GrillSgt's Firepit

4 Shocking Secrets About Fast Food

What fast food chains don’t want you to know about the food they serve. I’ll be thinking twice before I eat fast food again. How about you?

4 Shocking Secrets About Fast Food on Yahoo! Health

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Expiration Dates Mean Very Little

Turns out expiration dates on foods and drinks aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. The FDA doesn’t mandate them, although some states do. And there’s little consistency in the dates and the way their used. You’re better off using your nose and eyes to determine if foods and liquids are spoiled.

Expiration dates mean very little. – By Nadia Arumugam – Slate Magazine.

New Year’s Resolutions

2010 is upon us and as is customary, it is time to make New Year’s resolutions. Except, I don’t make resolutions. The problem I have with New Year’s resolutions is that they are implied to begin at the stroke of midnight on 01 January of the new year. As such, people think that at the stroke of midnight on 01 January of the new year, they have to immediately begin fulfilling their resolutions. I think that’s one of the reasons so many resolutions are broken within days of the new year. People make these promises to themselves and can’t fulfill them immediately upon the start of the new year, so they drop them. For example, I’m willing to be that thousands of people resolve to quit smoking each new year. That implies that at the stroke of midnight on 01 January of the new year, they must quit smoking. So say you set this goal and you’re at a New Year’s Party where people are drinking and smoking. It’s now midnight. Are you really going to stop smoking in the middle of a party? Not likely. So you tell yourself, “I’ll begin in the morning when I wake up.” The morning comes, and you want a cigarette. You have one figuring you didn’t quit smoking when you said you would and already broke your resolution. So why bother, you say to yourself.
Continue reading New Year’s Resolutions…

Just Catching Up

Ok, it’s been a long time since I last wrote. I had started an update on the whole baseball and steroids issue after Manny Ramirez was suspended, but never finished it and decided to discard it. So, here’s what I’ve been up to the past few months.
Continue reading Just Catching Up…

P90X

After two aborted attempts to really get going with P90X, I started again today. A variety of things kept getting in the way, but I’m persevering. I keep coming back to P90X because I really like the program. The variety keeps the workouts from getting boring. Tony Horton is motivating without being annoying like so many other are (can you say Richard Simmons…don’t get me wrong, Richard Simmons has helped millions of people, but he’s just too annoying for me).
Continue reading P90X…

Euthanasia

My brother-in-law recently had a pancreatic cancer scare in his family. Fortunately, it was not pancreatic cancer, which is currently incurable. But it got me thinking about euthanasia and assisted suicide.

We put down animals, like dogs, cats and horses, regularly because they are too ill, can’t walk, and such. We do this so they don’t have to live their final days in pain and misery. A couple of my friends recently had to put down their dogs. Euthanizing animals is legal and not considered cruelty toward animals. In fact, animal activists would probably consider it cruel if we didn’t put down animals that are terminal or otherwise would have a poor quality of life during their final days. Veterinarians likely recommend euthanasia daily.

What I don’t get, though, is why people are forced to live under similar conditions. We pump them full of drugs to relieve as much pain as possible, but sometimes all the drugs in the world aren’t enough. Sometimes all they can do is lie there and stare at the ceiling unaware of what’s going on around them or that their family is keeping watch. Why must people live through unbearable pain, misery and suffering with a poor quality of life when we know that all of the efforts to keep them alive will ultimately be for naught? Why is it that it’s okay to end an animal’s life for terminal conditions or poor quality of life, but it’s not okay to do the same for a human being under the same or similar circumstances?

What about the person’s family? They have to stand by and watch the person suffer the pain and waste away until there’s nothing left, putting an enormous emotional, and often financial, burden on them. It’s painful to stand by your loved one and watch him or her suffer knowing there is nothing you can do to help. You can’t even really tell them it’ll be okay, everything’s going to be fine. Because it’s not. At least not until they die and escape the pain and suffering.

What if you were the one who was living in pain, misery and suffering with no way out except waiting for your body to give out? What if you had to live that way for years? Would you want to live that way? Would you want to live your final days in extreme pain, misery and suffering? What if it was your loved one lying in that bed?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that everyone with a terminal illness should be allowed to take this course of action. I mean there are plenty of people who have defied odds and lived long lives despite incurable diseases. What I’m talking about is those times when a person has little time to live, absolutely no chance for recovery or a cure, and the remaining time they have will be spent in insurmountable pain, suffering and misery.

Perhaps Dr. Kevorkian had the right idea all along. Perhaps it’s time to rethink our values, morals and laws.

Softball Season Starts

Spring has arrived in Central Virginia. Well sort of… it can still be a little chilly some days. The company where I work put together a co-ed softball team, which I decided to join. The team is in one of the Co-ed Rookie Leagues. It’s going to be a blast! I’m not coaching, and since I can pretty much play any position, I have no idea where the coach is going to play me. He mentioned catcher on occasion, which is ok I guess, but I hope it’s not every game. After Saturday’s practice, I think it would be a waste of my abilities and experience to put me there all the time. There are a few good players, but not as many as I had on the Las Vegas Corporate Challenge team last year. I don’t expect us to challenge for the league championship, but you never know.

Keep watching the GrillSgt’s Firepit to see how the team, Lucky 7s, is doing. Our games are on Thursday nights. I’ll post each games result as well as how I did. The game schedule will be posted in the Events Calendar in the right sidebar.