Chef Del has a new recipe book coming out. Tell us briefly what is one of your favorite Wellness Forum recipes.
Briefly share your story about how taking Wellness 101 and adopting the Wellness Forum's diet made a positive difference in your health.
Describe your "aha" moment - when you decided that you were going to commit to eating a plant-based diet. Did you read a book? Listen to a lecture? See a movie? Talk to a friend? All of the above?
More Great Books AND Movies I Recommend!
Saw two great French movies this weekend with subtitles, loved them both. The Valet is about a very wealthy married man who is featured on the front page of the newspaper with his super-model mistress. The picture also includes a valet who works for alocal restaurant. Since the businessman cannot afford a divorce, he tells his wife that the supermodel is with the valet. The fun starts when she does not believe him and he has to make arrangements for the supermodel and the valet to pretend they are in a relationship. Just fun!
The other movie is called The Closet, also French with subtitles. In this film a boring plain accountant loses his job. His neighbor convinces him to tell everyone he is gay in order to get his job back. He reluctantly agrees to do this and gets his job back. His relationships with almost everyone change, and the movie is hilarious. I won't spoil the end; worth seeing!
now for some amazing books....
I just discovered a new author - Tess Gerritson. Her books are the basis of the television series Rizzoli and Isles, which I enjoy sometimes! Anyway, I found one of her books at the used bookstore in Port Clinton and loved it so now I am going to read them all.
Before I Go To Sleep by S.J. Watson will blow your mind. I read this book in one day. It's about a woman with amnesia who is beginning to get her memory back after 20 years of being completely disconnected. Her problem is figuring out who to trust. I did not figure it out until the very end - riveting and suspenseful.
Nelson DeMille writes great stories - I don't think he's one of today's literary geniuses but the stories are entertaining. By The Rivers of Babylon is set in the Middle East and involves hijacked planes, religious wars and love stories all intertwined. Great fun laying-on-the-beach read. I also read Plum Island by Nelson DeMille - another long saga/mystery. I'm DeMilled out for a while now.
Moneyball: The Art of Winning by Michael Lewis is about the Oakland A's, who have defied all the convention wisdom about what it takes to build a winning team. It turns out the conventional wisdom is wrong in baeball just like it is in medicine.
Speaking of conventional wisdom being wrong, I also read Freakonomics by Steven Leavitt. Great book and what we think we know about economics is wrong too. I think it pays to be skeptical in today's world....
That's all for now - these are the top picks for this weekend; I'm traveling so much and planes and airports and hotel rooms are great places to catch up on reading.
My Most Recent Recommended Reading List
It's been a while since I've posted interesting books I've read and some of you have been asking, so I'll try to remember to post these more often. Here are some of the great books I've read recently:
I Was A Dancer by Jacques D'Amboise
I am a BIG dance fan and have had the pleasure of seeing Jacques perform, hosting him in my home, and traveling to New York to see performances presented by The National Dance Institute, which he founded. This is a great story of a great man who has made a HUGE contribution to the world of dance.
In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson
Phenomenal true story about the experience of the American Ambassador to Germany and his family prior to the start of World War II.
The Boy from Baby House 10 by Alan Philps
This book will shock you; while we all have some understanding of the unfortunate status of orphaned children in other countries, the Russian orphanages have historically been some of the worst in the world. This book is the story of a remarkable child who managed to get out of the system in spite of the odds against him and was adopted by a woman in the U.S. Inspiring!
The Road of Lost Innocence
The author resounts her story of being sold into sexual slavery by her family, a practice that is still fiarly common in Southeast Asian countries. She managed to escape and fueled her anger over what happened to her into a program that helps other women to escape and build productive lives. You'll have trouble believing that women still are treated this way, often with little interference from government.
Breaking Night by Liz Murray
This book should be required reading for any kid from a disadvantaged home. Liz Murray's parents were alcoholics and drug addicts. She and her sister roamed the streets of New York, and eventually Liz dropped out of school. Determined to escape the fate of her parents, she managed to get herself through high school and admitted to Harvard while homeless. There really are no excuses!
Switch: How to Change When Change is Difficult by Chip Heath
One of the best business books I've read for a long time. I'm still incorporating the things I learned in my business.
The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough
I think I must have slept through most of my history classes in school. I've read lots of McCullough's books and they are all incredible - why didn't I know these things? Anyway, this book chronicles one of the largest natural disasters in America's history and as I read it I realized that things really don't change much in a hundred years or so!
I'll write about more later - I read several books every week and it would take several hours to tell you about the ones I've read just in the last few weeks!
