Study: Obese kids are Absent More
PHILADELPHIA—Obese elementary schoolchildren miss a couple more school days on average than their normal-weight classmates, according to a study that says being fat is a better predictor for absenteeism than any other factor.
Are these kids actually sick more often or…do you think it’s because they’re…still walking to school (slowly) when the end of day bell rings? Nah, when I was in school, the truants were often out behind the arcade smoking darts instead of dissecting a frog on one of those wax cake pans. Perhaps the fat kids these days are less nerdy than in my day and are pounding a baker’s dozen behind the portable and making fun of the jocks’ limited employment prospects in the economy of Web 2.0.
Or just maybe they’re still at home trying to finish eating that huge lumberjack slam breakfast (plus the requisite 7 nap-hours it takes hours to digest). These kids are “finishers”! Give ‘em credit.
U.S. Chocolate Sales Forecast to Reach $18 Billion by 2011!
NEW YORK, Aug. 9 /PRNewswire/ — Directly on the heels of Campbell’s
announcement of a possible sale of lux chocolatier Godiva, consumer
research firm Packaged Facts has released its highly anticipated industry
report, The U.S. Market for Chocolate showing a mature market although still primed for growth from $16 billion in 2006 to $18 billion in 2007.
The “report” finds that strong consumer interest in the reported health
benefits of dark chocolate and a general trend towards product
premiumization (including organic and fair trade products) are the main
drivers in current market growth.
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…seriously…how many more times are we going to have to read about these (alleged) health benefits of chocolate? Is anyone actually buying this argument or is it simply a lobby to help people mitigate self-imposed guilt? Are you purposefully putting chocolate in your diet to take advantage of these healthy claims? I’d love to hear if you are.
Let me give you an example. I read in this morning’s news that “chocolate is healthy” and on another page there’s an article telling me that I shouldn’t eat farmed salmon because of the PCBs in it. Come on now, if anyone honestly thinks it’s healthier to eat chocolate than salmon, I’ve got $20,000,000 dollars in Nigeria to give you if you don’t mind giving me your bank account number to help transfer the funds to first.
Also, in other news, Mountain Dew has unveiled its Green Label Art series of aluminum bottles. The series, which runs until October, features graphic designs created by a variety of young artists.
These young artists ostensibly found some inspiration in the artwork used by AriZona.
…and that’s not a bad thing. I like what PepsiCo is doing with all of their brands. They are continuing to keep them fresh and active and they’re taking some risks.
8 Comments
August 14, 2007 at 9:25 pm
Actually, I do purposefully put chocolate in my diet to take advantage of the health claims. However, it’s not your typical off-the-shelf milk chocolate & not even the dark chocolate marketed by the usual candy manufacturers.
The stuff I eat is not dutched (alkalized) and is at least 70% cacao. A 12 g. serving has 4.5 g of fat, 70 calories and 1 g fiber. I’ll eat a couple of them a day. I’m careful to cut back my caloric and fat intake someplace else so I don’t end up looking like a mounds bar myself.
Of course, any of my claims to health benefits are my experience only, but the research behind cacao seems pretty solid.
My personal experience has been mood elevation, HDL increase, LDL reduction and perhaps blood pressure improvement.
BTW, I try to eat a couple of servings of fatty fish (salmon, tuna) per week too. I take 6 g of pharmaceutical grade fish oil per day too. I’m just a tad older than you (you could probably be one of my kids), if your picture is an indication. I suffered a pretty major heart attack four years ago, so my motivations are perhaps a little different than most.
I’ve got a little blog where I comment on antioxidant research that I come across – cacao in particular. One of these days I’ll get around to posting my numbers for the claims above. Until then, if you want to see some of the research that is coming out regarding cacao, click on over to http://chocolatesauce.wordpress.com.
August 15, 2007 at 12:20 pm
thanks for the note. i’ll check out your blog.
btw, i’m older than i look. since i started eating more chocolate and less salmon, i’ve looked great for 55.
just kidding!
i don’t eat much chocolate.
October 1, 2007 at 9:17 pm
the breakfast is the necessity , but the thing is that you must take it light . and should have a good work out too .
October 3, 2007 at 8:57 am
I really like the route pepsi went with MNT dew packaging. Interesting to see these trends show up in mass market. Those grafitti artists doing toys have been around for years- now (well since ugly dolls at least) they are getting some serious mainsteam exposure. It should be interesting in the coming years to see how this trend evolves or ceases to exist. Personally I think it’s here to stay for awhile… too many factors to list.
October 10, 2007 at 12:32 pm
[...] Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…seriously…how many more times are we going to have to read about these (alleged) health benefits of chocolate? Is anyone actually buying this argument or is it simply a lobby to help people mitigate self-imposed guilt? Are you purposefully putting chocolate in your diet to take advantage of these healthy claims? I’d love to hear if you are. — read full article [...]
October 23, 2007 at 6:08 am
nice site! has taken pleasure in perusal
December 19, 2007 at 11:14 pm
I would like to see a continuation of the topic
October 12, 2008 at 12:23 pm
thats crazzy