Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Maybe it's just the places where I eat, but restaurants seem to be putting less and less salt on their food. If you're not home, it's a bit of a problem if you find yourself low on salt : lethargic, nauseated, having a headache--kind of like having a cold, but without the congestion. What to do? Grab a bunch of salt packets at fast food restaurants.  Get a personal salt lick . Weighing in at five to seven pounds, it can double as a free weight and a weapon that would sail through TSA inspections. Sears, of all places, sells salt pinch tins . My choice is a pump salt mill produced by Vic Firth. It's the size of a small flashlight and heavy for its size. It'll fit in a small purse and it doesn't look like it would leak or get caught on anything.

Well, your media collection looks shiny and costly How much did you pay for your laboratory testing And how much did you pay for your conference admission Is it you or your mom who needs the paleo prescription? Now Vibrams for running and trails with clean dirt And freezers for organs that you haven't even heard of And how much did you pay for your Crossfit subscription That proves that you care That you're living like a cave man? How do you afford your paleo lifestyle? How do you afford your paleo lifestyle? How do you afford your paleo lifestyle? Parody of Rock'n'Roll Lifestyle by Cake Illustration from http://animals.m1.timduru.org/dirlist/pig/

I constantly hear about ways to relax--but what about stimulation? Most of us go to school and study a lot of subjects we're not interested in, or have routine jobs, housework and commutes. Maybe we hear more about relaxation because highly sponsored things like TV, movies, and shopping are more passive than stimulating. We all need something fun and exciting--something with flow. A few ideas that have worked for me: Get a dog. Mine is half Australian shepherd, and she squeals when I come home, hollers when we're leaving the house, gets me out of bed, runs on the treadmill, rolls in the snow and swims in the river. Now she's trying to catch flies. Even if you have a small yard and a full-time job, the life you'd give a dog would probably be better than the one it has at a shelter. Go kayaking or rafting. Worries vanish when you're looking for the next wave or waterfall. Take up dancing, preferably something you can do at a club, not just at a studio. For tha...

As you'd expect, there's no lack of good restaurants in San Diego. I didn't go to as many as I wanted to: I was hungry only once or twice a day, even though I did a lot of walking. Since I was doing so much walking, I ate more carbs than I normally do. Grand Central Cafe at the YMCA Building, Broadway & India. So-so food; a little pricey for the lack of quality. I ate here a second time only because I didn't want to walk elsewhere in the coldest rain I'd ever been in. (I don't recommend their noisy hotel, either.) Burger Lounge. Best burger I've ever had, anywhere. Excellent salad, too. According to their website, "Our beef comes from one farm, grown by a small company where the animals are well treated and never spend time in a corporate 'feed-lot'. Their diet consists of tall green grass from beautiful Kansas prairie land. This is what nature intended cows to eat and nothing more. No hormones, no antibiotics, no grain, no corn, j...

I just got back from a trip to San Diego that wasn't at all what I thought it would be. It started with skin care products. These used to be my crack cocaine, especially when I was on a low-fat diet. I thought I was past that, but a dealer found me on the street and got me to drop what used to be a mortgage payment (before I refinanced). At least the stuff she sold me worked. Spending such an embarrassing amount of money on skin care was a wake-up call to be more stoic and less of a hedonist. The weather and hotel set the mood. It was so cold, cloudy and humid that I wore my long down coat and alpaca gloves. The hotel was the noisiest room I've had since I lived in a military dorm. Some of the guests let their doors slam shut with a BOOM!; my room was across the street from an all-night construction site; and very late one night, someone on the second floor pulled the fire alarm for no discernible reason, sending everyone out to shiver on the front steps for half an hour. ...

Unless you live next door to McDonald's, you won't get faster fast food. Hat tip to Tess over at Tess's Paleo Journey for the idea of bacon-wrapped liver. Ingredients: 2 T lard 1/2 small sweet potato 1/2 bell pepper 1/2 pound liver 2 strips bacon 4 mushrooms 2 T olive oil salt for mayonnaise: 1 egg 1 cup light olive oil or grape seed oil 1 t mustard 1 t lemon juice few dashes of savory spices (e.g., herbes de Provence, Mrs. Dash, etc.) dash salt & pepper Put the broiler pan 4" from the flame and preheat the broiler. Heat the lard in a medium sauce pan on medium-high heat. Peel and julienne the sweet potato into 1/4" wide strips. Trim any film or tough bits from the liver and cut it into strips 3/4" x 3/4" x 3" long. Use a very sharp, thin knife if you have one. If the mushrooms are large, cut them into two or three pieces. Toss them in the olive oil and skewer them. Put the sweet potato and liver trimmings (the bit...

Long-time readers may recall my sinus infection that just wouldn't die. Over six months, I took antibiotics, long naps, a decongestant that gave me an allergic reaction so bad I stopped to wonder if I'd wake up the next morning . It finally ended when I came up with SWAMP and took megadoses of vitamin D, Mucinex and salt. It's February and once again, I've been fighting off a cold for a few weeks. While SWAMP consists of taking 50,000 IU of vitamin D for two days, I've had to take 40,000 IU for the past several days to keep my cough from getting worse. I'm not the only one who's taken large doses like this long term. Jeff T. Bowles, a layman, wrote and self-published a book called THE MIRACULOUS RESULTS OF EXTREMELY HIGH DOSES OF THE SUNSHINE HORMONE VITAMIN D3 MY EXPERIMENT WITH HUGE DOSES OF D3 FROM 25,000 to 50,000 to 100,000 IU A Day OVER A 1 YEAR PERIOD (caps in original) about his research and experiences. Bowles is a little crazy, and his problems...