#64 - Signed Gluten-Free Girl Scout Cookie Petition

This past weekend there were little Girl Scouts everywhere selling cookies as a fundraiser for their troops. I'll probably end up buying some cookies and giving them to my brother since he LOVES thin mints but recently I've began to suspect I'm wheat intolerant so I cannot eat the cookies.

Today I found a petition online while looking through LinkedIn. It's a petition for Girl Scout cookie manufacturers to offer at least one cookie free of the 8 top allergens not only so they can sell those cookies to others but so the little ones with food allergies can enjoy the cookies they are encouraged to sell.

It's so quick and easy to sign the petition. Currently they have 12,180 people who've signed and they need 100,000. Go make your voice heard!

http://www.change.org/petitions/encourage-the-girl-scouts-to-sell-an-allergen-free-cookie

#63 - Why Crossing Your Legs Might Be Bad For You

Vintage Photo from CassiesTaleVintage on Etsy, $3.29

Many of us women (and men too!) were taught that crossing your legs is the proper way to sit. However, yesterday in my nursing assistant class (more on that later) the instructor was talking about the circulatory system and as side note commented that crossing your legs may cause varicose veins. So, always on the lookout for blog fodder, I scribbled in my notes to check into this.

Reasons To Stop Crossing Your Legs:

1. Crossing your legs puts pressure on the veins in your leg and may cause the pressure in the veins to increase and bulge – translation it can cause those horrible looking varicose veins and poor circulation in your lower legs.
2. Crossing your legs can cause lower back pain. Sitting crossed-legged puts pressure on your lower spine.
3. Sitting with your legs crossed tilts the pelvis and may cause muscle imbalances (especially if you cross your legs with the same one on top each time)
4. You can look lady-like without crossing your legs and not risk possible adverse effects of sitting unbalanced. In fact, in England queens and princesses do not cross their legs. They cross just their ankles. 

Photograph of Kate Middleton by Samir Hussein/Getty

I've been trying to stop crossing my legs since last night and my goodness, it's nearly impossible! Good luck!

#62 - Origin of the Word Lunatic

Today during our weekly knitting time, I was talking about being amazed how much the moon affects people.  When I was working in the nursing home as a nurse aide, I never kept track of the moon cycles but some evenings when I walked into work, I immediately knew it was a full moon. The patients were very different on those evenings. I remember one evening/night I had a patient who kept telling me something was in her room, another one kept saying someone was pinching her (she was alone in her room), and several yelling and carrying on. As all the nurses and nurse aides scurried around the nursing home trying to calm everyone done, someone said "it happens every time there's a full moon".

Lunatic Pillow by elementees on Etsy, $15.95

The science nerd in me loves the use of the
periodic table elements to spell things! :)

Today I was talking about this chaos during a full moon when a friend said and that's where the word "lunatic" comes from. I'd never really thought about it but once she said it, I knew it must be true. "Luna" is the latin root for "moon". Of course, "lunatic" would have originated from the craziness that a full moon brings on.

Full Moon Behind a Tree Painting by WindingRoadGallery on Etsy, $25

In the 13th century, lunatic meant "affected with periodic insanity, dependent on changes of the moon".

In the old days, people believed you'd go mad if the moon shone on your while you were sleeping. So some people had roofs that came down over the windows of their house.

Other uses/phrases with the word lunatic:

In 1933, "lunatic soup" was Australian slang for "alcoholic drink". For some reason this really made me giggle.

Today the phrase "lunatic fringe" is used to describe extremists and irrational members of a group or society.

#61 - Geocaching at the Dr. James Rich Wildlife Management Area

Today my husband and I drove about 30 minutes north of Lexington for a little geocaching date. I love just spending time in the woods and geocaching has added a whole new level of enjoyment to that!

We visited the Dr. James Rich Wildlife Management Area (WMA) and spent about 4 hours basically playing in the woods. It was awesome! The WMA is 1700 acres of wooded area. It is a public hunting area so it's a good idea to wear blaze orange during hunting season.

Entrance 

Information about the WMA

 We found 9 caches today and tried to find a 10th but couldn't find that one. Here I am signing one the logs. I must say we found some of the most unique caches we've found so far during this adventure. Special thanks to Ground Fox for placing all these fun caches!  Yes my shirt is on inside out. I was trying to keep the right side cleaner since it was kinda muddy out there today and I was climbing through trees etc.

Found a cache!

Putting a log back inside the cache for the next person to find.

All smiles! I love being in the woods!

Isn't it gorgeous?!

#60 - Tazo Apple Tea + Cinnamon + Honey = Heaven

I'm kinda obsessed with tea. It might be an addiction. But I've had a box of Tazo Organic Red Apple Tea for a long time that I just haven't drank. I found the tea to be somewhat bland. Today I doctored it and created a taste of heaven. I can't believe I didn't do this before!!

 

I boiled a stick of cinnamon in a saucepan with 1 cup of water. Then I poured that over the tea bag and let the cinnamon stick stay in the mug with while the tea seeped. The I added about a teaspoon of honey to the drink and sprinkled a little more cinnamon (this time ground) on top before stirring it up. It is delicious! It could be my new favorite chill-out-in-the-evening tea. I was relieved to find out it's caffeine free because it's getting late and I already drank it so there's nothing I could have done about it now! haha! I didn't even think to check that before I started creating heaven in the kitchen.

Not only is this drink delicious, both cinnamon and honey are so good for you. I'll do a blog about the benefits of each of these foods soon. :)

It's so yummy that I just had to make a second cup for my husband who thought about stealing mine!

There's more to this story! As I was typing up this blog, my husband apparently discovered Whole Foods' 365 Organic Wildflower Honey and I heard him eating spoonfuls straight from the jar (such a guy!)...then between bites he says "Oh my gosh! Winnie-the-Pooh had it right!" Hilarious! How can I be mad at him for eating from the jar when he says something like that?!

#59 - Antique Pewter and Tomatoes

Today while reading about genetically modified foods in a book called Mendel in the Kitchen: A Scientist's View of Genetically Modified Foods by Nina Fedoroff and Nancy Marie Brown  I learned two interesting facts.

1. In the 1700's people who could afford to ate from pewter plates.

Rare Antique Pewter Plate from the 1700 or 1800s from  tennesseehills on Etsy, $100

2. Because foods with high acid content caused lead to seep out of the pewter and cause lead poisoning, tomatoes were thought to be poisonous for about 400 years!

Hand Painted Tomato on Canvas by ThePaintedPicket on Etsy, $25

I'm so glad tomatoes aren't actually poisonous and can't wait to plant some this year! Can you imagine life without pasta sauce, pizza, ketchup, and tomatoes in your salad and on your sandwiches?!

Custom Painted Garden Markers on Wooden Spoons by CatherineLaPointe on Etsy, $5 each

#58 - 10 Resume Tips

I'm a little behind on my learning and trying new things. It's been a busy week or so. I'll be catching up over the next few days. :)

This week has brought some unsettling news. Due to the sequester, funding at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is affected. One of the grants affected is one that will pay me after April. So I've had to think about other options from employment since my husband and I MUST have health insurance and he's a PhD student right now.

At first I felt a bit panicked about the news but now that I've taken action, I'm seeing it as an opportunity to explore my options and perhaps leave basic science for public health since I finished my MPH last year. However, both fields are very interesting to me so I'm not ruling out either of them.

This week I created a resume for the first time that I can remember. In academia I've always used a curriculum vitae but because I'm applying for jobs outside the academic environment I had to research how to put together a resume.

Here are some 10 tips I found:

1. Use a standardized fonts. Remember, many fonts do not convert well from Mac to PC or from one version of Word to another. 

• Here are a few fonts that are considered standardized: Times New Roman, Georgia, Arial, Tahoma 
• Use 12 point font

2. Keep the most important details about yourself at the top of your resume.

• Employers and human resources often get a lot of resumes for a position. Having your most important information at the top of your resume keeps them from weeding you at out first glance just  because they don't know why you're qualified for the job. 
• Some information that should be at the top includes: contact information, relevant work experience, relevant volunteer experience, and education

3.  Include achievements versus responsibilities.

• did you implement a change that increased efficiency? production? 
• did you receive an award for teaching or mentoring?
• Including achievements tells the employer that you were not only responsible for ____ but you were also good at it. 

4. Tailor your resume to each job posting.

•  Each work environment is a little different. For example, I'm apply several places: a worksite wellness program, health departments, and research labs. It's obvious my cookie cutter resume wouldn't work for all three of these places. So I tailored my accomplishments and skill listings to each job listing. Something that is a skill in a health department may not be useful at a worksite wellness program or in a research lab. 

5. You don't have to include every job you've ever had. 

• Telling employers that I worked at a grocery store when I was 17 is probably not going to help me get a public health job.
• I included my past two jobs and then one that was part-time yet relevant to the job listing

6. Don't include irrelevant information.

• Potential employers probably don't need to know your religious views, political views, sexual orientation, etc.
• By not having this information on your resume, you don't set yourself up for discrimination (illegal - but it does happen) or stereotyping

7. Don't lie or exaggerate.

• Need I say more? We live in a world of instant everything. Your lies will be found out...just don't go there.

8. Ask someone to proofread your resume.

• After you've stared at the thing for hours/days/weeks, you know what it SHOULD say. Having someone else read it will make sure it says what you think it says. I've read sentences and added in words that weren't typed in. I just knew what it was supposed to say so I added it in without even realizing it.
• Someone else might be able to catch small errors that are easy to overlook.

9. Don't jam your resume with text.

• White space allows the resume to flow and looks clean and crisp.
• Be concise.

10. No jargon, slang, or text messaging lingo. 

• Having a friend outside your field read your resume is a great way to screen for jargon. Sometimes we use words so often in our daily lives that we assume everyone knows what it is. 
• Slang and text messaging lingo look messy and irresponsible.

Any tips you'd like to share?