Category: health

Not A Bumper Sticker

“One of the important things with Russell and the elite athletes is that none of the foods he consumes are inflammatory foods, which means no yeast, no mold, no dairy, no gluten,” Goglia said. “Dairy’s like eating moderately hard phlegm. It adversely affects oxygen. No dairy, no breads — muffins, bagels — nothing that is yeast, mold and gluten-bound. So starches are always one-ingredient guys like potatoes or rice or yams or oatmeal. If it’s got more than one ingredient in it, he couldn’t eat it.”

Paragraph from an ESPN article about Russell Wilson’s nine meal, forty-eight hundred calories a day diet to lose weight.  Russell Wilson, a professional athlete, is the Seattle Seahawks’ quarterback. He’s trying to get down to two hundred fifteen pounds. This diet has helped him. He’s gone from two hundred twenty-five pounds and sixteen percent body fat in March, to two hundred fourteen pounds and ten percent body fat now. Of course, he exercises and conditions hours each day.

Overall, there’s a lot to think about here. No dairy, no gluten, no yeast; is it a diet you could endure?

Is it a healthy diet?

4

Fitbit Miles

I managed to achieve a goal of walking an average of seven miles per day for the last week, ending at 7.05 miles. It seems like so few in reflection.

My thirty-day and three month averages both increased, as well, to 6.95 and 5.82, respectively.

I remain dubious about the Fitbit’s accuracy, but it’s progress. I’ll take it.

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So Just

Illness interrupts life, if you’re fortunate. The less fortunate end up in hospital, hospice, or a grave. For me, the latest illness is an interruption to my usual routines.

  • Took a hot shower on day three, first since March 20.
  • Didn’t exercise or walk, achieving less than four thousand steps on each of the the first two days, far below my Fitbit goals.
  • Didn’t post, and barely read anything, until the third day.
  • Didn’t write, edit or revise. Didn’t address any publishing biz.
  • Didn’t do yard work, or go out anywhere, and scarcely kept up with the news.
  • Ate little but soup and buttered toast for the first several days, and drank large quantities of tea and hot water.
  • Binged season four of ‘Justified’ and advanced halfway through season five. No ‘Red Dwarf’ was available streaming. RD has been my sickness staple since the turn of the century. I have some of the DVDs and tapes, but it was easier to stream TV.

Being sick allowed some thinking time. I remembered that I’d dreamed of trying to help a general get to a hospital a few days before my illness, and wonder if I was attempting to warn myself. I dreamed a bunch when I was sick, about broken plumbing, stolen baseball gloves, fake roses, taking charge to organize people and processes, family, and flying.

I dreamed of flying a lot during the illness. It wasn’t like Superman and other superheroes would fly, horizontally, with their arms stuck out in front of them, as though diving, or with my arms swept back like wings. No, my flights were like I was walking through the air. I would step up into the air, find my direction, step toward it and be there.

There was some goofiness. I sang to myself. One of the things I sang was, “You say , “Meow,” and I say “Hello. Hello, hello.” I don’t know why you say meow, I say, “Hello.”” I just kept messing with the Beatles’ song, substituting meow for everything “you say”.

It was a mild illness in the relative spectrum of how these things go. The illness has faded to a harsh cough, a throat that’s sore when I cough, and some mucus. Energy is back up to about eighty-three percent of normal. The sensation I couldn’t get warm is gone, the aches have receded, and clarity has returned to thinking.

So just resume everything.

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Sporadic Update

An organized compilation of random subjects plaguing me that I may have posted about, but which I think I should update readers about.

  • The Trial. A plea bargain was accepted so I don’t need to testify about the break-in. The saddest aspect (besides tangible evidence that strange, sick people are out there) is that our beloved neighbor, Barb, has moved out. She’s just too frightened in her house any longer. That’s troubling. Barb and Walt were two of the best things about our location. Walt’s passed away and Barb has moved away, moving me to sigh about change and life.
  • The close call. I survived one close call in April, when I endured one of the worst haircuts I’ve ever received. This young ‘stylist’ was clearly a novice and took to my head with the same sense of style that military barbers employed when I entered basic training. Fortunately, my hair has grown out into something that looks reasonable again.
  • Tucker. Tucker suffers from conjunctive gingivitis. We submitted him to some oral surgery in April. It went terrific. Several teeth were removed, including one of his big lower front fangs, if you will, but he’s not having any swelling, bad breath, pain or drooling, so hooray! On the coin’s flip side, he’s feeling so much better that he’s very energetic and wants to assert his position as the alpha beast.
  • Other cats. Peace has been brokered between Meep (a.k.a. Popi) and Boo Radley. Boo’s PTSD also seems to be diminishing. The big bedroom bagheera without a tail has become more trusting of us. Quinn, of course, remains Quinn, a sweet, charming cat who prefers to avoid conflict.
  • Neighbor cats. Pepper, Princess and Buddy continue their visits and begging. Pepper remains the worse. That’s a little surprising. We always believed Wade’s corgi, Bella, annoyed Pepper, driving her toward us. Sadly, Bella passed away from cancer last month. She’ll be missed but with her absence, we thought that Pepper’s daily visits would taper off. They still could, with time. It could be that what was once refuge is now habit, though. Buddy is a sweet little black character. He’s clearly well-fed, but enjoys being petted and presented kibble, which, being a sucker for cats, I do.
  • The cats’ activities interfere with yard work. Here they come when I make an appearance, pop, pop, pop, Pepper, Buddy and Princess, pop, pop, pop, Boo, Meep and Quinn. (I keep Tucker away for the safety of the rest.) Boo likes to settle right beside me, instructing me about what I’m doing wrong as I weed and mulch while the rest visit each other and observe me. All flee to safe distances when the edger and mower come out.
  • Fitbit. I took some Fitbit hits with the travel last month. Daily mileage on average dropped to five and a quarter miles per day while the average of steps per day dipped to about twelve thousand for the year to date. But summer is here, so I have hope I can raise those averages.
  • Reading. Just read four books in April: ‘Ordinary Grace’ (which I loved), ‘I Am Pilgrim’ (a quick, fast read that had some flaws but remained compelling), ‘The Passenger’ (although interesting, a disappointment), and ‘The Devil’s Star’ (a Jo Nesbo Harry Hole novel). Just started ‘The Shadow of the Wind’ at my other’s insistence.
  • Writing. Really hope to finish ‘Long Summer’ soon and get it out there. Its complications absorb a lot of limited brain power keeping it all straight and then trying to present it in a manner that won’t cause insanity among readers. Still *ahem* haven’t leaped back into publishing like I wanted/planned/expected but I remain determined to do so. ‘Peerless’, ‘Everything in Black and White’, the Spider City’ trilogy, and ‘Fix Everything’ all need to undergo the editing and publishing process. Meanwhile, I’m really eager to write the third book in the Lessons with Savanna mystery series.

There are other things to write about, of course, particularly on the family fronts, but I shield them and their activities, so I post very little about that. Politics, technology and economics remain passions that deserve posts but I end up diverting too much energy to write much about them. Dreams are experienced every night, so I could write about those, too, like last night, when I didn’t like how the dream was going, and changed it in the middle, astonishing everyone in the dream. We’re also undergoing the annual raccoon invasion, and dealing with yard work. My wife’s health continues to be a concern while I remain stupidly healthy. Trips and adventures are planned, and we’re hopeful we can pull some of them off this year and not get sucked back into the black hole of family issues.

Overall, I’m excited, optimistic and hopeful, a great way to live. The writer is pestering me to get on to it with Brett, Philea, Handley and the rest, so it’s time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

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The Prune Solution

A study begun in 2001 concludes osteopenia dried prunes can improve bone density and strength.

My wife was instantly all over that. Old distrusts arose, however, as she regarded the bag at Trader Joe’s. “They look like giant raisins.” Distaste crossed her face. “I hope they don’t taste like raisins.”

My wife and I are the raisin version of Jack Spratt and his wife. I love them; she hates them. I suggested we buy some for our away kit. Everyone has an away kit, don’t they? Away kits are packed with emergency supplies so you can survive or flee from natural disasters like a tRump Presidency. Raisins are rich with nutrients and have a long shelf life. I thought they’d be ideal for the away kit.

My wife gagged. “I’ll die before I eat raisins.”

She has firm opinions about foods. She loves mushrooms and swoons over onions in any permutation but peas appall her. Don’t even bring up lima beans with her unless you want to witness her horror. Meanwhile, I’m not fond of mushrooms. I eat them grilled in various dishes and pizza (like, of course), and they’re great in a spinach salad, but I won’t eat them out of the jar, as she does. Peas are number five in my list of favorite veggies.

She also loves figs. I can’t say I love them, but I do eat them. I didn’t until recent years, though.

The thing about prunes, though, is, they might be great for bones, but they do have certain other side-effects. So…ahem…the next morning….

Eating my first prune, I read the bag label after reaching home and stowing our purchases. A serving size of prunes was five. Knowing of their side effects, I stopped at three. Call me a pessimist, but I wanted to see what happened in my body after those prunes joined the fray. Sure enough, the next morning, quite abruptly, my bowels sent a flash message to my brain: “Get to the bathroom now! Hurry, hurry, hurry.”

Without sharing too much information, everything was fine for that movement, along with the other two morning engagement. By that third, I’d decided, maybe I’ll ease into the prune solution.

You know, just to be prudent.

And that’s why I wrote that whole thing.

As for my wife, she announced, “They do taste a lot like raisins.”

“Not to me,” I replied. “They have a slight cherry sweetness to them.”

She nodded in agreement. It appears the prunes are acceptable.

Time to write like crazy, at least one more time.

2

Mom’s Fault

It’s pouring rain. Soaked dark, my coat dribbled rivulets across the floor as I walked across the coffee shop.

“Did you walk?” the coffee shop owner asked. “I know you like to walk. I’ve seen you walking all over town.”

“No, I just walked a mile,” I answered. “I wanted to feel the rain and wind.”

“You like to walk, don’t you?” the owner said.

“Yes.”

Yes, I like to walk. It’s Mom’s fault. In my young life’s dawn, I’d want to go somewhere and requested Mom drive me. “You have two legs, you can walk,” she’d reply. Stories about her walking when she was a child followed. She walked to school miles in both direction, no matter what the weather was, digging trails and tunnels through the Iowa snowstorms, if necessary, fording rivers and forging trails, dodging wild animals while picking berries or nuts on the way home to use in baking, and stopping to milk the cows. If she walked in those conditions, I could walk.

I might have exaggerated about what she claimed to do.

So I walked. I walked everywhere. I didn’t have a car in high school for several years, so I walked the miles home from school after sports activities and play practices. I walked to my girlfriend’s house, miles more, and back again. Sometimes I was given rides. Sometimes, people attempted to molest me.

Once in the military, my wife and I didn’t have much income, so we walked. Over in the Philippines on duty, I didn’t have a car and had plenty of time, so I walked around the base and the town. In Germany, walking was organized into Volksmarching and celebrated with drink and food. Terrific!

By the time I began writing, walking was ingrained as part of my thinking process. I was pleased to discover that studies validated my impressions about walking. Walking ten minutes a day made most people happy besides providing exercise. Walking also enhances the creative process for most.

I was sure of that latter. Deciding I needed to put myself and my goals and dreams first, I started taking an hour out of the work day to write. Bosses, co-workers and team mates didn’t care as long as I did my share. As part of that, I observed that walking helped me shift from work Michael to writing Michael. As I walked to write, I would ask the eternal writing questions, “Where the hell am I? Where does the story go next? What do I need to write next? What did I write yesterday?” Asking these questions and thinking about it prepped me to sit down, ready to type.

Likewise, after leaving, I’d often continue working out characters, scenes and plots as I walked back to work. Then, walking to write the next day, I would recall the previous day and resume writing with little effort.

I was surprised that studies didn’t demonstrate a link to improved focused thinking, as well, and problem solving. Perhaps I’d trained myself to solve problems by walking, but I always felt leaving work for a short work, changing the scenery and releasing my brain from the work environment, was hugely instrumental in being able to see answers and develop solutions. Perhaps, though, that was still the creative brainstorming that writing seems to encourage.

My walking continued once I started working from home. I walked to take breaks and enjoy fresh air and sunshine. Then, walking to the coffee shop to write, I walked to reduce my carbon footprint and help save money and the environment.

Now, I have the Fitbit to encourage me to walk. If I haven’t walked in an hour, it buzzes me to get up and walk. So I leave the coffee shop and hustle down the steps and around the block and back. That’s enormously reduced my writer’s ass, which is when your ass goes to sleep after being almost stationary while typing or writing at a desk or table. When I’m at home, my wife and I jump up and start running around. Sometimes, we chase the cats, but they’re not into it, so we don’t do that much.

But, like many things I do and enjoy, my walking started with Mom.

4

Strap It On

Well, it’s been a week since we strapped them on. I had mentioned buying them in passing about a year ago. Like a volunteer seed, it took root in my wife’s thinking. After a year, we finally  took action. Now I can provide some feedback on what a Fitbit has meant to me and my life, at least one week of it.

My Fitbit is a Charge 2, worn on my right wrist. The Fitbit informs me that I walk an average of twelve thousand steps and five miles a day. My highest miles walked were five point six, measured out in fourteen thousand steps. My resting BPM is fifty-nine, with a low of fifty-five and a high of one hundred thirty-nine, reached when I walked up the equivalent of thirteen floors of steps while doing an urban hike. I averaged seven hours and fifty-seven minutes of sleep per night, awakening three times. I’m usually restless twelve times per night, with a high of seventeen.

All interesting stuff. I’m dubious about its accuracy. It seems to think you’re sleeping if you’re reclined and not moving. But my wife and I both note, yeah, we’re in bed, but we’re not always sleeping just because we’re not moving.

I’m pretty pleased with my walking activity. We’ve endured many days in the low mid to low twenties and high teens where built up ice encumbered walking. I’m also recovering from wrenching my right knee while on the ladder, cleaning smoothie off the kitchen ceiling.

The Fitbit seems very dependent on arm movement. Don’t move your arms, you don’t get credit, it seems. It also sometimes seems to work in blocks. Yesterday, crossing the house to attend the cats, I checked my steps: twelve thousand, six hundred forty. I found the cats, petted them, provided them with catnip fixes, went around checking on doors, poured and drank some water, refilled the water pitcher, and took out the recycling. Then I checked my Fitbit.

It still registered twelve thousand, six hundred forty.

I knew I’d been moving around, and I swung my arms when I was walking, if I didn’t carry anything, so I knew – what? That the steps hadn’t registered. But was it a question of yet? 

Indeed it was. After sitting down at the computer and turning on Sneaky Pet’ on Amazon, I checked my Fitbit, and my steps had jumped. It had a full charge, done earlier that day, so I put this down to a system flaw.

Despite these things, I like the Fitbit. I installed the app on my iTablet or whatever it’s called and the two synchronize whenever they’re near one another. What I like is that it tracks and counts a great deal of information. Even if it’s rudimentary or flawed, it provides a sufficient structure to encourage me to do more and be more mindful about what I’m doing. The Fitbit buzzes every hour to remind me to move around, something I appreciate. My wife and I often make a game of that, first marching around to ‘Colonel Bogey’s March’, and then chasing each other around the furniture until one of us needs to go pee.

Once I have three weeks of averages, I can establish goals to move around more. The biggest thing is that I want this as a companion, and not a master. I don’t want to become obsessed with counting steps or miles and reaching higher and higher levels, but to use it to enhance my healthy practices.

Of course, part of me thinks into the future, when the Fitbit’s technology is improved and replaced. Then I expect to find it in a drawer, forgotten, and take the opportunity to write, “Do you remember Fitbits? We used to wear them to count our steps.”

Who knows what we’ll be using by then?

 

7

My Personal Cycles

I’ve long adhered to a few basic ideas. I want to think them out, so I need to write about them.

First, I have basic cycles. Yes, this is the basic emotional, intelligence and physical bio-rhythms. I know, and can feel them, waxing and waning.

I can tell when they all plummet together; at those times, I can’t get my shit together. It feels like I’m on the verge of spiraling out of control as I bounce through near-calamities, barely avoiding disastrous results.

It is not a good time.

I’ve become more aware of these cycles as I’ve aged. I don’t think they’re increasing in strength but that, as I’ve become aware of them, I’m paid greater attention to them, and from doing so, can sense their changes.

I can tell when they all come together; I feel fantastic and optimistic when they all rise and converge.

But, besides those cycles, I’ve recognized a few more energies within me: dreaming, social, writing, memory and creativity.

After observing my dreaming cycles for the past few months, I saw the pattern today. While I’m a veritable dream machine, the intensity, number and ability to remember them fluctuates. A pattern has emerged of going up and down through several weeks.

Social energy is harder to define. I think it has a pattern as well, but I have a naturally low social energy. Another blogger pointed me toward a post that queried, “Are you empath?” Of their thirty points, I was nonplussed to see how many seemed to apply to me, or that I applied to myself. One of the aspects identified was how being around others drain me. I’ve always known that. I find being with others hugely taxing. I find corners and the edges, where I can avoid the rest and shield myself from their energy and guard my own.

Which ties in with my creative energy. I’ve always been aware ‘on some level’ of my creative energy. I feel it most powerfully when it surges, and have always felt it. There is a cause and effect relationship inherent in it; I enjoyed being creative as a child. Being creative was encouraged in school and by the family. Drawing, painting, musical instruments, writing short stories, they lived it all, so I did it all. Besides that, creative activities could be done in solitude and solitude was accepted for these activities. Pursuing them allowed me to avoid socializing, which drained me. I ask myself, though, if I hadn’t been creative, encouraged to be creative and then pursued being creative, would I be more social? Perhaps so, but in reflection, exercising creativity has always been a joy. I think being creative is my natural path.

Writing energy is a bit different from the others. I’ve coaxed and nurtured my writing energy to develop. It seems like it resides in me but it’s a latent energy that needed to be brought out. Writing energy is harder to maintain because it is even more solitary than creative energy. I’ve learned a few tricks through the years to identify and maintain my writing energy but it seems to have sudden rises and plunges. I’m still learning to see and feel the rises and plunges coming on, and I continue to probe myself for the cycle.

All of these energies, however, are dependent on having enough sleep, eating properly and exercising. When these areas are taken care of, then I’m able to maximize an energy when it rises. Conversely, if I don’t take care of these areas, I’m not able to maximize them. Worse, when I’m in a trough, I feel it more acutely.

Writing and creativity energy are waxing now, so I blame them for this post. See, I’ve been intensely writing and creating. I woke up thinking about Hendrik Lorenz and Chi-particles.

Then it all went from there.

 

3

Today’s Theme Music

I don’t know about you, because I actually don’t know you (I barely know myself), but I could use a rebuild every now and then. Take this gut. Please. Rebuild it. Put my twenty-five year old version back in there. Like a lot of things, I like my body as it used to be.

But c’est la vie, my friends. That’s life and we can’t get rebuilt.

Except that’s not how it was for Steve Austin. He was a man barely alive, and they rebuilt him. I wonder, though, you know, if you can rebuild him, did they rebuild all of him? Was this a ground up restoration or did they just pick and chose? I suspect the latter. They’re always talking about one of his eyes and his legs.

That’s what worries me about being rebuilt. I worry that I’ll ask, “Which of my parts should I replace?”

After softly clearing her throat, my consultant tells me, “Well, on your budget, you’re pretty limited.”

Of course I have a vision about how I want to be rebuilt. “What about Brad Pitt? Can I order anything out of the Brad Pitt catalog?”

“Yes.” My consultant clears her throat. Again. “You can afford anything out of his fingernail sections. Here, page through the website. It’s organized by body parts. So, just select limbs, and then click down to arms, hands, and fingers. See? Brad Pitt’s fingernails are quite reasonably priced. We can rebuild you with a couple of those.”

“A couple?”

“Yes, you can afford a thumb and a little finger.”

“From the same hand?”

“No.”

“What about my mid-section?”

Heavy laughter ensues. When it ends, my consultant tells me, “Oh, you can’t afford Brad Pitt’s mid-section.”

“I can take out a mortgage on my home.”

“That won’t be enough, I’m afraid.”

“How ’bout a bun?”

“Excuse me?”

“Can I get rebuilt with one of Brad Pitt’s buns? You know, his rear end? His ass, to be crass, his derriere, if you want posh.”

“Oh my gosh, excuse me. I spewed coffee when you said that! No, you can’t afford Brad Pitt’s buns, and don’t even think about anything off his face.”

“Not even an earlobe?”

“No.”

“Well, what can I get?”

“Here, let me show you our John Goodman collection.”

“John Goodman? From ‘Roseanne’?”

“Yes, I think you can afford his mid-section.”

“I don’t think that’s an improvement.”

“Are you sure? He is a star.”

So, anyway, I won’t be doing any rebuilding on this cyber Monday. I’m still saving for improvements I can afford. Meanwhile, here is the opening from ‘Six Million Dollar Man’. Oh, sure, they can rebuild Lee Majors. What’s he got that I haven’t got?

That was rhetorical; you don’t need to reply.

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Hungry Today

My wife and I are on day eight of the ten day green smoothie cleansing fast. I’ve modified mine for my writing needs, permitting myself my mochas. Purists will be disgusted that I’m allowing myself sugars, milk, coffee and chocolate. I accept their umbrage. My weakness humbles me. I’m disgusted, too. But I need to write and this is part of it. That’s a shameful confession.

Other than that, I’ve been dealing okay with the smoothie fast. We are allowed raw vegetables, nuts and seeds as a snack on it. This is my third time this year doing it with my wife. Three days were endured the first time (for me, while she went for forty-one), five days the second time (she went for ten). Now I’m going for ten with her. It’s been cool so far but suddenly, today, I’m hungry. Pizza, sandwich and pastry visions are torturing me.

Meager strength comes from recognizing this is my choice. I’m doing it to support my wife. She suffers RA. Foods create imbalances, and imbalances cause flares of pain, inflammation and stiffness. That’s just the surface stuff. Other things are happening under the skin, heightening stress and anxiety, because we don’t know what will manifest itself next.

It’s cleansing for me, too, and I need cleansed. I’ve had a typical American middle-aged diet of too much processed food for too long and celebrating too frequently and too much. Then I erred and ate the same thing everyday. That is not actually good. Although my breakfast meal of choice was organic oatmeal with walnuts, and blueberries or other fruit and berries, that extended diet (I followed it for over a decade) caused digestive problems. My body needs variety to stay balanced.

Of course, it’s bizarre and ironic but appropriate that we have people starving elsewhere, searching for anything to eat to sustain themselves while we pursue this smoothie fast. Appropriate because this is the state of the world, isn’t it?

Ironic, too, that I write about having the same diet everyday and sit here, drinking my customary quad shot mocha. Not ironic, but pathetic, yes? The day may change but the saboteur is often me damaging myself despite my self-awareness. And damages aren’t limited to what I eat and drink, but thoughts born of low self-esteem, waning self-confidence and worldly weariness.

So I’m hungry, hungry for change. The fast and those cravings are symptoms of a deeper malaise. Author, fix thyself.  Continue reading “Hungry Today” →

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