To be healthy, or not to be, that is the question

A few weeks ago I was pushed into having a Health Risk Assessment performed on me. At SRC (where I work, to those of you who haven't been paying attention) we take health very seriously. There have been many studies done and all of them have come to roughly the same conclusion: Businesses should encourage their workforce to create and maintain healthy living habits because healthier employees are less of a financial risk. A company takes a measured risk when they hire someone. They invest time, energy, money, equipment, and many other investments in order to have someone come in and perform a function. The initial investment is the largest when the recently hired employee is still learning the ropes. The employee's output is low and training takes up another employee's time which takes away from their output. In time, there becomes a standard cost for that employee which includes the utilities they require to do their job (water, electricity, etc), their salary, their expected overtime, bonuses or profit sharing if applicable, and the amount that the company kicks in for the employee's insurance.

The investment goes far beyond just the paycheck. So when an employee works for a long period of time and knows all of the ins and outs of the business and can perform multiple functions with a high rate of efficiency that employee is one to hold on to. What if the employee dies of a heart attack, though? Oops. The company just lost that huge investment and great asset. Now they have to do it all over again. Let's tone down the severity a little bit and ask what if the employee gets sick for a day? Then the company doesn't have that asset for a day. This all adds up and it's been found in these studies that healthy people tend to miss less work than their less healthy coworkers. Therefore making the healthier employees a greater asset.

SRC has bought into this line of thinking and established a Health Committee long ago. We have a nice workout room, an outdoor running track, and an on-staff nurse and health technician. They are constantly having walks for various causes, free classes teaching healthy habits, and even competitions. There is always an incentive. For every event that you join in you acquire 1 or 2 health points depending on the event. At the end of the year they throw your name in a hat for every point that you've acquired and you can win things like a home gym, iPods, LCD TVs, gift cards, etc.

Well, all the points you acquired for the year are void if you don't do the Health Risk Assessment. So, they signed me up. They took my blood and my measurements and my height and weight and then let me get back to work. Well, this week I got back the results. I'm not happy with them. Hence the blog. I write blogs bragging about many things, but I wouldn't go around bragging about my health. That just seems like an inevitable random lightning strike victim waiting to happen.

I think I'll start with my good results and then slowly rise to anger with the others. I have a healthy amount of the good cholesterol, total cholesterol, cholesterol ratio, triglycerides, and blood sugar. My heart rate of 78 and blood pressure at 116/68 were "very good" according to the woman who took them. Now comes the bad news: my BMI (Body Mass Index) is 29.48. And according to their little decoder ring that puts me in the overweight category just under obesity. What!? That's right. I'm one Krispy Kreme away from being obese according to their scale. So let's look at their scale, shall we? BMI is a measure used to determine obesity. BMI is simply weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared. First of all, the use of the metric system tells me that this measurement was created by someone outside the U.S. and probably set the category limitations with Americans in mind thinking that we're all overprivileged fat and lazy Big Mac munchers. Second, the only factors that play a role in determining this number is height and weight. But, that can't be accurate. There are plenty of people I know who are my same height and weight, but don't have the build. Some are all muscle, some are seriously lacking muscle, but according to this measurement they are all overweight and almost obese. What a joke.

But, what about definitions? We all think that we know what words mean, but for the sake of argument let's look them up. The Free Dictionary defines obese as "extremely fat, grossly overweight". Wesbter's is significantly nicer about it with their definition "having excessive body fat". Or maybe they're not being nice since that includes EVERYBODY. Excessive is defined as "more than what is necessary." Everyone has more body fat than what is necessary unless they're anorexic or something. Fat is defined as "notable for having an unusual amount of body fat."

So, to wrap up the differing definitions let me conclude the following. Webster's calls you obese if you have more body fat than what is necessary for your body to properly function. The Free Dictionary calls only those who are extremely notable for having unusual amounts of body fat and who are way beyond even being overweight obese. So, did this help you to decide who to look for the meaning of words from? It did for me.

In case this post has made you curious about what your own BMI is, I've kindly inserted the following link to a BMI Calculator so that you, too, can feel good about yourself. Use with caution, you may not like the results. In case you are reading this and don't have a way to check the link, then here is the formula: Multiply your weight in pounds by 703 and then divide that number by your height in inches squared. Then the cutoffs are listed in the chart.

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We Gotta Take The Power Back... dannah, dannah, dannooooww Come on, COME ON!

You may be wondering what was wrong with me when I typed the title to this blog, but I assure you that nothing new is wrong with me that hasn't always been wrong with me. It's simply some lyrics out of a RATM (Rage Against The Machine) song. And those words that aren't found in Webster's were my air guitar version of Tom Morello's amazing guitar manipulations. I say manipulations because Tom Morello doesn't play guitar, he manipulates one.

Anyway, air guitar and explanations aside, I wanted to say something in light of what is going on in Washington. I also would like to admit some incorrect thinking and make good on what I've previously talked about in the last blog (Bailout Bombed). I made it pretty clear that the financial institutions are the ones to blame for this need of a financial bailout. I pointed out that "their mistakes" of irresponsible lending are now costing us money if our government decides to give them our money. Now I sort of think that I was wrong. Sort of. Rather than go into my own words, I will simply insert a paragraph that I read on FederalBudget.com. Here it is.

It seems there were many forces and organizations pressuring the financial institutions to make housing loans to folks who clearly would not qualify for them. Goes back to the turn of the century. The ruse was "affordable" housing, and the slogan was "everyone has a right to own a home". (Not according to the Constitution). It was a well thought out project. It was calculated that a bailout would be needed. Congressional members supported it. A few resisted, even those resistors knew what would happen. The pressure was heavy and many-fronted. The financial institutions must lend to unqualified borrowers. Ultimately, the scheme would lead to having the citizens buy houses for the low income earners that couldn't qualify. This is clear socialism. More than that, it was calculated, premeditated, theft. It is against the U. S. Constitution for the U. S. Federal Government to do this.

The author of this paragraph is Gene Simmons. No, he's not the guy from Kiss who sticks out his tongue, but the founder of the National Debt Awareness Campaign (NDAC) who willfully bares the burden of informing individuals like me and you the truth behind the government's decisions that affect the economy and also unfortunately bares the burden of having the same name as an infamous goober. You all should make some time to read through this highly informative website that isn't flashy by design but is clearly devoted to teaching the American public the problems with our economic system. However, unlike so many other sites I have found, this one also offers solutions beyond a mere suggestion as to who to vote for. So you are aware, the NDAC does not support or endorse any political party.

I wonder now if Jodi and I didn't benefit from this pressure on the financial institutions in some way. We got approved for our home loan in January of last year after a long road of fixing our (when I say "our" I mean "my") bad credit and building up good credit. I wonder if we would have qualified under normal circumstances. However, I would hardly put us into a category alongside all these people who are foreclosing on their homes. Most of these cases are with people who couldn't afford the home that they were buying in the first place. Some people just shouldn't be able to buy a home if they don't have the income to warrant it. We had the income and the career longevity and job security and the low debt-to-income ratio. We just had a poor credit score since we had a severe lack of credit hits. I always thought that it was good to buy things outright in cash and that it was responsible to turn down credit card offers. However, it turns out that if you ever do want to borrow money, you'll need to show a history of doing just that. Which makes sense, but then the problem of getting that first lender to lend you money arises.

I've strayed here a bit, but I wanted to let it be known that the NDAC has done a lot more research than I have concerning the subject of today's financial crisis. Therefore, I'm inclined to believe now that maybe our government has planned all along to take this money from us and to give it to the financial institutions so that it allows the financial institutions to keep funneling money everywhere. And why not? Every time that money changes hands in the US, the government takes a piece. And when no one is buying and no one is selling, the government feels it necessary that they intervene to get things moving again so that they can go back to collecting. I'll end this with two more quotes.

For society as a whole, nothing comes as a 'right' to which we are 'entitled'. Even bare substance has to be produced.... The only way anyone can have a right to something that has to be produced is to force someone else to produce it... The more things are provided as rights, the less the recipients have to work and the more the providers have to carry the load. -Thomas Sowell (quoted in Forbes and Reader's Digest

A politician cannot spend one dime on any spending project without first taking that dime from the person who earned it. So, when a politician votes for a spending bill he is saying that he believes the government should spend that particular dollar rather than the individual who worked for it. -Neil Boortz

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Bailout Bombed

Today's economic crisis is obvious and not so obvious at the same time. Everyone sees the gas prices fluctuate from day to day and think that they have a handle on what is going on with America's finances, but I'm willing to bet that the average voter probably can't explain the process of credit institutions and how their stability can affect the market. We've all seen news reports, debates, headlines in the newspapers, and probably online stories from all over the US but all the information is getting lost as it piles up on the heads of the people who don't fully understand it.

I know all this because I am one of the people that don't fully understand it. I read a lot and do a lot of research before I formulate most of my opinions, but the information out there is a bit much to take. There appears to be an agreement that the financial security in America is at stake, but the way to go about healing it is where all the confusion comes in.

The White House wants to bail out the financial institutions that are struggling with foreclosed properties and bad debt. Their hope is that by purchasing these bad debts from the banks it will allow them to become healthy again where they can continue to dole out loans to people who need them for businesses, personal property, and homes. It's the classic "trickle down" economic process that promotes helping out the biggest companies so that they can in turn create jobs,give loans, and stimulate spending.

But, what if, by relieving the banks of the results of their own mistakes, they only go out and make the same mistakes again? Or maybe they won't. But, what's stopping them from doing so? By bailing these companies out we're giving them the message that they can do whatever they want and even if their company fails they'll still collect.

I know that if the economy continues its nosedive that America as we know it could radically change. But, I fail to see what I should be fearing by this change. Let it fall. It's a machine that was built by the wealthy to become wealthier by feeding off of the majority. It's wrong and it deserves to tumble. My guess is that the majority will survive just fine, those that don't rely on the government (their neighbors) to support their lifestyle. For the others, it can only serve as a wake up call to a broken system.

While it may be a difficult road, one in which that us fat and lazy Americans aren't used to, I think that we'd be better off letting the bottom fall out and starting over with a much more aware society rather than this willfully ignorant one. Many will disagree with me and I welcome any comments for or against my position, but I would like to ask these people who are for a government bailout a two-part question: Can you explain to me what you expect that this bail out will save? And, if saving our current mode of operations is your answer, then what is it about the current mode of operations that is so worth saving?

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Remember the Vikings

Foreword: Sorry for the blogs being few and far between for the month of September. I have a small handful of blogs that I read and I know how it feels checking in on them just to see the same old blog sitting there. Today is my last day to get one in before the calender flips over to October so here I am. Can you believe it? October! I'm too busy to actually write one that takes a lot of brain power, so sue me if you don't like the content but here goes.

This past Saturday I ran across a news story that made my jaw drop. Maybe it wasn't quite that dramatic, but you get the idea. It was about Parkview High School's football team. Apparently, they won their game last Friday night. I normally wouldn't have been reading about sports, but the headline caught my attention. Parkview's win broke a fifty-eight game losing streak. 58 games! Before Friday night's game their last win was October 10, 2002, almost 6 years ago.

Think about that. Both the Class of 2007 and the Class of 2008 spent their entire four years of high school without a win on the football field. This discouragement had to extend beyond the lighted field. School spirit probably isn't what it once was, but there is still a pride to be had by a season record even if you never attend a single game. I know I've felt a spark of healthy pride when someone finds out that I graduated from Ozark and starts complimenting their football program. And I was a soccer player! I didn't go to football games, and yet I've felt it. So, what then for the multitudes of students who had to bare the embarrassment of a losing streak that took years to break?

According to the News-Leader the state record for longest losing streak is held by the town of Iberia, MO. This is a tiny little town of 605 people halfway between Rolla and Lake of the Ozarks. Their losing streak of 72 straight games stretched from 1965 to 1974. The second longest losing streak took place in Gainesville, MO. Gainesville lost 66 in a row and is also a small town of 632 people. Parkview now holds the third place for longest losing streak in the state. On a sidenote, neither Iberia nor Gainesville have football programs anymore. So, one could say that Parkview holds the longest football losing streak in the state for a team that is still active.

Friday night's win didn't come easily either. It was a battle down to the final tick of the clock. Parkview beat Hillcrest in double overtime 39-36. It will be interesting to see what this win does for the team for the rest of the season. Coming out of a slump like that could easily turn the entire morale of the team around. Time will only tell. Just remember the Vikings when everything seems to be working against you and you see no end in sight.

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Say Cheese!

I fear that If I talk about Studio Living Room or photography in general any more that people might get the impression that this is merely a company blog page designed for the purpose of promoting itself. However, recently I've been really busy with events and even busier with editing the photos from those events so I don't have much else to talk about. I'm not sure how many collective hours I have spent touching up photos this month, but I feel that my eyes have definitely been working overtime.

My most recent job was for Battlefield Lanes here in Springfield. They recently got a contract for ten billboards around town promoting their bowling alley, and they were looking for someone to take some action photos and some shots of their facility for use on these billboards. Well, it was a friend of mine who hooked them up with the billboard contract and he then recommended me when they asked if he knew any professional photographers. So, that was cool. I interviewed for the job and got it.

The photo shoot went well and it was neat to be involved in some commercial work. Another bonus was that one of the photos that the general manager really wanted was of a small child bowling. They had a plan already for this photo but the intended subject couldn't make it when we did the shoot. So, we just did without. I suggested that we could use my kids and they thought that that was a great idea. Jodi then thought it would be nice if we could do it before the billboard designs got finished so that they could use it as they had originally planned. So, I negotiated with them and in exchange for me returning with my family to take a few photos of them bowling we got to bowl that night completely for free. Lyric had never been bowling before and was a lot less interested in it than I thought he would be. Like most kids, he's always loved playing with balls (or "deesh" in his language) and so I thought for sure that he would get a big kick out of bowling. But he did just that. He kept trying to kick the ball rather than roll it. We did get some good shots of him even so.

Free bowling was good, but the real bonus will be if Jodi, Jacob, or Lyric or some combination of the three find their faces on a billboard somewhere. I thought that it would be cool just to have my work displayed on a billboard, so how much cooler is it to have my wife and kids on one. That would be something for the scrapbook. Anyway even if my blog page is the only place they're used they're still out there. Here are some of the pics from the shoot. Of course, most of the pictures I took for them weren't of us but I'm including mostly ones of us because I'm biased like that.

Also, stay tuned. I've been editing the Des Moines wedding and it is turning out beautiful. My best yet.

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Beauty Revisited

I wrote yesterday's blog and after proofreading it I watched the Dove commercial again even though it needed no proofwatching. I'm just amazed at the amount of work that went into making a beautiful model picture that didn't even resemble the woman that was an attractive woman already. Afterwards, I noticed the short list of related videos that YouTube attempts to entice the viewer with. Several were other examples of extreme makeovers using Photoshop. I chose one and watched it.

Impressed as I was, I ended the short video slightly upset because I noticed the author was using tools found in Photoshop that were awesome. See, I don't use Photoshop. I use GIMP. And, I'd never found those tools in GIMP. Which, if GIMP had these tools, my work of editing photos would be much simpler with a better finished product as well. But, then I had an epiphany. Despite my well-rounded experience with GIMP, I still don't use all the features. I thought maybe there is a GIMP equivalent to these Photoshop tools.

I Googled a description of what the tool was doing and after a few clicks found the name of the Photoshop tool. I then Googled the tool name with GIMP. First try was a charm. I found a forum of someone asking for the equivalent and receiving direction as to which tool will perform that same function in GIMP. YAY!

So then I had to try this method out for myself to see if I could do in GIMP what this guy had done in Photoshop. I saw that he got his photo from Stock Exchange which is a free stock photo website. I searched "girl face" and wound up finding the exact photo he used and decided to use it as well for easy comparison purposes for our finished products.

Below is the video that the guy did, the original photo from stock exchange, and my edited version completely performed in GIMP. So much for Photoshop being a little bit better than GIMP.






What I did: gave her a nose job, plucked her eyebrows, fixed her terrible eye make-up, gave her green eyes, changed her lipstick, gave her a tan, got rid of the mark on her face (whatever that was), smoothed out her skin, reshaped her face and skull, pinned her ears back a little, whitened her teeth, rounded out her shoulders, changed the background which got rid of all her stray frizzy hair, and added a little color to her cheeks to give the slight illusion of cheek bones. So, what do you think?

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Beauty Defined

The idea of beauty is an interesting thing. I've heard many studies over the years claiming theories about what constitutes beauty in a society. Some of these theories you may have heard yourself. One of them is based off of symmetry. A study showed that faces that measured to be more symmetric in photos were given a higher approval rating from the people who were picked to rate the photos by beauty. This theory also is carried into architecture. Most buildings are built as symmetrically as possible. Look at virtually every Capital Building in every State. County Courthouses, skyscrapers, Eiffel Tower, White House, the Taj Mahal. All these buildings seem beautiful to us. People take pictures of them not only for their size but because they're beautiful. Maybe they wouldn't be quite as beautiful if they weren't so symmetrical? It's a thought.

Another idea is that beauty is seen in reproductive capabilities. It's been said that men are subconsciously attracted to hourglass shaped women because the hips would suggest a better chance at birthing healthier babies. When googling about this subject for a little more content I even ran across there being a specific waist-to-hip ratio that according to physiologists accurately indicates women's fertility levels. On the women's perspective, I once saw a 20/20 report that was all about how a new study showed that almost 70% of women will pick a man to be her partner that has the "strong" facial features like wide jaws, over set brow, small mouth, and set apart eyes. These same women with almost the same majority pointed out that in their opinion these men that they would choose as a mate also have most of the undesirable qualities in behaviour like they tend to not be good fathers or caring husbands. The men's chances of abandoning the relationship at any point were greater.

This study clearly showed that the 1000 women polled would choose a mate based off of "desirable" appearances despite everything else being "undesirable". The other men were overwhelmingly seen as safer bets, but remained unchosen by the majority of the women polled. So, could women, too, be just as shallow as the men whom they accuse of the same? Sociologists claim that this study shows that these women like all women simply want healthy, strong, "desirably featured" children and are willing to take the chance on the man in order to get the desired baby.

For whatever reasons beauty is defined, the results of beauty have a profound effect on society and always have. A casual stroll through a shopping mall, a few minutes of commercials between tv shows, even something as simple as logging in to MySpace can find you seeing ads about how to be more beautiful with some skin care product, hair conditioner, or weight loss program. It was these ads on the internet that sparked this blog in the first place. I captured three of them and created two of my own. I'm sure that there's no misunderstanding as to which two I made, but for disclaimer purposes let me say now that both the Clearasil and Olay ads are indeed not ads ran by either company. After seeing these funny ads you should watch the YouTube video of the Dove commercial if you haven't already seen it. It's a great demonstration of how beauty is perceived and how the beauty product industry has raised the bar to an almost unreachable level.

Do you have any theories that relate to the subject of beauty? Let us know and comment below.

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