Air New Zealand Loves Richard Simmons

Pray for Japan

All this in less than 6 minutes!

Healthful Health Q & A

I first read these way back in 1992 when I used my IBM PS/1 computer to access Prodigy and bulletin boards. These are as funny today as they were then.

Enjoy!

HELPFUL HEALTH Q&A 

Q: I've heard that cardiovascular exercise can prolong life. Is this true?

A: Your heart is only good for so many beats, and that's it...don't waste them on exercise. Everything wears out eventually. Speeding up your heart will not make you live longer; that's like saying you can extend the life of your car by driving it faster. Want to live longer? Take a nap. 

 

Q: Should I cut down on meat and eat more fruits and vegetables? 

A: You must grasp logistical efficiencies. What does a cow eat? Hay and corn. And what are these? Vegetables. So a steak is nothing more than an efficient mechanism of delivering vegetables to your system. Need grain? Eat chicken. Beef is also a good source of field grass (green leafy vegetable). And a pork chop can give you 100% of your recommended daily allowance of vegetable products.

 

Q: How can I calculate my body/fat ratio? 

A: Well, if you have a body, and you have body fat, your ratio is one to one. If you have two bodies, your ratio is two to one, etc.

 

Q: What are some of the advantages of participating a regular exercise program? 

A: Can't think of a single one, sorry. My philosophy is: No Pain...Good. 

 

Q: Aren't fried foods bad for you? 

A: You're not listening. Foods are fried these days in vegetable oil. In fact, they're permeated in it. How could getting more vegetables be bad for you?

 

Q: What's the secret to healthy eating? 

A: Thicker gravy. 

 

Q: Will sit-ups help prevent me from getting a little soft around the middle? 

A: Definitely not! When you exercise a muscle, it gets bigger. You should only be doing sit-ups if you want a bigger stomach.

 

Q: Is chocolate bad for me? 

A: Are you crazy? HELLO ...... Cocoa beans ... another vegetable!!! It's the best feel-good food around! 

 

Well, I hope this has cleared up any misconceptions you may have had about food and diets. Now go have a cookie...flour is a veggie! 

Calories In = Calories Out = Bad Science

The Dances with Fat blog has a great post about the fallacy of this commonly held false belief.

An excerpt:

Besides which, a BMR-type calculation would be reasonable  if we were a lawnmower.  We can calculate the fuel needs of a lawnmower and then have a reasonable expectation of how much grass it can mow and what will happen when the fuel runs out.
Ready for a blinding flash of the obvious?  Our bodies are not lawnmowers.

Huge on DVD

I just found out today that this fantastic (but canceled) series starring Nikki Blonsky is on DVD! I just put my order in on Amazon even though I already downloaded every episode from iTunes when I got the bad news about cancellation. I look forward to the extras on the DVD's, such as episode commentaries.

I wish we had series like this when I was a teenager instead of stuff like My Mother the Car and Hogan's Heroes.

Dr. Fuhrman's FOX Spot

Dr. Joel Fuhrman's Cancer-Prevention Diet: MyFoxNY.com

Dr. Fuhrman and his 5 Cancer Preventing Foods were spotlighted in this bit on FOX news broadcasts last night. You can also read a write-up of it on the MY FOX New York site.

Now you see why I no longer watch FOX News.

Ow!

I finally updated those tickers, bottom left. Don't look - the weight one is not pretty at all, showing a gain since January 1, 2011. I blame the pain.

Last post I mentioned I was having a lot of pain again. Since Feb 9th I've had back pain - again - stretching from under the shoulder blade and now towards the front. I also have pain in the shoulder joint on the same side. For decades I've had mystery pains and blamed them on CFS/Fibro but my doc is one of these who doesn't believe those are legitimate diseases. I had seen the doctor in the past for these exact pains and he blamed them on my degenerative disc disease - pinched nerves in the spine causing referred pain - but now that we know the Vitamin D levels were microscopic if existent at all, these muscle pains could have been exacerbated or even caused by that, too. What ever is causing it, it hurts and has greatly affected my range of motion and quality of life. I can't sleep, I can't sit, I can't move without pain in the right side. It may ease up for a day or 2 then I would move too fast or reach too far and it flares up all over again, spasms bringing me to my knees at times, bringing me to tears others.

Increased pain means decreased exercise. Pounding my feet to Leslie Sansone hurts my back, rapid movements of Richard Simmons hurts my back. Forget the treadmill - there's no way I could open and close it without bring me great pain - if I could even lift the darn thing. So I've been doing a lot of qigong. Every day I'm doing my Fun with Qigong 5-Flows routine, either with or without the DVD, and then I discovered Lee Holden and his Qigong for Upper Back and Neck Pain routine.

I paused the video after each movement shown in this clip and did it 6 times on each side and by the time I was done my back didn't feel as bad as it did, so I went and ordered the DVD. I did the routine again this morning before my Fun With Qigong routine and again, it eased a lot of the pain I woke up with. I'm hoping this will really get the healing going in one direction now instead of 2 steps forward and one painful one back. I'll find out next week for sure when the video arrives and I can do it along with him instead of the half-assed way I'm doing it now.