Go look at John Riedy’s pictures of my little sister.

I imagine that the sentiment started with a scarcity of resources: “you better eat all your dinner because we don’t know when we’ll be able to buy more food.”

Or maybe, out of guilt: “finish your dinner, there are children starving in [insert developing nation here].”

Another likely scenario is an aversion to wastefulness: “you put that food on your plate, now you have to eat it because I’m not throwing it away.”

Especially in this day of Absolutely Ridiculous Portion Sizes in Restaurants, the last one resonates the most with me.  Until I realized this very simple truth:

Waste in, waste out.

Allow me to explain.  “Waste in” means that if I put more food in my body after I am already full, it is a waste.  It is a waste because it will add extra resources that my body does not need and then will be forced to store.  In layman’s terms: weight gain.

“Waste out” is the other side.  If I don’t eat the food, it will be wasted and go directly into the garbage, without being at all useful to anyone.

However, at the point that all possible futures for what is still on your plate constitutes a waste, do you really want it going to your waist?  (sorry ’bout that)

This leaves exactly two ways that the food still on your plate won’t end up being a waste.  You could eat it when you are hungry again.  That may work for some foods and some people, but in all honesty, I’m not a huge fan of leftovers.  Not sure why, because I’m not an insane quality snob or anything, but I’ve just always preferred a good meal the first time around.

The other option, the one I employ as often as possible, is to give your restaurant leftovers to someone who needs a good meal.  When I lived in Berkeley, I you could easily judge the authenticity of a pan-handler’s need by their reaction to offered leftovers.  Of course, in order to pull this one off, you probably have to be living in something like a city and also be walking.  Both of those things are good for you, too, by the way.

“Why aren’t you married yet?” is not the compliment that you imagine it to be.

Call first.

Don’t drink so much.

Don’t plan anything farther in the future than your relationship stretches into the past.

Here is a nifty little website that I happened upon today: the Responsible Shopper.

I’m not sure why, but with each week that passes lately I’m turning into a bigger and bigger hippie.  I actually took my mom’s comments about the low prices at Forever 21 (don’t laugh–we were in Vegas) to explain to her the idea of externalized costs.  For her, the problem is that she doesn’t know about the many ways that our consumer culture does damage to the planet, to cultures, and to individuals.

My problem, on the other hand, is not knowing what to do with that knowledge.  Enter Responsible Shopper.

There are three parts to the site: Learn, Act, and Live.  Learn is a browsing-friendly overview of many of our favorite consumer-product-based corporations, like Starbucks, WalMart and Disney.  Act is where the bleeding hearts try to get you to sign something or do something that will have a positive impact on the practices of those corporations.  Live is where you can learn about alternatives to the things provided by those corporations.

Go.  Read.  Be Responsible.

Get one.  (That’s right, I did.)

The conditions under which you should not buy an iPhone:

1. You live under water.
2. You live in space.

Listen guys, I know you’re thirsty.  It’s San Diego, it’s August, and every living thing that doesn’t have the ability turn the handle on a sink is suffering.

Here’s the thing: You’re not going to find what you’re looking for here.  The way that I know that is that you all are still just a bunch of lone scouts, randomly wandering the vast expanse of my countertops.  If you were going to find something here, you would have found it.  You’ve been over and over the likely territory, and since you haven’t yet managed to organize yourselves into a cringe-inducing line of scavengers, let’s assume that is not in your future.

So, I honestly think the best thing you could do is go look somewhere else.  I don’t have what you want, clearly, so your short lives would be better spent elsewhere.

Also, the first one of you who bit me had better be the last one, or else I’m going to abandon the peaceful coexistence we’ve been enjoying faster than you can say “thumb”.

Yep, that’s me.  I’ve been thinking about quitting.  I’ve been thinking about picking one of my many themes/disciplines/hobbies to focus on and write about.  Finally, it came to me.

Unsolicited advice from an unqualified source.

This way, I can jugde, rant, elocute, preach, and spew about whatever I want, and it all stays together under this new bit of continuity.

This is going to be fun.