I’ve been counting my blessings the past week. Despite the apparent number of Apple devotees fawning over the iPhone, so far nobody’s made any attempts to persuade me that it has any vital features my current phone doesn’t also have.
(Note to Apple execs: If you’d like to give me a free phone and a few months of service (3 – 6 seems fair), I’m willing to use it and give people my genuine impressions of the device. That’s a much better deal than you’ll get from most of the celebrities you usually give stuff to.)
A former employer used to regularly accuse me of being overly cynical and negative. I’ve never agreed with that assessment. The world we live in does however require a healthy dose of skepticism.
Take for example this claim from the bottom of a carton of Diet Coke:
It’s true. Research shows that all beverages contribute to proper hydration. That means whether it’s your first can of the day or your afternoon pick-me-up, Diet Coke helps you stay hydrated all day long. So stick with the Diet Coke taste you love. Your body will thank you for it.
They even have a web site dedicated to this sales pitch.
I call shenanigans on this claim. Oh, I suppose the statement is true enough. There’s certainly nothing in it you can point to and say, “That’s a lie.” All beverages do contain water, and getting water into your body is what hydration is all about. But there’s some vital information missing.
Most Coca Cola products contain caffeine and caffeine is a diuretic. Putting it as politely as possible, what this means is that caffeine causes your body to lose water by causing you to visit the bathroom more frequently. I don’t know whether the net balance leaves you with more water or less than if you’d skipped the Coke; but if dehydration is a concern, a nice cold glass of water would be a far better choice.
So I don’t agree with the claim that I’m overly cynical. I’m just a little less likely to be taken in by a marketing pitch.
According to radio, Montgomery County Councilwoman Duchy Trachtenberg was successful in her bid to have Montgomery County be the first in the nation to ban the use of trans fats in restaurants.
According her March press release, she’s a Health Professional, so I guess we can assume that she actually knows what a trans fat is and why it’s bad. Perhaps I’m skeptical, but I’m thinking the rest of the council doesn’t know anything about them aside from the fact that there’s no political risk in banning them.
No word is given on how this will help lower taxes, reduce traffic, improve schools, or anything else that the voters actually care about.
I eat fast food more often I like, but when I do, I usually get it to go. Tonight was the first time since early last fall that I actually went and ate my dinner in a fast food restaurant.
It’s been pretty well established that I’ll read practically anything (more about that another time), and tonight was no exception. While I was eating, my eyes strayed to my hamburger’s wrapper and I read the inscription: “Nothing says you like having things your way more than having this WHOPPER with Cheese.”
But I ordered my sandwich without cheese. Does this mean I don’t like having things my way? Are they saying my way is wrong? Does this mean that the only way I can truly have it my way is to have it their way?
Probably the best way to handle this in the future is to eat the wrapper and read the burger.
After spending most of Sunday afternoon on yard work, I decided to go out for ice cream after dinner.
For most of the past year, “going out for ice cream” has been synonymous with “going to Bruster’s.” In part I go there because it’s only a mile away (Amy called this “walking distance” until I pointed out that it would mean walking along Rte 355). But mainly I go there because it’s good ice cream.
By the time I got there on Sunday evening, it was clear that a lot of people agreed with me about that being a good place to go. At 8:00pm, the place was absolutely packed!
Unlike the other Bruster’s locations I’ve visited in Pennsylvania, this one has a drive-through window. Not only were there long lines at the walk-up windows, there was a line at the drive-through too.
The line at the drive-through went completely around the building. And then it did something I’d never seen before: The line wrapped around the front of the building too. It was so long that the end of the line was actually blocking the exit from the drive-through! Put another way, the only way anyone could leave the drive-through window was if the rest of the line moved up. But the line couldn’t move up until the car at the drive-through window left.
People in the DC area can be quite stubborn, and they’re equally used to waiting for gridlock to clear up. And Bruster’s ice cream is worth waiting for.
I’ll bet they’re still waiting.
How bizarre. I just heard a commercial on WTOP that starts off with a claim that the Washington DC area leads the nation in the incidence of kidney disease. This isn’t something I was aware of, but having seen the impact kidney failure has on people’s lives, I’d prefer to keep my kidneys.
The commercial went on to say that there’s something you can do about it. I was prepared to hear a public service message about getting more exercise, eating healthier or even (shudder) cutting back on the caffeine intake.
Instead, the commercial started talking about playing in a golf tournament that includes various celebrity players as whichever air personality recorded the commercial and some politicians.
So apparently the claim is that if you live in the DC-area and prefer to avoid a future of relying on dialysis, instead of changing your life-style, you should play golf instead.
Watching Pirates of the Caribbean today, I also saw a trailer from Disney, promoting the list of movies they’re planning to re-release on Blu-Ray DVD. The list includes quite a few well-known/well-loved movies such as The Lion King, Finding Nemo, Pirates of the Caribbean and even a few less liked movies such as Herbie: Fully Loaded. All in High Definition.
A few months ago I finally saw what a High-Definition TV image looks like. I don’t see myself running out to buy an HDTV any time soon, but I do have to admit to being surprised at how sharp the image was. The people in the images looked almost real enough that you could reach out and touch them.
And that’s the odd thing. Several of the titles Disney is planning to re-release are cartoons. I don’t understand the benefit. The cartoons will perhaps look more cartoony?
Of course, there is one important benefit. If people run out and buy the movies just so they can say they have the Blu-Ray version, Disney will make a fistful of cash. Good for them I guess, but I think I’ll pass.
One of the consequences of my new job was that I needed to buy some new clothes. I’m not one of those folks who goes out and buys a new wardrobe at a whim, but my first day on the job convinced me that the jeans and polos that been “business casual” at the old job weren’t going to cut it. (For the first day of the job, I’d worn a tie and jacket, and thus put off clothes shopping that much longer.)
While I was buying dress shirts and slacks, I also picked up some new T-shirts to go with them. Standing at the checkout line, I noticed something most unexpected about the T-shirts’ packaging. Along with the usual size and quantity, Hanes had also prominently labeled the shirts as “tagless.” I’d discovered a few years earlier that they’d stopped putting tags in the T-shirts (because they itch!) and that was enough to make me choose them over another brand. But what really got my attention was that the bag was also labeled as resealable.
Six weeks later, I’m still trying to understand the marketing angle on this. What are you going to store in it besides T-shirts? I could see using the bags to keep things dry on a camping trip, but that’s not a common use, is it?
All I can think of is the old commercials for Zip-Lock and Glad bags about how you could reseal the bag to keep the contents fresh. Is that a problem for T-shirts?
On Friday I spent about 20 minutes on the phone with Tracy at the Red Cross headquarters for the local area. I think she understands my complaints, though it’s not clear to me what actions will be taken to resolve them. I did come away with a few insights into some of the things they do, though I think they need to review some of their reasoning. Continue reading Update on the War with the Red Cross→
There was an email from Wendy waiting for me when I got home from work today. She sent me the name of one of the “appropriate folks” to address my concerns. It’s a name I recognize. Tracy helped me out a few years ago when I had a group of people who wanted to come in together to donate blood, but needed the donor center to stay open an extra hour. With luck, she’ll be able to help out again.
I expect her first question will be to ask what I want them to do. It’s a short list. Continue reading Day three of my War with the Red Cross→
