How could the cost of living crisis possibly be linked to obesity I wondered while making a crisp sandwich for lunch the other day.
Research from Aberdeen University has found that food insecurity is causing people to eat more highly-processed foods that are high in sugar, salt and fat.
Professor Alexandra Johnstone from the Rowett Institute said that as the cost of food goes up “making healthier choices costs more in terms of the cost of your supermarket shop”.
I’d been planning to have a KitKat for dessert but instead squeezed it back into the value multipack and tried to get on the waiting list for an allotment.
With food prices rising by up to 80%, I’m sure lots of people have had the same idea and I fully expect to be waiting until 2025 to have my own strawberry patch.
Still, it gives me time to save up for some cream to go with them.
It’s daunting being in charge of finances but at least I’m not Humza Yousaf, who took on the added role of SNP Treasurer after Colin Beattie resigned.
I swear I heard the words “Tag! You’re It” faintly in the distance while the first minister tried to look composed as he was enveloped by reporters and scandal continued to swirl around the party.
Rishi Sunak is being investigated by Parliament’s standards watchdog over a possible failure to declare an interest in a childcare firm of which his wife is an investor.
Adding it all up
It could just be that the couple, who with their £730m fortune rank 222 on the Sunday Times Rich List, have lost track of their assets which might explain the PM’s obsession with maths.
This week he said that adults who cannot do basic arithmetic ought to be embarrassed and that a poor understanding of maths should not be “socially acceptable”.
Bullying isn’t socially acceptable and seeing your deputy PM having to resign over it is embarrassing so it’s all relative isn’t it Rishi?
By the way that’s a mathematical concept I just threw in there so feel free to send me a gold star when you get a minute.
I’ve also been trying to work out the chemical formula for CoffeeMate which has gone up from £2.45 to £5.65 – or 130% – meaning I either learn how to make it myself or start using the cups from my daughter’s doll house.
One puzzle I’m trying to dodge is joining the dots between Putin deploying nuclear subs to the Pacific, the G7 foreign ministers preparing for “extreme tactics” from Russia, all Nato allies agreeing that Ukraine will become a member and the testing of the UK’s new emergency alert system on Sunday.
Mobile phones will produce a loud 10-second blast at 3pm to test the electronic warning, intended to notify the public of major emergencies.
Mobile phone alert
What’s more alarming is that I find myself agreeing with Jacob Rees-Mogg who has disabled the alert on his phone because he doesn’t want to be “shouted at by the government”.
In my defence, unlike the former business secretary I wasn’t in the Cabinet when this system was agreed upon.
Maybe he was having one of his famous lie-downs during that meeting.
New Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden says it could be “the sound that saves your life” which is about as comforting as learning that cable cars proposed for Aberdeen beachfront could operate in up to gale force conditions.
I think I’ll stick to the thrill rides at the actual fun fair and focus on uplifting stories such as that of a former deep sea diver who fulfilled his dream of dancing at his wedding two years after almost dying from Covid.
Davy Duncan of Fort William was in a coma in a Villahermosa hospital in Mexico, where a local taxi driver appealed for his rare blood type and a soldier and policeman donated so he could have a transfusion.
He and wife Helen Smith flew a group of Mexicans who helped in his recovery to Scotland for their wedding on the banks of Loch Linnhe – a reminder that there are few things more heartening than the kindness of strangers.
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