Back from Greece :( At least I Brought back a Tan!

I’m Back!

Well, I got back Monday night, very late, but I have been out of blog-mode for a couple of days. I still can’t believe I’m back in the U.S. Sighhhhhhhhh. I mean I missed you guys and all but I wouldn't have minded missing my plane. –Away from the beautiful beaches and breathtaking buildings. And the guys weren’t too bad to look at, either. Almost as cute as Italians.

As for the Mediterranean diet, I was a little shocked to see so many French fries. There were French fries in my gyros, with my fish, with my Greek salad and once I was shocked to find fries cooked INSIDE of my beef. I just ate too many French fries at lunch I need to stop writing about them it’s making me sick. Lots of starch- needless to say I probably didn’t order the healthiest Greek dishes, but hey I was on vacation. How did you do?

Everyone, well mostly everyone, in Greece however looked a lot healthier than we do in the U.S. weight wise. However, after being surrounded by a cloud of smoke for 9 days I think the reason they stay so skinny is because most Greeks, well 1/2 , are addicted to cigarettes. It was like the U.S. 50 years ago. People smoked EVERYWHERE. In offices, in restaurants, on ferries etc. etc. etc. I think I shaved off 5 years of my life from that 4 hours ferry trip to Santorini from the smoke. So cheers, thanks a lot Greeks.

The cigarette ads along the highways targeted mostly women and their drive to stay thin. One ad featured a cigarette called “Slim Line,” which already makes it sounds like a diet pill, and pictured a thin woman in a bikini smoking a cigarette looking extremely chic. You wanted to be her, and the ad made it seem like the way to do that was to smoke a cancer stick. The price people pay to stay thin. Another ad pictured an equally chic woman blowing smoke and holding a cigarette in her bony fingers with the quote, “My Fitness.” I know. I KNOW.

How is this legal? The cigarette companies are clearly playing into women’s insecurities and manipulating them into killing themselves. My mom, who works for the American Heart Association, was especially disgusted. She gave our travel agent a lecture about how he shouldn’t smoke while I sat there shrinking down into my seat, kicking her under the table. But it wasn’t too bad because he remembered it and upgraded us on one ferry to the business class, which was non-smoking. Very nice.

Well- I’m off again, jet-setting to Minnesota. I probably won’t try to eat traditionally Midwestern food; I don’t consider butter its own food group.

Until Next Time-

HHH