Cankles

Saddle bags, love handles, muffin tops... and now "cankles." Well, you can't have perfection and you can't fight heredity. But here's a web site that promises to help, Say No to Cankles.

What causes cankles? Heredity. Too much salt. Pregnancy. I think I can rule out the third cause, but definitely have the first two. Both grandmothers had cankles and I salt everything.

What can you do about them? Not much. But the site recommends high-intensity, fat-burning cardiovascular activities, long brisk walks 30 minutes a day, and "step" classes. Also calf raises on the stairs 3 times a week. Hmm. I suspect that makes calves more muscular so the ankles look slimmer.

Then it makes suggestions about shoes and various optical illusions. Doesn't look good ladies. We may just have to learn to love them.

High intensity exercise more beneficial?

That’s what this article in Prevention says. The calories are the same--the results are different.

"Researchers from the University of Virginia found that women who did three shorter, fast-paced walks a week (plus two longer, moderate-paced ones) lost 5 times more belly fat than those who simply strolled at a moderate speed 5 days a week, even though both groups burned exactly the same number of calories (400) per workout. Those speed walking also dropped more than 2 inches from their waistlines, pared about 3 times more fat from their thighs, shed 4 times more total body fat, and lost almost 8 pounds over 16 weeks--all without dieting!

The improvements didn't stop there. The high-intensity exercisers lost about 3 times more visceral fat--the dangerous belly fat that wraps around organs such as the liver and kidneys and has been linked to diabetes, heart disease, and high blood pressure. "Vigorous exercise raises levels of fat-burning hormones," says lead researcher Arthur Weltman, PhD, director of the exercise physiology laboratory at the university. It also increases afterburn (the number of calories your body uses postexercise as it recovers) by about 47% compared with lower-intensity workouts."

Women in the Middle East

We've just returned from a Holy Land Cruise. When you visit Europe or the Middle East you do realize that Americans are much heavier, but they are just 20 or so years behind. It's like the economy. It's going around.

Fittest and fattest cities

Miami is the fattest and Salt Lake City is the fittest. Does government interference or regulation or nanny coddling have anything to do with either one?

It isn't even the weather, which I suspect is nicer in Florida. Not access to the beach--or fast foods--or sidewalks.

No one in the USAToday where these stats appear wants to notice that Salt Lake City is loaded with Mormans who advocate a particular life style.

Another media myth

It's expensive to lose weight.

And usually, if you read the entire article, someone explains that it is processed food that is expensive, not fresh or frozen.

It's January so newspapers are promoting their diet plans which probably have tie-ins with processed food companies, TV reality shows, and pharmaceuticals. News articles will also encourage coupon use, because they print them (they are ads that exercise your scissor muscles). Coupons cover up price increases and introduce the 15th type of Ritz cracker.

It's not expensive to eat fresh food, or even food labeled "organic," although that probably doesn't make a lot of difference, except to increase the cost slightly. The advantage to your health of not buying food fertilized or contaminated by sewage is probably huge, but by the time you get down to the minuscule, unmeasurable amounts of herbicide and pesticides on commercially grown food, which is where we are today with our health gate keepers who want to return American women to long food queues like Europe, the cost and health benefit is pretty small. You have a much better chance of getting Grandma's genetic links to cancer and heart disease than developing problems from eating too much fish or chicken on hormones. News flash. If you live long enough, everyone gets cancer or their heart gives out.

Anyway, today for lunch I took out about 5 spears of tender, fresh asparagus, rinsed them, and arranged a few "baby" (peeled) carrots from a bag, (always, always rinse) on a glass plate and zapped in the microwave uncovered for 1 minute. Add a dollop of low fat sour cream, a little salt and pepper, and enjoy. Then I had my sliced apple and 1/2 cup of walnuts, because I missed breakfast due to exercise class. The entire lunch/breakfast probably didn't top $2. You couldn't make and eat a bagel sandwich with potato chips for less than $4.

One thing mentioned in the USAToday article on dieting that I agree with is that half of all food dollars are spent eating out or take out. Combined with my morning coffee and our Friday date night, that's certainly true for us. However, I count about half of that as "leisure and entertainment."

Cross posted at Collecting my thoughts

Wasn't this settled?

Eat less, move more, don't smoke. "Combined impact of lifestyle factors on mortality: prospective cohort study in US women," Rob M van Dam, BMJ 2008;337:a1440 Here.

I guess it needed more study. Alcohol consumption was also part of the study, but there are trade offs, depending on the amount. The danger is always that "light" will move on to "excessive," thus eliminating the health benefits.

Conclusions
Avoiding cigarette smoking is of pivotal importance for the prevention of premature death. In our study of middle aged women, adherence to lifestyle guidelines involving a healthy diet, regular physical activity, and weight management was also associated with markedly lower mortality. Of note, our results indicate that a healthy diet and regular physical activity have important health benefits independent of reducing adiposity. These findings underscore the importance of intensifying both efforts to eradicate cigarette smoking and those aimed at improving diet and physical activity.

It was like brain surgery

Ellen lost 300 lbs after gastric by-pass and people started treating her like she had a brain.

Story here from Quick and Simple.