The Chicken or the Egg?

380 million salmonella eggs. Not yummy, but, apparently, neither is 80% of the chicken. It's regularly contaminated with the very same salmonella involved in the recent recall. Still, no one is talking about that. People only speak in sound bites now--even my adoptive Italian Grandma stated: "It's not worth the risk." Just hours later I read her exact words in an article by Mike Adams.

No, the FDA, the CDC, and the USDA aren't telling you to throw out of those tiny tainted chicken corpses. Proper cooking kills the contaminant. Same with the eggs. They don't report that.

So was it the chicken or the egg? Both? Neither? In this case, if you plow through the misinformation, it is obvious that it is the farming practices that are wrong.

Awww, come now. THAT doesn't make for exciting television. We need sensational news stories with sci-fi endings, like the idea of nuking all the eggs, eradicating nutrients along with the contaminants. Why attempt to cure the big agribusiness disease completely when you can invent a new oppressive solution that will evenly distribute poor health to everyone? Now that's equality!

What's useful about the age-old chicken-egg question is that it probes for root causes. What started it all? That's why I almost became a naturopathic doctor. I appreciated the methodology: restoring balance by addressing the most basic problem.

Nowadays, we treat the surface. Not just in conventional medicine. In so many arenas.

Take, for instance, insults to supposed "teabaggers" by so-called progressives who believe that Tea Party values are without merit simply because neocons like Palin, desperate for followers, are hoping to capitalize on this record-level disenchantment by posing as champions and saviors. They are not. This situation has smeared the good names of Patriotism and Political Dissent, which are GOOD THINGS. Vital things.

If Republicans are racists, Democrats are socialists, and Independents are just wasting their votes, where does that leave us? You know. Us. The people.

Nowheresville.

Popular adherence to the false left-right paradigm is infuriating and dangerous.

When will pseudo-progressives and faux conservatives quit their petty assaults on each other?

Isn't it evident that most politicians, be they Democrats or Republicans, are beholden to corporations whose primary motivation is not our well-being but their profit?

In this atmosphere of zero accountability, we can expect that such interests will contribute to the promotion and election of more corporate shills who seek to co-opt movements by both true conservatives and true progressives and to subvert their agendas. The problem is not the other side: it's the infighting among those of us who realize something is amiss. We need to befriend the Other. We need to dig into our differences and find the overlap, or it is curtains for our country.

The exacerbation of political difference is our greatest weakness. We are powerless until we see this. Only from a place of empowerment will we be able to identify those parties who wish to exploit that weakness by fomenting tensions and thereby keeping us too distracted to start rooting for ourselves and each other. You know. The home team.

French Kissin' for the DNA

When I hear a boy has a cold, it is an immediate turn-off for me. If he eats white flour and sugar, my heart suddenly stops fluttering. If he is regularly exposed to chemicals, I hide my cuteness from him. If he smokes, I think, "What a waste!" and promptly begin searching out a new crush.

My friends and family dismiss my criticisms as "weird" and "picky" and suggest that I broaden my horizons. I vehemently protest until they switch topics.

Apparently, I am not alone. Vastly outnumbered but not entirely alone.

Yesterday Luke had bubblegum for breakfast and an ice cream sundae for dinner. Sure, it was organic raw vegan ice cream, but where was the balance? What kind of nutritional debt did he accumulate that day? I scolded him for not preserving his genetic integrity in front of our new drummer because he knows better. No, it didn't earn me points with either of them, but I get angry. I have invested in his health. I have taught him. He has been the beneficiary of all my diligence. The countless books and articles I've studied have allowed me to impart sage advice whenever applicable. He's been lucky to have me as his personal nutritional counselor/gourmet chef/health guru. I do realize that he usually eats properly and that, more importantly, he prefers to, but sometimes he gets disappointingly lazy, and I just can't stand it!

Sure enough, last night Natural News sent out a video and article about the "genopocalypse." It discusses how humans are destroying their fertility and their very genetic code via poor diet and lifestyle choices. Studies in small mammals have demonstrated that, even if you don't see genetic anomalies in the next generation, some reproductive irregularities will appear consistently in third and fourth generations and beyond. In his article, Adams claims that vegans will be the ones making viable deposits to the sperm bank, but I disagree; only the most discriminating vegans who are supplementing correctly will be able to contribute to the cause. All of the vegan boys I know eat mass quantities of unfermented soy, which is mostly GMO, highly estrogenic, and definitely unsuitable for consumption by men or anyone, really, unless they want to end up like these poor rats:

"...female rats fed a diet of GM soy experienced a drastically higher infant death rate, and their surviving infants were smaller and less fertile than the offspring of rats fed on a non-GM soy diet. Male rats fed the GM soy had their testicles change from pink to blue, and the GM soy was also observed to damage the DNA of sperm and embryos. Fertility problems such as abortion, infertility, premature delivery, prolapsed uteri, infant death, and even delivery of unformed infants (bags of water) have been observed in farm animals fed GM cottonseed and corn."--
Doctors Warn About Dangers of Genetically Modified Food



After watching and reading, I called Luke again. I told him I believe he has a moral obligation to his progeny to make healthy choices and implored him to do so.

Sometimes I suspect we've strayed too far from our primitive roots to ever connect fully with our most basic urges, but on this account, I was right. It may be socially unacceptable to say these things, but biologically I've always known it to be true. No matter how my contemporaries have fought me on it, I continue to feel this need to couple with someone who is fastidious about his health--not, of course, to an extent that is unhealthy! Just someone who puts genuine effort into his body, mind, and spirit because he finds value there. As I do. Simple.

Maybe someday soon I will get to reclaim and recontextualize the terms weird and picky. Maybe what's weirdest about me is how uncannily right I am to consciously and meticulously choose a partner who doesn't represent a genetic dead end.

Dusting Off My Brutes

Noticed this afternoon that my room was a little on the dusty side. Pulled everything off the shelves before leaving for rehearsal.

I returned home to my floor, as I left it, littered with coated-grey objects. I was just about to tackle the issue when an ex decided to make an appearance.

We'd ended on bad terms. Remember? He's the one I publicly humiliated at a party by pouring lemonade on his cheating skull.

As you may recall, this is the umpteenth time a major cleaning, corporeal or otherwise, has summoned unfinished emotional business before me. Indeed, the lemonade incident itself remains a shining example of this very phenomenon.

Years later he didn't want to explain, really, or even entertain explanation. He merely wanted to convince me that, though we made a "dangerous pair," I just might want to flirt with that danger yet again.

Ahhh, so he wasn't married with 3 kids! That's how I envision the whole lot of my former interests: snatched up by better women than I and now, miraculously, fully invested in completely enviable lives of which I dare not learn a single detail lest I become ill over what could have been.

And why wasn't he living the perfect life I pictured for him? Perhaps because he isn't a good kisser or because he is wildly insensitive or because he is always an enigma or because, ultimately, he could care less about this litany of complaints I am now cutting short out of consideration for you, kind reader.

He tried and tried, but time healed AND educated. I met a boy better suited for me, and THAT didn't even work. Here he was presenting me with a lesser option. Absolutely no temptation. Sooo easy to brush off.

There are reasons we aren't together, reasons we aren't with our formers, reasons that aren't always evident because we're not quite ready to see in the midst of the collapse--reasons that later become cause for celebration.

Thank goodness I am not with this man! Thank goodness I am not with any of them!!!

Oh, yes. Sing it with me, and take this scientific morsel with you: next time you think you miss someone or you're simply wondering where he is, you have only to pick up a broom or grab a glass of green juice. Fixing those little kinks is only one sweep, one sip away.

Zen Cool Kitten

It is said that the Tantric experience is cool rather than hot. Thus, a Tantric version of Paris Hilton would instead chime, "That's cool." My teacher is always encouraging us to use this lens beyond the bedroom, and I've toyed with it for some time now without huge results, but, all of a sudden, I seem to have fully integrated this knowledge.

Likewise, my beloved Dr. Loretta Standley often speaks of spiritual romance, and I didn't realize it until today, but boy, am I in love! Today as the priest performed last rites on my grandmother, he was reading this passage, and I'm going to have to call him on his cell phone tomorrow to find out exactly what it was, but it sounded like a love letter. To me. To everyone. I know it sounds crazy, but it was so beautiful I had to hold back the tears.

Dr. Standley sees God as the Father, whereas I usually envision the Universe, but this evening I got a glimpse through her eyes.

My kitty Blake is a bad boy. When he isn't sleeping, he terrorizes his surroundings, knocking things off shelves and crying incessantly to get whatever he wants at the time, that is, until cuddles ensue late at night. Needless to say, he had to be locked in his room while the priest was here. With my "Thank you, Father," Blake was unleashed upon the household once more. He started brushing up against my legs, looking to earn some extra food, so I picked him up, scratched his precious white chin a bit, and let go, expecting him to immediately jump free. Surprisingly, he remained. Still. Tranquil. Just drinking it all in.

He would eventually bounce off of my thighs and onto better things, but those 25 seconds were magic. Right then, when he wasn't fussing and complaining and trying to make things happen for himself, my wish was to simply give him everything. Immense generosity that perhaps only a parent would know. Thus meandered a mind briefly imprinted with the word "Father." Quite the education.

I believe the Universe wants to give me everything, and it is asking that I be calm and cool rather than clamoring to receive. Flossie already told me this two years ago, and it's finally sunk in. In the placid, there is power, so stay zen, my little cool cats.

Declare Independence

Finding it difficult to concentrate on music when governmental and corporate collusion threatens our very survival and so few of us are enraged enough to do something about it. At a certain point, you have to put down your latte, turn off the television, and ask yourself about those big guys and their fortuitous stock dumping in the weeks prior to the blast; why a poison the UK banned as too toxic for its own waters is being poured out upon our once beautiful gulf; why benzene, a known carcinogen and only one of myriad toxins in their chemical blend of choice, is at levels THOUSANDS of times more than what is allowable and yet the public has not been notified. I mean, really, folks: what is it going to take for you to be politicized by the atrocities that are being perpetrated in your name by parties motivated by only power and greed?

Begin Educating Yourself

Get angry. Get loud. Get clear. Declare independence. Raise your (effing) flag!

Oh, Björk, you are beyond.

Ushering in the New: A Parisian Portable

Sometimes when I take a look around at our world, I see no method, only madness.

But there does seem to be a divine design. Sounds fruity, I know, but it's hard not to believe.

Over the winter I had told my mother that I was through with caretaking, that I needed to move on once the summer arrived. It just so happened that Gram and I were right in sync with each other, though we did not yet know it on the physical plane.

She has really deteriorated lately. Sure, it is hard to be around, but when she leaves I will miss her--the woman who constantly called me ugly when she first arrived three years ago. Well, "ugly" eventually transitioned into "so purdy," and I do appreciate the change, but it is unimportant, really. An interesting perspective, maybe, given my love of language, but today I am convinced of this: what people say is mostly inconsequential. I'm more into doing and even more into being. Only then do your words assume maximum power.

New opportunities are on the horizon. A bed of such infinite synchronicity. Far too rich a catalog to rest on mere coincidence. I'm convinced of this as well.

I'm going to make an extra effort to keep you apprised of our upcoming summer fun. For starters, we're shooting a video this week for our deliciously Parisian remix of "Portable" by the drop-dead handsome Jon DeeJay. It will be released and ready for download from all the proper cyber-places on June 15th. Talk soon!

xx,
m

Kitten Heels

Three-strap mary janes got nothin' on you, kid. Here's to your uber-precious pearly white fangs.