Coffee Talk

I have a hodgepodge of things to talk about, partially because I just do and partially because I never got around to blogging yesterday. Double-time, people!

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I cleaned the fish tank yesterday. Mundane in and of itself, there's an underlying tone of resentment on my part. I didn't want the fish. Rob decided, back in March, that the one thing Beth was lacking in her life was a fish tank full of pretty little goldfish. So he brought home a little (and by little, I mean about two quarts) tank with 10 Comets in them.



That...x5. Within three hours of being home, the fish count had dwindled to about four. So Rob and Beth traipsed off to Petco at 6:00 p.m. to do it up right. When all was said and done, 24 hours later we had this:



Now I realize that a three-year-old can't clean a fish tank. But a 29-year-old sure can and he's only helped maybe twice. Every other time, I do it myself. This was his idea! I told him the last thing we needed was another cost in our lives. Fish are expensive creatures to properly care for! You're putting in a new filter every month, you have to feed the shiny bastards, you need brushes and nets, water conditioner, gravel vacuum, algae tablets. How did animals I didn't want in the first place become my responsibility?

What's worse? I worry about the damn things! I actually care that they swim in a clean tank and have enough to eat. I care if algae starts growing.

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Finally, someone says it! Well, someone who's voice extends beyond the four walls of their two-bedroom loft apartment. I'm not disputing his gift as a motivational speaker. If you aren't listening too closely to the content of his speeches you might find yourself truly excited at the end of his monologue. But if, like me, you're listening for specifics, then you're going to be sorely disappointed. He calls for change, for looking past party divide to reach common ground, blah blah blah...but he has yet to relate any actual plans for all this change.

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We have two containers of peanut butter in our cupboard. One is Great Value (yes, Walmart brand) Creamy Peanut Butter. The other is Safeway's Reduced Fat Creamy Peanut Spread. Two differences: One is reduced fat and is called Peanut Spread. But I lie, there aren't just two differences. Check out their lists of ingredients:

Great Value Peanut Butter: roasted peanuts, sugar, contains less than 2% of molasses, hydrogenated vegetable oils (rapeseed, cottonseed, soybean), salt.

Safeway Reduced Fat Peanut Spread: peanuts, corn syrup solids, soy protein, sugar, contains 2% or less of the following: salt, molasses, fully hydrogenated vegetable oils (rapeseed, cottonseed, soybean), magnesium oxide, ferric phosphate, zinc oxide, niacinamide, copper sulfate, pyridoxine hydrochloride, folic acid.

Q#@$#%!#$^@#$%!#$%!@#$!???????????

Now I could sit here and research the function of each and every one of those chem class bonus question answers but I won't and this is why: I don't think I want to know what they're there for. Seriously, I'm of the mind that the longer the list of ingredients on a package, the worse it is for you. That's not that I don't buy processed foods like Nutri-Grains, cereal, soda, etc. But for something as simple as peanut butter, the list of ingredients shouldn't take up four rows of text. When I can afford to buy Adam's (which, by the way, I love but it's too expensive for as fast as we go through it), I love seeing ONE ingredient on the label: PEANUTS.

K.I.S.S. Keep It Simple Stupid. Er, Safeway and all other reduced-fat-peanut-butter-makin' companies.

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Finally, in this weeks edition of "Signs You're Online Far Too Much," I have to set the scene. I've brought in the Op-Ed section of the San Jose Mercury News to take a picture of the abovementioned political cartoon. I've opened it and then folded it in half like so...



As I'm taking a moment to read the rest of the Readers' Letters, I reach the bottom of the first column and instead of turning the newspaper over to read the rest, I reach for my mouse and start scrolling down. *sigh*