Bottled Water

Today in class, we talked about “consumption”, and we discussed the difference between “wants” and “needs”. Somehow, the conversation swung to bottled water. I immediately sat up straight and was focused throughout the entire discussion. Even though I didn’t participate in the discussion, it was very interesting to hear everyone’s comments/thoughts on bottled water. After the discussion about bottled water was over, I started to form ideas about what I was going to write my blog entry on. Here’s what I came up with:

In Winter Quarter 2008, I took a course called Water Quality Management taught by Professor Stefan Wuertz. For part of the first homework assignment, he had us compare the price of tap water per 1,000 gallons with the price of bottled water (any brand since they are all about the same price) per 1,000 gallons. He gave us the price of tap water as $0.88 per 1,000 gallons, which is the cost of City of Davis municipal water (I assume this is correct, but it can be easily checked on any water bill). For the prices of the bottled water, I called Safeway, and the person on the other end helpfully provided the prices for the products. Here were the results:

Bottled Water:

50 fluid ounces bottles costs about $3,046 for 1,000 gallons

2-gallon containers costs about $1,645 for 1,000 gallons

The price of bottled water is about 3,450 times more expensive than drinking tap water, and if the bottled water is bought in bulk (2-gallon containers), it is still about 1,850 times more expensive. Ridiculous. And here’s the kicker, most of the bottled water is just reprocessed tap water from different locations in the US. Also, the myth that bottled water is somehow healthier than tap water is untrue. I highly recommend clicking on that link, but if you don’t have time, then I’ll just summarize it quickly:

1. Tap water is just as germ-free and healthy as bottled water.
2. Tap water tastes fine.

This reaffirms what I learned about tap water in Water Quality Design taught by Professor Jeannie Darby. Tap water is fine. The US wouldn’t let cities distribute water that is full of germs and that is going to make people sick.

If you’re complaining about the taste of Davis water, you have a somewhat legitimate gripe. Davis water is considered hard, but I’m sure you’ll get used to it if you drink it often enough. I used to think it tasted a little funny, but it doesn’t bother me anymore.

So, here’s what you should do. Buy a plastic, permanent water bottle or get an empty bottle and fill it up with tap water before you go to school (You can wash the bottle out or use a new bottle every week or so, if you are worried about germs accumulating in your bottle, but I have been using the same bottle for a year, and I’m fine) That way, you still have that refreshing water that is just as healthy as regular bottled water, but you are saving money. Yay!

Wisdom Tooth

Last Thursday, I had my bottom-right wisdom tooth pulled out. I was surprised how quick it took Dr. Follmar (who, in my opinion, looks kind of like Brian Dennehy) to pull the tooth out. I spent 15 minutes in the waiting room, 15 minutes in the check up room watching an informative video about wisdom teeth removal and getting the right side of my mouth numbed up, and only about 2 minutes getting the tooth pulled out. After I got my tooth pulled out, Dr. Follmar put a piece of gauze in my mouth at the spot of the tooth extraction, and he told me to apply pressure on the gauze to help form a blood clot to stop the bleeding. Then, a nurse gave me an ice pack to apply to my jaw (to reduce the swelling) and told me verbal instructions about what I should do when I got home. She also gave me a bag with a small bottle of hydrogen peroxide, fresh gauze, and some cotton swabs. The bag also contained a sheet of information with the instructions written down (that was good because I was sort of in a dazed fog when she was telling me), and also some additional instructions: No spitting (how hard can that be?), no straws (fine, I won’t use a straw), and no smoking (not a problem. I don’t smoke). When I got home, I read the instructions and followed them the best I could.

I removed the old gauze and had some milk to go with my antibiotic and pain pills (I wanted to eat something, but it’s really hard to open your mouth wide enough to eat anything when your mouth is all numb). After I finished eating came the hard part: I swished my mouth with warm salt water and I brushed my teeth (both without spitting). If you think it’s easy not to spit, go brush your teeth right now, and try to get the toothpaste out of your mouth without spitting. Maybe you think it isn’t that bad, but I found it annoying. The next thing I did was I soaked the cotton swab in the hydrogen peroxide and swabbed the tooth extraction area. After that was all done, I put in a fresh piece of gauze and got a fresh ice pack to hold to my jaw.

The first day was a pain because I had to constantly apply pressure on the gauze and I had to hold the ice pack up to my jaw all day. I couldn’t eat any type of food (I could if I really wanted to, but it would take me such a long time to eat one spoonful of food like applesauce, yogurt, etc. that I gave up and just drank things to satisfy my hunger), and I just had to sit there and stare at the wall because I couldn’t do anything else. No videogames because one hand was always occupied with the ice pack, no talking because I wasn’t understandable with my mouth all numb, and no tiring activity (I think that was a rule because they didn’t want blood circulation to cause the tooth extraction area to start bleeding). I couldn’t concentrate on a book, so I just watched TV, but since I don’t have cable with so many different channels to choose from, I got bored with my limited number of channels.

The second day was better. I cooked six scrambled eggs for breakfast to see if I could handle eating soft foods (which I could and which allowed me to slowly work my way back to regular foods). I ditched the gauze and ice pack (At that point, I didn’t care if my face swelled up, I wasn’t holding an ice pack to my jaw all day). My mouth wasn’t numb anymore, so I could communicate again. My mind cleared up and I was able to focus on reading. I played some Final Fantasy 12. I went to the gym. It seemed like a regular day.

I continued taking antibiotics until the prescription bottle was empty, but I stopped taking the pain pills on Wednesday. Plus, the pain wasn’t intense, so it didn’t bother me. The only thing that bothered me was the no spitting rule and the fact that I had to rinse with salt water and swab after every meal. That’s what I’ve had to do all this week.

Tomorrow at 9:45 AM is my follow up appointment with Dr. Follmar. I should have asked the nurse how long it would be until I could resume spitting right after she told me no spitting, but I didn’t. This time I will ask and hopefully Dr. Follmar will say that I can spit again.

Image

When I first learned that our next blog topic would require us to write about one word, I was scared. I am not a good writer. I have trouble writing an essay about a general topic that’s supposedly easy to write about, so how the heck am I supposed to write a paragraph about a single word?!?!? I’m not the type of person where ideas just spring up in my head. I’m the type who gets ideas, but not necessarily good ideas, after thinking long and hard about what to write. So, here goes nothing:

When I think of the word “Image”, I think of how people see objects. For example, when an individual (usually a famous one that is in the spotlight) talks about needing to clean up his/her image, he/she wants to change the way people see and think about him/her. I like to think that my image projects a nice guy who laughs or smiles when someone makes a joke in front of a group of people (no matter how stupid the joke is), politely listens to whoever is talking, never talks unless he absolutely has to, and wears clothes only for the sake of wearing clothes (translation: I’m not fashionable). BUT, image is not the true individual, and is only the picture behind which the true person hides. For instance, I may look like I have some muscle on my arms (If you look hard enough, you’ll see it) which might imply that I am strong. That’s wrong. I might be a little bit strong, but what you are seeing is called “mirror strength”. Mirror strength is when a person looks strong because he looks big, but in reality, is not as strong as imagined. I consider myself to be a good example of a guy with mirror strength. I’m trying to get true strength by going to the gym often, but it’s coming along slowly. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that I’m an average guy hiding behind an image of a relatively strong guy for his size.

So, image is … an image. It’s what people, who don’t know you, see you as. Only when the person really gets to know you, the image of you they see is actually what you truly are.

By the way, it’s not necessary to tell me that I’m not that big when you see me.

One-In-A-Million

My first blog entry details the experience of getting the book New Keywords edited by Tony Bennett, Lawrence Grossberg, and Meaghan Morris at the bookstore.

I arrived at the UC Davis campus at 9:30 AM to pay my summer session fees, but I learned from the woman in Dutton Hall that I only can use Discover credit cards or checks to pay my account balance. Since I only had a Visa credit card with me, I couldn’t pay my bills, so I left. It was still only 9:35, which was 25 minutes until the start of my UWP 101: Advanced Composition class, so I decided to go to the bookstore to get a notebook for class. After I found and purchased the notebook, which only took me about five minutes to do, I decided to walk to class and read The Hunt for Red October by Tom Clancy until class started. I started to walk to class, only to decide that I might as well get my summer school books since I was at the bookstore already. So, I walked back to the bookstore and went down the stairs to the basement to look for my books among the hundreds of other textbooks. After I found my books, I stood in line to pay for my books, and in a one-in-a-million chance, I got the same cashier that I earlier purchased the notebook from. I thought that was pretty amazing considering that there were about 10 cashiers and each customer is randomly distributed to the cashiers depending on how quickly the cashiers finished helping their previous customer. I just happened to get the same one I had a few minutes ago. Wow. She made the obligatory “Hey, weren’t you in here a minute ago?” comment, and I politely smiled. Once I put the books in my backpack, I headed over to Storer Hall, and since I was still early, I got in a couple pages of The Hunt for Red October before class started.