Peer Response #2

In Lisa's blog, Real Food vs. Fake Food, she shares a story of when her parents started going on the Atkin's diet. Her parents went on the diet, and started to replace foods that are normally full of carbs, with substitute foods that lack carbs. Atkin's diet is when the carbohydrate intake is reduced in the diet in order to lose weight. Carbohydrates are a necessity and the some studies have shown that the Atkin's diet is not very healthy. Lisa goes on to talk about how her parents replaced spaghetti, which is full of carbs and starch, with a version that contains few carbs. She described the new, less-carb spaghetti as grainy, smelling like shoes, and an anvil in her stomach. Lisa said she would never eat the spaghetti again, and noticed many other foods her parents bought that were not in it's "real" form. The real form of food, in Lisa's case, were the foods that contained it's original nutrients, carbs, and starch. The foods her parents would buy contained artificial ingredients and some nutrients to replace the carbs that were taken out of it.

I whole-heartedly agree with Lisa. The food she described does not sound delicious. Eating should not be a painful process, and the spaghetti she described sounded painful. Lisa experienced first-hand the effects of "fake" food because her parents went through a diet that included many foods that were not in it's normal state. I agree with her arguments and I feel as if nobody should have to eat foods that are manipulated to reach a certain level for a diet.

Prepare a Meal

I would like to describe how to prepare stuffed green peppers. This is one of my favorite meals and one that my parents have made for me numerous times while growing up. This recipe has many different variations. This specific one I am going to show you today makes 6 stuffed green peppers, which can feed 4-6 people, depending on how hungry someone is and the size of the peppers. The ingredients, which can be found at any local grocery store, include 1.5 lbs lean ground beef, 1 onion (optional), 3/4 cup uncooked white rice, 3/4 cup water, 1 14.5 oz can of diced tomatoes with the juice, 1 14.5 oz can stewed tomatoes, 1 jar spaghetti sauce, and 6 large green bell peppers.

The baking steps are pretty simple. First, heat the ground beef and onion over medium heat in a large skillet or pot. Once they are brown, add the rice, water, diced and stewed tomatoes. Some salt and pepper can be added here for flavor, and then it is heated until the rice is tender. At this point, the oven should be preheated to 325 degrees F.

The green peppers can now be washed, tops cut off, and the seeds cleaned out. Now, fill the peppers with the meat mixture. The green peppers are then put in a casserole dish where they should stand up. Cook those in the preheated oven for 20 minutes or until the peppers are at a tender state.

After taking the green peppers out of the oven, heated spaghetti sauce can be poured lightly on top to add flavor, along with some shredded cheese if desired. In total, it takes about 20 minutes to prepare and 20 or more to cook.

I would add a side dish to top off this meal. I would probably add some sort of vegetable and/or salad to make it complete. Some easy variations can include using ground turkey instead of ground beef, which will reduce some of the fat. I love red peppers and have used those for this recipe. Red peppers are just a little sweeter.

Each step of the preparation is important. It is necessary to have clean, fresh vegetables and to cook the meat fully. After this meal, I feel very satisfied. This food is not too dense or heavy where I feel full to the point of sickness. I also feel very satisfied and accomplished because I made the meal myself.

Michael Pollan discusses the growing effect of processed foods and grabbing on the go. Americans, in general, are very busy and tend to grab processed, unhealthier foods when they do not have time to make a meal. This is becoming a problem because people do not receive all the nutrients they need and consequently their health declines. The meal I just made took less than an hour for food preparation and cooking, which was worth the time. I usually have leftovers when I make this meal, and that is a good use of food when you're a busy person. This blog, called Priceless, shares a good article about fast food menu's that can back up my Michael Pollan's opinion. I found a lot of it interesting, especially when it broke down the techniques used by Starbucks in it's menu. I believe some people chose to ignore the importance of eating a good meal. I agree with Michael Pollan and I think it is truly important to enjoy what you eat and take care of your body.

Demo Speech Self Eval

In my demonstration speech I showed the class how to use an erg machine. These motions directly correlate to the motions in rowing. This topic can be relevant to anybody who attends UW-Madison because we have very successful crew teams. Erging is also a very good workout, although most people do not know how to use the machine correctly.

From watching my speech, I think I could improve the informational content. The steps that I chose to convey are broken down and easy to follow. However, when I demonstrated them, I should have slowed down. I do not think I demonstrated the steps on the erg enough times for my audience to fully understand them. I believe I explained rowing in the best of my ability in the time allotted. There were a lot of questions at the end of my speech, but I suppose that is because rowing is a very unique and detailed sport, which some people do not know a lot about.

During my speech, it seemed as if my volume was loud enough and my eye contact was good. In the future, I would want to stand behind a podium or a table of some sort because my body language was not good. When I was speaking to the class and not demonstrating, I was not able to stand still. I changed my stance frequently, which made me look more nervous than I was. I think my enthusiasm for the topic was good; that sort of thing just comes across when you are passionate for a topic. My visual aids were also very relevant and effective in my speech. I don’t think everyone was able to see me demonstrate on the erg because of the tables in the class and next time I would move the tables. I would also make sure my video comes in clear next time, because it was blurry on the big screen.

I would choose this topic again because it is a big part of my life that I am passionate about. The only significant changes I would make are my stance and the clarity of my video. I do not think I would add anything. Below I added a link to my speech.

Rowing Demo Speech

Peer Response #1

I picked Daniel's blog about Brett Favre's hyundai commercial to write about. The celebrity endorsement he decided to analyze was Brett Favre endorsing hyundai cars. In this commercial, a 50 year-old Brett is shown getting the MVP award for the 2020 super bowl. Favre talks about how it is for hard for him to take orders from people being that old. Then he goes on to talk about possibly retiring. Hyundai makes fun of Brett Favre so they could go on to say that while Brett's future might be unknown, Hyundai promises to be there. Daniel talks about how this commercial could be successful and he found another blogger who enjoyed the commercial as well. I agree this commercial could be successful because the general public have been interested in Brett and his retirement fiascos. Hyundai does a nice job of contrasting themselves to Brett and describing themselves as reliable. Daniel gave a good description of the celebrity endorsement, while sharing his opinion on the commercial and it's possible success.

Analysis of a Celebrity Endorsement

The 2010 Winter Olympics just wrapped up, but during this short time Vick's made use of the athletes' publicity by contracting Apolo Anton Ohno and Lindsey Jacobellis for their commercials. Apolo Anton Ohno, a successful olympic speed skater, endorses both nyquil and dayquil commercials. Nyquil and dayquil are made by Vick's and are cold and flu medicine that come in both liquid and tablet form.

I think Ohno is the perfect person to have endorse a product right now. He was recently very successful in the winter olympics, which was watched by large part of the population. Ohno needs to stay healthy at all times, especially when he is racing, so the commercials show him in his racing gear, or with his racing bags ready to go for the olympics. The commercials are trying to show that Vick's cold and flu medicine is keeping him healthy. This campaign is fairly new but I believe this could be very successful. I don't think it will have a long-term success rate, but I imagine it would be successful as long as the olympics are fresh in people's heads.

Here are his dayquil and nyquil commercials. This website talks about olympic endorsements and says Apolo Anton Ohno has already been successful in his endorsement deals. It also explains how it is harder for U.S. olympians that are not on a national team, like NFL or NHL, to receive corporate support because they do not compete as often as other athletes. The article also mentions olympians like Shaun White and Lindsey Vonn.

Link pertaining to expos. paper subject

I linked to an NFL retired players page, which has similar topics to what I am covering in my expository paper about the long-term affects of the sport, and specifically, concussions.