Nature's Laws

Last night I was watching a little video clip of the Jack LaLanne show. LaLanne was an advocate of strength training and whole foods nutrition whose TV show ran from the 1950s through the 1980s. In the clip, he describes how his father died an early death due to heart and liver disease. A quote that really stuck with me was when he said his father died due to "disregarding nature's laws". That pretty much sums up my philosophy. Live in a way that generally mimics what our genes evolved to thrive on. Why did our paleolithic ancestors have strong, healthy bodies? Why are there still cultures that are free of chronic disease to this day, even into old age? Because they are following nature's laws. Break the law at your own risk.

Jack LaLanne and I do differ a bit on what constitutes a natural diet. For example, I don't throw out my egg yolks... But hey, the man is 94 and going strong. Here's another quote of his: "If man made it, don't eat it". Words to live by. Quite literally.

Eagle Creek

Last weekend, I went on a 3-day backpacking trip with some friends. We endured rain, snow, difficult river crossings and a vicious mouse attack, but managed to have a good time nevertheless. Here are a few pictures:

Punchbowl falls

Tunnel falls

Basalt cliffs

Apparently mice like cheese!

Vaccines

I am a label reader. Whenever I'm thinking about buying food in a box, which is rare, I typically read the whole label to look for sinister ingredients. So when I got a booster vaccine for tetanus last week, naturally I asked for the product information.

Along with a nice dose of tetanus and diphtheria toxoids, my medial deltoid received 0.28 mg of aluminum, up to 0.3 micrograms of mercury, and up to 100 micrograms of "residual formaldehyde". I got the vaccine because I like being able to chew, but I wasn't able to lift my arm for several days. I don't know if that was due to an immune response to the tetanus and diphtheria (probably) or if it was caused by the aluminum, mercury and formaldehyde they injected into my arm.

We work with formaldehyde in my lab, and I can tell you it is not to be messed with. I had to take an entire training course just to use it, during which I learned that if there's enough of it to smell, it's toxic. 0.1 parts per million in the air is enough to cause a burning sensation in the mucous membranes. We always use it in the fume hood. Formaldehyde is a toxin, a carcinogen, and a teratogen (causes birth defects). So I'm sure you'll understand why I wasn't too happy about having 100 ug of it injected into my body.

I'm not criticizing the concept of vaccines, I just wish they'd make more of an effort to clean them up!

Exercise Didn't Keep Us From Getting Fat

One of the surprising things I noticed when I was poring over data from the NHANES survey (US CDC National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey) from 1975 to 2006 is that the number of inactive people has diminished in that same time period from 50% to 24%. This is shocking to most people. We have this romanticized idea that in the 1970s people were more active, as if everyone chopped wood and walked 15 miles to work in the morning. The reality is, there were office jobs, housewives and cars without the large numbers of runners and gym-goers we have today.

Granted, NHANES data are self-reported and should be taken with a grain of salt. However, Chris at Conditioning Research pointed me to a study looking at changes in energy expenditure from the 1980s to the present in North America and Europe. It doesn't suffer from the same biases because it's based on direct measurement rather than self-reporting. Here's the executive summary: we're expending slightly more energy than we used to, partly because we exercise more and partly because it takes more energy to move our heavier bodies around.

I'm certainly not blaming the obesity problem on an increase in physical activity, but I do think we can safely rule out inactivity as the reason we've gotten fatter. In my mind, this only leaves one major possible cause for the obesity epidemic: changes in diet. Don't get me wrong, I think exercise is good. It has numerous positive effects on physical and mental health. But it's not as powerful of a tool for fat loss and general health as diet.

Anecdotally, I do know several people who lose fat when they exercise regularly. I also know some who don't lose fat when they exercise. Exercise and a healthy diet converge on some of the same metabolic pathways, such as sensitivity to insulin. But diet changes are far more effective than exercise at correcting metabolic problems. The reason is simple: the problems a person corrects with a good diet are caused by a poor diet to begin with.

A lovely UTI.

My cystitis has turned into a lovely Urinary tract infection. Geez, its terrible. Normally cystopurin or oasis sorts it out, but today I had to go to the doctor. I couldn't handle it any more. On top of that, The red team is playing at home too and I was about to chop my lower body off. So I have cefalexin to take 4 times a day. I hope they work quickly!

today was our little slimming world jaunt. I put on a pound this week, no surprise there. I always do around this time. Doesn't seem to matter what I do, I always gain. So I am not recording it, or feeling bad about it because I have eaten bugger all all week and know I haven't 'really' put on a pound. Next week will show up the loss. Pisses me off though.

I haven't eaten anything all day as I feel so crud. better go and prepare some tea or something.

Yesterday, today

I wasn't feeling too hot yesterday for some reason. I got up and nearly trod on one of our new kittens because they are now under our bed... and moving around too!

We had to do a tesco run for really random things like Salad Cream and pegs, shake and vac and black trousers. The most unconnected shopping list that ever was.

I had a mother of a headache by the time we got home, and the air was really heavy and full of storm... not that we had one though. We went to TB's house to sort her computer out again and then came home. I really wanted to go to sleep but time got away from me. I went to work and bought a bottle of red on the way home and ordered a curry. Its not good really, because I can eat a curry, easily. As long as I make sure I chew those prawns, then it slips down a treat. Rice is no problem for me covered in sauce!

I was all on my own, eating curry and chilling on the sofa watching telly. It was great. DS was in a show so DH and his Mum had taken him to do that for the evening, and as I had to work I couldn't get back in time for it. It made a change to have the whole house to myself... well nearly. Sue was upstairs in bed as she is not well at the moment, but Laszlo was out truck driving. All calm and quiet.

I was really tired by the time DH, DS and Granny got home, and I just wanted to go to bed. So thats what I did. I crawled into bed with a copy of OK and had a good read.

I don't think I ate anything else yesterday apart from the bottle of wine, curry and few crackers and humous at lunch...

Nothing much to report really.

Ho hum.

More Weight Loss Blogs

Read about three more bloggers who have had success losing weight here. One of them, is Shauna, pictured here. She used to weigh 350 pounds and now weighs 175. She's written a book about her weight loss journey and her blog is at The Amazing Adventures of Diet Girl.