A Whole Foods moment, part 2

Generally, I do not take over the counter supplements – of the type that are supposed to boost your everything, from the immune system to your sexual pleasure. It’s not that I do not believe in them. I’m sure turmeric, green tea, cloves and ginger really give a nice dose of anti to your oxidants, but when I last studied the ingredients of a leading supercritical antioxidant supplement (in addition to the above, it had parsley, peppermint, rosemary and, I kid you not, extra virgin olive oil and yellow beeswax), it sounded more like a list of salad ingredients than effective device for increasing your cell protective activity. Bottom line: I’ll focus on throwing together a salad instead. And anyway, there’s something grossly wrong about me paying money to counter free radicals. I was raised in a different political culture.

But yesterday I reconsidered. I had been talking to someone who is involved with pharmaceuticals and oncology and all those other important medicinal matters and he was rather shocked that I wasn’t blasting away at detoxification with greater force.

And then he said – I know you love wine. Surely you take milk thistle? I do not. I do – he tells me – at least once a day, I put it in my coffee.

Put something putrid in my coffee?? You have got to be kidding! My pricey latte should be bombarded with a foul seed extract that purports to counter the damage the caffeine (or wine) is about to inflict? No, it cannot be.

On the other hand, I had to admit that my rendition of a salad lately has been to open a bag of mixed greens or arugula and eat them straight from the plastic container. I don’t even take the time to give it a fourth rinse (believing all that garbage they write about it being already triple rinsed), I most certainly haven’t been putting any turmeric, green tea, ginger, parsley, peppermint or rosemary into it.

And, not surprisingly, I found that you can, these days, get everything in a pill. Everything. Forget about pouring putrid liquids into a great latte.

Okay, so now I have these pills that will save me from sure death by tomorrow. But just for July. After that, my life is all about purging and getting rid of things.