The Big Think

Went to a(n otherwise wonderful) Easter dinner party today, but couldn’t get over the irony of the main course: Roast lamb. For Easter.

More credit card fun.

I had to laugh when I told Erin that I was going to post an entry about… a grocery store. We just got back from a trip to the new Whole Foods World Headquarters grocery store in downtown Austin. Let me tell you, this place is overwhelming.
First off, it’s over eigty-five thousand square feet. That makes it, oh, about the size of a Sam’s club. But the variety there is just incredible. They have a gelatto bar, a coffee bar, a soup bar, a sushi bar (staffed by very small, very talented Japanese women), a very cool chocolate bar where they make gourmet chocolates, a fresh fish station, and lots of tables where you can order exotic foods, have a chef cook them up for you, and eat them right in the store. They have a huge meat dept in the back, a massive fresh flower section, and I can’t even describe the produce. Oh, and the wine section is a couple thousand square feet at least (including a groovy wine tasting section). This place rocks.

Whole Foods CEO John Mackey says, “To put this store in perspective, every department features more variety than you’d find in a stand-alone specialty shop – but with products free of artificial additives, sweeteners, colorings, preservatives and hydrogenated oils.” So it’s not only cool, but it’s healthy stuff there as well. We found things that we had never seen, and had no idea what they were. There are several aisles that are dedicated to specific regions (Asian food, Mexican, Indian, etc). According to this site here are some numbers:

1,800 wines, with suggested food pairings and tasting flights
More than 800 beer selections in a walk-in beer cooler
More than 600 of the world’s best varieties of fresh, soft, hard-ripened, artisan and aged cheeses
70 cuts of fresh meat prepared in house, 32 varieties of fresh-made sausage and more than 50 chef-prepared, oven-ready selections
50 fresh-baked hearth breads available every day
40 varieties of stuffed and marinated olives, capers and other antipasto
18 flavors of handmade gelato, with flavors ranging from vanilla orange fig to chocolate chipotle
14 pastry chefs concocting creations from baked Alaska to apple pie á la mode

If you’re ever in Austin, you have to stop in and see it. It’s a Foodie’s delight. Check out this Austin Chronicle article for some good pictures.

The comment section has been reopened! Feel free to comment on my posts. Also, please note that I may tweak the settings so that I have to approve comments before they list, so don’t worry if they don’t appear right away. I have to talk to Giles about how do do it all correctly.

Hogonice has this to say (emphasis mine):

The court doesn’t want to merely prevent extraordinary measures in the Schiavo case. It wants Terri Schiavo to be killed.

The liberal argument goes like this. Terri Schiavo can’t eat on her own, so feeding her through a tube is keeping her alive by artificial means.

Okay, fine. But the courts haven’t just forbidden people to feed Terri through a tube. People have been arrested for trying to put water in her mouth WITHOUT a tube.

Mox points out, correctly, that if she can swallow the water without a tube, it’s not artificial support. So why arrest people who want to give her a drink?

The only answer is that the courts want her to die, which is not the same as not wanting her to be kept alive by artificial means.

Before you make a fool of yourself by arguing, remember that all over the country, there are people who have to be spoon-fed every day, and we don’t get to starve them.

Here’s the funny thing. Now Ralph Nader agrees. Ralph points out that Terri swallows all day. If she didn’t, she’d drool all over herself. Obviously, the people who say she can’t swallow are full of it.

If she can swallow, why is it a crime to put food and water in her mouth?

Michael Schiavo objects to it, supposedly because she might aspirate food and have lung problems. So we don’t want her to have lung problems, but it’s okay if she dies of thirst…

Under penalty of perjury, a nurse swore that Terri could swallow soft food. In specific, Jell-O. Doctors have stated that she can swallow. Before you say something silly, like, “You can’t live on Jell-O,” think about the fact that thousands and thousands of Americans live on diets even softer. Not everyone can eat normal food.

I hadn’t heard this argument before. Under this logic, it’s okay to starve to death any person who does not have the ability to ask for food, or to lift a spoon to their own lips. How long until it becomes acceptable to starve our dying family members simply because their infirmities become difficult to deal with?

It’s not like this kind of behavior has no historical precedent. In fact, I would argue that selective weeding out has been practiced in many societies throughout history. It is only our current system of laws and culture, and not the wrong-headed belief that we have somehow “advanced”, that keeps us from following in the footsteps of ancient Rome or Egypt. Human nature hasn’t changed.

If Terri Schaivo is killed by the court, we’ve just set a precedent and taken a large bound down a very slippery slope.

The origin of the Road Runner’s trademark sound. (quicktime required).
view

Well, not quite, but go check out the sideways room!