Pain, Pain, Go Away!

I happened to see a video on Youtube that reminded me of my favorite day of Basic Military Training School. It showed an event called Mudderella, a five- to seven-mile obstacle course through the mud. (One difference: I did not end up falling in the water and getting wet during basic training.) It looked like so much fun I signed up for it and started doing the Navy Seal Workout to get in shape. The organization automatically set up a donation page on my behalf for anyone who would like to contribute to  Futures without Violence , an organization that gets four out of four stars from Charity Navigator . This short vacation will also function as a chance to adapt myself to some hardship, something the ancient Stoics recommended to keep your desires in check and appreciate what you have. The obstacle course might be fun, but the training, the three-hour drive and, probably, staying at another hostel-style hotel won't be.

I've found some great products over the past couple of weeks I'd like to share. I'm not affiliated with the companies that make or sell these products. Organicville Sesame Teriyaki Sauce Image from vitacost.com With four grams of carb in a tablespoon, this sauce is a lot lower-carb than most others. It's not too sweet, either. It has a bit of soybean oil, so it's not paleo-kosher, but it's just a condiment, eaten by the spoonful. I stir-fried some onion, broccoli, bell peppers and cherry tomatoes, added some pulled pork and sauce, and had a dinner worthy of my favorite Chinese restaurant in 15 minutes. Purchased at Sprouts. Nutiva Shortening It's shortening without transfats or frankenoils! This shortening is made with palm fruit oil, unrefined red palm oil and unrefined coconut oil. Palm oil is a source of CoQ10, carotenes and vitamin E. According to some other sites I've read, palm oil shortening is made by removing some of the polyu

If you're interested in genes v. environment, natural selection, evolution applications v. misapplications, check out this online course through Duke University : Introduction to Genetics and Evolution is a college-level class being offered simultaneously to new students at Duke University. The course gives interested people a very basic overview of some principles behind these very fundamental areas of biology.  We often hear about new "genome sequences," commercial kits that can tell you about your ancestry (including pre-human) from your DNA or disease predispositions, debates about the truth of evolution, why animals behave the way they do, and how people found "genetic evidence for natural selection."  This course provides the basic biology you need to understand all of these issues better, tries to clarify some misconceptions, and tries to prepare students for future, more advanced coursework in Biology. No prior coursework is assumed. I'm enrol

A "sensible diet" must be the one of the hardest things to figure out, even for a sensible person. There's always been conflicting advice, but with medical studies in respected journals being retracted and authorities admitting they were wrong about fat, and various laymen flip-flopping on dietary advice, we're living in confusing times. This post is to help readers sort it out for themselves. First, what is "sensible," or more to the point, what is the truth? I think it's something that meets one or more of these criteria: Something observable, directly or indirectly Something that stands up to scrutiny (i.e., it's not a trick) Something that fits with everything else you know Something that can be used to reliably predict other things Note that something sensible or truthful isn't necessarily balanced, it doesn't matter who does or doesn't believe in it, or how long it's been around. It's independent of all those t

Homeschooler and creationist Megan Fox (not the actress) recently "audited" the Evolving Earth Exhibit at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. "Audit" is a strong word: I work for real auditors (CPAs), who are highly educated experts in their subfields and concerned with accuracy (because they can be sued). When they don't know something, they look for the answer. They've also passed the long and difficult CPA exam administered by the State of Colorado. Megan Fox doesn't have the equivalent of any of these qualifications in the field of biology: what she's produced isn't an audit, but a silly video that I'm watching so you don't have to. Megan Fox at the Field Museum. Image from wonkette.com via Google images. Fox jumps right in with eukaryotes, which she doesn't know how to pronounce. The exhibit says that at first, all eukaryotes were single celled, and some are still single-celled, implying that others are not.

Having been a low-carber for five years and having a mother with type 2 diabetes, a lot of gifts we get are thrown out: food and restaurant gift certificates, in particular. Almost anything that's labeled "Healthy" or "For diabetics," isn't. If the recipient of your gift is strict about their diet, gifts on the no-no list will end up re-gifted or in the trash. Here's some help in making a good choice. No-nos: Sweets. There's a reason they used to call it sugar diabetes: it's a disease of disregulated blood sugar. Sugary foods are out. Starches. Starches are made of chains of glucose. The chains break apart in the digestive system, turning into glucose--a type of sugar. Bread, crackers, beans, noodles, potatoes, muffins, cornbread--no.  Sugar-free or "for diabetics." "For diabetics" doesn't mean anything--literally. It should probably say "for diabetes," meaning enough of it, in the right person, will c

It's been a stressful year: my father rapidly declined and died, and my mother ended up in the hospital and then in a nursing home for a while. While she was staying with me for a few weeks, a relative told the county I was starving and stealing from her. (Of course, the county determined this was a load of horse shit.) Lately, the same relative has been meddling in my mother's financial affairs, making messes as fast as I can clean them up. From the time early this year when I was doing a lot of work on my parents' house (e.g., insulating their attic), I wasn't taking my vitamins regularly or eating liver and oily fish weekly. A few years before, I started what I called the cavity-healing diet to heal my teeth; surprisingly, it made my TMJ better. Given my gum graft surgery last summer, I should have really been diligent about the diet, but I wasn't. I ended up with redness in the area of the graft, roaming TMJ, and the beginning of a cavity between two molar