The Greening of Kelly

I’ve discovered something!

My tap water tastes really good! And I’m shocked!

In my effort to Green up my life, one step at a time, I’ve already mentioned that I am trying to quit my Diet Coke addiction. I also had a little bottled water habit. In my previous homes the tap water always tasted bad, really bad. If I was going to drink water, it needed to taste good. I was so sure that the water in my current home would taste bad, I never actually tried it.

I bought two glass jugs for the fridge, one for iced tea, the other for water. I vowed not to buy bottled water anymore. I wasn’t really happy with this idea because, “Ugh, tap water!” but I was wrong.

So wrong.

It needs to be cold, but otherwise I am very happy with leaving bottled water in my past.

I enjoyed the movie. It was funny, it was touching and it was informative. There was enough information presented to get me thinking, but not so much that I was overwhelmed. I actually thought that there could have been a little bit more information presented about the health implications of eating so much high fructose corn syrup and corn-fed beef, but over all I left the theater with positive thoughts about the movie and the message.

Here is the first paragraph from the review in Variety:

Further evidence that everything is bad for you is offered by “King Corn,” which reveals how the U.S. farming staple is much more present in our diet — and having much more of an effect on our ever-expanding national waistline — than consumers realize. No doubt inspired to some degree by “Super Size Me,” this equally engaging, slightly better-crafted docu deftly balances humor and insight.

The Sustainable Table also has a pretty good in depth review and description of the movie if you are interested.

Below is an extended clip (about 20 minutes) of the movie if you are unable to find/rent/watch it in your area:

KING CORN- Extended Trailer

Here are a couple videos that I found on the subject of HFCS and corn-fed beef:

High Fructose Corn Syrup–Still Not Sexy

Corn-Fed Beef and Sustainability

Things to think about!!

I am planning on going to a free showing of KING CORN tonight. I figure it fits nicely into my pay more attention and maybe I’ll learn something philosophy. Maybe I won’t learn anything useful, but I bet I will come home a little more ahead than if I stayed home watching Real World/Road Rules Challenge the reunion show!

From the KING CORN website:

Behind America’s dollar hamburgers and 72-ounce sodas is a key ingredient that quietly fuels our fast-food nation: corn. In KING CORN, recent college graduates Ian Cheney and Curt Ellis leave the east coast for rural Iowa, where they decide to grow an acre of the nation’s most powerful crop.

Alarmed by signs of America’s bulging waistlines, the filmmakers arrive in the Midwest enthusiastic about their new endeavor. For their farm-to-be, they choose a tiny town in Floyd, County, Iowa—a place that, coincidentally, both Ian and Curt’s great-grandfathers called home three generations ago. They lease an acre of land from a skeptical landlord, fill out a pile of paperwork to sign up for subsidies and discover the U.S. government will pay them 28 dollars for their acre. Ian and Curt start the spring by injecting ammonia fertilizer, which promises to increase crop production four-fold. Then it’s planting time. With a rented high-tech tractor, they set 31,000 seeds in the ground in just 18 minutes. Their corn has also been genetically modified for another yield-increasing characteristic: herbicide resistance. When the seedlings sprout from Iowa’s black dirt, Ian and Curt apply a powerful herbicide to ensure that only their corn will thrive on their acre.

By summer, their modern farm is thriving, and the Corn Belt is moving toward a record harvest of 11 billion bushels of corn. But where will all that corn go? With their crop growing head-high, Ian and Curt leave the farm to see where America’s abundance of corn ends up. As they enter America’s industrial kitchen, they are forced to confront the realities of their crop’s future. In Brooklyn, it sweetens the sodas of a diabetes-plagued neighborhood. In Colorado, it fattens the feed trough of a 100,000-head cattle feedlot. Ian and Curt are increasingly troubled by how the abundance of corn is helping to make fast food cheap and consumers sick, driving animals into confinement and farmers off the land. Animal nutritionists confirm that corn feeding can make cows sick and beef fatty, but it also lets consumers have fast food at low prices. As feedlot operator Bob Bledsoe says in KING CORN, “America wants and demands cheap food.”

As Ian and Curt discover, almost everything Americans eat contains corn. High-fructose corn syrup, corn-fed meat, and corn-based processed foods are the staples of the modern diet. America’s record harvests of corn are supported by a government subsidy system that promotes corn production beyond all market demand. As Ian and Curt return to Iowa to watch their 10,000-pound harvest fill the combine’s hopper and make its way into America’s food, they realize their acre of land shouldn’t be planted in corn again—if they can help it.

King Corn Trailer

I wonder if I can talk my daughter, Starr, into joining me?

I have been an avid Diet Coke drinker (um, addict) for years…and years! Diet Coke was my coffee and my constant companion. I rarely let us run out and if we did for some reason, I was climbing the walls until I could make an emergency run to the store.

I’ve known for years that it probably wasn’t good for me. I knew that it wasn’t real food. Chemicals and aspartame…yum! Those things can’t be good for me. I have quit several times over the years, but have always fallen back into the habit.

I have quit once again. I feel it’s important, but it won’t be easy. So far I have substituted with iced tea with sugar (about 1/2 the sugar of regular sweet tea) and water. Give me some time and I might move on to caffeine free varieties of tea as well as further reduce or eliminate the sugar, but not immediately! Like I said, it has to be doable and easy or it won’t stick!

It’s been a week and three days. Wish me luck!