Bellists and Bellism

I work for an amazing online magazine at iamthatgirl.com. The majority of the staff is young women, but each and every one of us on the staff would call ourselves bellists. Bellists live out the ideals of bellism, which is a movement dedicated to reconstructing society's definition of beauty. We at IATG do that by promoting other facets of a person; we encourage education, promote positive role models, and do a number of other things to inspire young women to DREAM BIG.

But here's the thing I notice...In a room full of female bellists (remember what that bellists work to redefine beauty), every one of them is beautiful. And I have to wonder why.

Every one of these women is also incredibly smart, probably more than the average girl in the coffee shop, and I wonder if those two characteristics mix well or successfully most of the time. I'd say they don't. Women, if beautiful, are not welcomed into boardrooms. They are either assumed (based on first glance) to lack the proper intelligence or they're considered a distraction for the men in that room. I think that's why many successful business women are plain-looking.

And isn't that exactly the fight of bellists? Not only to eradicate the need for all women to be physically beautiful so that they can walk into the local bar or local church social or whatever feeling confident of catching a man's eye but also to obliterate the construct that women who do happen to be physically appealing have nothing more to offer than their looks.

I've just finished reading a short essay on The Ugly Duckling (see my other blog for its text). The story has been prolonged for over a hundred years, contributing to a society's construction of image, and at a very early age nonetheless. I believe the world is fostering with bellists who are grown, and once we recognize ourselves, and gather together, we need to affect children and youth so that they can grow to be businessmen or businesswomen, a beautiful husband or a beautiful wife, without having to consider a glass ceiling based on their looks.

Fatty, fatty, fatty, fatty....

As Ross would say, "If you want to see a man gain weight and a woman stop shaving her legs, get 'em married." But what do you say when the man getting married has to be carried down the aisle in his bed--which he hasn't left in 6 years--due to his obesity?

Manuel Uribe, formerly the world's heaviest man (weighing in at 1230 lbs, though has since lost over 500 lbs) is now married. And though I should be wondering about who this woman is, if she inspired him to lose weight, etc. etc., I can't get past one curiosity.....How did the couple meet? I mean, unless they met prior to his bed rest, she would have had to chance upon Manuel while he was in bed. Would this be in his home? Or does he have people to carry his bed around to the local bar as though he were some form of ancient Egyptian royalty?

Hmmm....

Banana-Rama

I have long been known to eat more than my fair share of bananas. I eat them at breakfast, at lunch, at dinner, for snacks, with peanut butter, sliced, whatever. According to recent Japanese trends, this diet makes me thin.

Yep, the Morning Banana Diet is so HUGE in Japan that they can't keep bananas in stock. The diet's instructions include eating a banana for breakfast along with a glass of lukewarm water, eat normal meals for lunch an dinner, and be in bed before midnight.

The Japanese, obviously known for their obesity, may be onto something. Bananas are known to increase energy. (Now you can workout.) They can prevent depression, PMS, and anemia and they reduce high blood pressure (giving you better health). Add more sleep to the banana and you also get reduced stress, prevents cancer, bolsters your memory, and (GET THIS) makes you lose weight! Hmmm.....

Shall we sing along?

A beautiful bunch a'ripe banana
(Daylight come and he wan' go home)
Hide thee deadly black tarantula
(Daylight come and he wan' go home)

It's six foot, seven foot, eight foot, BUNCH!
(Daylight come and he wan' go home)
Six foot, seven foot, eight foot, BUNCH!

National Debt Clock

So you may have heard. The National Debt Clock in NYC's Time Square had to change its look last week. The debt has gotten so large that we have had to add a digit to the square that previously only held the dollar sign. It's hit $10.2 trillion.

Not to worry. There is a plan to remedy the situation.

The clock will be replaced next year to allow it to track up to a quadrillion dollars. I had to find a definition of that because I get a little loopy after trillions. A quadrillion is a 1 followed by 15 zeros.

This, of course, begs the question, what if we did this with our personal debt? Let's say I max out my credit card. No problem! Get a bigger card. Literally. Increase its dimensions as well as its funds. So what if it can't fit in your wallet? It's big and shiny and that's cool.

Parental Controls for your Car

I'm Ba-aaaaack. I know I've been MIA for awhile, now. But to be completely honest, it's only because I'm stupid enough to not only forget my password but also forget which of my emails I use for Blogspot. Get over it. I did.

So here's what you missed in the meantime: the SKIN project (which I had to have one of my writers at the magazine write on since I could not). Link here to that article. It's a really awesome but incredibly risky way to unite people through literature.

And now.....
the MyKey. This is a feature on upcoming Ford cars/trucks that limits the driver's speed to less than 80mph. It also allows for stereo volume limits an annoying noises to remind you that you aren't wearing a seatbelt.

Basically, it's a parent's dream and a teen's nightmare. But guess who usually buys the car?

The idea is a bit Big Brother for me to swallow. But, what with the new applications on your apple phone telling you where all your friends are at any given moment (and vice versa), the MyKey is surprising tame (and strangely geared toward safety rather than stalking capabilities).

Hmmm.

New DNA; Ramsey okay

Well, it only took eleven and a half years, but it looks like the family of JonBenet Ramsey is in the clear. Several years ago, the evidence swayed those still following the case that Patsy Ramsey was not the likely murderer and that the evidence suggested an intruder. New DNA has eradicated any remnant beliefs of the family's guilt. The results were announced and issued with an apology to the family for the increased stress in the situation. Unfortunately for Patsy Ramsey, this all comes a couple of years after her death from a battle with ovarian cancer.

Jeffrey MacDonald only wishes he had such luck. Excuse me, I mean innocence.

She Has Her Reasons

I originally wrote this for the magazine but a demographic shift means it's no longer usable.....

Recently, my friend and I were discussing how uncomfortable we find the chairs we sit on for most of the day, every day, so we decided to get a little creative and think of things that might substitute for those chairs. Our not-so-great ideas included a tree stump (think of the splinter hazards), a stack of old textbooks, and no chair at all. But I’d have to say our best idea was the exercise ball….and here’s why:

1. It’s colorful. Most desk chairs offer you the wide color selection of black, or gray, or brown, or black. If a store is particularly daring, they may carry some shade of navy blue that is so dark it may as well be black. In contrast, the exercise ball comes in bright colors like yellow, red, and blue—the primaries. What an eye-catching way to add a little pop to your desk space.
2. It’s round. I don’t know why I find this fact so appealing other than that chairs don’t really have a shape. They’re chair-shaped. But an exercise ball, it’s spherical. It’s the best shape because it has no edges. If you hit your knee on it because you misjudged a corner—oh wait! Impossible. There is no corner.
3. It’s playful. I like to see how long I can balance on an exercise ball without touching the floor and have minor competitions with others or with myself. The game is not quite so challenging when you’re seated on a chair with four legs. I’ve tried it. It’s rather dull.
4. It’s unique. Do you know anyone who has an exercise ball-chair? I don’t.
5. It’s bouncy. I have been known to have some difficulty sitting still. And if you can get me to sit still, it probably isn’t in the proper way to sit in a normal chair. I’ll sit with in Indian-style, with my feet folded under my legs and nothing hanging down (let alone placed firmly on the ground). I’ll even sit with my feet both up on the chair, my knees bent, and my chin resting on my knees—let me tell you, this is a general no-no in the professional world. If I’m going to sit primly and properly all day long, my desk chair at home better offer me something different. The exercise ball is an interactive chair. It’s not quite so serious. And you know what bouncy, bouncy, bouncy means….
6. It’s fun, fun, fun, fun, fun!

There are, of course, negative aspects to the exercise ball-chair. For instance, how would you slide it under the desk for a nice, neat effect? It would just roll right out again. I can’t say I know of much back support that it offers—although, that may instead require you to work on your posture, which would, in turn, be a positive aspect of the ball-chair. The most obvious negative for the exercise ball desk chair is, of course, that with all the colorfulness, roundness, playfulness, individuality, bounciness, and fun, you’d never look at anything on the actual desk. This possibility somewhat defeats the point of the desk itself. In which case, we could remove the desk and simply play with the exercise ball in an empty room…..only when would any work get done?

Oooh, dilemma.