To this writer it means two things: an
opportunity to stay competitive in a game as I become an “O.G.” and to give
back to the community I live in.
Every year I play in about ten charity
fundraising golf events. They range from helping a University Law School,
baseball and football teams, the American Red Cross, a local Hospital
Foundation, Wounded Warriors, and the most recent one a local food and social
aid organization.
To participate in these charity golf events
provides the opportunity for me to give back to local and national groups I
support. This past week the Inland Valley Hope Partners held their annual golf
event to raise funds for local food banks and shelters for the homeless. I find
it amazing in a country with so much wealth and technology we still have to
raise money so a family can eat, so a family can have a roof over their head,
so a family has the opportunity to battle an addictive disease. This
organization, like many unrecognized organizations, does so, so much to help
our fellow citizens. The commitment of its’ volunteers is a true pleasure and
honor to witness.
This is why I like and play the game of golf;
forget the prima donna Tiger Woods, forget the expensive resorts, forget the
fancy equipment – I love the game, the friendships I develop playing it, and
the people and organizations I help. Now if only I COULD PLAY THE
DAMN GAME!!!!
FOOD ADDICTION -
"Obsessed: America's Food Addiction -- and My Own," by Mika
Brzezinski, with Diane Smith (Weinstein Books, 239 pages) - Chapter 2,
"The Value of a Healthy Thin": " Weight is almost the only place
where people are willing to speak bluntly about their prejudices toward an
entire group of people. ... That willingness to stereotype reflects a prevailing
idea that obesity results from lack of willpower and discipline. It totally
ignores the reality of our contemporary food environment, which makes high-fat,
high-sugar foods easy to access, and it shows ignorance about how such foods
can get a grip on us that is hard to release. It shrugs off the mixed messages
we get: one that tells us 'being thin is worth just about any price' and one
that says 'this food is cheap, available 24/7, and designed to stimulate
pathways in your brain that keep you coming back for more.' ...
"New Jersey Governor Chris Christie ...
is often in the spotlight, not only because of his leadership role, but also
because of his size. Like any politician, he's had to develop a thick skin, but
he's still deeply hurt by some of the hateful comments and tweets he gets. He
read me these two: HEY GOVERNOR, WHAT DID YOU HAVE FOR BREAKFAST TODAY, ONE
STICK OF BUTTER OR TWO? and THINK GOVERNOR CHRISTIE CAN BE VP? HE'S TOO . . .
FAT, AND AMERICANS HATE FAT PEOPLE. People would never say such vicious things
about someone with any other type of health challenge. "It is
extraordinary how brutal people will be about my weight," the governor
said. He thinks people assume he is lazy or lacking discipline because of his
weight, and wonders, "Do they think I got this far in life without
discipline?" I've heard Oprah say the same thing ... 'For somebody like me
who's had so much success in my life, and really been successful at everything
I've tried, to not be able to be successful at this is incredibly
discouraging,' revealed Christie.
"The attitude he encounters ignores the
many complex factors involved in losing and regaining weight. Getting to a
"healthy thin" certainly takes personal discipline and determination,
but it also requires some changes in the world around us. It is not enough to
say "eat less, do more." Or to follow columnist Eugene Robinson's
simplistic advice for anyone with a weight problem: take a walk and eat a
salad. 'That is the height of ignorance about what this issue is really all
about,' Christie avows. 'I'm well beyond the taking a walk stage. I work out
four days a week with a trainer. I'm riding the bike and lifting weights and
doing floor exercises for an hour a day. For people who have never had issues
with their weight, they can't understand it."
"Insiders said it was the only thing
keeping the straight-talking executive from higher office. Despite Christie's
denials, political fund-raisers say that the surgery is a clear sign that he's
going to join the 2016 race ... Sources said Christie didn't make the decision
lightly - he even had private conversations about the operation with
once-rotund Jet coach Rex Ryan. Ryan lost about 100 pounds - down from a
massive 350 - after he had the same procedure done in 2010. Christie has never
revealed his weight, but estimates have run from about 300 to 350 pounds. He
hired the same ace laparoscopic and bariatric surgeon as Ryan - Dr. George
Fielding, head of NYU Medical Center's Weight Management Program. ... [H]e
never went into Fielding's office for medical visits - instead, the doctor came
to the governor's house in Mendham ... Christie said he went under the knife at
7 a.m. for 40 minutes and was home the same afternoon. The Doctor inserted a cone
tube around the top of his stomach, where it restricts the amount of food he
can eat at one time and makes him feel fuller, faster. 'A week or two ago, I
went to a steakhouse and ordered a steak and ate about a third of it and I was
full,' he said ... Sources said he has already shed nearly 40 pounds. ...
"As he drops pounds, doctors will pump
more saline solution into the lap band, restricting his stomach further and
forcing him to eat even less. In 2006, Christie said in an interview that
getting a more involved surgery - gastric bypass - was never a consideration
because it was 'too risky.' ... 'I know it sounds crazy to say that running for
president is minor, but in the grand scheme of things, it was looking at Mary
Pat and the kids and going, "I have to do this for them, even if I don't
give a crap about myself."
--"Onward: What I've Learned Today
": "I want my girls to see me at peace with eating, and I might just
be making progress in becoming a better role model. These days I'm eating more,
and I don't feel hungry all the time. Today I made myself a sandwich with three
eggs, Swiss cheese, and arugula on two big pieces of wheat toast, grilled in
olive oil. I didn't measure the olive oil and I didn't worry about the fat in
the cheese. And I ate all three eggs, including the yolks. ... I rarely take
the path most people follow, and things usually work out best for me that way
... Talk to your friends and the people you love -- have the conversation about
being obese. Confront them about their health and their weight, and then offer
your support. ...
"I'll continue to speak out about the
obesity crisis in our country, but when you hear me talking about healthy
eating on TV, know that I'm not the skinny know-it-all who knows nothing about
food obsessions. Know that I am struggling, too. As for Carlie and Emilie,
they're beautiful just as they are. That's all they need to know. It took me
way too long to understand that about myself, but thanks to my family and friends,
better and more beautiful days lie ahead. With all my heart I wish the same for
you."
BIRTHDAYS
THIS WEEK – Birthday wishes and thoughts this week to: George
Brett (60), Pierce Brosnan (60), Bill Dillhoefer …has the greatest practice
golf swing in the game, Michelle Lamotte …famous hotel/resort consultant.
COMMENCEMENT
2013
– The 2013 college and university commencement season week number three, here are
this weeks’ notable speakers – May 13 – University of Pennsylvania; Joe
Biden, VPOTUS. May 16 – LSU; Cookie Roberts, Political Commentator. May
17 – Wheelock College; Maria Shriver, Journalist and Author. May 18
– University of Virginia; Steven Colbert, TV Host. May 19 – Yale
University; Cory Booker, Newark Mayor: University of Vermont; Wynton Marsalis,
Musician: Morehouse College; Barack Obama, POTUS.
WHAT
WE'RE READING: "The Guns at Last Light: The War in
Western Europe, 1944-1945 ... Volume Three of the Liberation Trilogy," by
Rick Atkinson, author of "An Army at Dawn" and "The Day of
Battle" (Henry Holt, 896 pages): "In 1947, the next-of-kin of 270,000
identifiable American dead buried overseas would submit Quartermaster General
Form 345 to choose whether they wanted their soldier brought back to the United
States or left interred with comrades abroad. More than 60 percent of the dead
worldwide would return home, at an average cost to the government of $564.50
per body, an unprecedented repatriation that only an affluent, victorious
nation could afford. In Europe the exhumations began that July: every grave was
opened by hand, and the remains sprinkled with an embalming compound of
formaldehyde, aluminum chloride, plaster of Paris, wood powder, and clay.
Wrapped in a blanket, each body was then laid on a pillow in a metal casket
lined with rayon satin. Labor strikes in the United States caused a shortage of
casket steel, and repatriation was further delayed by a dearth of licensed
embalmers, although government representatives made recruiting visits to
mortician schools around the country. ... Thus did the fallen return from
Europe, 82,357 strong.
"As the dead came home, so too the things they carried
. ... The Army Effects Bureau of the Kansas City Quartermaster Depot filled a
large warehouse ... just below a majestic bend in the Missouri River. From a
modest enterprise that had begun with half a dozen employees in February 1942,
the Effects Bureau had expanded to more than a thousand workers, and by August
1945 they were handling sixty thousand shipments a month, each laden with the
effects of the American dead from six continents. Hour after hour, days after
day, shipping containers were unloaded from rail freight cars onto a receiving
dock and then hoisted by elevator to the depot's tenth floor. Here with
assembly-line efficiency the containers traveled from station to station down
to the seventh floor as inspectors pawed through the crates to extract
classified documents, pornography, ammunition, and perhaps amorous letters from
a girlfriend that would further grieve a grieving widow. The prevailing rule
... was said to be 'Remove anything you would not be returned to your family
if YOU were the soldier.' Workers used grinding stones and dentist drills to
remove corrosion and blood from helmets and web gear; laundresses took pains to
scrub bloodstains out of field jackets and uniform blouses. ...
"Banks of typists in an adjacent room hammered out
correspondence to the next-of-kin, up to seventy thousand letters a month,
asked where the soldier's last possession should be sent. Over the years
Effects Bureau inspectors had found tapestries, enemy swords, a German machine
gun, an Italian accordion, a tobacco sack full of diamonds, walrus tusks, a
shrunken head, a Japanese life raft ... [and] thousands of diaries ... Even
when the last old soldier has gone to his grave - and may the earth lie lightly
on his bones - the cause for which he fought is sure to live on. The war and
all that the war contained - nobility, villainy, immeasurable sorrow - shall
light us down to the last generation."
DEAR
RINK RATS –
Can you
recommend any summer movies coming up, every year at this time I find it
difficult to select a few goods movies out of the crush of summer releases.
Thank
you.
Movie
Buff
Dear
Movie Buff –
We like
the following for this summer:
May 10 –
“The Great Gatsby”; star-studded remake of the great American novel.
May 15 –
“Star Trek Into Darkness”; 12th Trekie movie, but a good one.
May 17 –
“The Iceman”; a contract killer’s double life.
June 7 –
“Hey Bartender”; a documentary about a
former Marine and a white collar worker trying to reinvent themselves tending
bar.
June 28
– “Copperhead”; the Civil War viewed by a farmer from upstate New York.
July 3 –
“The Lone Ranger”; anything with Johnny Depp as a star, a must see.
Aug 2 –
“2 Guns”; Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg as federal agents both thinking
each other is a bad guy.
Enjoy.
Rink
Rats.
THE
SWAMI’S TOP PICKS: NHL Playoffs, First Round – Chicago Blackhawks, Detroit
Red Wings, Vancouver Canucks, Los
Angeles Kings, Pittsburgh Penguins,
Montreal Canadians, Washington Capitals,
Boston Bruins. Season to date (0-0)
THE
PREAKNESS STAKES – the 138th running this Saturday here
are our picks: (Win) Orb, (Place) Govenor Charlie, (Show) Will Take Charge.
AEI has an event on the future of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
on Wednesday at 2 p.m., including remarks from former NEC member James Parrott
... Retail sales this morning at 8:30 a.m. EST expected to drop 0.3 percent,
0.2 percent ex-autos ... Industrial production at 9:15 a.m. on Wednesday excepted
to drop 0.1 percent ... Housing starts at 8:30 a.m. Thursday expected to rise
to 920,000 from 907,000 ... Consumer prices 8:30 a.m. Thursday to drop 0.3
percent overall and rise 0.2 percent ex-food/fuel ... University of Michigan
Consumer Sentiment at 9:55 a.m. Friday expected to rise to 77.9 from 76.4.
Next week: the Original Six, student debt saga on the
horizon and the words of the month.
Until Next Monday, Adios!
Claremont, CA
May 13, 2013
#IV-4, 161
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