Lighter Monday roundup

I just couldn't talk about this stuff in the same post as those horrendous stories.

Apparently the majority of women think there's something wrong with their bodies (including their breasts).

I wrote the other day about how Rebecca Traister's "All the Single Ladies" was a snapshot into my life. The Times today ran a piece that could be called "All the Single Ladies: China edition."

“Because they are highly educated, they hold well-paid jobs, they lose the financial incentive to get married,” says Zhang Xiaobo, a professor of economics at Peking University’s National School of Development.

OMG, this is my life:

Suitable mates are simply hard to find, said Ms. Cheng, who describes many men her age as “not mature or irresponsible.” Referring to another former boyfriend, she said: “When we wanted to do something, or go for food, he only liked to act cute and say with a smile, ‘We’ll do whatever you like.’ It made me feel like I had a son.” 

It reminds me of that line--Lili Taylor's line--from Mystic Pizza: "I'm not going to marry an asshole! It's the 80's! Why would I marry an asshole?" My sentiments exactly.

Changing topics, this piece about the Mediterranean diet pinpoints--I never could--what I hate about the word 'foodie.' Someone called me that once, and I recoiled.

“There is no word for ‘foodie’ in Italian. Food is central to everyone’s life here. It’s normal to care deeply about food.” Quality and taste are held to a high standard in Italy and throughout the Mediterranean. There is a great respect for the craft of food production, and although dishes are often prepared simply, excellent ingredients are valued and shortcuts that compromise quality shunned. It was an important reminder of the wisdom of moving away from low-quality, hyper-processed foods — which are often laden with unhealthy additives, sodium and sugar — in favor of top-notch ingredients, served close to their source and simply prepared.

In the same way that I hate when people (eg RM) obsess about how "healthily" I eat. I just eat food. The best pinpointing of that was in the article about how France has never embraced superfoods, which have less appeal when people just eat food.

I guess at the root of it, it's weird to see people fetishize or exoticize something that's second-nature to me. Almost in the same way that it's weird to see high-end Russian food sold for a fortune. I've been making Russian beet salad every weekend--to last the week and at a cost of a few dollars. The Russian food that goes for a premium at restaurants is similar to what's derided as "poor people food" (another term that shocked me, for various reasons, the first time I heard it years ago).

RM isn't the only one who associates nutritious eating with some kind of cultish mania. There are people who legitimately think that eating healthily is a sacrifice. I have a morbidly obese family friend who just can't get past the idea that, at heart, I really want to eat animal products and my dietary choices are based on preternatural restraint. In fact, I don't believe that sustained dietary habits can be based on restraint; you have to truly love and enjoy your food. And I do. I eat my beet salad (which is really a salad of root vegetables), and my very flavorful pasta, and I feel for the paleos or other carbophobes who don't allow themselves those foods.

While we're on the topic of things people don't get: style is not only a personal thing, but a body-type thing. Clothes made for larger women don't work for smaller women, not just because of proportions. Larger women can pull off bolder, more experimental things. (I cannot.) This was a constant battle with my mother before she lost her mind: she would constantly try to foist on me clothes that would look awful. She insisted that they were very trendy, etc., and they well may have been but they wouldn't have worked on me. My first rule of clothing (and shoes) is, wear the clothes and shoes; don't let them wear you.