Book Review: Food Rules

*I wrote this (unpaid, unsolicited) review for my workplace 'green' blog and thought I'd share it here as well.

Michael Pollan, bestselling author of In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto and The Omnivore's Dilemma, has published what is called a "definitive compendium of food wisdom." Food Rules is a short, easy-to-understand guide to eating real food and avoiding over-processed "food-like substances."
Pollan's mantra of "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." was established after the extensive research he did for his previous books. He found that all the science and techno-babble about the nutritional value of food could be simplified down to its core: real food is what's important. Not the additives, the preservatives, the artificial, the pre-packaged - real food. This philosophy is reiterated again and again, with rules such as "Avoid food products that have ingredients that a third-grader cannot pronounce," and "It's not [real] food if it's called by the same name in every language (Big Mac, Pringles, Cheetos, etc.)"
The book not only discusses what to eat, but also how to eat. Pollan discusses the problem with "Western" food culture in the introduction, and breaks down the way we eat as one of the key issues alongside what we eat. Common sense wisdoms such as "Stop eating before you're full" and "Spend as much time enjoying the meal as it took to prepare it" encourage readers to pay attention to how they're eating to avoid overindulgence.
Pollan's previous works cover some of the same material, but go into much more detail regarding the science and statistics behind the reasons for avoiding processed foods. Food Rules is, in essence, the simplified version. Some of the 'rules' were written by Pollan, but in the introduction he discusses his process for this book, talking to not only nutritionists, doctors, and food scientists but also folklorists, anthropologists, mothers and grandmothers, looking for insight into what rules, ideas, wisdoms, and sayings about food are not only truthful, but have survived the tests of time and culture. The result is a common sense, simple to follow guide for eating healthfully.
(If you'd like to borrow my copy of the book, feel free to ask! It's also on sale on Amazon.com for $5 - less than half the cover price.)

My Two Cents: Avatar (SPOILERS!)

Saw Avatar last night.

(If you haven't seen it, STOP READING.)

In the immortal words of Keanu Reeves....
WHOA.

Ahem.  Seriously though, the story has been told before.  Dances with Wolves popped into my head of course, but so did Fern Gully: The Last Rainforest (does anybody remember that movie?  Robin Williams as Batty?  No really!).  It's classic: "civilized" people invade the world of supposedly "uncivilized" people because  there's something there that they want, and they'll destroy whatever gets in their way.  Lots of "they're savages" and "so-called deity" and such.

There's a bit of a Wall-e feel too - humans have destroyed the natural resources on Earth, so we head out to destroy other planets too.  The difference here is it's in the name of profit - there doesn't seem to be any sort of "survival" side to the story.

The antagonists are somewhat stereotypical of this kind of story - we have the greedy businessman looking to make a butt-load of money off whatever it is they're stealing - in this case, a mineral called "unobtainium" (which admittedly sounds a bit hokey, but then I guess it's supposed to) - and we also have the military guy, in this case a hard-core Marine, who will do "whatever it takes" to get the mineral, including destroy the indigenous civilization.  Both of these characters are in the movie, which might be a little much.  But Giovanni Ribisi, the business guy, was absolutely brilliant and played the character to just the right extent where I truly felt uncomfortable.  Not just "oh he's the bad guy" but "shit, there are actually people like that in the world."  The Marine however, was played by a type-cast hard-core military-esque guy and yeah, he was kind of over-played.  Granted, there are people like him in the world too, but it's just not quite as believable or scary to think about, in my opinion.

The protagonists balanced it out though.  Jake Sully, the hero, was a great character.  Trying to still be a Marine despite being paralyzed, but then being drawn into the society of the Navi (the indigenous tribe on the planet) and inevitably taking up their cause and abandoning his own people - but it didn't feel forced.  It wasn't overdone.

The chick - there had to be one, right?  Otherwise why would this guy go through all this? - Neytiri, was AWESOME.  The new female hero of our time.  Seriously.  I loved Zoe Saldana as Uhura in Star Trek, but she was amazing as Neytiri.  Okay, so she wasn't physically playing the part - although she kind of was, through motion-capture - but it was still her in the character, and wow.  Harsh, raw emotion... powerful warrior... all in a hot (blue) package.  I'll say it again: AWESOME.

But then there's the film itself.  Holy CRAP.  I can't describe it.  Okay so after seeing Transformers you could say "the CGI was really awesome!" - you can't just say that about this film.  Because really?  It was more like "what CGI?  There was CGI?"  Really.  It was absolutely breathtaking.  When have you ever seen a CGI character smile with their eyes?  And the scenery, and the animals, and the... the whole frakking thing left me exhilarated.

There was only one thing that I was really "meh" about.  One character, actually, and that was Sigourney Weaver's character.  As a human, she was good - typical bad-ass Sigourney Weaver, attitude galore, but then as an Avatar... erm.  Hers was the only one that I thought looked fakey.  Her face was too soft, too girly for Sigourney Weaver.  And the Avatar side of the character was completely different from the human side.  It was a weird dichotomy that just didn't mesh for me.

In the end, I had a hard time getting to sleep last night because I was just so PUMPED about this movie.  It is an EXPERIENCE.  Period.  I'll be seeing it again.

I don't want to stir up a hornet's nest, but...

I'm not sure I understand why Dr. Tiller is being so deified and honored in his death. Yes, it is horrible that he was murdered, and even more so that it was in church in front of his wife. That itself is terrible. But I keep reading these articles, blogs, and Tweets that he was a "shining star," a "crusader for women's rights", and on and on.
Wait a minute. He performed late-term abortions, correct? At that point in development, a fetus can't be passed off as an "inhuman blob of protoplasm" anymore. There's so much web traffic out there right now, but I also read on Bill O'Reilly's website that Dr. Tiller also performed abortions on 10-15 year old girls, cases of rape and incest, and did not notify the police. His reason for performing late-term abortions? The women were "depressed." NO SHIT. How is that worth honoring?
I'm pro-life, to an extent. I do believe that people, mothers and fathers alike, should be held responsible for their choice to have unprotected sex. Cases of rape or incest, whether in minors or adults, or severe illness that threatens the life of both mother and child, are the only instances where abortion should be condoned in my opinion. It's not a matter of "women's rights" to me. What about the child's rights? Because they have no voice, they don't count? The child has to give up its right to having a potentially wonderful life simply because "it's not the right time for me to have children" or whatever the reason is? If a woman is not fit to be a mother, there are countless other women out there who are, that maybe can't have children of their own, or that are willing and able to adopt by choice. Just because someone was irresponsible and had unprotected sex shouldn't make abortion the go-to answer.
But that's not the point here. I don't think murdering Dr. Tiller was right by any means. But I don't think it's right to call him a saint either.