It's the most wonderful time of the year?

Happy holidays to y'all!
Every year around this time, people begin to get into the holiday spirit. They get all bundled up and go ice skating, go caroling, go to the CSO to see Welcome Yule, their annual christmas show (co-written and composed by my boss!), and enjoy what the city has to offer this time of year. Yet, this year seems different. All my friends who are usually the Cindy Lou-Hoo's of Christmas, seem to be distracted. A lot of it, sadly, comes down to too much work. This week is the week where all the teachers try and cram in all they can before the break and before the end of the semester and everyone just seems overwhelmed. In a recent post by DocOc, he talked about what schools provide for us and what we wish to get out of them besides a diploma and a nice Ivy League acceptance letter (or where ever you may wish to go). I think that through the constant drudge of busy work assignment after busy work assignment, we lose sight of that and whats important, at least I do. Although starting December off with listening to the Christmas station in my car (and subsequently turning it off when any Mariah Carey song came on), I have not gotten into the Christmas spirit because I just haven't had time. It takes a full day to watch Rudolph, trim the tree, and enjoy your time at home, but since I've been slammed with so much work before break, I haven't had time to breathe, let alone have a Christmas party!

So back to the big question:
What do I want to get out of my high school experience besides that acceptance letter?

Honestly, I want to know how to live, be well-rounded, and not obsess so much over the little things. Maybe high school isn't the place to learn those things, maybe I'll have time to watch Rudolph when I'm older and this is the time to work hard and maybe skip an eggnog or two (not like I drink it, cuz its just disgusting but I think the idea still holds) in order to get to the next level in this video game we call life. But I hope it's not, I hope I can find time to drink and undrink an eggnog and watch the old Christmas movies I love so much, and see A Christmas Carol at the Goodman Theatre, spend time with the people I love, and really get into the holiday spirit. Maybe.

Critical Viewing Revisted

A few months ago (wow have we really been in school that long?), I posted a blog about my trip to Kenosha (can be seen here) and about the eating habits of lower income families. Today, I was on a mission to make cookies for my best friend's family for Hanukkah and I realized we had NOTHING in our house to make cookies with, so I ventured to the store. Unfortunately, my family only had cash accessible today, much like many American families, so I had to shop on a very strict budget. While in the store, I got baking soda on sale for 99 cents, chocolate chips for $3 and brown sugar for $2. I was pretty excited that I found so many things on sale that I needed, but then I got to the dairy section. We were desperately in need of butter, not just for my cooking, but for veggies and everyday stuff. I had $6 left in my pocket and looked over my choices. To my dismay, I couldn't afford any of the butters offered. I had no idea what I would do because I really wanted to make these cookies and I didn't want to come back from my trip empty handed, so I looked over the rest of the section to see if there was anything I could get. I then see the Imperial Margarine box on sale for 99 cents. For those of you who don't know, margarine is filled with trans fats and partially hydrogenated oils and was created to be a butter substitute (more info on the history of margarine here). Being somewhat health conscious, I knew that margarine is not the healthiest choice, but I really needed something to bake with so I compared it with butter nutrition wise and I posted my findings below!

On the left is butter and the right is margarine. Margarine has double the calories and 2g of trans fats. This is obviously a lot less healthy, yet on my visit to the store it was 1/6 of the cost of the butter. Ultimately I took the margarine, knowing that I would be able to buy butter tomorrow, but what about the families who don't have that option? I really realized how much food really costs and how a family could, by simply trying to provide their family with necessities like butter, could be forced to use unhealthy substitutes because they don't have the funds to spend $6.34 for 4 sticks of butter.