Around this time last year, my dad went to a health conference with the company he works for, General Electric. At the conference were a number of other companies, all which were presenting some sort of new health and fitness product. One of these companies included Nike, who was presenting their new device called Nike FuelBand. Nike FuelBands are “bracelets” that you wear throughout the day from when you wake up to when you go to sleep, which track your energy output that day. You figure out a daily goal, and the FuelBand tracks your active movement and displays them as “fuel points” in which you can achieve in order to meet your goal. Everyone at the conference got these bracelets for free, and my dad has been addicted ever since. 

As a little kid, when I was asked to think about what life would be like in the future, flying cars always came to mind. When you were a little kid, did you ever think “I can’t wait to have a car that drives for me?” Not as likely, but it’s definitely a possible concept! I remember watching the James Bond 007 movies as a kid and seeing all of the cool technology that James Bond got for his job, like pens that have cameras, night vision sunglasses, and of course cars that drove themselves! I always wondered when I would see things like these in real life, and now cars that drive themselves have turned into a reality!

Have you ever had a veggie burger? Chances are, the answer is yes. Veggie burgers are are essentially a soy and vegetable product with added spices that attempt to mimic the flavor and texture of a real meat burger. Many people only think of veggie burgers when it comes to artificial meat, however, nowadays there are a TON of other options up for grabs. A veggie burger is no longer your only option, stores now sell “meatless” chicken nuggets, bacon, breakfast sausages, ground beef, hot dogs, and more! There is now much more to chose from, and these options are also getting closer and closer to mimicking the actual texture and taste of the meat product, so you can hardly even tell it’s not meat! Vegetarians and non vegetarians alike are beginning to realize how incredible the new technology is becoming for the meatless meat market. 

As promised in my last blog, I have decided to write a blog on the health benefits of Guinness. My family is very Irish and always have plenty of Guinness on hand because according to my grandparents and my great grandparents, “a Guinness a day keeps the doctor away”. According to the article, Beer With Benefits: 4 Reasons to Drink Guinness, my family has been right all along, there are a bunch of reasons why the beer is good for your health! 

Growing up, my parents were very lenient and open about alcohol, as long as it was in our own home or I was with them. Coming from a very Irish family, I grew up with my grandparents offering my Guinness on holidays when I was all but 14 years old, saying “if you want to be healthy and live a long life like me, you better drink your Guinness!”. It seemed like such an odd thing to say to me back then, when I was being taught how terrible alcohol is for you in health class at school. However, there has recently been a lot of research on the benefits of some alcohol, and my grandparents have been proven right! Guinness, along with red wine, actually have a lot of health benefits. In this article I will only be focusing on the health benefits of Red Wine, but don’t you fret, I will be doing an article on the health benefits of Guinness next!

Recently, my friend told me about this new fad called “drone shipping” that Amazon has been buzzing about. Amazon is calling this new technology in which they would like to reveal by 2015 “Amazon Prime Air”. This is a concept in which Amazon would receive an order online, an employee would place it in a plastic box and then it would be transported on a conveyer belt to get picked up by a small drone that will then fly it directly to the persons house. If you would like to see exactly how Amazon pictures “Amazon Prime Air”, check out this video! Almost looks too good to be true, right? Well, it may be.

As we all know, Penn State has a huge drinking culture. All of you are probably used to seeing girls in high heels stumbling down Beaver Ave, drinking jungle juice and natty light, and waking up at the crack of dawn football Saturdays to start tailgating. Although drinking and partying does not define us here at Penn State, it is a big aspect of the PSU college experience. However, have you ever wondered what it would be like going to school at Penn State or even in general if the drinking age was still 18? Our lives would be completely different…in a good way.

I could go on and on about all the reason why every state in this country should implement an 18 year old drinking age, but that would take more than just this blog. So, I will limit myself to why having an 18 year old drinking age would benefit both the establishment of Penn State and the students of Penn State.

1. School-Run Parties and Social Events

Yes, I know most of you are thinking to yourselves right now, “Is this girl crazy?” It sounds awful and boring at first, but think about what it was like when your parents went to school. The schools put on a lot of parties for students. I can remember my mom telling me stories of her college throwing giant parties in the lobbies of residence halls, cafeterias, commons areas and banquet halls. She told me each one of these parties had multiple kegs of beer, loud music, dancing, cool lights, and food. I remember laughing as she recalled stumbling from the elevator to her dorm room after these parties. I don’t know about you, but that sounds PRETTY prime to me….

2. Much Less of a Chance of Getting Alcohol Poisoning and Drugged

Okay, I’ll start off with alcohol poisoning. There have been countless times when I have seen people take a ton of shots, shotgun beers and then chug Franzia all within a matter of an hour in order to pregame. Whether it be a party or a football game, the point is to get as drunk as possible as fast as possible, which has some serious risks. As fun as it is to get drunk and have fun with your friends, we as college students shouldn’t have to practically kill our bodies to have fun. Lowering the drinking ago would drastically reduce the need for us to binge drink for the following reasons…

• Beaver Stadium would be able to sell beer in the stadium, which would eliminate students’ need to drink as much as they can before going into the stadium, making drinking safer
• Students could go to the bars as well as apartments, houses and frats. This eliminates the need to drink as much as you can at the first place that you go to for the night in fear that they will run out of alcohol, also making the drinking habits of students safer
• Students would be able to go out and purchase their own alcohol to consume instead of having to drink jungle juice at frats and risk getting roofied. Ex: Pregame with friends before going out then drink beer at a frat
• Just better quality alcohol in general!!

3. The Penn State Social Scene and Culture would be More Unified

Now, I am in a sorority, and I have to admit, Greek life in general is very inclusive. A lot of Greeks stick to themselves and don’t talk to people who aren’t Greek. A lot of times, people in Greek life end up doing the same thing over and over again every night. Pregame, Social, Party, Late Night, etc. etc. I’ve got to admit, after a while, it gets boring! If the drinking age was 18, a lot of people in Greek like would go to the bars as well and not spend all of their time in fraternities. The students at Penn State would begin to spread out their social lives throughout all aspects at Penn State and begin to get to know each other better!

As you can tell, this is only a very small glimpse into what life would be like if the drinking age was lowered. If you want to find out about all the pros and cons of lowering the drinking age, check out this article on procon.org!

If you read my initial blog post, you know that I am very into eating local and supporting local farms. For me, this is the most important aspect of my life that involves the environment. Some peoeple put emphasis on recycling, others on eating only organic or no meats. I truly believe that eating local foods is what will help us “save the world”.  For a lot of people, taking that step towards eating local is a difficult one. It’s so easy to just go to the supermarket and pick up a container of Tyson chicken breasts. However, in this post I will show you how eating local isn’t as hard ad you think!

Look up Local Farmers Markets

The best website out there for locating farms near you is called Local Harvest. Here, you can look up anything from farmers markets, meat processors, grocery stores, restaurants, and actual farms near you. It is the easiest process ever! From here, you will be able to find whatever you are looking for. I find that this website is best used for finding farmers markets and farms. If you are skeptical about finding farmers markets near you, don’t fret, I can assure you, there will be at least five within a 10-15 mile radius of you! With just this website alone, you can take care of all of the produce you need, as well as some meat (with the meat processors option) and sometimes even dairy.

What you Tend to not Find at a Farmers Market

Okay, so you have all of your produce and some meats and dairy taken care of. Now it’s time to talk about what you (typically) cannot find at a farmers markey, which is everything besides those. For example, pasta, granola bars, cereal, juice, etc. What I reccommend for finding the most local and sustainable products is as follows…

1. Look up “natural food stores” near your location: you will most of the time be pleasantly surprised to find that there is one near you!

2. Whole Foods

3. Trader Joes

4. Fresh Market

Typically, all four of these vendors will carry a much larger variety of local (and organic) foods than your normal grocery store. A lot of times, they will be specials or they will be in a different spot than you would normally find them, with a note written next you it saying where it is from near you!

A list of Organic Products that I Enjoy

These brands use small, fair-trade farms and farmers for creating their products

• Applegate Farms (meat, usually frozen)
• Amy’s Kitchen (frozen meals)
• Earthbound Farm (mostly fruits & veggies)
• Simply Organic (grains, sauces, dressings, beans)
• Organic Valley (milk, eggs, butter, cheese)

Finally, I want to leave you with one last thing that I have found very helpful. Yale did a Sustainable Food Purchasing Guide that goes over everything you need to know about finding reliable sources of local and sustainable food. It’s an AWESOME guide for beginners in the sustainable food world. I hope this article was helpful and that it convinced at least some of you to try to start eating local, sustainable and organic!

Have you ever searched for that perfect app and been so happy when you found just what you were looking for? Whether it be a recipe finder app, a game, or a picture editor, there is literally an app out there for almost everything. After being an iPhone user for four years now, I have put together my list of my favorite apps that I think are most useful and also an app that I can’t find but would LOVE to see. 

I’m sure most of you are wondering what my title means. Carve? Carve meat? No. Carve snow. Or in the words of Google dictionary…