Just press a button

Visit the hunger site at www.thehungersite.com and all you have to do to feed a hungry person is press a button...that's it...just click on the the gold (ironic) button which has 'Give Free Food' written on it.

24,000 die a day from hunger-related causes - 75% are children under age five.

1 out of every 7 people on earth is afflicted by hunger - about 1 billion

All you have to do is press a button.

How does the site work? The funding is paid by site sponsors and the funds go to hunger relief charities.

And every day you press the button you make sure that someone gets at least one cup of staple food.

All you have to do is press a button.

Pizza time

Pizzas - they are great, especially in Italy but others can leave a lot to be desired. Daughter, tonight, planned to cook pizza and pasta for us but due to embroilment in conversation overcooked both...the pizza to a point way past carcinogenic. I wanted to preserve it - give it a coating of varnish and put a clock movement in it and hang it on the wall, she wasn't amused. I went out and bought a pizza, because she had her friend coming round and had promised her food. Daughter mentioned pepperoni so I got it, two for one, even though I don’t like pepperoni...I thought I'd pick the bits off.

Now where is the moral of the story? What way could we make the world a better place with pizza?

Firstly - shop bought pizza, though inexpensive and convenient can have too much packaging, preservatives etc. and can taste disgusting whereas take-away pizza can be expensive, convenient, still have too much packaging and can still taste disgusting. The answer isn't so convenient...but is usually tastier...make your own.

There are all kinds of alternatives from the 'quickie' which only involves spreading a little passata or tomato puree (or both) onto some bread or pitta, a few thin slices of whatever, some grated cheese and stick it under the grill. Or you can make your own dough, adding whatever you want...and you can put pepperoni (if you have to eat it) in a separate area so that I don’t have to pick it off and end up only eating the crusts because I can still taste pepperoni.

Make the world a better place. Make your own pizza.

Try out http://www.absoluterecipes.com/pizza-rec/pizza-dough.html

later again after a few hours sleep

Working out how this blog thing works. I presume there will be the initial enthusiam which will wane...and as I won't always have the time I've got in the Easter holidays, I will make the most of it now.

I tried a while back to buy a Make Poverty History wristband but found they were sold out everywhere (which is good really) so I'm glad I worked out how to link it to this blog - easy really, click on the link, scroll down to the end of the page and they give you the html to stick onto your template and even tell you where to stick it - can't ask for more...except to actually, maybe, make poverty history.

day one...a few hours later

Ok its baby steps...I know it doesn't seem like much but when I went for the orange juice carton at 6.30 this morning, I realised I could start. I could start drinking water more. This would not only be better for the world (cutting out packaging) but also be better for me (cutting out the sugar, additives, preservatives etc.).

Coffee is a bit of a sore point though. There have been times I couldn't live without it but did manage to wean myself onto herbal teas. They were a terrible disappointment at first - the aroma promised more than the taste fulfilled. Like many things we eat or drink they are an acquired taste, they grow on you - with persistence you can find the subtle flavours that the aroma promises. And how that aroma fills the room when you brew up!

Of course with tea you never get 'coffee breath', or the 'coffee comedown' and there is, what could be the most amazing benefit of tea (especially green tea) - its cancer preventing/blocking properties (see link below). What more could you want from your beverage, apart from it being Fairtrade, which is how I like my tea or coffee!

August 2003 Green Tea 'can block cancer'
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3125469.stm

March 2005 Cancer hope for green tea extract
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/4348059.stm

day one

Seems like a good idea, not a new one, its been done before - just not by me.

I'm someone who needs to be motivated by challenge. I'm not into new year's resolutions, no they are more frequent than that - new week's resolutions...Monday morning, I tell myself, I will change the world or at least my world, whatever version I am living in.

Officially it is summer time, the clocks went forward an hour, we all lost an hour's sleep...I'm plannin' on losing more. It seems like a perfect time to begin again...I'm not going to wait 'til Monday.