Would you like your left or right arm?

I had a person ask me this question, "Would you like you left or right arm?"  I told them I could do either.  I was then told to sit in a nicely reclined seat and wait for someone to come talk to me.  "What's your name?  What's your birthday?  Social?  Gender?"  (You'd think I'd remember my gender right?  "Uh, hold on a second, let me call my mom."  I guess they are just checking I suppose.)  Following this brief interrogation my arm was swabbed with this yellow gooey stuff, which was then followed by a brief prick, and Wallah!  Blood!

Donating blood is one of the easiest ways to help other people and it hardly takes any effort at all.  Just a light squeeze every 3 to 5 seconds, and usually within 5 to 9 minutes they have the blood they need.  I'm getting this from the Red Cross information on blood donating; they say a unit of blood can save up to three peoples lives.  That's pretty amazing if you ask me.

So what are the steps to donating blood?

1. Contact your local blood donation agencies including Red Cross and others.  The Red Cross even has a website. http://www.redcrossblood.org/  You can set up appointments or they do allow walk-ins.
2. Drink a good amount of water and have a good meal before donating blood
3. Travel to the donating location safely (so you can still donate)
4. Take time to answer the questions honestly and accurately
5. Stay cool and relax as blood is being drawn
6. After you're finished take 10-15 minutes to drink plenty of liquids and eat the provided food
7. Keep the bandage on for at least 5 hours and follow the other directions given such as no heavy lifting or exercise

It's really a lot of fun and it can help save lives.  So take time to donate.  At the most it might take an hour and a half, but imagine the time your blood could give someone else, years or more.  If you haven't donated yet, you might even find out you have a rare blood type that can save the lives of infants as well.  My only advice is this...  Remember your name and your gender.  ;)

"Super Size Me!"

There's something else that happened to me recently on a health note.  I watched the film "Super Size Me" and I have never been more disgusted over fast food than I did after watching this movie.  For those who have not yet seen it, first of all you should, but I'll give you a synopsis about the film.

It starts with a real lawsuit filed by two teenage girls who are suing McDonald's for not educating them about their food, thus making them overweight and obese.  The narrator, Morgan Spurlock, investigates this claim, from the teenage girls, that one will become obese and put themselves at significant health risks if they continually eat McDonald's.  He decides to eat food from McDonald's for 30 days for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  And he also limits his walking to that of the average american, five-thousands steps a day.

I don't want to ruin the rest of the show for you, so here are some things of note.  After 1 week on the diet he gains about 5 pounds, and 5 more pounds after week two.  After three weeks his doctors, which he has three monitoring his health, all recommend him to stop his diet because it is affecting his health significantly.  His liver appears like it is beginning to fail, he wakes up at night with a shortness of breath and difficulty breathing, and he experiences what he believes are heart palpitations.  Pretty scary stuff, right?  Oh, and my favorite part is you get to see footage of a gastric bypass surgery... mmm...  Ya know, it says this in the film, McDonald's actually got rid of their "Super Size" after this film.  They claim it had nothing to do with the movie.

Needless to say, after I finished watching this film I felt disgusted.  I even had to go on a run just to overcome that feeling!  The run felt great!  So I'll probably limit my fast food intake even more, and continue to exercise.  If you haven't yet seen it, watch it!  Even though I was disgusted, I recommend it!  If you've already seen it, let this be a reminder, fast food is dangerous!

Removing Trans Fats

In 2003, the FDA passed legislation which allowed food companies to post "0 Trans Fat" on their labels as long as it was 0.5 grams or less per serving.  I found this out as a result of doing work on my technical report for my technical writing class.  How then can you tell if a product has trans fats?  If the product has "partially hydrogenated" oil then you can safely assume it has trans fats.  Seriously, check out some of the common snacks or food you eat.

I did this last weekend and threw out several food items.  Why would I do that?  Trans fats have a really hard time exiting the body, if at all.  Trans fats have been linked to a higher risk to heart disease and cardiovascular issues (stroke, diabetes, obesity, etc).  So I threw out the products because I don't want to eat any high risk items.  And to think, if I had not written my paper, I would still be eating them at putting myself in danger.  Whooo, that's a relief!

Anything you can do to remove trans fats from your diet, do it!  Don't get caught by people who say that it's more expensive or that it tastes better.  I've done the research and there is no difference.  The healthier oils may cost more per gallon, but it is distributed over a lot of servings making the cost increase negligible.  If you'd like more information let me know.

Why Cats? I Don't Know

I really have no explanation for it, but since I was little I have had almost 5 times as many cats than dogs.  I don't dislike dogs, I actually love them, but somehow I end up with cats.  I mean sure, they're intelligent animals, sassy, and have lots of attitude!  And I know you know what I'm talking about!

Take for example my cat Jack.  I don't like naming my animals adjectives like "fluffly" or "spaz" so he has a normal name.  This cat is crazy smart!  And not to mention very patient and persistent.  For two and a half years now, he knows that if he wines loud enough and long enough, we will eventually let him inside.  It's like having a small child at the grocery store.  "I really WANT that candy mom.  Pleassssee!  I WANT it!"  And then they proceed to further embarrass you by writhing on the ground back and forth.  I'm telling you, my cat KNOWS instinctively how to wine.  So not only is he smart but he's weird.  I caught him once climbing a chain link fence... no joke!  He put his paw inside the hole and climbed to the top of the fence.

A little over 6 months ago we picked up another cat.  My sisters friend's cat had kittens... accidentally... and so we offered to take one in.  My sister insists that she chose her, but I did.  Out of all the cats I picked her, and not only that but I raised her as my own.  The first few days I would lay beside her to help with the transition.  Not to mention I named her, Zoe.  She's a lot of fun and is always wanting to play.  She runs up and down the stairs after people and she and I like to play this game.  She runs down the stairs before me and goes under my bed.  I then jump on my bed and she pops out and tries to catch me.  It's the cutest game!  She also likes to steal my sisters stuffed animals and drag them around the house.  She's just one of the family.

Lastly, I saw the best video I've ever seen on youtube.  You can type in "kitten surprise" and find it but I thought I'd post it here.  You'll see what I mean.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHwY8qACATA  So Cats are cool, and cute... but I'd still like to try another dog.

Cars

For those of you who don't know, I drive a BMW 2003 motorcycle and I love it to death.  Unless you've ridden on a beautiful machine like that, you don't know what life is really about.  It's true!  But recently, here in Utah anyway, it's getting super cold, and this year I've told myself I'm not going to drive if the temperature is below 32 degrees fahrenheit.  Now when you're driving 80 mph down the freeway, I'm sure you can imagine, that can get really cold!  So for the last little while I've been researching into getting a car.  It's taken my three weeks but I finally found one.  It's an older car with low miles, but that's great for yearly taxes and insurance.  It's a 1996 Subaru Legacy Wagon and it's in pretty good shape.  Sure it's not a sports car, but it's my baby now.  Seriously though, car searching is a beast.  It takes a lot of energy, especially if you're on a time constraint and budget.  But I survived, and that's what matters!

A Whole New World

Wow, I never thought I would be doing this! But here I am, adding my thoughts to the world wide web. It's an interesting idea really, to put one's thoughts out into the universe. Essentially that's what we do everyday, but blogging allows for vocalization. A lot of people use other social networking sites for that same purpose, but more annoyingly so. Personally, I'm not much for posting all about myself, what I'm doing every minute, what I just ate, or how I'm feeling. Isn't that what real friends are for. What happened to calling up your friend and saying, "Hey [insert name], I need someone to talk to. Do you have some time?" or "Dude, guess what? I just asked the cutest girl on a date!" Come on people, that's the real way to do it, or is that old fashioned? If so then I'm just an old fashioned guy, and proud of it too!

So this is it. If anybody ever reads this, I hope you enjoy it. 'Til next time! :D