On baby duty in the very early morning hours, I soothed daughter no. 2, or at least held and swayed her till she had cried herself out, and then, weighing the relative attractions of a return to bed and the prospect of a few hours to myself in a quiet house, settled into the March 20 issue of The New York Review of Books. My opinion of this publication is the opposite of the one expressed by Camille Paglia over at Salon; when it arrives in the mail, I linger on the table of contents, in the manner of a 6-year-old fondling wrapped presents, before tearing into it. The top attractions of March 20, in my estimation, were Michael Tomasky on the Democratic side of the presidential campaign, Nicholson Baker on Wikipedia, Jason Epstein on In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto, H. Allen Orr on J. Craig Venter and genomics, Oliver Sacks on a memoir (A Journey Round My Skull) about a brain tumor, and Jeff Madrick on the problem of income security in old age. All recommended. I think my favorite was the article about food and eating. Epstein quotes author Michael Pollan's "deceptively simple" advice: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." Pollan, you see, does not regard many staples of the American diet, purchased at fast food restaurants or plucked from the inner aisles of grocery stores, as "food." Epstein elaborates:
avoid all foods packaged with long lists of ingredients, especially those whose names cannot be pronounced. For example, the list of ingredients in Sara Lee's Soft & Smooth Whole Grain White [sic] Bread occupies half a page of Pollan's book and includes beside the omnipresent high-fructose corn syrup such wonders as ethoxylated mono- and diglycerides, azodicarbonamide, and guar gum ["sic" in original].
In a book I own, What to Eat, nutritionist Marion Nestle advises: "Move more, eat less, but eat more fruits and vegetables." The advice of people who look into these things seems to be of a piece, and if more of us followed it, perhaps what Epstein calls the "symbiosis of the American food and pharmaceutical industries" would abate. Compared to 1960, Americans now spend, on average, about half as much of their incomes on food but three times more on health care. What we are eating is creating demand for prescription drugs.
By the time the rest of the house was stirring I had made it to the advertisements in the back. These too are interesting.
Bored, married white male, six foot four inches, slim 190, active mid-seventies, highly educated, NS, seeks petite, very skinny, bright, middle-aged female for long-term romance. Northern Queens.
Hmmm. Not a mensch, probably, but who can't take encouragement from a display of such ruddy optimism in a man of 75? And, speaking of men in their mid-seventies:
I'm 75. A retired lawyer who has completed over 400 pages of a book (?), why the question mark? It's another stinking memoir that I'd like to convert into a farce, parody or satire. I need help from an elegant writer possessed of a fine Italian hand who has plenty of time and patience. Reward: personal satisfaction in being a Good Samaritan and a fat fee.
His prestigious career stands revealed as farce but he still seems to be in good spirits.
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