A Foodie's dilema

My pal S was on the train this morning, reading the sequel (?!) to The Omnivore's Dilema, another book by Michael Pollan. We were discussing how confusing it is to eat.
Well, it is, stop laughing. Pollan posits that it is so difficult to know what is healthy or not because we are so confused by modern nutritionists. The fads of no fat, low fat, no sugar, etc have left us with no idea.
There was a study about word association with a terrific rich cake. The Americans answered something about guilt or health or something while the French (I think) answered celebration.

I think some of this is really caused by the rise of marketing and advertising in the 60s and 70s. Food became more packaged, more marketed, more focus grouped.

Aside from making me hungry, I am thinking....when does Madmen come back on TV?

Shared Fortune

The other day I was on the train with my "kitchen cabinet" . My cabinet is the group of amazing women I ride the train with who give me practical business and personal advice. They are usually right on target.
Sometimes I get to give some advice too.
Last week one of my friends told me about the job opportunity she got. It is really exciting to get the chance to enter a new career and new challenge, particularly in this economy and as you are getting closer to 60. I have a very keen intuition, which probably helps in what I do for a living.
In any case she started telling me about telling her business partner she will leave the firm. I asked if she cried. She said how did you know? I don't know, I just did. Then she told me that they shared their fortune cookies and the fortune was "it takes a thousand shots to make the first basket". I said, but that wasn't yours, it was hers. Again she said how did you know that? Then I asked what was hers, she said it was about flexibility and her friend/partner is very inflexible. She was saying that for story telling purposes, she attributed the fortunes to the opposite person.
I told her that she shouldn't do that because it is most interesting to me that they shared their fortunes.
What is a fortune anyway? It refers to money, wealth, to the future. And after all, these are all things that they shared for years. In the future, she may be able to give her ex partner business. And in this economy, that may be the best "shared fortune" of all!

High School Prom

Ahhhhh Prom. I remember going to mine with all of my friends. How wild it is to send off one's son to prom. That is A above with his date. I don't remember wearing sexy dresses like that, but maybe that is just my memory.
I was thinking back to how my friends and I all went together. We went to something called the "Gambol" which was held in our gym. This was no small affair and the gym was decorated like the set of a movie. In fact, you didn't know it was a gym, except maybe from the lines on the floor. My boyfriend had the post prom party and then we all went to Jones Beach. We "spiked" a watermelon and drank plenty, but then the drinking age was 18. We got to experiment when we were still at home.
Hey magpie, do you remember? Who did you go with?
Now the kids go to a fancy venue and then they head off to the shore or the Hamptons for the weekend. I bet they still experiment plenty but they don't talk about it as much.