Fish and chips anyone?

I've just read this heartwarming story from the Mail Online - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1044893/Couple-ring-20-000-fish-chips-travel-60-miles-favourite-lunch-day-decade.html
A couple in their 70s have used their free bus passes to travel from Bristol to Weston Super Mare every day for the last 10 years to eat a fish and chip lunch and walk in excess of 6 miles. They started doing this after the man had a heart attack and was told to get more exercise. He's lost 7st in 10 years and is healthy now.

The comments make interesting reading as a lot of them are very negative condemning them for eating fish and chips every day and for doing the same thing day in day out. Some obviously hadn't read the story as they comment on the effect of driving that far each day. They went on the bus so no effect on the environment as the bus would have gone there anyway. It's amazing how people commenting can't see they walk off the energy contained in the fish and chips. Fish is good for your health and everyone needs some carbohydrates and fats. It just shows how many people don't understand what food is basically for - to give you energy. If you then burn that energy you won't put on weight.

Many people commenting seemed not to know routine is actually good for you. They also seem to have completely missed the point that even if you walk in the same place every day you will still see something new - meet different people etc. They're getting exercise and they're not sitting at home staring at four walls. Good luck to them. I hope I'm that fit when I'm their age.

Fat people are responsible for global warming

There is an article in today's Telegraph online http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1973230/Fat-people-blamed-for-global-warming.html saying new research blames fat people for global warming. There's a certain strange logic to this: fat people eat more so it costs more in terms of resources to produce their food. Yes I can understand that. It was the next bit I found unpalatable - fat people walk less and travel by car more and don't use public transport!! How's that for sweeping generalisations?

I actually walk more and use public transport more than many thinner people I know so I don't see how they can generalise like this. If you're thin and active you might also eat more than fat inactive people. What about food everyone in the Western world wastes as well?

Personally I don't subscribe to the idea that mankind is wholly responsible for climate change. What about volcanoes? What about all the historical evidence about climate change in the past? Were dinosaurs driving around in gas guzzling cars before the last ice age? I don't think so - though of course there are the Flintstones to consider!

I'm all in favour of limiting waste but not for reasons of climate change. The whole carrier bag thing irritates me immensely. Those of us who use carrier bags as bin bags will only have to buy alternatives if they ban them entirely - so where's the difference? I refuse to wash out the kitchen bin every time I use it because I can't put a bin liner in it - that's a waste of water and washing up liquid.

The other thing that really bugged me today on the news is the idea that many rural doctor's surgeries may have to close under the new grand plan for polyclinics. So how are rural communities to manage? This potentially means more cars on the road and more people travelling which is not what this government wants. Our leaders and their policies seem less and less joined up by the minute.

Those of you who follow Dr Crippen's posts on NHS blog doctor - link at top of page - may have read his comments on extreme feminism. Even though I'm female I still sided with him. The women he's referring to who are discussing 'birth rape' seem to have a very strange outlook on life. I fail to see how medical procedures can be described as and equated with rape. They may be unpleasant and uncomfortable but NOT rape. There is something definitely skewed about this sort of attitude in my opinion. Do men being examined for prostate cancer regard the examination as male rape? I doubt it.

I've come across this attitude before in women of my acquaintance who seem to think doctors get turned on by giving women internal examinations and regard anything like that as disgusting and demeaning. To me it all depends on your attitude to it. What if the doctor is turned on? As far as I'm concerned if he's doing his job properly I don't really care what vicarious enjoyment he's deriving from the task. As long as a procedure is medically necessary - what is the problem?

Maybe this all brands me as anti-feminist - which I'm not. I don't like the extremes of misogynism or feminism as they're apt to throw the baby out with the bath water in their pursuit of their ideals.