I guess I should have started off with an explanation but I'm not much of  blogger. Matter of fact, I detest blogging. I think it's vain, uncredited and damaging to the truth. But what the hell, if my professors have told me for two years straight that if I want to hang on to the sinking ship that is journalism, I must get a blog out there. It all seems ridiculous to me. Despite the debate in emerging media, I don't believe in getting news (or any valuable information that is) from anyone's blog.

That being said, read mine.

There are millions of topics to talk about but the one that affects us all whether we like it or not is food. It's an interesting thing, food. We love it, we hate it. It kills us, it gives us life. There are countless people starving to death while there are numerous others with excess amounts they don't know what to do with.

I love food. Who doesn't? I could sit for hours with no company but the refrigerator. That being said, I thought I would dive a little deeper into the details of our food. What we prefer not to know, but what it is crucial that we do know. That's pretty much everything.

I'm not exactly a mindful eater. I try. I've been a vegetarian for over seven years and try my best to look at where my food came from and how that effects the bigger picture, but that doesn't mean I don't eat from major food chains or disregard the horrors to satisfy my taste buds.

I'm writing this in hopes that I will become more responsible for what I consume. If anyone actually reads this I don't expect it to change their minds, just open their eyes.

Water, Water Everywhere....

We've all done it. There's a water fountain right across the way but we veer off and go toward the vending machine for the "purer, more convenient" choice. What happened that made us look down upon the tap and chose to only quench our thirst from plastic bottles? When did we decide it would be better toto pay more for a gallon of water than a gallon of unleaded gas?
 
I guess it happened when a ridiculously good marketing strategy got people to pay for the allure of the haughty, healthy bottled water trend. For the longest time we were purchasing only bottled water with something else to offer: minerals, electrolytes, flavors, bubbles. Even a trip through a purifier would convince us  that we needed that extra step. But was this in the interest of our health, our image or our laziness? Well since most tap water is just as healthy (if not more) and even the homeless of NYC cart around Aquafina bottles, so why are we paying ridiculous amounts for something we can easily get from our sinks? Yes we're lazy, yes we want the most convenient thing now but we are also intelligent and should be able to put two and two together.

What gets me (aside from the absurd amount of waste, consumer mindset and outdated bias of course) is that people all over the world are dying because they don't have access to clean water. We have it all around us. We flush our toilet with drinkable water, we wash our laundry with it and other people are dying because they can't get access to any. And yet, we're somehow too good for that water. How disgusting it would be for us drink the same water that our utilities run on.

Is it okay because we have the options in front of us and we're merely express our freedom to choose? Sure. But it does not make any sense. The tap is safe, hell some of the tap is cleaner than bottled waters. The city water is held to higher standard and inspected far more often than bottled water companies.

If you know it's ridiculous to buy bottled water but still keep doing it I suggest you read Elizabeth Royte's Bottlemania. She successfully makes you disgusted by your habits without making you feel like you're being attacked.