Betsy Hart's blog

A thought about the local neighborhood pool and kids and obesity:

Summer is when one realizes there really is a childhood obesity problem. I see so many young people hanging out of their suits at the pool AND ordering the second batch of fries. It's estimated by 2010 fully one-half of all children in the U.S. will be overweight or obese. In the 1970s, that figure was abour 4%. We had McDonald's and Hostess and junk food and TV then too. (Though it's true we didn't have the ridiculous protion sizes served up back then.) But maybe - just maybe - parents were a little more likely to say "no" than they are today!

Hillary Clinton has got to get over the "woman" thing. Over and over again at her recent presidential contender speech in Iowa, she stressed what a feat it would be to elect a woman president, and how unfairly she was being treated in the race already because she is a woman. The press comments on her hair, not that of her opponents, for instance.

The Wall Street Journal reports that. . . Candles are dangerous!

Who knew?

"The growing popularity of scented and decorative candles. . . is prompting fire safety concerns. . . Safety and industry officials are weighting new labels and standards for candle accessories that would lay out warnings more clearly," reported the WSJ.

Ah, so now I'm in the majority on something at last. The New York times reports that perhaps for the first time in history, 51% of adult women in the United States are living without a spouse.

Personally, I've never been comfortable being in the majority on anything. It makes me think I'm doing something wrong, or that I'm mistakenly "going with the crowd." In a way, this is yet another example - I certainly never wanted to be in THIS majority!

One of my New Year’s resolutions was to not use my credit cards for the month of January. We’re half-way and a day through the month — and so far, so good.

(Well, sort of. I had to order some books from Amazon for a work project. But I think that falls under “required expenses.”?)

So now the world is all atwitter over the plight of those poor, too-thin, fashion models. Major fashion shows in Europe have set a floor under "thinness" after one model tragically died from anorexia last year.

As many as 3 million people a year die from Malaria (and millions more are sickened). As TIME magazine reported this week, the war against Malaria continues. The latest idea, actually quite successful, are mosquito nets treated with an insecticide. They are about 10 dollars a piece. Cheap for the west, hugely expensive to Africans, where Malaria continues to rage and destroy.

"The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists is recommending Down syndrome screening for all pregnant women," according to today's New York Times.

It used to be that the rather arbitrary age of 35 was the "floor" for recommending the procedure of amniocentesis, which could detect Downs in the babies "older" mothers were carrying. As mothers age they are more likely to have a Down baby, but because most babies are born to younger mothers, the sheer numbers mean that most Down babies are born to younger mothers.

The New York Times reports today that kids all over the country are getting a new kind of report card. One that tells moms and dads whether their kids are “fat.”? Well, it doesn’t use that terminology, but the front page story by Jodi Kantor writes that Pennsylvania is one state where school officials are telling parents the “body mass index”? of their kids. A formula for figuring a healthy height/weight relationship.

Some people are just complainers.

Working Mother magazine, in a well-reported cover story, has just come out with its list of the top 100 companies for working moms, and it's a smorgasbord of good stuff for working women.