but it was much worse years ago when I first put on weight. It is partly down to the lack of confidence but it’s also, in part, the anxiety and depression.

It’s kind of sad that I’m comforted by food rather than other elements in the world.
. . .
The eating combined with my osteoarthritis and other disabilities doesn’t help – the additional weight on the joints isn’t a positive impact.
. . .
I did swim, but don’t any more.
. . .
“Just lose weight.” I hear that all the time from family, friends, colleagues, doctors …
It’s not rocket science – I know that … but that means effort, doesn’t it? It means having to motivate myself and persevere … I can’t …

I can’t because mostly the depression acts as a complete roadblock. I wish it didn’t, but despite trying just about everything available I’ve not yet found a way through the roadblock.

What is also for many oversized people, me included, is that the brain doesn’t internally know one’s real size. The brain still thinks of you being your normal size and doesn’t adjust for your new size. So you don’t (instinctively) realise how much space you take up. You have this internal picture of yourself the way you were (or should be).

People are constantly judging me … I am a reflection of something that they could become. They tell themselves that they’ve got control, they’re sensible, intelligent and no way would they ever get to my size. But let me tell you, I was you once and you could be me.
. . .
The only person I can hold responsible for my position is me. However, I refuse to accept the size I am. This is not who I was meant to be.
If I accept it then I’m telling myself that I’ve given up and I don’t want to give up.
I don’t want to be normal because normal is boring. I just want to be the best of myself.

I wish it wasn’t thus. I don’t like being the size I am. I understand the risks. I know all the things I should do to combat it, and if I could do it I would have done long ago. But having looked at, and thought about, the problem in depth, the first thing that has to happen is to fix the depression and other mental issues. That is a huge challenge, and I’ve not yet found the key to unlocking it – I wish I had!

beliefs, ramblings

Gendered Loos

A story in the Guardian earlier this week quotes “feminist academic” Germaine Greer as saying publicly on Channel 4 TV that all public toilets should be gender-neutral.

Now I don’t like Germaine Greer, her strident attitude and many of her apparent beliefs. But on this I have to agree with her. Why can’t toilets be gender-neutral?

I recall when I was a graduate student (mid-1970s), I was a student rep on the university’s accommodation sub-committee and we were debating the possibility of having mixed corridors in student residences. Not just mixed blocks with single sex corridors of rooms, but actually mixed corridors. This was put up for debate by the university housing department as a way of better utilising the available accommodation. None of the student reps had a problem with the idea, nor did the younger university staff; in fact the only objections came from a couple of stuffed shirts at the top of the housing department. As we all pointed out: bathrooms have doors which can be locked, as do student rooms; and we all have to live in the real world with mixed genders. So how are student residences any different especially when many students choose to live in mixed-gendered flats/houses.
(I don’t know if this was implemented as I left before the start of the next academic year.)

How is this different from having mixed toilets, even if the toilets are “public conveniences”? Our local swimming pool has a mixed gender changing room with cubicles. How is this different from mixed toilets? We live in a multi-gendered society. It’s not as if we’re asking pregnant or menstruating women (or indeed anyone else) to perform their ablutions without any screening; and yes, I do get why they wouldn’t want to.

So you think you (or the children) might see something they shouldn’t. Oh, please! For a start we all know what’s under my t-shirt and jeans, and your t-shirt and jeans, so why the fuss. And kids have to learn about what’s under those t-shirts and jeans, and the bodily functions, sooner or later. How much better for them to learn in an open environment where they can be properly, and age-appropriately, explained by a parent, grandparent etc. – or in an educational environment like a school?

Yes, OK, public toilets tend not to be the most pleasant of places, but we make them that way. Men’s loos are supposedly worse than women’s – until you talk to people who run clubs who’ll tell you the women’s loos are often much worse than the men’s. So we all need to be more civilised. And maybe the thought that the other gender – who, of course, we want to impress – are watching might get us all to smarten up our ideas.

If gender neutral (or should they be “gender inclusive”) toilets are such a bad idea how is it that many public organisations like theatres and museums, let alone many companies, are going this route? And how come “disabled access toilets” are always non-gendered?

I don’t buy all this division of facilitates, any facilities, by gender. For all me we’d have mixed gender changing rooms with no cubicles. I just don’t get the problem, and I never have. I can’t be doing with it.

So I have to concede that Germaine Greer is right: all public toilets should be gender neutral.

amusements, personal

Ten Things

This month something slightly more topical in Ten Things …

Ten Things I did Over Bank Holiday Weekend:

  1. Hosted a literary society pub meet
  2. Prepared a meeting for next week
  3. Ate fish & chips
  4. Drank too much alcohol (not all at once!) and enjoyed it
  5. Did more work tidying up my rebuilt website & blog
  6. Completed two prize crosswords
  7. Won £2.50 on the lottery
  8. Read the latest New Scientist and a railway magazine
  9. Started on reorganising and rejuvenating the plants on our tiny patio
  10. Tried (and failed) to get a 10 year old laptop working satisfactorily
amusements

Auction Oddities

We’ve not had a selection of the eccentric and downright weird auction items recently. This is mainly because the last couple of sales at our local auction house have been on the dull side. However here is a selection of the best oddities from the March and April sales.

A charming set of eight buttons, each styled as a Victorian watch face, the numerals linked by swags of flowers, each button 2.6 cm Image

A collection of wooden plucked musical instruments Image

A Royal Albert Flowers of the Month part tea service, an orange lustre tea service decorated with romantic couples, a Royal Doulton toby jug The Walrus and the Carpenter D6600, a small quantity of souvenir ware, a Japanese vase and a safety deposit box and contents

A Victorian entomology cased and glazed set of pinned moths Image
As so often that isn’t quite what they mean!

A nice collection of mainly wood and metal ware including cased set of chessmen and dominoes, 19th century wooden box present from Loch Fyne, 19th century hand painted tea caddy, a collection of alabaster eggs in wicker basket, religious wares, 19th century inlaid stoneware desk paperweight and candlestick, set of three hand painted wooden candlesticks, wooden bowls, letter racks, milking stool, a box of hand tools, brushes, two copper jelly moulds, etc.

An old red plastic telephone, a box of tea and magazine cards including Valiant, old magazines including Rin Tin Tin, Tweety, Sylvester, Look and Learn, and a signed card from Dave Clark of “Time, The Musical”

A mixed lot including a 1906 copy of The Temperance Party paper, a fashion print, cigarette cards, silhouettes, two folders of official slides of medieval frescoes in Yugoslavia, a quantity of silver-plated commemorative spoons, miniature porcelain and a 1938 copy of The Daily Telegraph, etc.

A green plastic carton containing a miniature horse and trap, powder boxes, a decorative spoon, hat pins, a pair of stylish early 20th century door handles, a shell purse, lighters, a model alpine house, photo album, etc.

No allocated
But it has an Image!

A child’s vintage Lilliput typewriter, cased men’s grooming sets, a ladies vintage shoe stretcher, a silver plated sugar sifter, a cased set of M Dobson binoculars, a cased Greenkat telescope and a decorative horn

A good lot of pewter in three boxes comprising a 17th century style candle wall sconce, table wares, tureens, dishes and bowls, steins, an art nouveau butter dish with liner, a jelly mould, toast rack, a pair of pricket candlesticks, coffee pot, etc., a box of reference books on collecting including pewter and money boxes, and a Victorian folding deckchair

Not Allocated
Another which also has an Image!

A most interesting collection of 38 Friendly Society ceremonial staff heads in brass, mounted on wooden stands

A Victorian pottery jardiniere stand supporting the bust of a lady
That could have been better phrased!

An old metal trunk with labels containing blankets
I’m still puzzled as to how to get a blanket in a label

A vintage Nativity set, a pair of vintage scales, two large table lamps, a small oak stool, a vintage record holder and a large vase

Three bamboo and rattan tables, a wickerwork basket, three towel rails, a lampstand, a rocking horse and a glass-fibre boot stick stand

As so often it is the odd juxtapositions that make many of these stand out, despite the lack of crap taxidermy.

More anon!

environment

Something’s Rotten

I am appalled at this story from yesterday’s Guardian:

Rotten results: Sainsbury’s drops project to halve food waste

I’m especially appalled at the stupidity of people that they just cannot be arsed to do better than this.

And here’s another “cost of food” story we (yes, including me) quietly ignore:

What is the true cost of eating meat?

These are such good demonstrations of how, as a species, we’re so self-centred that it’s going to destroy everything.

On a slightly different tack, here’s another example, this time from Scientific American:

Global Tourism Has a Bigger Share of Carbon Emissions Than Thought

Like three times bigger! FFS.

Someone please explain to me how anyone can genuinely justify any of this.

Gah! People!

environment

Urban Tree Festival

Anyone who follows along here will know the importance I attach to trees: they create shade, help clean up urban pollution, support a whole raft of important species from aphids to squirrels and owls, provide us with fruit and nuts, as well as giving many of us a great deal of pleasure. Urban trees are especially important as there are many studies showing that a green environment is important for life enhancement.

So I’m pleased to see the announcement of the first ever Urban Tree Festival in London.

The event, which runs over the weekend of 18-20 May, is promising a series of urban tree-related events across London including tree identification, street tree walks, and a close look at London’s Mulberry heritage.

Most of the events are ticketed (via Eventbrite); links are on the Urban Tree Festival events page.

H/T IanVisits

amusements, personal

Bank Holiday 20 Questions Meme

Just for a bit of time-wasting amusement here’s a twenty question meme for the end of a bank holiday weekend.

  1. Name a food that you can’t stand but which most people seem to love. Butternut squash.
  2. Name a food beginning with each of your initials. Kale. Custard. Marmite.
  3. Who is the most famous person you’ve met? Author Ian Rankin.
  4. What was the last thing you read? This screen.
  5. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? Get rid of the depression because pretty much everything else would follow from that.
  6. What vegetable do you most hate? Sweet potato.
  7. What superpower would you most like to have? Omnipotence – with that you can do anything else.
  8. What would you love to be an expert in? Doing nothing.
  9. If you could make any discovery, what would it be? The secret of immortality. Let’s face it, none of us really wants to die.
  10. What would you like to have named after you? A dung beetle would probably be most appropriate. Or a wasp. Yes, I’ll settle for an annoying wasp.
  11. If you could meet any figure from the past or the future, who would you meet? Elizabethan composer William Byrd.
  12. What was the last thing you put in your mouth? Earl Grey tea.
  13. Are you a good influence? I very much doubt it; indeed I might be worried if I were.
  14. Does pineapple belong on pizza? Definitely not; neither does peach, unless you’re making a specifically fruit pizza. (Must sometime write up my method for fruit pizza.)
  15. Something that’s worrying you at the moment. Diabetes.
  16. One skill you don’t have but wish you did. The ability to magically attract money. Well, who wouldn’t!?
  17. Tell me one unpopular, but entirely logical and far-sighted opinion you hold. The private car (van, etc.) should be banned. Yes, it would be tricky, but it could be done and it needen’t be as horrendous as you might imagine. (I must write an essay on this sometime.)
  18. Do you ever write in pencil any more? Yes, actually quite a bit of the time: old programmers always write in pencil.
  19. Do you wear rings? Yes. I’m currently wearing three: wedding ring, silver wedding anniversary ring, and a copper ring. Oh and my original (very worn) wedding ring on a chain round my neck.
  20. Tell us three things you did today? Tried (and failed) to get a very old laptop working. Started reorganising the patio. Made a chicken salad.

Nobody is tagged, but join in if you want – just leave a comment here with a link to your answers so we can all enjoy them.

links, personal, ramblings

Welcome!

Welcome to the new Zen Mischief site!

If you have landed here it appears that the migration from our old site has been a success. Thank you for your patience during the transition.

So what has changed?

  1. The driver for the change was to make the Zen Mischief Weblog part of this front page.
  2. That means the look and feel is slightly different, although the blog navigation is still in the right-hand column.
  3. The static pages still exist and are now linked from the left-hand column.
  4. The short site description and the current quote now appear at the top of the left-hand column.
  5. A few of the old static pages have been sunset; the rest have been revised; and there is some new content.
  6. If you trawl back through all the old blog posts then you’re likely to find some missing images; I’ll correct these as and when the opportunity arises.
  7. Oh, and you may need to update your bookmarks/favourites.

And that’s about it. Everything else should be much the same, and hopefully normal service can resume.

environment, links, medical, natural history, science

Your Monthly Links

Here’s the usual selection of links to articles which interested me and which you may have missed. We’ve a packed house, so on with the show …

Science, Technology & Natural World

Some interesting speculation on whether a pre-human industrial civilisation could have existed on Earth, and whether we would be able to tell.

Apparently European women are twice as likely to be naturally blond as men.

Ravens. The Tower of London has them. So who better to ask about the intelligence of Ravens.

Wasps. There are countless species of them, they’re mostly tiny, and most are parasitic – indeed there’s thought to be at least one parasitic wasp species for every other insect species.

Ants perform triage and launch rescue missions on the battlefield, but only if it’s worth the effort.

Scientists are suggesting that trees may have a form of “heartbeat”, but it is so slow we wouldn’t normally notice.

Why does soil, especially newly wet soil, Springtime soil and forest soil, smell so identifiably?

It seems many trillions of viruses fall to Earth each day – millions per square metre – and it’s not all bad.

A meteorite found in Sudan contains some tiny diamonds, which means it is thought to be the remnants of a lost planet.

Health & Medicine

Do you suffer from chronic pain? Medics are suggesting that a change of mindset could help reduce the pain as much as analgesics.

Who, apart from me, had flu this last winter? If you did you shouldn’t be surprised as apparently we don’t take flu seriously enough. It really is worth getting the flu jab (especially if you’re in an “at risk” category). Although I was vaccinated and still got flu which floored me it wasn’t anything like as bad as if I’d not been vaccinated.

The NHS is being urged to include boys & young men in the HPV vaccination scheme (currently only adolescent girls are eligible). Not only would it help contain the general spread of the virus, but more and more men are getting head/neck cancers from the human papilloma virus, thought to be due to the young having more oral sex.

A test is being developed that will allow a foetus’s sex to be determined from just a finger-prick drop of blood during the first trimester of pregnancy.

There needs to be much greater awareness of the state of our post-birth vaginas. As usual the UK lags behind our old enemy, France, in post-partum rehabilitation.

And while we’re at it, we still have an appallingly poor knowledge of the anatomy for the clitoris. Yes, that’s all of us, it seems!

Environment

Unlike my neighbour, most of us understand that plants are important. Here’s why.

Bees are important too. And you can help the bees by doing less. Just mow your lawn only every two to three weeks.

Scientists are developing an enzyme to eat plastic bottles.

Art & Literature

It’s reported that Neil Gaiman is to make a film of Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast trilogy.

Stockholm residents are up in arms over a five storey high blue penis mural.

London

IanVisits has created a useful map of all London’s miniature steam train rides.

Meanwhile another London blogger, Diamond Geezer, has produced a London Random Tourist Inspiration Generator for when you want to go somewhere but don’t know where.

Lifestyle & Personal Development

We’re moving towards a cashless society, or so we’re told. But being cashless puts us at risk, so the Swedes are turning against the idea.

Why are some societies strict and others lax? New Scientist investigates.

Do you want to be more assertive in life? If so there’s a dominatrix in New York who will teach you.

Chiltern Railways, whose trains run north-west out of London’s Marylebone Station, are suggesting eight seated yoga poses you can do on your commute. I struggling to decide how serous they are.

Crazy cat lady is a frequent image in pop culture. But why?

Food & Drink

A recent column in the Guardian is suggesting that eating goat is as tasty as lamb and a sustainable, ethical choice of meat.

Shock, Horror, Humour

And finally, one for the engineers and kids out there. John Collins, aka. “The Paper Airplane Guy“, holds the distance record for flight by a paper airplane. And he shares a few of his secrets with us.

food+drink, medical, words

Orthorexia

Orthorexia

Excessive concern with consuming a diet considered to be correct in some respect, often involving the elimination of foods or food groups supposed to be harmful to health.
A disorder characterized by a morbid obsession with eating only healthy foods.

The OED reports the first use to be as recent as 1997, viz.:

“Orthorexia nervosa refers to a pathological fixation on eating proper food.”
[Yoga Journal; September-October 1997]

“Orthorexia – like anorexia and bulimia – eventually reaches a point where it takes over the sufferer’s life … Raw food fans take this to the utmost extreme.”
[Cosmopolitan (UK edition); September 1998]