#always so expensive. and yes it’s fair to demand a decent price for something that takes a lot of work to make in good quality.

[demigodofhoolemere]

*looking at clothes online*

Oooh, I love these styles so mu—

*sees prices*

Oh lol just kidding actually

[rachello344]

ace-of-twos:  last night you reblogged a thing and one of the options was “tell me a story that happened to you”. i’m sorry this took so long to type. but here it is. i hope you enjoy reading it. sorry it’s a mess. 

… [Rachello344: I’m adding a readmore because damn is this a helluva story, but it is also quite long XD]

first thing you gotta know is that like any set of best friends, lex and i make terrible decisions. this includes deciding to go to the fair last minute which, yes, may sound like a great idea, but just wait for it. the second thing you gotta know is there are going to be a fuckton of asides in this story bc the entire day was a magical and incoherent wreck. 

there’s a fair that comes into town twice a year. i don’t usually go bc it’s hot and loud and god there are so many people. but lex convinces me and we go.

our first mistake: we arrived as it opened, at 1pm. 

our second mistake: from arrival to departure, we did not leave the fairgrounds. 

our third mistake: we stayed until approximately 8:30pm. 

keep in mind that those numbers, first and second and third, only really apply to that particular list. many mistakes were made that day. most, but not all, were made by us. it was terrible but also mostly hilarious. 

so, to get into the fair and actually get to the rides, you have to walk through a long kinda psuedo hallway filled with carnival games. giant prizes are hanging from the ceiling. one of these prizes is a dragon. it’s fucking adorable as shit. keep this in mind. it’s important. 

at about 2pm, both of us high on adrenaline, we decide to ride the tilt-a-whirl. i have never properly been on a tilt-a-whirl so a number of things happen in rapid succession. lex scares the shit out of me by making the carriage spin super fucking fast. (i thought you were just supposed to sit there and let the momentum spin you around. oh, how wrong i was.) i discover that i fucking love the tilt-a-whirl. i demand we ride it again. we get in line. when we get back to the ticket gate, the person managing the ride tells us that we’ll have to take another person in the carriage with us. this is fine until it’s revealed that this other person is a 10yro girl. 

lemme describe this girl for you: big, trusting eyes; dark skin; the sweetest smile; chocolate colored hair in a neat bob; matching shorts and top. basically she’s the most adorable small child i’ve ever seen. 

lex and i are 100% planning to spin the ride out of control. 

i am slightly worried for this child. maybe we shouldn’t do this. i really don’t want her to throw up, specifically on either lex or i bc we are idiots who live far away from the fair and yet brought no spare clothing despite the fact that fairs are messy places. to be fair, i also just really don’t want her to have a terrible time. but mostly the throwing up would be a downer. 

we spin the ride. 

for two seconds, i watch the small child with concern. and then she screams, the delighted kind, and i help lex turn the carriage into a poorly maintained and probably dangerous metal tornado. 

(s'all good, no one’s died at the fair in… years, probably. idk.) 

i’m pretty sure we made that kid’s day. we also probably made her parents want to kill us bc we definitely turned her into an adrenaline junkie. 

moving on. there’s a swing ride called the yo-yo. (yes, it’s exactly as terrifying as it sounds. the only ride that scares me more is the zipper.) lex initially doesn’t want to go on it bc tbh it’s a wee bit rundown. it’s an old fair, everything is a little broken, but this ride is like scarily old. but then she remembers some of the nostalgia or smth and we get in line. 

all the swings are individual seats, one in front of the other, around a thing that spins. a major fucking asshole sits in front of lex. 

i’m already scared out of my mind, no matter how fucking safe they claim to be those things do NOT feel secure, and then this guy? he starts swinging back and forth, trying to hit his girlfriend that’s sitting in front of him. he hits lex multiple times in the process. i was so close to strangling him but i really didn’t want to be arrested for murder and ruin an otherwise good day so i moved on. 

(also he and his gf spent the entire time before the ride got started making out????? like wow. can there be a limit on pda? like please? chill out.) 

you remember that dragon from earlier? let’s get back to it. 

okay, actually, one more aside. it’s time for lunch. lex and i have realized too late that fair food is fucking expensive. we spent all our money getting day passes so we could ride every single ride available to us. lex is a bottomless pit and i don’t eat much, but even i’m hungry. 

we do the obvious thing and beg my dad to drive out to the fair and give us money for food.

(yes, we had passes. this means we could’ve left and come back. no, we did not do that. in our defense, going home would’ve taken like an hour and then add in food prep time and actually eating it and then coming back? yeah, no. fair only comes once a year. it’s ride or die.) 

my dad gives us way too much money. yep, his mistake. like. giving a large amount of cash to teens wandering around a fair? not smart. 

despite the fact that we were both starving, it’s also fucking boiling out. we aren’t as hungry as we think we are. so we split a poutine and still have a ridiculous amount of money left. 

back to the dragon. 

we’d gone up to one of the stalls before and asked what we had to do to win one. the lady is old and kinda grumpy, probs not super happy about working around screaming kids, so instead of telling us how many balloons we had to pop to get a dragon (the information we were looking for) she tells us how much money to just straight up buy it. 

i’m hard of hearing and have problems processing auditory input so i do not hear what the price is. this is before lunch and i have fourteen dollars. 

she walks over while we’re trying to count out how much change i have and then shakes her head. she did not say fourteen dollars. she said forty. anxiety kicks in and it’s suddenly the worst moment of my life. 

after lunch, we have forty dollars leftover. we march up to the lady and i would love to say we shoved forty dollars in her face but we did not. we crouched over her counter for about ten minutes trying to figure out what combination of change equaled forty dollars. then i awkwardly poured it into her hand. 

she’s going to just give us the dragon but apparently she has to keep up the ruse bc she drops a handful of darts on the counter. we have eight darts between us and we have paid forty dollars. all i want is the dragon. 

we each throw four darts. it’s horribly sad to pay forty dollars and get a measly eight darts. but hey, the economy is shit. we are also shit. as in, we are awful shots. i think we managed to pop a total of three balloons. it’s far more likely that we only popped two. 

i tell myself that we aren’t paying for the darts, we’re paying for a dragon. 

the lady hands us a dragon. i forget that anything bad has ever happened to me in my life. i am so fucking overjoyed to have a dragon. like damn. 

the rest of this story happens much, much later. 

it’s about 7pm. lex and i have decided to go on one last ride and then leave. we’re both wearing shorts, have no jackets, and it’s getting cold out. so we get in line for the himalaya. 

(to explain, it’s kinda like a roller coaster but it only goes around a little circular track. they play really, really loud music the entire time the ride is going. it’s awful and amazing. esp bc they play weird shit like gangam style and old justin beiber songs. it’s weird. the ride spins forward for half a song and then backwards for the last half. there’s usually a guy standing by to make sure that everything runs smoothly but he also has another purpose. he sits there with his hands out and high fives as many people as he can. it’s amazing but as the lighter person i’m never on the outer edge so i can almost never reach him and it’s upsetting.) 

we’re waiting in line for the himalaya. we’re both tired. we’ve been here for six hours. both quiet. and then lex screams. 

she’s seen our friend chris on the ride. we did not know chris was there, had no plans to meet up with him. and chris is kind of awesome and bubbly and just all around a pretty cool dude. we both love him. 

so clearly, we spend the next couple of minutes making funny faces at chris every time the ride brings him closer to us. it’s what friends do. 

when chris gets off the ride, he’s here with some other people that we barely know but that isn’t important, we make plans to ride the himalaya together as our final ride. lex and i get on the ride and we’ll meet up later. 

(before then, we also persuade him to ride the tilt-a-whirl with us and scare the shit out of him by spinning it as hard as we can. there’s videos of him just screaming. it’s pretty great.) 

then it’s the last ride of the night. the himalaya. 

we all get in line. 

after such a good day, something just had to go wrong. 

we’re getting pretty close to the start of the line and there’s a pretty decent gap in the line bc it’s late and everyone’s lazy so lines tend to be disorganized. a group of teens is kinda chilling next to the line and they do the unthinkable. they attempt to slide into the line just ahead of us. 

this brings us to the part of the story where chris almost gets in a fight. 

chris may be an airhead but he absolutely will not stand for shit like that so he just holds his arm out in front of him like a shield and tells them to go to the back of the line. the teens do not take this super well. 

incorrigible as ever, they still jump the line but this time they end up just behind us in the line. everything is fine. and then the ‘leader’ starts talking shit at chris, backed up by his boys. 

(i should mention that chris is trans, pre-t, and fucking tiny. he also lacks comon sense. for all that he may be like three years older than me, he will always be my little brother.) 

so when the leader says, “if you ever fucking touch me again, i’ll grope your ass,” we all get a little defensive. also bc the guy’s a dick. 

there’s two kids in line behind us and in front of them. lex has noticed them, i did not. they’re middle schoolers. clearly. they’re full of energy, dancing and dabbing and just generally being walking, talking memes. lex is also a memelord. these are her people. so she turns to them and asks them to annoy the shit outta the guys behind them. 

being annoying middle schoolers who love chaos, they comply. 

at some point they ask us how old we all are. now, remember how i said chris is fucking tiny? he tells them he’s 21 and they don’t believe it. and of course, i’m 19 but i look 12 so they don’t believe me either. 

chris and i are both fucking extra so we dig out our wallets to present our id cards to these kids. and my wallet is a wee bit of a disaster. i’m also clumsy. so when i try to get it back in the bag, it doesn’t end well. i decide to just carry it with me on the ride and it’s all going great until i trip. all the cards spill out. 

now there’s this guy and i’ve seen him on several rides. he’s wearing sunglasses and a frown. i have not seen him smile all day. he also keeps texting during rides with is baffling to me. ENJOY THE DAMN RIDE. 

just giving you context so he’s clearly established as a douche. 

i trip right next to his car. as i’m struggling to pick up the contents of my wallet, he turns to me and says, “how many fucking cards do you need?" 

i’m not proud, but here’s my response: "how many fucking cards does your mom need?!” then i walked away. and keep in mind that half of my cards are still on the floor as i make my exit. (luckily lex grabbed them.) 

with that nonsense over, we attempt to get on the ride. 

now, i’m a fucking twig with legs and i’ve already said that chris is tiny. we figure that all of us will fit in the one car. we have forgotten to factor in lex’s fucking gigantic hips. she cannot fit in the car with us. so she gets out and looks around and spots them. 

the middle schoolers, they’re sitting behind us. 

lex approaches their car and says, i kid you not, “move fuckers, i’m getting in.” respectful of their meme elder, they allow this. 

we figure that’s enough adventure for one day so lex and i start to leave the fair. it’s been a long day. we are very tired. i say, wistfully, “damn, we should’ve gotten a picture with the meme children.” lex and i turn to each other, communicating non-verbally, and simultaneously turn to head back into the fairgrounds. 

and that’s the story of how i ended up following two children on instagram. 

[sportsandfitnessinfo]

New Post has been published on http://fitnessandhealthpros.com/foods/what-to-consider-when-deciding-what-to-spend-on-food/

What to Consider When Deciding What to Spend on Food

Farmers market it Portland, OR

Money is a touchy subject. Even without bringing up finances directly, people like me who encourage others to eat Real Food often get branded as elitist out of hand.

I get it. Finding and affording fresh food can be difficult or impossible for some people, and that is heartbreaking. But I don’t think that should make the entire subject off limits.

Food is a complex topic that includes issues related to health, economics, culture, human rights, animal welfare and the environment/sustainability. We also need to make food decisions multiple times a day in order to survive.

I consider all these things when deciding what to purchase for myself and my family, and know first hand what kinds of tradeoffs come up when choosing what to eat. Over the years both my priorities and financial means have changed dramatically, and ultimately evolved into the system I use today.

Here I’ll take you through my thought process in making food decisions, including how I’ve adapted to lower and higher income levels.

Of course none of this is intended as a judgement or condemnation on anyone else’s decisions. Everyone’s values are personal and equally valid, and obviously you need to do what works for you and your family.

My goal here is to shed some light on a difficult subject and hope it provides some clarity for those who are trying to make heads or tails of these issues.

But first a bit about me

For context you should know that I don’t come from money, and even calling my family middle class is a stretch. While I grew up in a decent suburban neighborhood, my family sometimes needed help from our church putting food on the table. My dad lived his entire adult life without owning a bank account, let alone a savings account. We did our best, but often had to sell things to make rent.

When I got to college (paid for by scraping together scholarships, student loans and a few jobs), money was really tight. My dad would send me fifty bucks when he could, but there was never any real safety net. It wasn’t unusual for me to live on eggs and canned tuna for the last week of the month. The dieter in me found this to be only moderately inconvenient.

At the time my main priority in food shopping was low price. I shopped at Costco and Trader Joe’s and thought organics were a scam to take money from chemophobic hippies (I know! LOL). I ate a lot of cheap takeout, which in Berkeley was still pretty good, if only moderately healthy.

In grad school things changed a lot. I started becoming a foodist, learned about Real Food and discovered the farmers market. I was a recipient of a fancy NSF graduate fellowship grant that afforded me a luxurious salary of $ 30,000/year, but because I was living in San Francisco I was still spending over 30% of my income on rent.

Still I ate pretty great. The Ferry Plaza Farmers Market in SF is one of the best farmers markets in the US, if not the world. I know a lot of people who consider it ludicrously expensive, but that was not my experience at all.

Yes, it’s possible to pay $ 4.50 for a peach, but it will be the best peach you’ve ever eaten. More important is that I could pack a bag full of kale, radishes, squash, onions, carrots, herbs and other incredible seasonal produce for $ 30. Fruit, especially ripe seasonal fruit, is expensive. Vegetables are cheap. I actually saved money during this period by cooking way more at home and cutting down on how often I ate meat. I also felt amazing and lost 12 lbs.

Things really changed after I graduated, wrote Foodist and got married. Suddenly I could afford steak and sit-down restaurants whenever I wanted, but by then my priorities had shifted as well.

I had never had to worry much about the ethics of eating before I had disposable income. I mostly bought produce from local organic farmers, a convenient luxury that was a byproduct of where I lived. I knew that industrial meat and dairy production were terrible for the environment and a disgusting form of cruelty to animals, but I couldn’t afford it anyway so there wasn’t any conflict. My biggest splurges were an occasional wedge of fancy cheese and wild Alaskan smoked salmon.

Now that more animal products were literally and figuratively back on the table for me, I wanted to make the most responsible choices I could.

There’s no way around it, ethical food costs more money.

Conventional produce is cheaper because big industrial farms exploit workers (sometimes as literal slave laborers) and demolish the environment with cheap petroleum-based fertilizers and Monsanto’s pesticides and herbicides. Smaller organic farmers must spend the time and energy tending to the soil to keep it healthy, and diversify their fields to prevent weed and bug infestations. More time and resources means more money to produce the same amount of food, and higher prices at the market.

Farmers market fruit tastes better because it is grown in season and picked while ripe, making losses due to bruising much more common. Organic certifications are also expensive. Even more cost.

Grass-fed beef and pasture-raised poultry and eggs require more (higher-quality) land, better feed, and sanitary living conditions. Farmers also face more difficulty and expense in processing these products, because they lack economies of scale. Again, these all cost more.

When I was a brokeass grad student I cared about these issues, but opting out was easy because I couldn’t afford it. Now that I can afford higher-quality, ethically produced products I’m happy to pay extra for the farmers who care enough to grow the best crops and for the animals I eat to live a decent life.

I’m also willing to spend a little extra time sourcing those products, which are not always easy to find.

San Francisco makes a foodist’s life easy, but I’ve found it much more difficult to eat to these standards in New York. Restaurants and grocers that source sustainable, ethically-raised food exist, but it isn’t the default like it is in the Bay Area and I often have to take looooong extra trips to find what I want. And I live in bougie Williamsburg.

I find myself preferring to cook at home even more in NYC than I did in SF, largely because I’m unsure of where restaurants sources their ingredients and it’s kind of obvious they aren’t amazing. A lot of the time I end up eating vegetarian so I don’t have to worry about it.

These experiences have led to me to create a mental hierarchy for my priorities when choosing what to eat. It isn’t perfect, and I make exceptions often, but it helps me to have a framework to think about these issues since I eat pretty darn often.

My priorities when buying food

1. Health

My personal energy (and I’d bet yours too) is highly dependent on how I fuel my body. If I’m not eating a wide array of different kinds of vegetables, legumes, grains and seafood/meats I feel lethargic and foggy, and will usually get sick.

Since feeling crappy impacts 100% of my other responsibilities in life, eating a diverse assortment of Real Foods is my number one priority when it comes to grocery and meal selection.

This has some implications. If I’m traveling or even very busy I don’t always eat local/seasonal/organic/sustainable. I try to avoid these scenarios, but when it comes down to it I’ll take what I can get.

It also means that sometimes I pay stupid prices for room service salads if greens have been hard to come by.

2. Quality

Quality is a very close second to health, largely because they are often related. As someone who prioritizes health to the point where my daily nutrition is almost always well-balanced, quality is often the deciding factor in choosing a specific meal.

What I mean by quality is close to what I mean by Real Food. To me, quality food has been crafted with care and fashioned from real ingredients, rather than mass produced in a factory. However, quality doesn’t always correlate with the healthiest choice.

If I’m traveling in Texas and have a choice between an artisan brisket sandwich from a world class family owned restaurant or a salad from Starbucks, I’ll take the sandwich on most days and hope there isn’t too much sugar in the coleslaw. That said, I wouldn’t make a choice like that two meals in a row, so health still wins down the stretch.

On the ethics side I am not going to repeatedly buy bad tasting chocolate just because it is fair trade. Ideally I’d find a delicious fair trade chocolate, but if I’m bothering with chocolate at all it had better be tasty.

3. Ethics/sustainability

I want to live in a world where the people who grow our food are respected and earn a living wage, and where we don’t pretend animals raised for food are less sentient than pets we keep at home. There are people who raise food this way, and I consider it an honor (not a luxury) to support their work.

I understand that it is not practical to demand this standard for 100% of the food I eat. Ethical and sustainable food is still sadly hard to find in most locations, and can be prohibitively expensive for many people.

That said, I would encourage anyone who does have the means to consider supporting ethical and sustainable food whenever possible. Our support is they only way these practices will be able to grow and reach more people.

I hope to see a day where sustainable food is ubiquitous enough that I can move it to #2 or #1 on this list.

4. Price

When it comes down to it I don’t want low-quality, unhealthy or unsustainable food, so even at a super low price it isn’t worth buying.

That said, it also drives me bonkers when restaurants and grocery stores try to sell mediocre food at artisan prices. I can tell the difference you jerks!

For me, as long as pricing seems fair (or I’m completely desperate for something green) I’m willing to pay for food that fuels my body and soul, and supports my values. I don’t consider stores like Whole Foods a rip off, because they are working so hard to offer transparency where nobody else will. In fact, I’m happy to support their mission.

It’s unfortunate that so many of us need to make such tough decisions in order to feed ourselves and our families. As always, all we can do is our best.

What factors do you consider when deciding what to spend your food dollars on?

Originally at :Summer Tomato Written By : Darya Rose