Eating Animals

I'm in the middle of Jonathan Safran Foer's book, "Eating Animals," about the prevalence of factory farming. Very sad. I can't help but be especially affected by the information about the poultry farms, where the birds are given, on average, 67 square inches of space (that's smaller than a piece of typing paper). I've looked at our coop and wondered how many birds (or pages of my last unpublished novel) would fit inside with 67 square inches to each ... 50? 100? I'm sure there's a mathematical solution, but it's more interesting to just try to visualize them. Then to be glad there are, in reality, only eight feathered bodies wandering around.

I'm reminded of some of the reasons I chose to become vegetarian over twenty years ago, though I think it's gotten worse during that time. It's a good book, though. Well worth the read for anyone concerned about animal welfare or the quality of their food.