Green Mothers Digest

Kids are back in school, and where does that leave us?

We are back in the kitchen. Yup. No more fun take-out because it’s too hot to cook (actually, over here it still is), we are now back in our serious mode, intent on providing nutritious meals that mean business.

There is just one teensy weensy problem with that: I hate to cook.  Hence the appeal of raw food. Unfortunately, nobody else cares I don’t like to cook – they still like to eat.  And they don’t like raw.

As John Slatterly said last Sunday night: “Bad news.  My life is ruined.”  Bah.

Not quite.  This has been one of the strangest summers I have lived through yet.  From the oil spill to driving my daughter for a volunteer job on a farm 30 miles each way, to experiencing quasi-surreal financial woes, the list goes on…

Whenever I can, I escape to the beach.  It’s magical, this instant rejuvenation that overcomes me when I near the ocean.  And I can barely even swim, but there you have it.  It’s being near it, not in it, that counts for me.

box jellyfish

Soon, more structured days are ahead again, and, well, maybe that will help.

Meanwhile, I came across this scary video.  Well done.

The Environmental Work Group (EWG) is proposing we take our fate in our own hands, i.e. we don’t wait for EPA regulations and Congress passing new laws, to improve our chances to grow old without cancer.

Sounds good to me…

Here are the 9 rules.

The President’s Cancer Panel
Executive Summary

Ok, I am mad.  Listen to this condescending attitude that oozes from this statement like an overripe cheese killing you with its aroma: Even though it has been widely accepted for quite some time that there is an undeniable link between dense breast tissue and breast cancer, “many health professionals fear that giving women information about their breast density will serve little purpose other than to confuse or worry them, since it’s largely determined by factors outside of their control (such as heredity, age and ethnicity).”

Pardon me, “confuse or worry?”  In other words, we shouldn’t worry our little heads about this – it’s all beyond our control anyway?

And “…despite the fact that many researchers are convinced it could help identify high-risk women and maybe lead to treatments to reduce their risk — to date it has played a small part in the battle against breast cancer.”

This is unconscionable.  I hate to sound preachy, but it smacks of paternalism to withhold that kind of information based on the assumption that it would serve no purpose when it could well make a difference in a woman’s decision on whether or not to have a mammogram this year, or to maybe wait another year, especially since there has recently been confusion over whether or not a woman should have a mammogram every year or only every two years.

“But Connecticut passed a law last year requiring that patients’ mammography reports must include breast-density information. And many doctors and researchers are in favor of more disclosure.”

Well, at least somebody  in the medical establishment has some common sense.  (But why Connecticut?)

Apparently, breast density is automatically measured and recorded when you have a mammogram, it’s just that they don’t pass the information on to us…

Breast density increases the risk by 4 – 5 times, versus heredity which doubles it.

You can read the whole story here.

?

I had no idea.

Apparently the whole entire media got yesterday’s Supreme Court decision on Monsanto’s Roundup alfalfa wrong – except the GM Watch and the New Food Network.

The decision was “nuanced,” too much so for the general media and public.

That’s too bad.  Now everybody thinks – because reporters can’t figure it out – that the bad guys (Monsanto) won again, when in fact they didn’t.

I am confused.

Here is a quote from the majority rule (7-1) read by Jugdge Alito:

“In sum…the vacatur of APHIS’s deregulation decision means that virtually no RRA (Roundup Ready Alfalfa) can be grown or sold until such time as a new deregulation decision is in place, and we also know that any party aggrieved by a hypothetical future deregulation decision will have ample opportunity to challenge it, and to seek appropriate preliminary relief, if and when such a decision is made.” (Opinion at p. 22).

Here is part of what the New York Times wrote:

“In its first ruling on genetically engineered crops, the Supreme Court today overturned a lower court’s decision prohibiting Monsanto Co. from selling pesticide-resistant alfalfa seeds until the government completes an environmental impact study.”