Though not every addict experiences the same lack of control for every addictive substance or behavior, an addict is an addict.

This is borne out by the phenomenon of switching addictions, whose classic example is, for me, old AA meetings: They were chokingly thick with cigarette smoke and had officers assigned to ensure the meetings would be adequately supplied with coffee (with or without sugar and cream) and donuts.

And, surely you know someone who, say, quit smoking and gained 40 pounds.

I've been remiss in reporting a key development in the fight for public recognition of food addiction: The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association, whose statute allows it to say what is a mental illness and what isn't, has indeed included binge-eating disorder in its fifth edition.

In my typically reasoned and reasonable fashion, I argued yesterday that we should choose not to schedule bake sales in schools to raise money for programs. I conceded that such sales are a hometown institution that embraces fond memory and other positive content.

Any author likes to have his book mentioned by someone, anyone, any time. When the mention is in the press, it almost always includes contact beforehand with the writer, who's seeking guidance for the topic (additional sources, perhaps) or something else.

As an advocate on issues including obesity, nutrition, and school food, I’ve had an opinion on bake sales, and especially school bake sales, for some time. But until about a week ago, they were something that people did, as opposed to something that people did in my son’s school.

Research published in the Journal of Pediatrics says that obese kids are more susceptible to Big Food’s marketing come-ons, which should surprise no one, since they’re the ones (apparently) acting more often on those messages.

Ten overweight kids and 10 healthy weight kids were shown 120 logos, half of them to do with food, so their brain responses could be observed. From a synopsis:

As one of life’s necessities, food has become intertwined with practically every human emotion: We eat to celebrate, we eat to share tradition and family ties, we eat when we’re happy, we eat when we’re sad, we eat when we’re bored.

Nothing about this is wrong. But especially in a nation where 2 out of 3 American adults are obese or overweight, it’s important to remember food’s first role, to nourish and sustain, and if we need to make compromises, they must come from the emotional meanings before we toss aside our health.

Some of my friends will tell you I'm insufferable in my certainties (hi, Ron; hi, honey), and they are certainly not reacting to nothing. That's only worth mentioning because I'm not sure if Food Tank, a food policy think tank on the verge of launch, is going to make any difference in the world. So far, there's a website and the following video, which strikes the right notes, if little more. I can't say I even know what "more" there should be, only that that was my reaction.

I've written several times that marketing to children is a particularly low form of commercial behavior, made worse than it intrinsically is because it is so completely, so blithely accepted — to the point that such marketing is tax deductible.

The New Entry Sustainable Farming Project has devised a fresh way to expand arable land in Massachusetts — by seeking to put former farmland that was subverted by subdividing back into production.

Yes, of course, they put houses onto those farm plots, but in cases of low-density lots, small-scale farming — enough to make a profit — is still possible.