LizardDreams

I've been on a nutrition kick for quite a while, and because I lurve food I'm always on the look-out for nutritious food that actually tastes wonderful.

I ran across this recipe in a "Weight Loss" guide put out by Prevention Magazine and figured, since I took the time to port it into my database, I'd share it with you.

The cool thing about this recipe is that it supplies a good portion of protein (builds muscle), dietary fat (aids in cell construction), and is moderately low in carbs.

Click here to go to the recipe.

Fresh in time for summer, the AP recently wondered, " How much skin is too much at the office?"

New or young employees showing up to professional office settings in tank tops, flip-flops, exposed bra straps can cause the summer heat to ramp up inside managers' offices. While some companies have dress codes, many do not. Apparently too, people today are not necessarily taught what to wear to work.

I just thought I'd share a few thoughts about office dress.

1. Writers for television series "House, MD" like to have House mock Hospital Administrator Lisa Cuddy's perpetually plunging décolletage. The undercurrent there is that middle aged women who expose cleavage -- no matter how lovely -- are showing desperation.
2. When I was a young engineer, we had a new hire from college join us just in time for summer. I was pregnant with my first child and feeling particularly whalesque at the time. "Beth" had a lovely, athletic build and was one of those who could look sexy in a flour sack. Instead of flour sacks, however, Beth chose to wear tight-fitting high-cut shorts and midriff tops, and those skanky strappy sandals that say "fuck me" to passers-by. Interestingly enough, Beth never had to do any of her own work. In that day and age, most of our co-workers were guys. I think you get the connection. When their own work started slowing down, it was the first time I'd ever heard of our department's dress code. Beth quit shortly after.
3. In my father's day ('round the time Fred Flintstone was just starting his first paper route) there was only one uniform for the men in corporate settings -- white long-sleeved button shirt, black or charcoal suit (pin stripes were verboten), dark, solid-colored tie, black shoes. When I entered the corporate work force, things had loosened up a little and women were permitted to wear pants suits or very dressy slacks, colorful dresses. Men could wear nice button-down dress shirts with khaki slacks.
4. Casual Friday! About a decade ago the company I work for started to permit people to dress down on Fridays. The intent was that we could wear clean, untorn jeans instead of khakis or pantsuits. In the Southwest, however, we had already been wearing jeans most every day, at least in the engineering sections, so we took "Causal Friday" to mean we could wear shorts. This apparently really bothered the manager in one of our Texas divisions. He passed a rule: Men's knees could NOT be exposed. Women could wear skirts or tasteful shorts, but men had to have covered knees. One guy showed up wearing pants that, today, we would call capris. He was sent home. See, you could be sexist in those days.
5. Today, every day is Casual Friday where I work, although most of us keep the clothing in good taste. We're not exposing belly buttons, undergarments, nipple-outlines, butt cheeks. Our clothing is clean and well mended -- mostly. Men wear shorts if they wish. We all wear jeans if we wish. Even my boss's boss wears casual looking capris and tropical blouses (she's female, so it's okay). I wish, however, they would re-institute a dress code. I'm not sure how they could get away with what I have in mind, however, given you're not supposed to notice the particular details about any one individual, officially, but here's what I wish: grotesquely overweight people, particularly ones who are hirsute, are prohibited from wearing anything that exposes any bit of drippy flabby flesh. No shorts. No skirts or dresses above ankle length. Long sleeves and very high necklines or even scarves are required. I just don't know how much more of this guy's ape-ish bowed legs I can see each day. I try to look away, but the image is burned into my mind like a particularly gruesome accident site.

's'all. You got any dress code stories?

There's a bagel shop within walking distance of my home (disclaimer: yes, I'm perfectly aware that New York Bagel Snobs will claim that the food served there cannot properly be called "bagels" since they're not made in New York, but, fuck'em, saying "bagel" is far easier than saying "bagel-shaped food substance."). I go there a couple of mornings a week -- sometimes with the dogs and I eat outside. They get a bagel-shaped dog cookie to share, too.

These kinds of counter-service eateries often have tip jars near the registers. Toss your loose change, or a dollar bill in if you wish. Some peeps think that people who do not actually wait on you at a table do not deserve any sort of gratuity, but I figure that their wages are still calculated at food server scales, they do actually do some work on your behalf, and if they're friendly and prompt enough, tossing my change or a buck in every now and again doesn't take the skin off of my nose.

Yeah. Except today I could not do even that small bit, because the tip jar was gone.

Joolee, the manager at this particular eaterie, explained it to me. "Corporate had us remove them. They said taxing it was problematic, and there was the kerfuffle at Starbucks where supposubly managers were taking money from the tip jar ... "

'k, I didn't know about any Starbucks tip jar kerfuffle, although a cruise through Google News turned up all kinds of blogs and editorials about tip jars in general, but I digress.

"So you gonna get a pay raise, to make up for the loss of tips?"

She snorted. I was glad she wasn't near the food. "Yeah, right. This is corporate, we're talking about."

Yeah, she had a good point.

Joolee said that while the money never amounted to much, the company claimed it cost the company effort to estimate how to tax the workers for it (that's way doubtful). She said that often they would purchase gift cards for the cooks and servers out of the tip income, making it easier for the company to track. No more gift cards, and no increase
in pay is probable.

But large corporations are run by bean-counters and corporate bean-counters are all about pinching pennies, and never, ever about the people who make the company do what it does best.

Fucking bean-counters.

Y'know, a friend and I were talking about Bastille Day (as opposed to Best Deal Day) and Guillotine and it makes me think that in those times we the Common Peeps rallied against the despotic monarchies. I wonder when the new revolution will arise where the Common Peeps -- including lower and mid-level management I suspect -- once again rise up and beat down these latter day despots? I'd hate to see another Union movement, but I am getting pre-tty sick and tired of corporate mentality and bean-counterism.

Fuck sake.

A police force has apologised to Islamic leaders for the "offensive" postcard advertising a new non-emergency telephone number, which shows a six-month-old trainee police dog named Rebel. The German shepherd puppy has proved hugely popular with the public, [...] But some Muslims in the Dundee area have reportedly been upset by the image because they consider dogs to be "ritually unclean", while shopkeepers have refused to display the advert. Tayside Police have admitted they should have consulted their 'diversity' officers before issuing the cards, but critics argued their apology was unnecessary.

If Muslim shopkeepers do not want to display the image, then they don't have to display the image. If they dislike seeing it, then don't look. Man up. Throw it in the trash. But, hello, in our culture (as in British culture) -- which just happens to be the culture in which these Muslims chose to live -- dogs are revered as loving companions and heroes.

Learn to deal with these things, you whiny-assed schmucks.

Aside from that, any culture that considers dogs to be "ritually unclean" really needs to grow the fuck up and enter modern society.