Restaurant discounts for Seniors!

Forsyth MO - It's no real secret that attendance figures are a little down for many area eateries as the economy continues to spit and sputter along. That and the fact that social security income continues to lag behind inflation has had a negative impact on how us old folks spread their meager incomes around. As a group seniors have always been a 'filler crowd' for restaurants as they will often show up during the slack times for a late brunch or early dinner. But, that trend has been waning somewhat, as menu prices climb while there has been little or no cost of living increases coming via the Feds. 

So, what to do? Well here's on suggestion for all the area restaurants to consider. Give the oldie moldies a break by discounting meals on the days you owners find that you lack any customers at all! Be the first food emporium, on your block, to cut them a deal and enjoy the bennies right up to the time that your competition gets wind of what you're doing. Done properly as a marketing tool, profit margins will not shrink but rather expand under the burden of increased traffic, on days where there was little or none before. And note, that should you elect to do this, make darn sure your clientele are properly informed! Ads in local papers, store front banners and the Internet should all be used to the fullest extent. (Since you all have been collecting email addresses for some time, use those to target specific audiences.... uh, you have been collecting emails, right)? Seriously, being creatively proactive is not a bad thing.... On  a final note. For those Seniors who can afford it, and in those restaurants that may offer up a discount...please consider giving that extra amount of money to your server!

Since posting this piece, all I've heard is the sound of crickets....My response has been to curtail my visits to local eateries to a high degree. I would encourage others to also do so.

Update: December 2016 -  Zero participation by any area eatery that I was aware of. And, so my participation at eating in those venues was also zero.

Update: June 2017 - Things are changing. Discounts at one local eater may be announced soon. 

Update: June 13, 2017 - Charlie's Steak, Ribs and Ale was now offering a Veteran discount for meals of 10%. I also understood that the same discount was being offered to seniors on Mondays!

A bacon melt sandwich at the Frosted Mug!

 

Stock picture

Forsyth MO – While sitting at a local watering hole on an otherwise slow Memorial Day weekend. A good friend offered to share with me a grilled sandwich that he had prepared for himself. He had no name for it, I look closely and confirmed that there was bacon, tomato and that appeared to be jack cheese sandwiched nicely between two slices of grilled Texas toast! The first name that came to my mind was 'bacon melt'!

While this creation by chef Louis Murray was not on the John's Frosted Mug menu, it probably should be! The picture above is an approximation as I did not have my camera with me at the time. I'm hoping they might consider offering this taste sensation sometime in the future!

The Frosted Mug is a venerable institution of many decades and is staffed by a very aggressive staff of individuals who are dedicated to serving their customers in a professional and courteous manner.

River Run not ready for prime time!

Unwashed filthy signs greet park goers...

After a great early spring and with plenty of time, it appeared not much had been done to clean up the River Run Park near Forsyth MO on the eve of the Memorial Day weekend.

Locked gate screams stay out!

A closed gate on the Baker Street entrance, dirty unwashed signs and toilet/shower areas that had not been prepped.... these all spoke volumes to me. My thought was that perhaps I should find another park to camp in, say Shadowrock Park right across the river where everything was shipshape and many of the available camping spots had been taken.

In my mind the story was very easy to read. River Run is managed by the Federal government while Shadowrock Park is under local control. River Run is a mess while Shadowrock is clean and functional. That the difference, these days, with most everything that the Feds touch. My opinion? Perhaps River Run should be turned over to the city of Forsyth as they seem to know how to at least maintain while also making a profit....

 While Shadowrock support nice bathroom facilities, not so at River Run where porta potties are considered good enough....

2018 Update: The Park is closed for the season and partly under water. Great land management by the corps.

CRE bacteria here in the US!

A long-dreaded super bug that is a strain of E. Coli has made its first appearance in the United States, researchers at the U.S. Military HIV Research Program announced Thursday.

After being identified in China, Europe and Canada, researchers identified mcr-1 positive— part of the deadly family of bacteria carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae, or CRE— last month in a urinary tract sample in Pennsylvania, and found it was resistant to the antibiotic colistin.

Colistin, known as the last line of defense against the most antibiotic-resistant bacteria, now appears to be exchanging genes for its resistance and waning in strength, according to a news release.

"Colistin is one of the last efficacious antibiotics for the treatment of highly resistant bacteria. The emergence of a transferable gene that confers resistance to this vital antibiotic is extremely disturbing,” Dr. Patrick McGann, of the Multidrug Resistant Organism Repository and Surveillance Network (MRSN) at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR), said in the release. “The discovery of this gene in the U.S. is equally concerning, and continued surveillance to identify reservoirs of this gene within the military health care community and beyond is critical to prevent its spread.”

Since the first transferable gene for colistin-resistance was identified in China in 2015, microbiologists have been monitoring food supply and humans for its presence, according to the study that reported the U.S. finding, which was published Thursday in Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy. In Pennsylvania, the urinary tract infection sample from a 49-year-old female patient receiving treatment at a military facility was sent to the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center (WRNMMC), where colistin susceptibility was tested. Tests revealed the bacterial infection would be resistant to colistin, and the center sent the sample to MRSN for sequencing, which identified the colistin-resistant gene, mcr-1. It’s unclear how the woman contracted the infection.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), infections with CRE germs are very difficult to treat. One report suggests they may contribute to death in up to 50 percent of infected patients.

In the new study, researchers reported that through intergovernmental communication, the CDC and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) also have identified a swine intestinal infection with a single mcr-1 positive E. Coli strain. The Pennsylvania case and swine case may not be linked, but “the evidence of the strain in the U.S. is a public health concern” that “could worsen the current global crisis of antimicrobial resistance,” according to the release.

At the National Press Club in Washington on Thursday, CDC director Tom Frieden called CRE a “nightmare bacteria.”

Excerpted from an article that appeared on Fox News

The hidden delights of a grilled bologna sandwich!

OK. What delights might I be a referring to? In point of fact, there wasn't much to say in the way of good stuff about my luncheon sandwich this day. It consisted of a slice of bologna sandwiched between two slice of white bread. I also slathered on a tablespoon of mayo to to help make what was mildly bad nutrition into something even worst!

Have you seen this sandwich?

For this report, I brought in a police sketch artist who did a pretty bad job, (but he was free and so I had that going for me). But, if you use your imagination, you can see that he did a good job labeling the main ingredients:

1. White bread which I toasted and which turns almost at once into glucose when it hits the intestines. A real sugar rush is then experienced. About 100 calories.
2. A thin layer of mayo which is also egg white mixed with oil. Think the world 'fat' and you got it nailed! About 90 calories.
3. Bologna is a sort of meat or meaty substance that, like its cousin Spam, comes from unknown sources. You don't want to know. Trust me. About 60 calories in each slab.

There you have it! A 250 calorie concoction that, were you to feed it to your dog on a regular basis, would likely kill him within just a few years!

Also, on this day, I had a small amount of Mandarin oranges 70 calories) in a desperate attempt to be able to use the words 'fair nutrition'.

So, what exactly are those hidden delights. Beats me. This junk is about all I can afford to eat while basking in Obama's Utopian Society....

Pink Floyd, and I do now feel very numb!

Never knew the nuances of this song until only recently. Enjoy!

A pseudo Paleo breakfast!

Changing your weight at the venerable age of 66 can be rather problematic. Drop it too fast and your heart implodes. Gain it too fast and you get the same result, only sooner. In either case, your junk shrinks... no wait, that happens all by itself...

For many years, I've wandered in haphazard fashion down the isles of weight loss programs. There are something like a gazillion of them, I think everyone on the planet has published at least one book on the subject... Currently, I am on the Paleo diet kick. Paleo stands for Paleolithic which refers to a time in human history that predated  the more current Neolithic period which is marked a change in human civilization. It was at that juncture, some ten thousand years ago that primitive man took a left turn and decided to settle down and grow stuff. We became an agrarian society which is defined as 'any society whose economy is based on producing and maintaining crops and farmland. Another way to define an agrarian society is by seeing how much of a nation's total production is in agriculture.' Once that new age began in earnest, we slowly began to walk away from a diet consisting of meats, fruits, berries and nuts and more towards one consisting of assorted vegetables and grains. And while that was not a totally bad thing to do, we've managed to pervert the process to such a point, by the 21st Century, that many of us are no longer walking very well. No, we are crawling, towards the nearest hospital. So, in review. The American male has gone from a totally lean eating machine to a fat and sloppy sophomoric blob who sits for most of his life while waiting for God to ring the recess bell... Not a pretty picture. Over just the past fifty years obesity has begun to run rampant with a corresponding large spike in the number of cardiac related deaths! Today, morbid obesity is pandemic in the US!  Did you know that Paleolithic man did not know about much in the way of diseases? Most did not exist! Heck, he didn't even have tooth decay to worry about! And while it's true that few survived very far into their twenties, most of the deaths were the result of predation for in those times as life was pretty brutal and short!

Be that as it may, a few scholars have taken note that the average Paleolithic man ate himself a pretty decent diet. On any given day, the successful hunter would perhaps score some meat, maybe a birds egg and some berries. (Note that while I refer to men, the women did every bit the same type of jobs only they also had kids to be concerned with while the difference in overall muscle strength precluded them from as much hunting). So, for millions of years, we homo sapiens pretty much thrived as a species with nary a single can of corn among us.

Some of these self same scholars have thought about those ancient lifestyles and then concocted diet plans that sort of kind of emulate those much more basic lifestyles of old. If one were to go for a 'Paleo Diet', one would be giving up all processed foods (meats included), all grains and dairy products. Note that left precious little to choose from at you favorite grocery store! In fact, you would be limited to just fresh veggies, meats, nuts (not legumes) and fruits. Wow! Talk about a severe diet! Most people could not exist in a world without Hostess Ding Dongs, Lays chips, pizza and ice cream! But, that be the world I was headed for for the duration of my diet! Note, however, that once I reach my personal weight goals, I may just grab myself a frozen Digiorno pizza!