So Cool!!!!!

Yesterday afternoon, I spoke to Emily Dixon, a volunteer at Kiva. WOW!!!!! Kiva is developing a curriculum for high school students, and they want some of my ideas. Yeah!! I don't know if they'll use any of them, but if I can help in any way, I will be over the moon. So, I'm off to do that, then we McCabes will be at the beach for about two weeks. So, I may not post for a while. Sorry!!! (Yippee!!! Kiva!!! Yeah!!!)

More Top Tens

Top 10 Calorie Consumers

1. USA 3,744.1
2. Portugal 3,740.9
3. Greece 3,721.1
4. Austria 3,673.3
5. Italy 3,670.6
6. Israel 3,666.1
7. Ireland 3,656.4
8. France 3,653.9
9. Canada 3,589.3
10. Malta 3,586.9

World Average 2,804.4

This, again, comes from Russell Ash's The Top 10 of Everything 2007. He added this comment, one of very few commentaries posted in the book:

"The Calorie requirement of the average man is 2,700 and of a woman 2,500. Inactive people need less, while those engaged in heavy labor require more. The countries in the top 10, as well as many others, are consuming over 30 percent more than they need -- hence the rise of obesity and related medical problems. However, the Calorie consumption of over 10 of the poorest African nations falls below 2,000, with Eritrea's average of 1,512.8 standing at just 40 percent of the figure for the USA."

More to follow...

Scary Business

This next series of posts is inspired by what I saw in the stands at the Mets game.

We'll start with this series of Top 10 lists found in The Top 10 of Everything 2007 by Russell Ash:

Top 10 Countries for Global Sales of Fast Food

1. USA 148,612,900,000
2. Japan 13,875,100,000
3. Canada 12,709,900,000
4. UK 12,062,400,000
5. China 9,765,000,000
6. South Korea 9,249,100,000
7. Germany 7,367,900,000
8. Australia 5,685,300,000
9. Brazil 4,967,300,000
10. India 4,914,700,000

Top 10 Fast Food Companies for Global Sales

1. McDonalds $45,933,000,000
2. Yum! Brands (KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut) 24,418,000,000
3. Burger King 11,100,000,000
4. Wendy's International 10,200,000,000
5. Doctor's Associates (Subway) 6,523,000,000
6. Darden Restaurants 4,655,000,000
7. Domino's Pizza 4,193,000,000
8. Brinker International 3,807,000,000
9. Applebee's International 3,593,000,000
10. Starbucks 3,450,000,000

My Mistake

Small World.

Dan Koeppel, the author of Banana; The Fate of the Fruit That Shaped the World contacted me to say, "I'm not sketchy! Really!"

It seems I made a mistake in last post about Bananas. Koeppel's book was published before Chapman's book, and the two apparently cover different ground. As I've said before, Koeppel's book looks great, and his website is delicious. Check it out.

Let's go Mets!!!

I've only been to Shea once this year, but what a day to go!! Holy cow! What a great game!!!

IT WAS AWESOME.

It may have been the best game ever. One to one through most of the game, complete pitcher's duel, Ryan Howard struck out twice, Aaron Heilman NOT losing the game for Perez, Reyes stealing, Delgado getting a hit in the bottom of the 8th, Billy Wagner closing it out with just a little drama, perfect weather, no drunk fans, a thousand kids in identical t-shirts from their day camps, quick game, BOTH of my kids scoring the game through 9 innings!!!!! WOW.

Oh, and I forgot... The Mets and the Phillies are vying for first place in the division! Bliss. Pure bliss. Great fielding, great pitching, perfect clutch hitting. What a day.

Bananas

Dan Koeppel may have written a great book about bananas, but he's a little late. Earlier in the year, Peter Chapman wrote "Bananas; How the United Fruit Company Shaped the World." (Koeppel seems to have swiped Chapman's title, and that makes Koeppel look a bit sketchy, but it may not have been his decision. Publishers sometimes determine the titles of books.)

I LOVE THIS BOOK. It's phenomenal. It tells the history of the United Fruit Company, and, trust me, it's not pretty. There's a ton of intrigue -- the coup in Guatemala, nasty business in Honduras, Che Guevara, Fidel Castro, right-wing Colombian death squads -- and so much fun. The writing is brilliant and clear and you will want to drop everything to continue reading. (My children have learned how to cook dinner for themselves...just kidding.)

The one down side is that Chapman is so brilliant that he assumes that his readers know a great deal about American history. I do, so that's not a problem, but most Americans don't. If John Foster Dulles doesn't immediately ring a bell, you may miss a great deal of the import of this work. Read it anyway. You'll learn something.

Bored?

Then, check this out: Gigapan