Chef Clark Church of the Garnish Restaurant at the Aspen Club & Spa has just the right recipe for cooking classes sure to transform your stance in the kitchen.
The Atlantic blogs at the Aspen Ideas Festival about a subject that remains shrouded in mystery: what does Islam have to say for itself. "I went into the discussion 'Who Speaks for Islam?' assuming that it would be an informative but relatively tame chat between two like-minded people," blogs Jennie Rothenbirg Gritz from Aspen. "The speakers listed on the program--Irshad Manji and Dalia Mogahed--were both women intellectuals raised and educated in the West; based on their bios, it was hard to imagine either one of them advocating anything but a modern, democratic approach to the Muslim faith. But as soon as I glanced at the stage, it was obvious that the discussion was going to be edgier than I'd expected."
Although we are all destined to age and injuries are commonplace in our society (especially in a ski town such as Aspen), it does NOT necessarily mean that we are taking “painful steps into an age-old reality of decrepitude” as the article states. As I listened to the writer describe a tumultuous journey of immobility, painful physical therapy, emotional agony, daily stress and a very long recovery period following an ACL injury, I realized that this society is missing a HUGE piece of information. There is a 5000 year old medicine called Acupuncture and Chinese medicine which has been scientifically proven to speed up the process of healing, increase circulation, help tissue regeneration, decrease inflammation, reduce pain and balance the emotions.
Acupuncture is a medical modality, originating from China, with a 5000 year old history. It is a method of inserting sterile, disposable needles into specific acupuncture points to encourage the body to promote its own natural healing ability and to improve overall bodily function. Many people have only heard about Acupuncture for pain management however, Chinese medicine is a complete and comprehensive medical system with the ability to diagnose, treat, and most importantly prevent disease. Acupuncturists are trained in Chinese Medicine as well as Western Medicine, allowing for these practitioners to work closely with Medical Doctors and within the western diagnostic system. The treatment differs in that Chinese Medicine practitioners are trained to get to the root of disease by treating with herbal formulas and natural remedies to promote the body’s own healing ability.
Last summer I started receiving a CSA (community supported agriculture) box from Paonia. I had never even heard of this before I became involved. You pay the farmers up front for future produce so they have money to grow the food. I paid for ten weeks of locally grown food and received whatever was abundant and in season. I received vegetables I had never eaten, or prepared, and a few I even had to look up their name! Always making the box of produce a little surprise.
There was a time there, oh, along about 1980, when my Dad and I were just bachelors. My mom took off with some rich doctor to Florida, never to be heard of again until 12 years later (another story.) My dad and I were close, very close. We hunted and fished and played football and baseball, drove trucks and tractors and worked cattle, etc., etc. He wasn't even my real Dad. I'd find that fact out about six years later.
We had entered the “practice” portion of the “Women’s Health Conference: From Theory To Practice”—and that meant a group of us was walking in the woods to the Rio Grande Trail and thence into Clark’s Market in Aspen with Dr. Bob Vogel, the University of Maryland professor of medicine who doubles as chief of medicine for the Pritikin Longevity Center and Pritikin Research Foundation.
The idea of the conference, sponsored by the forward-thinking Aspen Center for Integral Health (acih.org) was to dig down deep into what goes down in the real world. Thus: the walk, a moveable lecture about what remains for us to feast upon in the healthiest of worlds.
The 1st Annual Aspen Women's Health Conference dives into practical applications of the latest health research. The program highlights what important new findings mean to women in their daily lives. From "living greener" to feeding our families (and ourselves) in a better, healthier way, key aspects of healthy mind, body, relationships, and environment will be covered. Join us and learn how to put theory into practice.
Much like the human potential biomass as a source of transportation energy is boundless but we must first take the steps to make it such. There are many dedicated organizations putting in the sweat equity required to make this resource a realization in today’s business model.
However at what point do we as a society need to jump and calculate the costs at a later date? It is much like the idea of our fore fathers who took the chance to cross the Atlantic to reach a new land with unlimited possibilities with out doing multiple feasibility studies. At some point there needs to be a collective ambition to realize we don’t know the risks of such a venture however with out taking chances we will never know the possibilities of change and will be limited by our established resource, fossil fuel.
I had the good fortune to go to Social, the new Aspen restaurant on East Hopkins Avenue, on opening night, but I finally had the chance to return this week with a group of four friends of ours from Michigan. At first, I was concerned we had led our visiting Spartans astray. Social, you see, is based on the Spanish Tapas concept, whereby small dishes are the norm--and these guys like to live LARGE when they're living in Aspen. One time, at Takah Sushi, our visiting host from Michigan ordered a whole fish so big I was looking for the boat. When these guys saw Social had only a couple of big dishes, they started to mumble even as our stomachs were grumbling. I should have known better....
Adventuregirl.com's Stefanie Michaels releases her 2008 list of Valentine's Day Top Ten Global Places for Romance.
Michaels' top 10 picks include:
Warm hearts with the Powder Love Couple Package at Aspen, Colorado's brand new Sky Hotel, which offers an in-room movie, two "high altitude" massages at the Aspen Club and Spa, and a Kama Sutra weekend couples kit, including the original oils of love - sweet almond oil, spearmint pleasure balm, and sweet honeysuckle honey dust.