Corporate Productivity Suggestion: Ditch the Snacks

I'm old enough to remember when the only refreshment at the office was coffee. If you wanted a snack, you had to bring your own or find a vending machine. Yet our brains worked just fine without the constant grazing: we all did our work and only new employees needed frequent reminders of standard operating procedures. Anyone too spacy to remember how to do their job was thought to be a stoner.

Now, cake for every birthday is standard. Some offices have free pop and snacks (read: junk food).

Soda, chips, crackers, and instant oatmeal make for unstable blood sugar in people susceptible to blood sugar swings, and roller coaster blood sugar levels affect mood, thinking and energy for the worse. How often do you see coworkers getting drowsy a few hours after lunch? How often do you hear, "My brain isn't working today"? Snicker-snacking all day long can make for high blood sugar and lethargy in some people--when it's really bad, it's called "carb coma." Think of Thanksgiving afternoon. Thanksgiving is mostly a carbohydrate orgy.

Besides the lost productivity, there's the cost of the snacks. Businesses could give everybody a nice little year-end bonus if they ditched them. There's also the time employees spend walking back and forth to the break room and the time someone has to spend placing the grocery orders, putting them away, and fixing the pop machine when it breaks down.

It's time for the office snicker-snacking to go the way of casual Fridays.

Comments

Lowcarb team member said…

Lori
Yes, I too can remember it used to be a cup of tea or coffee and on with the work. Although I also used to take in some fruit to eat. Now of course you hear "I was in such a rush this morning I'm eating this cereal bar" Shock, horror do you know what you are eating? Carbs, sugar, carbs, sugar Eek!! As Doug on our blog would say "Can't you bring in a low carb strawberry cake instead please?" LOL

All the best Jan

July 14, 2013

Lori Miller said…

It would be just as easy to grab a couple of boiled eggs or some full-fat cheese or yogurt if you're running late.

July 14, 2013

Galina L. said…

Ditching the snacks is good for almost everything - loosing weight, saving money, saving environment (American garbage consists mostly of wraps) and a kitchen space. I remember giving my son several spoons of a sourcream as a quick breackfast when time was an issue.

July 16, 2013

Lori Miller said…

Good point--I didn't even think about the trash. Back when my father hunted elk (think how many calories are in an elk), we used some butcher paper and tape and put the meat in the garage freezer.

July 16, 2013

An Objective Book about Other Childhood Vaccines

Today's decision by the CDC to add COVID shots to the schedule of childhood vaccines has some people concerned about the rest of the vaccines on the schedule. Contrary to fact-checker claims, adding COVID shots to the schedule means children will be required in about a dozen states to get a COVID shot to attend public school. Indiana isn't one of them--our childhood vaccination law doesn't mention the CDC and such a requirement could run afoul of our ban on COVID vaccine passports. But even freewheeling Indiana has some vaccine requirements and this kerfuffle has people wondering how safe those vaccines are. There's a book called Vaccines: Truth, Lies and Controversy by Peter C. Gotzsche, DrMedSci and co-founder of the Cochrane Collaboration, about the safety and efficacy of all those vaccines, including COVID and others. Cochrane was founded to "to organise medical research findings to facilitate evidence-based choices about health interventions involving healt

Diabetes Down, COVID Curiosities, New Glasses after Accident

Diabetes Down Despite Dietitians' Directions Last Sunday when I wrote about the grifters over at EatThis.com, which calls itself "Eat This, Not That," I was worked up enough to tweet to their medical expert board members if they stood by the site's article flogging sugary drinks and fast food for St. Patrick's Day. The site has over 1,300 articles, mostly puff pieces, on McDonald's and a news feed full of "the most important breaking news" on Doritos, burger joints and Chips Ahoy! I asked a dietitian who responded to me what exactly the "not that" part was in "Eat This, Not That." Important news about what you should eat! I was worked up until I remembered the saying, "You can't cheat an honest man." Meaning that this con, like a lot of others, requires some dishonesty on the part of the mark. Every Joe Six-Pack knows that cookies, chips and coffee-flavored milkshakes from Starbucks aren't health food. It takes s

Battered Cod and my Eclipse Pictures of my Colander

If you miss battered cod on a low-carb, grain-free diet, here's a recipe that'll satisfy your craving. It's based on a Dr. Davis recipe. Battered cod and cole slaw Ingredients 1 pound cod fillets 2 eggs 2 tablespoons butter, melted 1/2 cup ground golden flaxseeds 1/2 cup grated cheddar cheese 1/2 teaspoon onion powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper 1 teaspoon garlic powder Instructions Preheat the oven to 375°F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Slice the cod into 1-1/2 to 2 inch pieces. In a small bowl, whisk the eggs and butter. Beat continuously--don't let the butter cook the eggs. In a shallow bowl, combine the flaxseeds, cheese, onion powder, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Coat each piece of cod in the egg mixture and then roll in the in the flaxseed mixture. Place on the baking pan. Bake for 20 minutes, turning once. Eclipse Crescent Shadows Today was the total solar eclipse, and my house was in the "path of totality."

Blog Lineup Change

Bye-bye, Fathead. I've enjoyed the blog, but can't endorse the high-fat, high-carb Perfect Health Diet that somehow makes so much sense to some otherwise bright people. An astrophysicist makes some rookie mistakes on a LC diet, misdiagnoses them, makes up "glucose deficiency," and creates a diet that's been shown in intervention studies to increase small LDL, which can lead to heart disease. A computer programmer believes in the diet and doesn't seem eager to refute it because, perhaps, scientists are freakin' liars and while he's good at spotting logical inconsistencies, lacks some intermediate knowledge of human biology. To Tom's credit, he says it's not the right diet for everyone, but given the truckload of food that has to be prepared and eaten, impracticality of following it while traveling (or even not traveling), and unsuitability for FODMAPs sufferers, diabetics and anyone prone to heart disease (i.e., much of the population), I'm

Eclipse Glasses, Probiotics for Heart, Muscle Recovery

Are your eclipse glasses fake? The total solar eclipse over North America is almost here, and Indianapolis is in the "path of totality," meaning the moon will completely block the sun here. A lot of people have gotten special glasses to safely look at the eclipse. But the American Astronomical Society says , "counterfeit and fake eclipse glasses are polluting the marketplace." Some of the counterfeit glasses appear to be safe, the society says, but others are fakes that are no more effective than sunglasses. One of the counterfeits they describe matches the glasses someone gave me. I don't know where she got them, and she's not someone I'd trust to perform adequate due diligence. I just got over an eye injury and I don't need another one--I'll try the pinhole method instead to see crescents during the eclipse if it's not too cloudy. Picture from Pexels . Heart Centered Probiotic I started getting scary heart palpitations several years ago

Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Search This Blog