Who is Mr. Grant?

Copyright © 2018
Brian Doherty
All rights reserved

I noticed that my mother had baked a couple of apple pies.  I was excited because she knew how I loved pies.  But she normally didn't bake two pies at a time and asked her what was the extra pie for.

"I want you to go to Mr. Grant to bring this over to him," she wrapped in tin foil.

"Who is Mr Grant?"

"The old man next door."

I was feeling a little iffy about going over to Mr Grant's house because he had been giving me creepy looks whenever I pass by his house.  It was very awkward bringing the pie over to Mr. Grants house.  He invited meinto have a beer and a chat with him so I did.

After spending time with him more often, turns out that he was a really great guy. Every chance that I get I would go over to see him and spend some time with him.  I am surprised that we had quite a few things in common.  I really enjoyed his stories growing up and how he was in the military.  Of course there were sad moments as well.  I was really sad to hear that he had a condition that he would only live until the end of the year and not sure he will reach Christmas.


WRITER'S FIRST DRAFT NOTES
...Mr Grant, a 64 year old, who lived alone, moved in next door from me a couple of months ago.  Every morning he sits outside the front door reading his newspaper with a cup of coffee. 

...I saw blinking lights through the curtains of my living.  I paced across the floor with my cup of coffee.  I peeked through the blinds.  The ambulance was parked in front of Mr. Grants door.  I walked outside and paced toward the ambulance with silence. 

...He held me in his arms on the couch for comfort.  It was really nice to be in his arms. I was really sad because time was running out on Mr. Grant because he was dying and I wished I knew him longer than I did in such a short time.

..."Mr. Grant you can't die," I said, "I'm only after getting to know you, and I enjoy your company very much.  You taught me alot."  He could tell from the tone of my voice that I was very sad.

..."I know you don't," he said, "But whatever happens, I want to die in my own house."

...Mr. Grant was loosing his strength that I started to come over to his house on a regular basis to take care of him.  He has been in and out of the hospital.

..."I have a feeling this is it," feeling very weak in his bed.  "My time has come."

..."No."  I held his hand.

..."Yes, I'm afraid so.  I must go."

...I was getting really upset and sad. I gazed into his eyes. "Take me with you."

..."You can't. You have your whole life ahead of you.  You need to continue living and experience things on your own, until its your time to go.  But I will be waiting (on the other side)to guide you)." 

..."I love you" I cried, holding his hand. "I will never forget you."

...A tear started streaming down Mr. Grant's face as he took his last breath.

Understand your fats and fiber

According to the website that was given to us on American Heart Association, under the meet the fats section, there are four different types of fats, two good fats and two bads.  The bad fats are saturated and trans.  Saturated fats has a chemical that is made up of carbon and hydrogen atoms, which are typically solid at a room temperature.  Trans fats (or trans fatty acids) are created in an industrial process that adds hydrogen to liquid vegetable oils to make them more solid.  Another name for trans fats is “partially hydrogenated oils”.  Trans fats are harmful because they raise your bad (LDL) cholesterol levels and lower your good (HDL) cholesterol levels.  Many trans fats will increase high risks of heart disease and stroke.  Saturated and trans fats are in foods like hamburgers with cheese and bacon, steaks with baked potatoes with butter, sour cream, bacon bits, and cheese, also in desserts such as cheesecake. 

The good fats are mon (monounsaturated) and poly (polyunsaturated).  Mon and poly are good fats.  Unsaturated fats are simply fats that have one double bonded carbon in the molecule.  Monounsaturated fats rae typically at room temperature but will firm up when chilled.  Vegetable and olive oil are examples of this process.

Fiber is roughage you get from fruits and vegetables, whole wheat, and grains, which help to clean out fat and cholesterol from the blood stream and keep the digestive system of preventing constipation.  Lipids help clean out the blood of bad cholesterol. 

Food sources of the dietary fiber can be found in lettuce, Swiss chard, raw carrots, tender cooked vegetables, such as asparagus, beets, mushrooms, turnips, and pumpkin.  They can also be found in broccoli, artichokes, squashes, sweet potatoes, string beans and vegetable juices.  You can be able to get more fiber from legumes, such as lentils, black beans, split peas, kidney and lima beans, and chick peas.  They are also in sunflower seeds, almonds, pistachios nuts, and pecans.  Another good source of fiber is fruits and grains, such as whole wheat products in flowers.

The differences between soluble and insoluble fibers are that soluble fiber draws water and turns into gel during digestion, and it slows the digestion as well.  This type of fiber can be found in oat bran, barley, nuts seeds, beans, lentils, peas and some in fruits and vegetables.  This fiber can help to lower cholesterol and prevent heart disease.  Insoluble fiber, which is found in foods, such as wheat bran, vegetables, and whole grains, can add bulk to the stool helping food pass more quickly through the stomach and intestines.

The benefits of a high fiber diet are energy, faster and smoother bowel movements, avoiding constipation and other digestive issues.  This cleanses the blood by removing bad cholesterol, preventing heart disease and stroke.         

Understanding Food Labels

It is important to understand and the use of the Nutrition Facts Label.  The Nutrition Facts Label helps to ensure everyone is eating a healthy, balanced diet.  There are 6 parts to a nutrition facts label.  “The serving size” is the amount of servings in the item.  “Calories” is the amount of calories per serving.  3 & 4 are the “the nutrients” that gives us all energy regulating our body processes.  The footnote of the nutrition facts label that is located at the bottom of the label is based on the percentage daily value 2,000 calorie diet.  “The percentage Daily Value” is based on the percentage Daily Value.  There are three things that people need to know about the nutrition facts label:  calories, serving size, and % of daily value.  The fact is that most people do not think about how much calories they are consuming. 

The food that you eat is the food that will keep you running but in order to know about healthy eating and to keep the body strong and energetic, it’s a good idea to look on the label what you would be consuming.  Every serving you see on a can is the amount of calories you see on a can.  Here are three examples in my food pantry.  I have a box of Ritz Fresh Stacks Whole Wheat Crackers.  It reads that every 5 crackers have 70 calories, carbohydrate is 3 %, protein is 1 gram, and fiber is 3 %.   My second example is a can of Progresso Vegetable classic French Onion soup.  The can has 50 calories per 1 cup.  Carbohydrate is 3 %, protein is 2 grams, and fiber is 3 %.  The third example I have is Bumble Bee Chunk Light Tuna in water.  The tuna has 50 calories per serving in a 2 serving can which means that the cam would be 100 calories.  There is no carbohydrate or no fiber in the tuna fish can, and 13 grams of protein.

While watching the video, Gia’s friend went outside and looked for average people on their thoughts about breakfast cereal.  The question is “What is the official serving size of a bowl of cereal.” The result of this was that there was many that chosen the medium sized cereal, a few chosen a full bowl of cereal, and only 1 chosen the lesser bowl.  The correct answer was the person who chose the lesser bowl of cereal, which is actually a cup of cereal.  I also discovered which I did not know about was that the calories intake is not as they seem to be.

It was interesting that I had also learned about the 5/20 rule.  According to the video, there were not many people who knew what the 5/20 rule was.  Before I watched the video, I also did not know what it was.  The 5/20 rule means that anything of 5 percent or less of the daily value of nutrient is not good source such as Calcium.  Anything of 20 percent and over is a very good source. 

In conclusion, I feel that everybody needs to pay attention to the Nutrition Facts Label, perhaps it would be less obesity in the United States.

3-day diet analysis

It is very important to keep track of your food intake, analyze and what you can do for yourself for better health in the future. 

My daily food intake would be from when I get I would normally have some coffee to wake up.  I am not working at the moment, so I spend my days at home either working on my assignments or clean the apartment.  I am trying to eat breakfast in the mornings since I do work out so that I could be able to loose body fat.  I eat 3 meals a day.  Throughout the whole day I would drink coffee and I had stopped taking sugar, instead I would take Truvia or something like that.  I do love coffee.  I know that it is important to eat something for breakfast in the morning.  If I cannot find anything for breakfast, I would end up eating yogurt as an alternative with cinnamon.  During lunch hours I would try to find something to eat, most of the time I would eat a sandwich such as tuna fish, if not I would have one of those raman noodles or leftover food from dinner from the night before.  I know I do well in my lunch because I am constantly thinking about my protein intake.  Every once in a while when going to the store to pick up groceries, my partner would purchase a 16 ounces diet coke and I would wait for taxi.  I would drink some of the diet coke along with him.  I do not drink sodas any more .  I sometimes snack on things anything that I could find if I crave for it.  However, I had stopped eating junk food when I started working out.  There are times that I would crave for food at night, which I know is a bad idea.  I try to drink a lot of water, especially in my workouts.  It seems that I would drink about three to four glasses of water.  Dinner time, my partner does the cooking in the household.  Many times he would not cook any vegetables so I am left no vegetables on the plate and have one portion of protein and two portions of carbs.  Sometimes he would double the amount of carbs.  I am the type of person who would eat everything on my plate.  It is hard for me to stick with my diet because my partner is a diabetic and he eats certain foods and foods that would throw me off guard with my food intake such as chocolates or crackers or any other snacks.  There are times that I would want to order either pizza or Chinese food that includes that I will eat the leftovers for lunch the next day.  Sometimes I would have iced tea along with my dinner, if not water.  Because of my present food intake I had noticed that I was gaining weight again, and it is affecting my lower back because I have been having daily pain, so I decided to work out again and loose some of the weight.

            According to the 3 day diet analysis for my 2400 calorie allowance shows that I need some working on in my food intake.  The first day of Analysis I had not eaten any fruits at all.  I am not much of a fruit person, and it is something that I would need to start working on.  In my protein column I have 100%, slightly a bit over.  I try to eat as much protein as possible because I heard it is very important.  My grains, vegetables, and dairy are all under, in other words are low and can use more food intake.  Day two as you could see that I had eaten more grains than day one.  My vegetables are lower than the first day.  I did not eat much fruits on this day only ¼ cups.  The protein is over 100% just like day one.  On the final day my grains very low and could had taken in more grains for that day.  I did not take any fruits.  My vegetables column is very good and was the most vegetables intake out of the 3 day analysis.  My protein is slightly over 100%.

            In conclusion on this 3 day analysis are that I enjoyed this analysis and would be delighted to share this with you.  Before working on this, I knew my fruits would be on the low side, and the proof is there that I would need to eat more fruits and also keep my vegetables on the high side rather the low side.  I will also keep an eye out in the future for the 5/20 rule because it will definitely help me to become more healthier.

Navigation

"Creating good web site navigation is the most important task a web designer has to accomplish in the web design process."  (http://www.mardiros.net/good-navigation.html) 

Good navigation will help people navigate through pages within the Web Site as well as outside of the Web Site without complications.  Nobody wants a difficult Web Site to use because it does not help the user.  They will loose interest and leave the Web Site, so it must be easy to use and constructive, also consistent is important.  An Internet user could be able to come across with a good Web Site, however, the navigation is poorly.  A viewer should not be able to come on to a Web Site and look around to see where the navigation menu is located.  I feel that it should only take a few seconds locate the navigation menu.  If you can not find the navigation menu in a few seconds, then there is a problem.  The reason people come to a Web Site is to get information.  If the viewer has a hard time navigating, perhaps its difficult to find what they are looking for, will loose interest and eventually leave the Web Site.  Some people use images as part of their navigation menu, but be sure to use it in the other pages and at the same location so the viewer knows where to look on the following page.  For bigger companies, may use scroll down menus or bread crumb trails, but my site will use the basic navigation menu.  Links are important too so that they are accurate and accessible to that page. 

            There are so many ways to make a Web Site interesting.  However, a Web Designer should never copy another Web Designer's site.  "It is often a tough challenge to come up with a meaningful, unambiguous way to organize, arrange, and display content to users; and it’s often not much easier to find a visually interesting solution either." (http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2011/04/19/showcase-of-creative-navigation-menus-good-and-bad-examples/)  I feel that a Web Designer should be more creative with their own design, and that also means for the designer to sketch out their pages and thinking things through before designing, also making sure that the Web Site has good grammar. This also helps build credibility for them.  Some Web Designer may have extra links to their site where the viewer could go onto another Web Site to help them.  There is also a place where a viewer would have to sign in so they could retrieve full access to the Web Site, and if it is a blog that the viewer may be interested in, they could simply register to follow that Web Site. 

            One of my good examples of good navigation Web Site is that I want to make sure that my navigation menu are at the top of the Web Site right below the site's logo.  Sometimes when I view other Web Sites, I do notice the navigation menu would be on the left side.  "Traditionally the navigation menu is placed just below the header area or on the left hand side of the web page. Usability studies have shown that web site visitors instinctively look in these areas first." (http://www.jrox.com/content/article/139/good-website-navigation-design)  In my Web Site "The Life In Northern Ireland", my navigation menu will be below the header.  This way when viewers go onto my site, they know where to go and able to navigate it quickly and easily. 

            I will be adding pictures to my Web Site.  I always thought pictures makes a Web Site more interesting as well as presentable so it keeps the viewer on the Web Site.  My reason for add pictures is to give the viewers an idea how beautiful Northern Ireland is and worth visiting.

            I want to try to make the Web Site as convenient to the viewer without complications.  I know that it could be a hassle with many clicks with the mouse and not reaching anywhere.  This could be frustrating so the lesser clicks on my Web Site the better for the viewer to stay on my site.  Another good thing I may be considering is helpful and related links so it will help the user to find other resources.  I am also adding a contact information in case viewers would need to contact me and want to know any additional information on the Web Site.