OBESITY FRESH FROM THE COW?....

Today, so they say, more and more American children and adults are obese.
Today, also, more and more of the domestic animals from which we produce the meat we eat are laced with hormones fed to them by the farmers so that the livestock will grow for the markets more cheaply and quickly.
Hmmm... Like the sports guys who bulk up on steroids, are we and our children bulking up steadily on the meats we eat.
R.A.T. (Rose About Town) looks for your comments at randrmoore@gmail.com

MILITIA BEN RESPONDS THROUGH GMAIL, basically saying I should go easy on the cows; our arses get fat because we're not smart enough to stop eating.
I'm not attacking the cows, Ben; they eat what you give them. I just don't want to share the hormones through dairy products and meat. Or their antibiotics.
But then, I guess I would't be happy grazing on grass either.

R.A.T.

OCTOBER'S GYPSY CLOUDS

Rose's photo Oct 2009 in a Chardon mall

I don't know about you, but the dark clouds of October always give me a feeling of wanderlust.

I became a fan of these dramatic skies when I was a young reporter in the late 1950s, covering the waterfront in the little lake town of Fairport.

On my way home on many a late afternoon along the autumn shoreline, I'd pass the old Diamond Alkali along the Lake Erie shore. That big sooty factory's hulking buildings against the dark skies were eerily lit by sulphur-tinged industrial lights, and I perceived an odd and unexpected beauty there, enhanced by the moving outlines of white seagulls swooping restlessly around against the backdrop of  the darkness.

Somehow those sulking clouds that held that scene together would make me want to keep driving; my travellin' foot would grow ticklish on the gas pedal; I'd feel a gypsy spirit overtaking me.

The factory's long gone, but the clouds of October still have that effect on me and probably always will..