i think about food a fair bit, what should i eat. what tastes good. where does what i eat come from? will this make me feel better? will this make me healthier? am i getting enough protein/vitamin b12/iron?
most days, i don’t find it difficult to eat enough vegetables (i need to work on eating more fruit) – and thus most of the good vitamins/minerals one would get from veggies. however, i’m worried about food quality and vitamin levels in most produce and the decreasing variety of food. (the end of food was a fairly informative book but was a tad dry, especially right near the end.)
but the food shortages and food price increases give me something else to think (worry) about. like most things, i’m in the extremely lucky extremely small percentage of the population who is not going to be too badly effected by it (at least not in the short-term). i am not going to go hungry. i might not be able to buy cherries at the supermarket due to their price (although this is the time of year when it’s becoming quite reasonable) but i will be able to buy apples instead. and if apples increase to $5/lb, i’d have to cancel cable, stop daydreaming about buying a macbook next year, and switch to no name brand moisturizer. but i’m going to be able to afford to nourish myself (and pay my rent and have a little bit of fun).
well, i’ll be able to afford to eat as long as i am still working at a relatively well-paying job. however, it’s the interconnectedness of all industries/the market that i think is going to fuck us all in the end. as gasoline prices rise exponentially, housing markets crash, food prices increase, the retail sector suffers… and here we are/here we go. sometimes i wish i didn’t think about things like this, i had no knowledge of how fucked up our economy is, and how it all works. i haven’t read an economics book since this time last year. i’ve been promising (myself) that i’m going to start Stuffed and Starved: Markets, Power and the Hidden Battle for the World Food System for some time now… but part of me just doesn’t want to know any more.
i wish it didn’t but this shit weighs me (and my depression) down. but, sadly, i can’t let ignorance be bliss because i know just enough to feel guilty for falling into that trap.
when i started writing this, i meant to write about what i’ve been eating lately. wow, this got off topic.
