Extreme Mother's Day Gift Ideas

It's almost that time again—that auspicious spring day when we stop making jokes about other people's moms and honor our own. Since Anna Jarvis immortalized the celebration of mothers in 1908, the second Sunday in May has been a day of reflection and commemoration of those who labored to bring us into the world.

Jarvis herself reportedly became disappointed with the consumerist direction of her new holiday a few years after its inception. It's easy to be cynical about anything that enjoys its greatest visibility from holiday industry ads. ("Buy your mother the love she deserves this May 11th! Get the $400 Deluxe Package if you even care about her at all!") But Mother's Day generally gets a pass even among the cynical, since the act of giving something to your mother asks little and yields much.

As a cultural observer, I thought it prudent to provide a list of historical mothers, in order of objective quality.

BEST MOMS EVER
1. My mom.
2. Your mom.
3. Everyone else's mom.

Just kidding. But my mom is my one guaranteed reader, so it's in my interest to cater to my most consistently loyal demographic. There you go, mom—easiest Mother's Day gift ever.

...so are all the mothers gone? OK, cool, we can speak freely. We've got a few short days to go, and we've got stuff to buy! Here are some gift ideas for mom.

Probiotic Chocolate

So beautiful. Who needs flowers?

Your mom probably loves chocolate. Simply Googling "Women love chocolate" will call forth surveys, testimonials, and diatribes about the superiority of chocolate to nearly everything else—specifically men.

But your mom ALSO loves having great digestion. This is something she's likely less vocal and/or openly passionate about. Sensing this means that you're an attentive, thoughtful child. If your mom is older than you, and the odds are good that she is, digestive problems may be a source of increasing frustration. Probiotics—beneficial gut bacteria that assist with digestion—often help. Most people know that yogurt contains "healthy bacteria," but an increasing array of foods are being fortified with probiotic content. Chocolate is one of the latest. Why not please your mom's sweet tooth and GI tract at the same time?

In fact, now that we're on the subject, why not just give her some great chocolate and a potent, standalone probiotic? A dedicated probiotic supplement will be many times more powerful than any infused product, and just as natural. Forget the gag gift and get a superior version of both components. Any Foods For Living staffer would be happy to walk you through finding a perfect probiotic and/or chocolate for the moms in your life.

An Implausible Pastry

Many will be cooking for their mothers this Sunday. Most of them will be preparing fare that their own mothers could, indeed, prepare much better. Rather than insult your own mother on her special day by presenting her with your second-tier version of her culinary classics, why not side-step the issue and surprise her with something unique?

The last year has seen the advent of the avant-garde pastry. The names suggest that bakers stay up too late posing each other hypothetical questions more often than we suspect: Cronuts, s'morecicles, cragles, chocoflan, duffin, cakclaire. You get the idea.

If you're any sort of baker, or even word-combiner, take two favorite pastries, have a shotgun wedding, and head to Foods For Living for some baking supplies. When your mom sees some Bonuts emerge from the oven (or plastic container), she's sure to be as delighted by the novelty as she is moved by the gesture. Here are some ideas and recipes.

KIVA

I should feel weird about plugging a specific organization in a blog about food, culture, and safety. It says a lot about Kiva's mission and integrity that I feel not weird, but proud to include it. It is, in fact, part of my own Mother's Day gift.

As you know, many a mother across the globe will spend May 11 tilling a tiny plot of land to feed her family, or shutting down her fruit stand to run to a latrine a quarter mile away. I can't think of a more appropriate gift for the generous mothers among us than the gift of generosity itself. Let me explain.

The concept behind Kiva is simple: using Kiva's website, you select an individual to whom you will lend $25. This person usually lives in the third world, and is trying to secure a loan for his/her business or family. The goal of the loan is usually a modest one, such as building a toilet for the home, or buying food for a workhorse. In time, this person pays you back. Now you have your $25 again, and you can withdraw it or lend it again. There is no catch, no downside, and no reason not to just do it. But this isn't a Kiva ad—it's a suggestion for a Mother's Day gift.

Here is a video explaining the process in the most basic terms.

Kiva is not just a "feel good" organization. Kiva is one of the highest-rated charities in the world, and enjoys a reputation for no-nonsense business practices and transparency.

My mom loves that she can help people over and over again with the same initial investment. This process is a perfect reflection of my mother's generosity and love of sharing. It's giving the gift of giving, which is itself a gift... pardon me while I have a hall-of-mirrors freakout.

PTFit

Your mom's back is sore. I mean, probably. I don't mean to assume, but whose back isn't sore? It would be awesome to get your mom a back-massaging android servant for Mother's Day.

I think PTFit is the manufacturer of the droids you're looking for. The company produces the ideal robot companion—one made of wood, that runs on human power, whose only function is to provide massages. These high-tech companions may look like glorified shepherds' crooks, but make no mistake, they're great. A few moments of pulling the rollers over a sore back will make anyone a convert. The massage hooks are, of course, available at Foods For Living, where some staffers affectionately refer to the product as "the boyfriend."

Please, don't tell people you're picking up your mom a new boyfriend from FFL for Mother's Day. 

Enjoy your Mother's Day!

When the Famous Love You For Free

What was Charles Manson's favorite cheesy snack cracker? Which mineral water did Saddam Hussein prefer after a long hot day of dictating? We may never know. If either man were to express such a preference, however, some poor marketing director would have gotten a harrowing 4 a.m. phone call about "coordinating a response." 

Celebrity endorsements are almost as old as capitalism. ("If our bread is good enough for Caesar, it's good enough for you!") Most people claim to be unswayed by such contrivances, but data keeps showing us otherwise, so celebrity spokespeople are here to stay. But it's a different game entirely when the famous go off the reservation and express an opinion outside the confines of money-for-representation. 

Ironically, all celebrity endorsements exist under the premise that the celebrity involved enjoys, supports, or uses the product they advertise. I think literally everyone understands this is not necessarily the case. Does Sam Jackson really have a credit card preference? Did that Mikey kid even like Life cereal? Does that gecko even have a car!? We are inescapably aware of the manipulation involved, but the idea that certain celebrities are loyal brand ambassadors is a lie we've agreed upon. The ironic part is that when a celebrity actually endorses a product, genuinely doing what most commercials are in fact pretending to do, the concerned company usually ends up with a "situation on its hands." 

Here are some highlights:

Letting down her Garden...

When The Girls Next Door, a reality show starring Hugh Hefner’s granddaughters girlfriends, ended after just five short years (too soon), star Kendra Wilkinson went on to pursue other things. Like other reality shows based on the premise that the star indeed modeled for Playboy. Kendra may be an innovator and an inspiration, but she’s still human, which means she still loves butter-intensive Italian chain restaurants. Kendra’s open (unsolicited) endorsement of The Olive Garden tossed a hot PR potato into the company’s hands.

In 2008, Wilkinson claimed that Olive Garden was better than any restaurant in Italy. (It is unclear how she found time to visit every restaurant in Italy, given the demands of her career.)

Olive Garden, known for tossing around the word “family” like so many garden salads, was less than thrilled with the reality star’s endorsement. Wilkinson went on to offer a “modeling opportunity” to Olive Garden waitresses nationwide. That presumably smoothed things over.

Why did the chicken cross the sea?

While explaining anything immortalized in an Eminem lyric is probably unnecessary, this classic deserves recognition for the deft way in which seafood company Chicken of the Sea handled it.

When Jessica Simpson, then starring on “Newlyweds,” mused aloud about whether Chicken of the Sea was indeed chicken, or perhaps some other animal, perhaps one originating from the sea, the public couldn’t stop laughing. Chicken of the Sea, a subsidiary of a Thai conglomerate called Thai Union Group, invited Simpson down to HQ to sort things out firsthand. Ever the good sport, Simpson accepted, and pledged herself to a lifetime of tuna consumption.

As the public laughed and Marshal Mathers slaved over a hot rhyme book to concoct a relevant line, no one seemed much bothered by the fact that Chicken of the Sea is an idiotic and nonsensical brand name. The titular chicken totally comes from the ocean, not the sea.  

Woo Hah! I got your cognac check...

When you think of artisanal French brandy, you probably think of gold teeth, swingin' braids, and hip-hop swagger. No? Neither did French cognac manufacturer Courvoisier, probably—until rap artist Busta Rhymes touted his love for the product in his song, "Pass the Courvoisier." (He's very polite—he didn't just want to reach over you and grab the Courvoisier. Alas, "Excuse My Reach" just didn't have the Busta Rhymes flava.) 

It's no secret that successful rappers are passionate about conveying their success through song. People apparently love this about them. This, in turn, allows them to buy more gold-plated tanks, then talk about that, and everyone is happy. The only snag occurs when rappers—who are often known for somewhat freewheeling behavior—embrace products typically targeted toward the "let's-adjourn-to-the-den-and-enjoy-some-Havanas" set. Having gangsta rappers chugging your yacht-mini-fridge-ready cognac can tarnish the sterling legacy of the brand, it is said. Unless it leads to a huge increase in sales, at which point you stop caring so much. 

After "Pass the Courvoisier," the discerning manufacturer decided that "the cognac of Napoleon" could also be the cognac of Busta Rhymes. No official deal was on the books, but the company threw some lavish parties after a few of Busta's shows. One is hopefully tickled to imagine the French emissaries of the brand standing stoically at said parties' periphery with forced smiles.

Leggo my Faygo...

Detroit has seen better days, but it still has a lot of which to be proud. Motown, techno, the White Stripes, those cars, Faygo, and the Insane Clown Posse.

If one were to pair every item on that list with every other item, no more counterintuitive combination would emerge than Faygo and Insane Clown Posse. What do mentally unstable clowns who rap about murder have to do with family-friendly beverages? It depends on who you ask. (It's worth noting that people who rap about murder almost categorically also rap about which beverages they enjoy.)

Despite some similarities between ICP and Faygo—both are more popular with children than adults and healthiest in small doses—the perpetually potty-mouthed ICP is more passionate about fostering a connection between the brands than Faygo.

Matthew Rosenthal, head of marketing for Faygo, was diplomatic when speaking to the New York Times about the rappers’ enthusiasm for his company’s modestly-priced soda.

“We wish them the best,” Rosenthal told the Times. Citing ICP’s choice lyrical decisions, Rosenthal put it mildly:  “They’re not at all mainline kind of guys.”

ICP, on the other hand, would welcome a branded Posse beverage from Faygo. “We wish they would do a limited-edition Faygo pop run with us,” said  ICP member Violent J in an interview with Detroit’s Metro Times.

In an act befitting his moniker, Violent J threw an open bottle of Faygo (flavor unknown) into the writhing mass of Juggalos (devoted ICP fans) at a concert years ago. Evidently, sugar-water missiles and hip hop enthusiasts in clown face... completed each other. The rest is history. ICP continues to enthusiastically use and mention Faygo at every opportunity, and Faygo continues to smile and shuffle away.

Take your best shotz, or a cheaper locally-available alternative...

Life Shotz is not just a product. Life Shotz is a "tribe," and the expression of a "vision." It is a manifesto, made manifest. Because simply selling a "health" product without an elaborate psuedo-New Age tiered-marketing organization attached isn't selling a product at all. 

Make no mistake— Life Shotz is here to make a difference in your life. Because, as the company's website explains, "That's just what an insanely potent powder should do." 

Life Shotz, a blend of amino acids, B vitamins, and fruit powder, is about $3.50 a shot. Low cost alternatives, sans cultish marketing engine, shipping, or handling, are available at your local Foods For Living. You know who is not available at your local Foods For Living? Ken Shamrock, mixed martial arts athlete and former pro wrestler. 

Shamrock, a UFC hall of famer and MMA legend, was given some Life Shotz by a company rep at a wrestling camp. After taking them, "The World's Most Dangerous Man" was impressed enough to do a camera phone endorsement then and there, without pay or vested interest. Life Shotz has embraced the opportunity, and highly publicizes Shamrock's endorsement on their website. It is unknown whether Shamrock continues to enjoy Life Shotz in his capacity as a recent addition to 50 Cent's guard detail. (As a side note, having Ken Shamrock as a personal bodyguard reminds me of when David Bowie insisted on getting Stevie Ray Vaughn to play guitar on "Let's Dance." As if no other super-competent guitarist would do.) 

Blessing or curse, I look forward to the day when a controversial speed skater says that Foods For Living is her favorite place to get organic produce, or a divisive folk singer trumpets the praises of the deli's vegan chocolate bars. Until then, we'll have to settle for the endorsements of local community pillars, nutritionists, the press, and those U2 roadies who came through for Bono's bottled water in 2013.

It's Earth Day and I'm So Mad!

Having thrown an apple core into some pondside flora instead of the trash can, I felt good for completing my Earth Day celebration early this year. But even as I saw an interested buck poking his head through the brush at the periphery of my country estate, I couldn’t help but feeling like I could do more. Naturally, I left the buzzing cicadas and Sand Hill cranes and got on the Internet.

As the people of Earth ostensibly prepare to celebrate and honor our home planet (it is not yet the 22nd at the time of writing), a lot of them are really angry. It seems we can all agree that we are generally not “anti-Earth,” which is a great start. That’s essentially where humanity’s agreement on how to manage the planet ends.

I try to give real controversy a wide berth, at least in the context of writing a blog for Foods For Living. But reflecting on Earth Day, with the help of the Internet, I was struck by something: a day of commitment to stewardship of the planet is the centerpiece in a very loud argument our culture is having with itself. What’s more, the zebra mussels of misinformation and propaganda are clogging the flow of information to a disconcerting degree.  

In fact, calling the environmental conversation a “conversation” at all is significantly underselling its ferocity. While “war” is too strong a word, I could forgive someone for using it. Just look at pictures from the field: titanic machines, detonated mountainsides, protesters behind police barricades, chemical deployments, and a ceaseless propaganda machine on all sides. In the middle of this maelstrom is the “average person,” earnestly recycling, planting an Earth Day tree, and wondering how the greenhouse effect became a red and blue issue.

A Very Brief History of Humanity’s Relationship to the Planet:

For (far more than) 99% of human history, the Earth was our absolute and implacable master. Its capriciousness buried cities, dictated where we may live, and concealed the vast majority of its wonders completely. Then, in the late 1700s, the scale shifted so violently that it escaped humanity’s conception. 

By Earth Day 2014, roughly half the people of Earth favored treating the planet like a giant eggshell, and the other half seemed to think the old girl was built like a tank. Still another half was barely eking out a living from the land, and accordingly cared little for this sort of First World dialogue. A final half seemed intent on wrecking the thing, as if that might prove something about its workmanship. (I know that’s four halves. If fuzzy math isn’t your thing, you may want to pick a different topic, because foggy figuring is prominent when talking about the Earth.) In the interest of keeping it light while nodding to this all this chatter, I selected some compost nuggets regarding Earth, humans, and the combination, to share.

THE GREAT PACIFIC GARBAGE PATCH

THE MYTH: There is a giant (“Texas-sized” or double that, depending on your source) island of accumulated trash in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. This popular myth has been “well-documented.”

FACT: There is a gigantic amount of accumulated trash in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, albeit trash that has not formed any sort of solid mass.

Obviously, dumping trash into the ocean is a terrible idea. Also, it’s easy to imagine a Texas-sized area of waste. (I would make a Texas joke here—such as “see: Texas”—but part of my family is from Texas.) Unfortunately, most of the trash in the Pacific gyre has been pulverized into small bits, where it is introduced into the food chain via plankton. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, or GPGP, (or “jeepy jeepy”), is less on the unsightly end of environmental disaster and more on the long-term-poisoning-of-the-planet-end. “But not a literal island!” cry those who would call me alarmist. No, not a literal island. If you can get past his smirking, self-congratulatory delivery, this video by (convicted fraudster) Brian Dunning explains the issue succinctly. (A video purporting an actual island has triple the views on YouTube.)

Don’t worry. According to a 2008 article by The Journal of Science, at least 4% is the ocean is still pristine. Because Antarctica is too cold and too far away to be a good dump.

EVERYONE COMPLAINS ABOUT THE WEATHER, BUT ONLY THE ULTRA-RICH ARE DOING SOMETHING ABOUT IT:

This is somewhat old news, but it has missed a lot of my friends’ (Doppler) radar, so I’m mentioning it here: Bill Gates owns a patent for a hurricane-stopping device. As you can imagine, this is incredibly complex, and probably won’t work, and would require billions of dollars. As much as I love and respect Gates’s work as a philanthropist, one should note that Gates has not proposed funding this venture himself, as many reported. Although the idea of a mad super-genius creating a fleet of weather-controlling ships is awesome. Here’s a comprehensive article from Scientific American. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/can-tropical-cyclones-be-stopped/

LET A GUY WHO MAKES ELECTRIC CARS TELL YOU THE REAL TRUTH ABOUT ELECTRIC CARS

I’m a natural skeptic about information from manufacturers, but Richard Canny, CEO of electric car company THINK, makes some salient points in his defense of the (much more efficient) electric car. Try not to think of how fast your cell phone battery depletes as you’re reading about his Electric Vehicle utopia. http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/think-goes-myth-busting-for-earth-day--top-10-myths-about-electric-vehiclesbusted-91716524.html

THERE ARE MANY POINTLESS EDITORIALS LIKE IT, BUT THIS ONE IS MINE

This is a link to an article that isn’t special, or interesting. But it is an exceedingly common specimen around Earth Day. I’m showcasing this article as an object lesson in disingenuous persuasive writing about the environment.

This “editorial,” by computer science professor Dr. Barry Fagin, is the one example from which you may infer the many like it. It is one variety of the Earth Day Column From An Expert. The column is a meandering indictment of a few soft, unrelated targets. It contains only the vague entreaty, “Let’s abandon Earth Day myths.” The specific myths this doctor in computer science cites are few. He cautions us against mythologizing Native Peoples as perfect stewards of the land. He pokes some fun at an inaugural Earth Day advertisement by pointing out that an actor in said commercial is actually Italian-American, not Native American. (I bet he hated Scarface.) He cites a fabricated speech, quoted by Al Gore, and falsely attributed to Chief Seattle as an example of… I’m not sure what.

Oh, and he concedes that “humankind definitely impacts the planet, but the scope and nature of the policies pushed by the save-the-planet crowd are way out of proportion to what we know and what is likely to happen.” This is both the central issue of Earth Day and glibly dismissed without anything as inconvenient as “examples,” “evidence,” or specifics regarding what a sensible and moderate course of action might look like to the good doctor.

On a totally unrelated note, Dr. Fagin is a member of the Independence Institute, a Colorado-based Libertarian think tank. The think tank has donated at least $500,000 to another think tank, the Heartland Institute. You may recognize the Heartland Institute from their tireless media campaign against the recognition of global warming, or perhaps their collaboration with Philip Morris in the 1990s, wherein they helped distribute some Big Tobacco literature questioning the health risks of secondhand smoke. 

To be clear: I’m not taking sides in this insane dialogue. But I didn’t get this article from some blogger who lives with his parents. The Gazette is a proud Pulitzer Prize winner, and Dr. Fagin is highly respected in his field. (A field which has nothing to do with the subject of his conspicuously anti-scientific article.) I’m just hoping to demonstrate that “following the money,” a technique I learned on HBO’s hit crime drama, The Wire, is very telling when considering the perspective of an expert. Not that any college freshman shouldn’t be able to see through the guile of such hucksters. Fagin does prove one thing: by needlessly making Earth Day an argument, then using some common logical fallacies (straw man, non sequitur), you can indeed fill a column with text. 

SOMETHING SO REASONABLE IT DEFIES A SNARKY HEADING

Since I took a couple shots at Brian Dunning, professional skeptic, earlier, I'd like to help redeem him by linking my all-time favorite layman's summary regarding global warming. 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agfoRVfr6no

Phew. I don't know about you, but I'm feeling positively saturated with controversy. I'm also humbled by people like Bill Gates who may actually be able to control the weather (to some small extent) in our lifetime. But this Earth Day, I'm going to turn my back to the explosive conflict about how to care for our planet and celebrate ED2014 the best way I know how: I'm going to go outside. Maybe I'll even throw a second apple into the weeds.

Tomahawk Throwing for Health

Tomahawk throwing is taking the health and fitness world by storm, as I’m sure you've noticed. As spring wiggles its way out of winter’s grip, health-conscious folk across the Midwest are hauling their arsenals out of the shed. College students are sharpening their tactical hawks, stay-at-home moms are polishing their fast hawks, and professors are sanding the handles of their replica trade hawks. Indoor ranges are getting quiet as people take to parks and back yards to collectively celebrate the sailing of steel through the spring air. Some will join local throwing leagues, some will flip burgers on the grill between throws.

Some will throw alone, simply enjoying the clarity and peace of that reassuring tempo: the slow kiss of metal on wood. These few know that a well-thrown hawk is a manifestation of the will; it seems to sprout from the target, and presage the successes of the day to come. The axe meeting the target is the echo of achievement, in reverse. It is a warm, willful sound, wholly of the earth, both immediate and eternal.

All right, so throwing tomahawks isn't a new fitness craze. It has yet to develop the martial-fitness hipness of Tae Bo or cardio kickboxing. The above is an indulgence, a montage of an Americana made richer through embracing my favorite spring discipline. For years, I’ve been reaping the boundless physical and mental benefits of throwing tomahawks (and other sharp things). In a typically magnanimous move, I’m going explain how and why you should do something truly unconventional for the sake of fun and health.

Here are 6 benefits of tomahawk throwing, in brief:

• It’s good for your muscles. Skepticism is natural, but tomahawk throwing is a great workout. It’s obviously not intended to be comprehensive. But as an entertaining supplement, you can’t beat it. Throwing properly utilizes the whole body, so stretching first is essential. Throwing involves much of your core. It asks a lot of your triceps. Tomahawks on the ground can be retrieved with lunges. If you force yourself through the initial awkwardness of off-hand throwing, and lunge-retrieve with both legs, you’ll feel it the next day, and perhaps the next.
• It is “real” exercise if done vigorously. Imagine pitching a baseball or serving a tennis ball for a couple of hours. While your heart rate (probably) won’t approach that of running or calisthenics, a good rhythm of throwing and tomahawk retrieval is demanding. The uninitiated begin casually and quickly transition to sweating and layer removal.
• It is meditative and calming. Any marksman can tell you about the timeless bubble that hangs around the moment of release. Having an objective, no matter how transitory, is a great way to turn down head chatter and practice focus. Objective-based training/exercise improves attention, lowers stress, and builds confidence. Please just imagine I’m citing studies for those claims. Come on, you know it’s true.
• It forges positive personal traits. Whether you stick with the thrower’s simplest goal—get the tomahawk to stick in the target—or challenge yourself immensely—throw 8 different weapons from 30 feet away—there’s always a new frontier of personal challenge to be had with throwing. Feeling yourself ramp up a tangible skill (especially such an unusual one) is satisfying. Becoming a pendulum between the unattempted and the achieved sharpens the will and hardens one against adversity.
• It’s fun, social, and inclusive. It’s like horseshoes, "Baggo," lawn darts, and many other vestiges of summer Americana, except it makes you feel like a Viking or a Cree warrior or Daniel Day Lewis, instead of someone named Doug with a mortgage and a Subaru. People of most athletic abilities can participate, and throwing is just novel enough to promote an atmosphere of “Aw, heck, I’ll give it a shot.”
• It’s “primal,” which is hip right now. Your devoted “paleo” friends will be very impressed when you use actual paleolithic technology to unwind.

If you would like to get started, simply find a tree you don't value, or construct a target. Some simple and charming instruction on making a target can be found in this video.

There is an wide array of options for throwing. These can be purchased on the internet, or in sporting goods stores.

Here are a few options from my own collection:

The traditional/trade hawk.

This is the Ed Sullivan of tomahawks. This weapon was commonly traded with and among Native Americans during the seventeenth century. While Native American tribes used stone or even antler heads, European settlers quickly began producing metal-headed versions for trade with indigenous people. Its two-part construction makes the inevitable handle replacement quick and easy. Great for the traditionalist or mountain man, but comes with a steeper learning curve than modern equivalents. 

                                                        








The tactical tomahawk. 
Similar in weight to the traditional model, with notable modern innovations. A spike opposite the blade will affords the thrower another approach for especially resilient targets. A forged steel head is harder and more durable than the iron head of the traditional model. A fiberglass-reinforced nylon handle will stand up to years of throwing. The model pictured is the SOG Tactical Tomahawk.




The Fast Hawk (pictured with tactical hawk).
"Fast Hawk" is a brand name designation from SOG, the manufacturer, for what is essentially a miniature version of the above tactical model. The smaller size is  provides the creative thrower with a wide palette of new options. It's a great option for those lacking upper body strength. It's also so, so precious and cute.

The "Fast Hawk" next to its larger brother.

The Double-headed tactical tomahawk.
Besides having that ineffable quality of being "more Viking-like," double-headed tomahawks double your chance of a solid stick by multiplying the effective striking surface twofold. If the math is giving you a headache, look at the picture—two blades! The added steel does translate to added weight, so plan accordingly. This particular style is useful for extended excursions away from civilization: if you chip or ruin one blade, you've got another at hand.

The double bit or "Michigan" axe
We Michiganians are fortunate to have such a beautiful tool bearing our name. Make no mistake—this is an axe for felling trees and chopping wood, foreshortened for the purpose of throwing. With a 3.5 pound head, it requires care, strength, and dexterity to throw. The thunderous wallop of a successful throw with this axe provides unparalleled satisfaction. Not for the timid or careless. Caution: plan to replace your target after an afternoon with this powerhouse, unless your target is a tree. In that case, keep your ears perked for creaking timber. 

The huge throwing knife.
There's a point in a knife's life when it is no longer merely a knife. This is a time when it bears so little resemblance to its kitchen drawer brethren that it transcends its origins, and joins the elite ranks of real throwing implements. The pictured knife is such a specimen. The Cold Steel brand Sure Balance Thrower is a knife with a weight and size approaching a tomahawk. Its massive size and solid metal construction gives it incredible penetrating power. Caveats: this weapon is much more likely to ricochet significantly than a tomahawk. The tip remains quite sharp, and should be treated with care and respect. 


 

Throwing is a great reason to get outside, tone your muscles, improve your mind, have fun, and learn a skill that will almost certainly never come in handy. With a small initial cost and a gentle learning curve, throwing welcomes the brave and bored alike with open arms. 

Powder to the People: Diatomaceous Earth

While other food (health/culture/safety/fitness) blogs guide you through the showroom, I like to take you into the garage. Sure, people love photos of marble counter tops and canning tips and photos of children with cookies. Those things have a place, and that place is far, far from here. Today I want to talk about using tiny sharp bones as a sort of mechanical poison.

You can refer to diatomaceous earth as “D.E.,” if you’d like to sound especially hip and well-versed in the siliceous sedimentary rock scene. I’d argue that correctly pronouncing the product in all its polysyllabic Greek glory is a more certain path to impressing your friends, but the choice is yours. I’m sure we can agree that impressing your friends (and sales people at health food stores) is of capital import.

So we’ve established some options on how to ask for diatomaceous earth. Perhaps we should proceed to why you may want to ask for it. Or even, "what is it?"

“Diatomaceous” is an adjective meaning “from diatoms.” In simple terms, diatoms are algae with a crunch. These tiny phytoplankton number some 100,000 estimated species, but they all crunch the same. Their cell walls, known as frustules, are made of porous silica. The diatoms’ fossilized remains form a fine white powder en masse, and thus you have “diatomaceous earth.”

While D.E. has a great many uses industrially and domestically, it crosses the radar of the average person as a pest control agent. When an arthropod goes all Scarface on a big powdery pile of D.E., its exoskeleton begins losing its lipid coating, and dehydration ensues. Dehydration spells death for most living things, and common pests are no exception. Sprinkling diatomaceous earth along pest hots spots in your home is a safe way to eradicate the insect menace without endangering your pets or children—provided the D.E. is “food grade.” (Food grade diatomaceous earth is available at Foods For Living, of course.)

Obviously, the term “food grade” implies ingestibility, but what does it mean in the case of D.E.? Simply that it is free of pesticides and additives.

It should be noted that many people eat diatomaceous earth as a dietary supplement. Like most supplements, a quick Google search will unearth many hyperbolic claims about D.E.’s wondrous benefits. That isn’t to say that ingesting D.E. doesn’t have benefits. When any product begins to gain traction in the health industry, one can be sure that a league of opportunists and wild claims will be close behind. If you’re interested in using D.E. as a supplement, it’s beneficial to understand the nature of silica, how D.E. kills pests, and the different forms of D.E., along with their associated risks and benefits. A full exploration of the claims, studies, and evidence surrounding D.E. ingestion exceeds the scope of this post, but information on the subject is plentiful. Understanding even a little science behind the action of a product like D.E. can help you filter out the benefits from the hype.

Speaking of filters, there’s a lot to like about diatomaceous earth besides its potential for insect genocide. D.E. is used as a filtration agent for everything from swimming pools to wine to drinking water. It is used to clean up toxic spills. It’s in some cat litter. It’s an anticaking agent used in bulk feed storage. It is added as a “marker” to food in livestock nutrition experiments to measure how much of a given nutrient has actually been digested. Less experiment-concerned farmers add it to feed so as to keep horse and cow excrement free of flies. It was a stabilization ingredient in “Nobel’s Blasting Powder,” better known as “dynamite.”

If you haven’t gotten the drift yet, I’m going to spell it out: you come into contact with D.E. every day, whether you like it or not. Think you escaped somehow? It’s in many face scrubs and toothpastes, as well. Nice try.

So this stuff is great, and we use it for everything. Is there a downside? Well, try not to breathe in the “crystalline” form. The common “amorphous” form is essentially harmless, but there is usually some degree of the crystalline form present in D.E. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulates the crystalline content of D.E. in consumer products (currently 1%). The safety hazard posed by breathing commercial D.E. dust is truly negligible, but you may want to think twice before pursuing a career in mining the stuff. While you may get to travel to places as England, the Sahara, Czech Republic, and Santa Barbara County, prolonged exposure in mining conditions can result in silicosis. (“Silicosis” is the official name, but all the cool kids are calling it “potter’s rot” or “grinder’s asthma” these days.)  

Heating D.E. to high temperatures changes much more of it into the crystalline form, which poses a greater health hazard. This requires industrial processing, so don’t worry about leaving your earth on the windowsill. But this distinction is why you should make sure you always get food grade D.E., which will not be crystalline, for home use.

You're not the only one excited about spring. There are armies of equally elated bugs who are elated. Get some D.E. and sprinkle away. Worried about sustainability? New diatoms are born every day, and it only takes about 65 million years for their fossils to be viable for killing bed bugs. (Just kidding. While D.E. is not exactly a “renewable resource” in the most literal sense, there are deposits of the stuff that are miles thick in some places. We’re not going to run out any time soon.)

If you have further questions/concerns/want to buy some, your local Foods For Living associate will be happy to help. Refer to the pronunciation aid if need be, deliver your request with conviction, and prepare for impressed double takes in your direction.