I've never had a twinkie, and I am really not tempted. That pizza sounds heavenly. Mmmmm garlic.

Mmmmm garlic.

Oh god. There was probably 2 full heads of garlic on it. SO good.

Also, I fail to see how "unhealthy" behaviors that impact only the individual engaging in them affect society.

Actually, people that get sick do have an impact on society beyond what their health insurance covers. And parents that smoke at home affect their own children. And parents that die of strokes, wind up having children surviving on Social Security benefits. And so on. Consider the effect that Suzi's longtime sick coworker has had on her life, and that company. It's not like Suzi blames her or is resentful, but you can't say it's happening in a vacuum.

So I'm saying the sick people who have no impact on society are a tiny portion of wealthy, well insured people who can afford private nurses.

And parents that smoke at home affect their own children.

I already noted that smoking is an activity that DOES affect more than just the person who does it, unlike someone's decision to eat a Twinkie.

And parents that die of strokes, wind up having children surviving on Social Security benefits. And so on. Consider the effect that Suzi's longtime sick coworker has had on her life, and that company. It's not like Suzi blames her or is resentful, but you can't say it's happening in a vacuum.

How many disease states have an absolute causative action (or pattern of actions) that can be pointed to in order to say "Yes, he ate Twinkies his entire life, and now the Accounting Department of MegaCorp is suffering because of his absences from work due to his Twinkie-induced illness"?

Put another way, how many disease states can you point to and definitively say that if the person had done Healthy Action X, he wouldn't have developed the disease? Lung cancer and smoking, I absolutely agree. But what else?

What else is out there where you can say for sure that if the person had engaged in these vaunted virtuous healthy actions, they wouldn't have developed the disease and thus been a burden on society? With very few exceptions (lung cancer being one, HIV/AIDS being another), it's very hard to tell what factors caused a disease state. Because genetics plays an enormous role. And there's no virtue in being lucky enough to have been born to parents with no familial history of chronic disease.

Is that a verb?

It is among my people! Although whether it existed before the 90s, I couldn't tell you.

Ming is a verb, as in: "He mings!"

Meanwhile Minging is an adjective, as in: "That's totally minging! Take it away!" Or, indeed, as in the amusing wordplay in the Oasis song:

Round our way the birds are singing
Round our way the sun shines bright
Round our way the birds are minging (ie "the girls are ugly")
Round our way it's all right.

Fay, is it pronounced like the Chinese dynasty, or to rhyme with "hinge"?

so, it's different from minge? (which I think means cheap?)

It's pronounced like the Chinese dynasty.

"Minge", otoh, means girl's pubic hair. Or possibly pussy, but I've always got the impression it specifically meant the hair.

"Stingy" (with a soft g) means cheap - is that what you're thinking of?

got to go with Steph -- it is the putting health as a virtue that is the problem. virtue/vice is not the same as good/better/best. You won't get people to chose a carrot over a cookie until a cookie is no longer a vice. ( and the fact that there are people that will give me grief for eating carrots instead of broccoli ... well that should give you a bit of an idea of how far it goes...)

Hil -- strength and clamness to help you deal with things that awful

and I don't really understand Ming, but I think I get it .

Ha. Matt's new co has some interesting behaviors that remind us of the early days of his old co.

"Minge", otoh, means girl's pubic hair. Or possibly pussy, but I've always got the impression it specifically meant the hair.

huh. good to know before I tried to use cool british slang and call someone "mingy"