Is it Organic?

I was telling a patient recently to check out one of the new Asian supermarkets in town.  In the produce section, you can find wonderful greens, purple sweet potatoes, exotic mushrooms still growing in their little plastic tubs, and more.  “But they don’t have organic, do they?” my patient asked.  Not as much, I admitted, as say, Henry’s or Whole Foods.  But today I got my McDougall newsletter (sign...

McMansion Economics

In last Sunday’s Los Angeles Times there was an opinion piece written by three economists.  Entitled McMansion Economics, their essay points out that the size of the average American home has ballooned from 1700 square feet to over 2400 square feet since 1980.  Larger homes mean higher utility bills, more stuff and furnishings, a bigger mortgage.  They write, “if Americans are willing to rethink their assumptions about what their...

Excuse Me Miss, Your Diagnosis is Showing

A millennium ago, when I attended chiropractic college at what is now Southern California University of the Health Sciences, I had a professor I’ll never forget. Dr. Ahmed wore a long white lab coat and paced in front of his podium, admonishing us to pay attention. What if we missed only one class, one day in our lives, and that was the day he lectured on diagnosing appendicitis? A...