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Quickies

July 22, 2004

First of all, what's happened to Liz and Pat? I hope they're not gone for good.

You may notice that I have added a sidebar to the left of my blog. I've moved the navigation to that side and added some quick-links to the right. I've wanted to do something like this for a while. I wanted to be able to post quick links to interesting stories without wasting space in the blog area. I certainly don't have time to post to the blog every day, but I feel pretty confident that the quick-links will be pretty frequently updated, as they only take me about one minute to post. We'll see how it plays out.

Movies

Sarah and I caught Spiderman 2 about two weeks ago (our first theater movie together in so long I cannot remember the last one). Color me smitten with this movie and its predecessor - the first comic book adaptations that I have found to be nearly flawless. I like Doc Ock as a villain so much more than Green Goblin, so this movie was even better for me than the first.

Last weekend, we rented two films of note. The first was called City of God. This was a brutal and violent film about life in the slums of Rio de Janeiro. Heartbreaking and well-acted, I thought it was too gratuitously violent at times, but otherwise a very well-made foreign film. Not recommended for people who cannot stomach violence. In fact, Sarah was turned off because of it. I don't blame her. It was pretty graphic.

The second film was the documentary Spellbound. This is a fascinating look at the 1999 US National Spelling Bee and, more importantly, the colorful participants therein. I really enjoyed this movie and highly recommend it.

Consumerism

I've been meaning to share some shopping habits that we've come to acquire over the past couple of years, as I find such things interesting. Especially when it comes to alternative and organic foods. We aren't a totally organic household, but we do eat as much organic as we can afford.

Sarah and Ellie and I belong to Costco Wholesale, where we buy alot of non-perishables and other frequently used items in bulk. I like the idea of places that leverage consumer buying power by consolidation, especially when they are businesses that treat their employees well, as highlighted in this article: Costco's love of labor: Employees' well-being key to its success. From the time we joined two years ago, I noticed a higher quality of employee and much better service than I get in alot of super-stores. I'm all for saving money on bulk goods, but I'm not willing to sacrifice good service and I want to reward employers who offer good-paying jobs like these by giving them my business. Costco does both for us. Check them out if you can. They are a great alternative to Wal-Mart/Sam's Club.

Another store of note in Indy is the supermarket Trader Joe's. TJ's specializes in unique and exotic foods. They carry alot of meat alternatives as well as organic foods. They carry Fair Trade coffee and lots of organic dairy products that we use. But the real catch is that the prices are low, unlike some other groceries in town that carry alot of products that we like. TJ's also has incredibly low prices on wine. Good wine, too. I'm not much of a wine drinker, myself, but for $3 you can get a bottle of Charles Shaw that Sarah's folks swear by. (In fact, if you drank wine at my Birthday party, you've already sampled it!) $3 is cheap, people.

Unfortunately, we can't do all of our shopping at TJ's, as they don't always have everything we need, but we get what we can there and then hit the Marsh to supplement whatever else we need. We've found that it is still important to read ingredients and labels at Trader Joe's, as some items are pretty high in fat and/or sodium. But, generally, they do a much better job than the traditional stores here. I only wish that their selection were large enough that we didn't need to go anyplace else.

I can't remember who or when it was, but I recall a discussion on the blog a while back about the potentially harmful effects of aluminum in deodorants that prompted me to switch to Tom's of Maine Natural Deodorant. I don't know if there is a link to Alzheimer's or not, but if Cecil Adams is skeptical, so am I. And PBS specials like Trade Secrets keep me on the watch, although it might just be more propagation of the fear that Phil is talking about.

I've been using Tom's now for several years, and although it is about twice as expensive as other, aluminum-based brands, it has a minimal impact on my wallet, as it takes me about 6-8 weeks to go through a stick. So it comes out to only about $30 per year. If it turns out that Aluminum is linked to Alzheimers, then it will have been a wise investment, for sure.

Anyway, that's about all the consumer whore I have in me tonight.