(snip)

Ah, that most rare of Internet occurrences... a debate thread that turns into a *non*-debate thread, rather than vice versa...

>
> Not on the video. You may have to ask the doctor himself. Assuming there's an address to write to.
>

Well, I'll try to take a look, then. The thing is that arthritis is something that runs in my family so it is something I'm more-or-less concerned about, but (meaning no disrespect) I am wary of taking things I hear at face value.

> > > > > > At least right now I don't feel that frightened that my ham's going to kill me. I haven't heard of that many people who've died that way.
> > > > >
> > > > > Yeah, the ones that can't be removed by a good cooking take you slowly, or at least make life uncomfortable.
> > > >
> > > > That's the same argument they used to get me to stop eating saturated fats and refined sugar. :)
> > >
> > > Ah, the very *top* of the food pyramid. :)
> > >
> >
> > Of course. Ever hear the Carnivore's Creed?
> >
> > "1) Vegetables are not food. Vegetables are what food eats."
> >
> > "4) Mushrooms are not food. Mushrooms are just what eats the vegetables when the food's done with it."
>
> LOL. In #1, food is defined as something that eats vegetables. In #4, mushrooms are revealed as something that eats vegetables, but it's still purported as being not food. :)
>

Well, one could say that, like many similar creeds, the Carnivore's Creed is not truly self-consistent and is merely a written expression of its followers' subjective preferences.

Or one could say that after the food's done with the vegetables they are no longer vegetables, but the *remains* of vegetables, which is what mushrooms eat.

(Not that any of this would hold up five minutes in a biologist's analysis, but that's not what the carnivore lifestyle is about.)

> > > Didn't know about the cat thing, as far as Israel and the Muslims go...
> >
> > Read it in a book of cat-lover's trivia. The source was obviously biased, so they could've been a little harsh on the non-cat-worshipping cultures, but from what I've heard that's basically the origin of the Judeo-Christian anti-cat stigma. (Black cats and witchcraft and glowing eyes, oh my.)
> >
> > Where do they get this thing that cats are evil? I mean, cats aren't even *mentioned* in the Bible, while dogs are, and usually in a negative light. (Best known for licking up their own vomit. And King Ahab's blood.)
>
> I suppose that any animal whose eyes shine in low light would seem eerie. Or eye-ie. :)
>

But dogs' eyes shine in low light, too. They just don't happen to be shaped in that endearingly (or frighteningly, depending on whom you ask) feline slit.

(snip)

> I know bathrooms like the ones you described. *shudder* And I, too, cringe inwardly when I see someone go straight from doing his business to the door, not even letting his hands get under the water of the sink. (Okay, after zipping up, then.)
>

Yeah, but the scary thing is these kids then go on to serve food at my school's canteen.

Okay, so our school's canteen being the smaller-scale endeavor that it is, they do almost nothing involved with food preparation, but they *do* handle food. Okay, so all the food is prepackaged, but still, it means that when I *take* the package and take out the food the food has touched my hands which have touched a package which have touched the hands which touched some biological substances I'd rather not go into the details of. (How many iterations does it take for for germs to reach acceptable levels?)

Even though I know that technically urine is sterile or near-sterile, it's still icky. But it's not as bad as if they went out after doing that *other* thing...

Luckily, that *other* thing is impossible for anyone (or at least anyone male) to do in my school's restrooms, at least for anyone who has been trained with a standard Western-civilization sense of privacy. Because, in a fit of wisdom, the school decided that the best way to prevent people graffiting the boys' bathroom's stall doors was to *remove* the boys' bathroom's stall doors, meaning anyone who chooses to use the stall will be in a rather exposed position, if you take my meaning.

Most of us just wait to use the one-person unisex bathroom in the library (in fact, that bathroom probably accounts for 90% of the traffic our school library gets) or have a very close and very trusted female friend run interference while they go to use the girls' bathroom, which mercifully does have stall doors (or there'd be some kind of feminist riot).

Being sorely lacking in close, trusted female friends, I find I most often have to hold it, unless by some miracle the library bathroom is free of the usual long line of track-star athletes who inevitably beat me to the punch. This is my main reason for indulging my unhealthy habit of skipping breakfast and, at times, lunch on school days.

> > Ar"I get the feeling we're running out of things to talk about"thur
>
> Nyper"No danger of that"old

Ar"how did we get on bathrooms again?"thur