Sunday, November 04, 2007

If I were queen...

In which Brewgal reveals her cranky side...

Little Brewer #2's stint as a vegetarian was short-lived. Call it more of a vegetarian flirt. She lasted almost a week. I believe the final straw might have been my Adzuki beans and rice with sweet onions and garlic. Brewguy and I loved it. LB#2 took a bite, made a face and said, "Can I eat meat again?"

My latest task is to make sure she gets enough calcium. We discovered she has not been buying milk at lunch because she says she doesn't like it. The fact that the school only gives them 20 minutes for lunch and the lunch line takes 10 minutes might be another factor.

Warning: rant ahead.

We, as a nation, as SO VERY CONCERNED about childhood obesity, bad eating habits, lack of engagement with nature. Has it ever occurred to anyone that giving children 20 minutes to wolf down their food and then 20 minutes outside for recess might be contributing to this?? 20 minutes? SLOW DOWN. Worried that more lunch/recess time will cut into precious learning minutes? Extend the school day by an hour. That would give flexibility to either have a longer middle-day recess or a second recess at the end of the day so kids can work off some of that cooped-up energy.

And while we're at it, why aren't traffic lights and street lights solar powered? They're outside all day, right? IN THE DAYLIGHT? Has anyone ever thought to install a solar powered backup so that when there is a power outage (like last week during rush hour), the lights would still work and the morons who do not know that intersections without lights are FOUR WAY STOPS would not attempt to drive their cars through mine on their way to ... to wherever they are going?

Rant mode off.

Back to the calcium issue.

I am doing what any good research scientist mother would do. I am experimenting with my daughter. I hypothesized that if I sent milk with her lunch, she would be more likely to drink it. Turn out it is not just the time involved, it is the taste. She does not care for the taste of milk. I sympathize- neither do I. Next hypothesis: change the taste. So far we have been through plain milk, chocolate milk and Very Vanilla soymilk. Next week it will be strawberry milk, vanilla milk and plain soymilk.