I guess it really depends on your definition of health. Do you think that your child should chomp down taffy that contain the same amount of caffeine as a cup of coffee? Is that healthy? Or what about souped up jelly beans, that are injected with electrolytes? Does that change them from candy to nutritious snack?

No, this is not science fiction. Apparently, the candy industry feels it’s being left out of the move towards better health and eating habits, so they’re trying to resell candy as an essential nutrient by adding “health benefits” to their product. Is that pathetic or what. Candy is candy, accept it for what it is. No one is going to buy a jelly beans because they contain a few milligrams of vitamin C.

I feel that way about some diet foods. Take low-cal cheesecake. Can anything be more disgusting? If you’re going to eat cheesecake, then eat a slice of cheesecake, and not a sad watered down low calorie version. The purpose of eating a slice of cheesecake is to indulge in a decadent snack, and eating a modified version isn’t going to satisfy. Just eat the damn thing, enjoy it, be happy, and return to green salads and grapefruits tomorrow.

Anyway, about candy. Read on:

The candy industry is setting its sights on fitness buffs and kids. At this summer’s largest candy trade show, several new lines of “energy enhancing” candies were released in an effort to capture a piece of the $3 billion/year consumers spend on performance boosters. New product lines included jelly beans packed with 120 milligrams of electrolytes and taffy pieces containing the equivalent of one coffee cup worth of caffeine in each bite. “I don’t think that the new products belong in the candy aisle,” said Cynthia Sass, a registered dietitian and spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association. “The use of stimulants is an even greater concern because they can cause dangerous increases in a person’s heart rate and blood pressure.” Larry Graham, president of the National Confectioners Association, disagrees, saying the candy industry has every right to “build healthful benefits into their candy.”

Read the article at CNN.com

A trim, maybe a shave. That’s what barbers do, right? You know, the guys who cut hair for $2 a shot before it became trendy to spend $200 on a haircut.

But back in the good old days, a barber was more a jack of all trades. A bloody jack. In the 16th century, barbers did the majority of surgery including bloodletting, pulling of teeth, treating bone fractures and external ulcers. I guess they figured that if someone could cut hair and shave a beard, then they could cut and shave other parts of the body. King Henry VIII of England, better known as the guy who liked to behead his wives, was a patient of one of the barber-surgeons, Thomas Vicary. I guess he was so thrilled with his treatment (maybe he had blood drained from his brain?), that he allowed Vicary to talk him into making barbers officially surgeons.

So on this date in , 1540, old King Henry established the United Barber-Surgeon Company and decreed that two hanged criminals a year would be given to the organization for learning anatomy. I suppose that handing over fresh corpses was better than digging up graves for bodies. The group’s symbol, the familiar red and white barber’s pole, signified bandaging and bleeding. And here I always thought it resembled a candy cane. Well, live and learn.