A Girl In WOW

Men Can Drink More Than Women: Say What?

8:07 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
Say you’re a woman challenged to a drinking contest by a male companion. Do you advocate for a handicap based on your double X chromosomes, or do you saddle up to the bar and go drink for drink, believing in equality of the sexes in all matters? The Straight Talk Determining whether the man has a physiologic upper hand depends on how ethanol is absorbed, wow gold cheap distributed, and excreted from the body, and how this differs (if at all) between the two sexes. Anecdotally, most people recognize that, given the same amount of alcohol, large people will feel its affects less than small people will. This is simply due to the fact that after ethanol is absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract into the bloodstream, it’s distributed throughout the body; the larger the volume of distribution, the less concentrated the substance. Since, wow cheap gold wow goldon average, women are smaller than men, it stands to reason that size alone would give women a disadvantage. But even after adjusting for weight and height, the average woman will still get drunker faster than the average man. The answer lies not in size per se, but rather, what we’re made of. Though there are always exceptions, cheap wow gold on average, a man’s body will have more muscle and less fat than a woman’s. Since muscle tissue contains more water than fat tissue, a man’s body contains a greater percentage of water than a woman’s, around 60 percent compared to 50 percent. Alcohol dissolves in water and not in fat, so as the ethanol moves from the stomach into the blood, it will be distributed in a greater number of a man’s cells cheap wow gold than a woman’s. Consequently, ethanol is more concentrated in a woman’s bloodstream; she will have a higher Blood Alcohol Content (BAC) with the same amount of drinks. Higher BAC leads to more ethanol going to the organs, where it exerts its intoxicating effects. health Top Tips nutrition Love lifestyle Happiness Weight Loss But what if the woman is more muscular than the man, and they weigh approximately the same? She may also be hindered by her rate of beer breakdown. While the majority of ethanol is wow power leveling oxidized in the liver, a small amount is metabolized in the stomach, by an enzyme called gastric alcohol dehydrogenase. A few small studies have shown that in younger women, the activity of this enzyme is significantly lower compared with their male counterparts. This means men are able to break down more ethanol in the stomach, so less is absorbed into the bloodstream. What women do have going for them, however, is a higher rate of alcohol excretion, though this is buy wow gold dependent on their lean body mass. Men and women eliminate about the same amount of alcohol per unit of weight, but women eliminate more booze per unit of lean body mass per hour than men do. Perhaps a leaner, stronger woman could drink a blubbery man under the table. The Takeaway Winning a drinking contest, or just being able to gauge how many drinks you can have while still remaining vertical, depends on numerous factors, including regularity of drink, that day’s food and sleep intake, and genetics. But based just on gender, it seems our woman in question—unless she stands eye to eye with her opponent and has already beat him in an arm wrestling competition—should take a drink or two handicap.

5 Food Fats to Know For Heart Health

7:56 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
1. Omega 6 Fats: This type of fat is found in corn oil and soybean oil and the amount we use has increased buy wow gold over the years because we eat more processed foods. Go check a few boxed foods in your kitchen cupboard and you will likely find soybean oil in the ingredient list. Too much omega-6 fat can increase inflammation. 2. Omega 3 Fats: There are 3 omega-3 fats - DHA, EPA and ALA. The first two are found in fatty fish such as tuna, salmon, trout, mackerel, and herring. ALA is wow power leveling the plant source of omega-3 and is found in flax seed and walnuts. Omega-3 fats help reduce inflammation. If you can eat fish high in omega 3 twice a week you can get a good base amount for heart health. If you don't like fish then you can take fish oil capsules. Remember to read the dosage directions on your supplement bottle. If your doctor recommends 1000mg or 1gram fish oil daily, that actually means 1000mg EPA/DHA. What you need to do is add the EPA and DHA amounts. Most bottles have about 300mg of these once you add them together so that means you need 3-4 pills to get 1000mg of omega-3. You also want to buy a brand you feel has good quality. Since supplementscheap wow gold are not regulated you have no guarantee what is actually in the bottle. Flax seed is a grain and can be purchased as seed or milled. You need to eat the ground form to get the health benefits because the body can not break down the seed form. Once it is ground be sure to keep it refrigerated. Add 1-2 tablespoons to cereal, yogurt, or any dish you are having. You will get the benefit of the omega-3 and the fiber! 3. Monounsaturated fats are also anti-inflammatory and good for our heart and cholesterol. The Mediterranean Diet is high in monounsaturated fats and includes regular intake of foods like olive oil, canola oil, avocados and nuts. Eating these good fats can lower blood pressure, cholesterol and reduce risk for Diabetes. health Top Tips nutrition Love lifestyle Happiness Weight Loss 4. Trans fats are not good for our health. Some trans fats are naturally found in animal foods but most of our excess trans fats are from processed fat in packaged foods.cheap wow gold Stick margarine is the classic example of trans fats. When stick margarine is made, oil is processed to become solid. This process is called hydrogenation and you will often see the words "partially hydrogenated" on ingredient labels. The chemical process of making oil turn solid creates trans fats which have been found to raise artery clogging cholesterol (LDL) and lower artery cleaning cholesterol (HDL). Trans fat amounts are required to be on labels by FDA and you want to try to keep your intake as close to zero as possible. The simplest way to keep trans fat intake low is to eat less processed food. 5. Saturated fats can also raise cholesterol. Just think of saturated fat as solid fat like lard or butter. Whole and 2% milk, cheese and fatty meats are wow cheap gold wow gold also high in saturated fat. Some snack foods and bakery products are high in saturated fats as well. Check the labels and try to keep saturated fat less than 20 grams daily. You do not need to quit eating cheese and eggs. My recommendation is to choose small portions of less processed cheese. I personally don't like fat-free cheese for the taste or texture. Eggs have a little saturated fat but are also a very good protein source. They have gotten a bad reputation over the years due to their higher cholesterol content. Reducing processed foods will do much more for your health than cutting out the eggs.

How to Walk to a Healthier You （II）

7:54 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
Defy Boredom 11. Periodically pick up the pace. Boredom can quickly bring a walk to a premature end. Keep your mind and your body engaged by periodically picking up the pace or challenging yourself by trudging up a hill. Every 10 to 15 minutes, complete a 2- to 3-minute surge. During your surge, try to catch a real or imaginary walker ahead of you. 12. Explore on your walks. You can walk anywhere at any time, from your neighborhood to your local mall to your downtown main street to a local trail. You can even walk laps around your office building! Rather than walking the same old tired route day in and day out, use your walks as a way to experience and explore the great outdoors. Varying your route and terrain will do more than keep you mentally engaged. It will also help you to target different leg muscles, improving the effectiveness of every outing. One day you might walk through a section of your neighborhood that allows you to marvel at your neighbors' gardens or Home improvement projects. Another day you might head to the local park. Still another day you might walk downtown. 13. Take your dog with you (or get a dog). Once your dog gets used to your walks, he or she will look forward to them and give you a gentle nudge (or annoying whine) on the days you try to get out of it. There's nothing more effective than a set of puppy dog eyes to extract your butt from the couch and get it out the door. In addition to walking the neighborhood, consider signing up for a dog agility class. During the class, you and your dog will circumvent a course with seesaws, hurdles, tunnels, and other obstacles. (Your dog tackles the obstacles. You run or walk alongside and yell the appropriate command.) Both you and your dog will get a great workout and you'll end up with a better-behaved and calmer dog as a result. Don't have a dog? Offer to walk a neighbor's dog twice a week. That commitment thing will keep you motivated. 14. Pump up the volume. In a study published in the journal Chest, people with severe respiratory disease who listened to music while walking covered four more miles during the eight-week study than a similar group that did not listen to music while walking. Researchers speculate that listening to music made the participants feel less hindered by shortness of breath and distracted them from possible boredom and fatigue. You don't have to have lung disease to benefit from music during your walks. Bring along a headset and play your favorite tunes. 15. Sign up for a stroller walk. If you're a new mom, you don't need us to tell you how hard it is to fit in time for fitness -- not to mention time for other basics like taking a shower. The good news is you can take your infant on your walk. A growing number of hospitals and fitness centers, including the YMCA, offer group stroller walks for new moms. Entire franchises, such as StrollerFit and Stroller Strides, have popped up in communities around the country. These franchises promote 50-minute to one-hour workouts that combine walking, stretching, and strength training with elastic tubing for stretches and resistance work. Health Top Tips Nutrition Lifestyle 16. When you feel like blowing off your walk, promise yourself you'll do just 10 minutes. "Head out the door for a short walk. Chances are, once you've warmed up, you'll exercise for longer than you anticipated," says Liz Applegate, Ph.D., nutrition and fitness expert at the University of California at Davis and author of Bounce Your Body Beautiful. "Even if you don't walk longer, 10 minutes is better than no minutes at all." 17. Five times a day, climb up and down a flight of stairs for two minutes. You'll garner the same heart-rate-enhancing results in those 10 minutes as you would get from 36 minutes of walking on a level surface. 18. Roll out of bed, get dressed, put on your shoes, and go. It's easy to get caught up in your day-to-day activities and tell yourself that you don't have time for a walk. If you exercise first thing in the morning, however, you have no excuse. Research shows that people who plan to exercise in the morning are more likely to fit in their workouts than people who plan to exercise later in the day. Exercising in the morning may offer a side benefit: You'll sleep better at night. When researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington, compared morning and evening exercise, people who exercised at least 225 minutes per week in the morning had an easier time falling asleep at night than those who completed the same amount of exercise in the evening. 19. Or, walk in the evening. That sleep study aside, we still like after-dinner walks. They get you away from the television, they keep you from eating too much at dinner, it's when your neighbors are outside, and it's just a lovely time of day. Don't let unlovely weather stop you either -- that's what jackets, boots, and umbrellas were invented for. There's something childlike and fun about a walk in the rain or snow. 20. Learn your m.p.h. That's miles per hour, of course, just like a car. Knowing it isn't that useful, but we're a nation of statistics lovers, and if monitoring your speed helps keep you motivated, then more power to you. A leisurely pace is 2 miles per hour, a healthy, brisk pace is 3.5 miles per hour, and going over 4 miles per hour is downright fast. A pedometer will measure this for you, but if you don't have one, you can simply count your steps during various 15-second periods. For a normal grown-up stride, if you walk 15 steps in 15 seconds, you're walking at a leisurely pace of 2 miles per hour, At 23 steps, you're walking a moderate pace of 3 miles per hour, and at 30 steps, you're walking about 4 miles per hour. 21. Walk in the prettiest area in your town (or the next town over). It just might encourage you to walk more often. When researchers from the University of Wollongong in New South Wales, Australia, surveyed walkers about their walking habits, they found that men who perceived their neighborhoods to be "aesthetic" were more consistent about walking around their neighborhoods. Other research finds that neighborhoods with well-maintained sidewalks and safe and well-lit walking areas encourage walking over neighborhoods that don't have those features. In fact, people who live in so-called walkable neighborhoods walk an average of 70 more minutes each week than people who live in neighborhoods lacking such characteristics, according to a study completed at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. 22. If you're over 60, walk on soft surfaces. As you age, the fat padding in your feet deteriorates. The absence of this natural shock absorber can make walking on sidewalks and other hard surfaces feel like foot torture. Flat grass and dirt paths will provide more cushioning for your feet than roads or sidewalks. 23. Train for an event. It's a great motivator. Check your local sporting goods stores for calendars or flyers on walks being held in your area. Generally, these fun runs and walks raise money for a good cause. For example, the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society offers a Team in Training program that will get you in marathon walking shape. Yes, that's right, lots of people walk an entire 26.2 miles in one shot. The society assigns you a coach and walking plan, and you raise money through donations. 24. Apply some lube. If you're a long-distance walker or somewhat overweight, chafing clothes can make you want to call it quits. You can solve the problem by wearing skin-hugging clothing and lubing up your sensitive areas with Vaseline. The Vaseline acts like a barrier to protect your skin. Stay Busy 25. Split it up. When you're too busy to go for your usual 30- to 60-minute walk, split it up and get out there for 5 or 10 minutes at a time. That may be as simple as taking a 5-minute walk break around the building after completing a big project at work. Such short walking breaks will refresh your mind, so you can return to work with more vigor. In fact, research shows that most of us can only focus at top capacity for 30 minutes at a time. After that, concentration begins to drop off. Your intermittent walk breaks may actually make you more productive! 26. Shop at the mall instead of online. Walking around the mall can burn about 200 calories an hour, much more than what you will burn sitting on your tush as you surf the Net for great deals. You can increase the effectiveness of your walk and shop time by doing a lap around the mall between store visits. 27. Walk and talk. Use a cordless phone and walk around the house as you chat with friends or conduct your Business. This is a great way to make use of those long times spent on hold with the IRS, phone company, or Internet service provider. Not only will you get some heart-healthy exercise, wow cheap gold wow gold but the exercise will help you maintain your mental cool. Use your pedometer to count your steps and you'll get the added bonus of feeling like you accomplished something rather than just wasting time. 28. Walk faster earlier in your walk. If you want to increase the amount of fat you burn during your walk, add some bursts of faster walking toward the beginning of your walk. Many walkers wait until the end of the walk to speed up, treating their faster walking as a finishing kick. Yet a study published in the European Journal of Applied Physiology found that exercisers burned more fat and felt less fatigued when they cheap wow gold inserted their faster segments toward the beginning of a workout. It works because you speed up your heart rate early and keep it elevated for the rest of your walk. 29. Feel each muscle you use in your walk. Concentrate on different muscle areas: calves, hamstrings, glutes, and quadriceps. Feel the movement in each area as you walk. The motivation you'll get from realizing the bang you're getting for your walking buck (all those muscles!) will keep you walking longer. 30. Take light weights (3 to 5 pounds) on your walks. Periodically work in arm exercises as you walk. This does more than increase the benefit of the workout. Carrying weights also builds muscle, and each pound of muscle burns cheap wow gold about 30-50 more calories a day. Build a couple of pounds of muscle in your arms alone and you'll burn an extra 100 calories a day -- even while you're just channel surfing. Not into weights? Try isometric exercises of the arms, chest, and abdominal muscles. For instance, as you walk, go through the motion of throwing a punchwow power leveling in slow motion. As you extend your arm, tense the muscles along it and do the same as you retract it. You should feel tension in your triceps, biceps, deltoids, and pectoral muscles. Then repeat with your arms going straight up and down, or out to the side, rather than straight ahead. You can also tense your chest muscles by bringing your hands together in front of your body and contracting
buy cheap wow gold across the chest and shoulders. Do this rhythmically to match your gait. Also try doing curls with no weights. Simply curl your arms alternately, in rhythm with your gait. Each time you curl your forearms, tense your biceps.

How to Walk to a Healthier You

7:52 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
Better Than Running It's so simple and convenient it couldn't possibly count as exercise, right? Wrong. Study after study shows that regular moderate walking can help you lose weight and reduce your risk of heart disease. If you don't believe us, then trust the research. In a study published in Diabetes Research in Clinical Practice, Japanese researchers tested obese men before and after they joined a one-year modest walking plan. All they did was up the number of steps they took during their daily activities, such as walking from the car to the grocery store. The result: Their blood pressure and cholesterol levels improved and the amount of body fat around their abdomen -- the dangerous kind of fat that leads to higher rates of heart disease and Diabetes -- significantly decreased. That's good news, because walking has now become the most popular fitness activity in the United States. Convenient, simple, and gentle on the joints, walking is perhaps the easiest form of exercise to maintain. According to surveys, four out of five women who start a walking program continue to walk, while half of women who attempt other types of aerobic exercise, such as swimming, drop out during the first few months. In addition, research has shown that a regular walking program, mile for mile, packs about the same punch as running when it comes to your waistline. Here are some ways both to sneak more walking into your life, and to get the most out of every step you take. 1. Learn the basics. Before you take your next step outdoors, you need to know how much walking to do, and how often. Here are the facts: * For it to be exercise, walk at a pace that has you breathing heavily, but still able to talk. * Your goal, first and foremost, is to walk five days a week, 30 minutes a walk. Do that, and you are getting the base-level amount of exercise that research says should maintain your health and vigor. * Don't assume you can reach that goal quickly. Walking hard for 30 minutes is, well, hard! Walk for as long as you are comfortable the first week, even if it's just to your mailbox and back. Each subsequent week, increase that amount by no more than 10 percent. * Start every walk with five minutes of easy-paced walking, about the same pace at which you'd do your grocery shopping, to get your body warmed up. Then, cool down at the end of each walk with another five minutes of easy-paced walking. This allows your heart rate to gradually speed up and slow down. * When you reach the target of 30 minutes a day, five days a week, set a new target. Either you should grow your walking habit by increasing your time, or you might be ready for new forms of exercise, such as strength-building exercises twice a week. 2. Pick a charity -- it could be Breast Cancer, the American Red Cross, the United Way -- and pledge to contribute $1 for every mile you walk. You'll take pride in the fact that you are walking for something beyond yourself, which will motivate you to go longer and faster. After every walk, mark the amount you owe on a chart, and when you reach $100, send a check. Whoever thought exercise could be tax deductible? 3. Walk with a friend. If she's expecting you, you're more likely to get out of bed on cold winter mornings or skip the cafeteria for a lunchtime walk. If one of you backs out for any reason, put $5 in a kitty. Hopefully this will never happen, but if you manage to build up any substantial sum, donate it to charity. 4. Walk for entertainment one day a week. Instead of walking around your neighborhood, walk through the zoo, an art museum, or an upscale shopping mall. First circle the perimeter of your location at your usual brisk pace. Then wander through again more slowly to take in the sights. 5. Use a pedometer. These nifty gadgets measure how far you've walked in steps and miles. They provide motivation by spurring you to meet a particular goal and showing you if you've met it. And research shows that they work. In one study of 510 people completed at Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center in La Crosse, Wisconsin, people who wore a pedometer automatically increased the amount of steps they took in a day. Often, pedometers hook onto your belt and are small and easy to use. 6. Shoot for 10,000 steps a day. Don't let that amount scare you. Most people walk about 5,500 to 7,500 steps during an average day as they amble to and from meetings, to the water cooler, to the mailbox. In fact, researchers who study these types of things consider 5,000 steps a day a "sedentary lifestyle." According to researchers at Arizona State University in Mesa, you can cover 7,499 steps a day without participating in formal sports or exercise. If you garner 10,000 steps a day, you're considered "active," while 12,500 steps a day garners you the title "highly active." Using your pedometer, find your baseline of how many steps you normally take in a day. Then increase that amount by at least 200 steps a day until you reach 10,000 to 12,500 daily steps. 7. Take the entire family on your daily walks. Not only will you be modeling good fitness habits for your children, but you'll also be able to supervise them while you walk rather than getting a sitter. If your children walk too slowly, ask them to ride their bikes or roller-skate alongside you. To keep everyone entertained, play your usual repertoire of long car trip games such as "I Spy." You can also try a scavenger walk, where you start out with a list of items to find during your walk and check off the list as you spot them. 8. Once a week, complete your errands on foot. If you live within a mile of town, or even a convenience store, start from your house. If you live out in the middle of nowhere, drive to within a mile of your destination, park, and walk the rest of the way there and back. You'll be surprised how much you can accomplish on foot, and even better, how many people you'll meet along the way. 9. Improve your walking posture. Proper posture will reduce discomfort as you walk and help you burn more fat and calories. So when you go on your next walk, readjust yourself to the following standards: * Stand tall with your spine elongated and breastbone lifted. This allows room for your lungs to fully expand. * Keep your head straight with your eyes focused forward and shoulders relaxed. Avoid slumping your shoulders forward or hunching them toward your ears. * Roll your feet from heel to toe. * As you speed up, take smaller, more frequent steps. This protects your knees and gives your butt a good workout. * Allow your arms to swing freely. * Firm your tummy and flatten your back as you walk to prevent low back pain. 10. Breathe deeply as you walk to a count of 1-2-3. Many people unintentionally hold their breath when they exercise and then suddenly feel breathless and tired. Oxygen is invigorating, and muscles need oxygen to create the energy for movement. So as you inhale, bring the air to the deepest part of your lungs by expanding your ribs outward and your tummy forward and inhale for a count of three. Then exhale fully either through your nose or mouth, also to the count of three.

The Path to a Healthy Heart

7:50 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
 Heart-Smart Living This is the foundation of the 30-Minutes-A-Day Plan. We’ve found the simplest, most powerful steps you can take -- without adding more jobs to your to-do list or expenses to your monthly budget -- to protect your heart the way nature intended. Heart-smart living can be as simple as laughing at a bad situation rather than getting angry. It means going for walks after dinner, not watching game shows or sports. It means having an apple for dessert rather than apple pie, or spending 15 minutes sipping a cup of Homemade cocoa curled up on the sofa with your spouse instead of watching the 11 o’clock news with a bag of chips. It’s doing a 5-minutes-a-day strength-training program while the Coffee perks in the morning or taking a 3-second meditative pause when the “you’ve got mail” alert sounds on your computer. Our message: At a cost of no more than 30 minutes a day, you can take powerful, scientifically proven steps to overcome the biggest heart threats out there, including tummy fat, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, insulin resistance, inflammation, free radicals, and a host of factors researchers are still striving to understand, such as homocysteine and a cholesterol particle called LP(a). Here’s the plan that lets you take them all on and win. 1. Focus on Small Changes for Big Results Fast, simple diet swaps can cut cholesterol by 30 percent. A 5-minutes-a-day weight-training program can replace wow power leveling10 years’ worth of lost muscle tissue. 2. Conquer Sitting Disease Americans spend 22 hours a day sitting or lying down, yet our bodies are built for lots and lots of daily activity. We’ll show you how to build healthy movement back into your cheap wow gold life, no matter how jam-packed your days are. Health Top Tips Nutrition Lifestyle 3. Eat Fresh Foods Fresh, whole foods don’t have to cost more or take more time to prepare than the packaged stuff. These wholesome, delicious edibles -- fresh fruits and veggies, grains, fish, meats, dairy products, and even soy -- not only taste good, they also protect your heart by slashing blood fats, driving down elevated blood sugar, cooling off inflammation, and fighting destructive free radicals. We’ll show you the easiest way to start eating healthier foods and fewer foods from a box. 4. Know Your Numbers You want results? You can track your success by keeping tabs on six crucial numbers. All adult Americans should know where they stand with regard to these numbers, but virtually none do. You may be surprised by the list, both what’s on it and what’s not. For help sticking with the program, we’ll also tell you which four things to monitor on a daily basis -- a task that should take about 30 seconds each evening. It’s that simple. 5. Avoid Toxins From tobacco to trans fats, sugar to environmental pollutants, the “toxins” we allow to enter ourcheap wow gold bodies seem to wreak havoc with our hearts first. Your body doesn’t have to be a Superfund site. We’ll show you how to clean it up. 6. Find Joy A growing stack of research links hostility, impatience, and holding grudges with poor heart health; in contrast, forgiveness, friends, and optimism are linked with healthier heawow cheap gold wow gold rts. Do you have a heart-threatening personality type? Find out -- and learn how to live a more joyful life.

Eternal Youth in a Pill?

7:45 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
A new pill may provide the anti-aging benefits of a lean diet without cutting calories. Drastically cutting calories can help you live longer, but that's no fun. That’s why doctors are excited about resveratrol, a substance that seems to mimic the life-lengthening effects of calorie restriction without dieting. You can get some resveratrol from pomegranates, blueberries, grapes and red wine (supplements are not proven to have benefits). Now pharmaceutical companies are working to engineer the substance into a prescription pill that may be effective enough to fight a host of aging-related diseases, starting with type 2 Diabetes. Drugmaker Sirtris’s experimental resveratrol drug, SRT501, lowered blood sugar and improved insulin response in people with the condition at least as well as current drugs -- without weight gain. It's also being tested on cancer and has shown promise in treating Alzheimer’s too. It may be available within five years. Next up: Living to 150?

Chinese Green Tea - More Than Just Health

7:44 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
Chinese green tea has been around for a recorded three thousand years, and has been providing folks with great flavor and plenty of health benefits...long before they even knew what most were! In Chinese Medicine, this brew was used to battle many conditions, and is still used today as both a helpful preventative and cure. Such conditions range from the common cold to more serious health issues such as the development of cancer. However, there is no current scientific research that suggests any tea will totally beat cancer, but there is research that revealed it can certainly help prevent it. However, there is more to this special type of tea than just battling cancer! Below we will quickly explore other aspects this great beverage has to offer aside from just health. Common Types of Chinese Green Tea When some folks think about tea from China, they may not realize that there are hundreds of varieties of this beverage. There is more to it then that little bag that sits at the bottom of Chinese food take out...there is no one variety! Below, we will only look at two very common teas...or else this article would be long indeed! First, we have "Dragon Well", a well-known variety. The leaves of Dragon Well are broad and flat, no longer than the average finger nail, and is very similar to the Japanese green tea, "Sencha". The aroma and flavor of this beverage has a smooth mellow note with mild grassy undertones. When brewed correctly, a pale green liquor is revealed which sometimes has a bit of sweetness, especially once the palate adapts. Then we have "Pi Lo Chun", also known as "green snail spring". This tea gets it name due to the fact that the leaves are curled into what looks like little snails, just like the way some Taiwanese oolong teas are rolled. When steeped, the leaves open up revealing a very clean taste that is more delicate than Dragon Well. There is also a hint of sweetness and its light taste is perfect for newcomers introducing themselves to loose Chinese green tea. Of course there are many more, but the above two are the only two types that are more widespread. All the other varieties are unique to each of the hundreds of individual tea farms and estates that produce them. Generally, each receives its own special "name" and remains exclusive to that specific farm, way of processing, and final preparation on how the tea is shaped, whether it be rolled by hand or by machines. Health Top Tips Nutrition Lifestyle Many different sizes, flavors, colors, and prices are associated which each specific tea. As mentioned...there is no one! Why Loose Leaf Is Important Brewing Chinese green tea using loose leaves over ordinary bags is a must in order to achieve full flavor and the most benefits! With bags, a large percentage of the essential oils dry up leaving little room for aroma, taste, and health. However, this is not the case with loose leaf brewed tea, granted if the leaves are steeped within 6 to 8 months of the flush. Remember, even loose leaves go bad with time. Bag brewed beverages can give a bad first impression on the subtle nature Chinese green tea offers. Sure the color will be brilliant, but the taste will be bitter, fuzzy, and very grassy...all which may be a big turn off for newcomers. Sadly, one would believe this is what all green tea is like, and would have missed out on the true superior flavor loose leaf is known for! The way it is meant to be enjoyed. Unfortunately this is the case for most Americans since over 90 percent of folks prepare their tea by using bags. Some health Benefits There is a wide range of benefits from consuming tea, some which include: 1. Lowered cholesterol and blood pressure 2. Younger and healthier looking skin 3. A stronger immune system 4. Help with weight loss, (along with proper dieting and exercise) 5. Aids with stopping the development of certain tumors 6. Can even lead to a healthier smile by abating plague Every week, new literature is published covering the many health aspects this beverage has to offer. Of course preparing loose leaf style as mentioned above and drinking several cups a day (not just one) on a daily basis is what will ultimately determine exactly how much of these benefits folks can reap. However, when it comes down to it, Chinese green tea should be enjoyed both for the aroma, flavor, plentiful varieties, culture, social enjoyment, as well as the health benefits! Aside from the Chinese green varieties, we also have white, oblong, and black, all which lead into hundreds of more varieties to explore! This is why loose leaf tea becomes such a great pleasure for most who enjoy it. With loose tea, there will always be a new variety to discover!

Get Past The Pineapple: 10 Life Lessons From Your Fruit Bowl

7:42 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
On 11 December 2007 author Terry Pratchett announced online and with glorious good humour that he’d been diagnosed with a rare form of Alzheimer’s disease.The news still shocks me, partly because it’s the first time I’ve heard the phrase “eat the arse out of a dead mole” in a press release, but mainly because it’s always a crying shame when terrible things happen to brilliant people.I wanted to help. In an interview with The Times two days later, Pratchett cheerfully told me that I simply wasn’t qualified: “I know it’s a very human thing to say, “Is there anything I can do?” but in this case I would only entertain offers from very high-end experts in brain chemistry.” I flunked chemistry and biology with crying colours, so I turned to a more traditional way of exploring the problem; I picked up a good book. The hardback I chose was “Going Postal” by the great man himself. On page 17 Pratchett gives a wonderful life lesson that I’d like to share with you today. Getting past the pineapple Going Postal tells the story of a skilled con artist forced to turn his life around to change the world for the better. In the opening scene, our troubled trickster ponders the meaning of life while seconds away from death at the gallows: “What you had to do in this life was get past the pineapple, Moist told himself. It was big and sharp and knobbly, but there might be peaches underneath.” What a wonderful little nugget of philosophy—a lesson in living from a fruit bowl! Only Pratchett could take a pineapple, add the word “knobbly”, and create a neatly-formed metaphor for overcoming hardship. Here’s what it teaches us: 10 lessons in life from your fruit bowl 1. The juicy fruit is often underneath There will be times when life gets sharp and knobbly. Your challenge is to keep on smiling and look for the tasty treats underneath. It’s a question of balance: without hardship, the good times wouldn’t exist. Never give up—getting past the pineapple is what it’s all about. 2. Wear lightweight armour Ever bitten into a whole pineapple? Didn’t think so. They’re tough old beasts at the worst of times, and so should you be. You want a solid outer shell to repel anyone trying to attack you, but you don’t need to harden up as far as the pineapple and dissuade people from talking to you altogether. Those in a full suit of wet copper armour don’t tend to be very approachable. (As Pratchett jokes—especially not in a thunder storm.) 3. Be patient The moment a pineapple is picked, the fruit stops ripening. It’s a simple idea and a powerful one. Many people seem in a rush to ‘become’ something. Whether it’s a famous musician, a great designer or a problogger, don’t hurry to ripen. Your heroes became famous through hard work and good fortune and you’ll have to do the same. There’s no magic ticket — just take your time and enjoy the ride. Fame should be an added bonus; never a goal. 4. Aim for the sun Few fruits grow in heavy shade. Fewer still revel in the darkness. This creates a lovely two-step metaphor for living: first, you have to leave the darkness of anonymity and actually put yourself out there, both online and off. Second, you have to do something unique if you want to really be noticed — the tallest fruit trees rarely grow in the shade of others. 5. Respect your parents Most fruit ripens to the point where it’s mature — then it drops and is no longer dependent on the tree. If you’re a parent, you’ll be laughing heartily at this metaphor! People aren’t like fruit, of course — we can call on our parents for life. (I chose simply never to mature!) Treasure the connection with your folks and try to really get to know them through your adult life. They probably have more to offer than you think. Health Top Tips Nutrition Lifestyle 6. Don’t be a banana The banana exudes ethylene, a gas that accelerates the ripening process in other fruit. It’s punishment? Many people separate it from their apples and pears altogether. The life lesson is simple: don’t be a banana. The underlying messages are these: firstly, let others develop at their own pace. Secondly, if you don’t want to live in isolation, play nicely. 7. Find beauty in simplicity The Carambola or “Star Fruit”; is a beautiful little treasure. Its cross section is a simple 5-pointed star. Nature creates beauty in simplicity, and there’s a lot we can take from this and apply in our lives. Before you add complex systems and pick up new devices, first strip your life back to the basics. There is a world of magnificence hidden in simplicity. 8. Look after your assets The wise farmer plants the tree and reaps the fruit for years to come. She doesn’t chop it down to sell the firewood. Look after your assets: your money, friends, family and health. You’ll gain more benefit in the long term by hanging onto them than you will by giving them up early on. 9. Pass it on All apple varieties share a similar trait: they can’t pollinate themselves or any flowers of the same apple variety. The best fruit comes from pollinating with completely different varieties. Before your one track mind reads too much into this, the actual message is innocent: share your knowledge. Pass on your thoughts and ideas to everyone whether they’re part of your circle or not. 10. Never judge a tomato You wouldn’t find one in a fruit bowl but, speaking scientifically, that’s exactly what a tomato is: a fruit. It’s important not to judge a tomato purely on its ability to work well with pasta. Lessons from the tomato: don’t label things unnecessarily, and don’t judge too early on. What all this means for you Apart from looking at your fruit bowl more suspiciously from now on (who ever knew fruit was so cunning?) I sincerely hope that, if you only take one thing away from this article, it is this: When life bowls you a pineapple, dodge it and keep running. As Terry Pratchett puts it: “Frankly, I would prefer it if people kept things cheerful, because I think there’s time for at least a few more books yet.” I look forward to seeing what fruits the new ones bring! Nick Cernis writes at Put Things Off, the laid-back productivity blog. — Leo’s Book-writing Update: I wrote for a little over an hour and finished another chapter (I had started it yesterday). I am taking a break to do a couple errands, but I’m gonna go back and write for another hour or so pretty soon. Making great progress! Thanks for the encouragement, everybody. - Leo

Better to Be Fat and Fit Than Skinny and Unfit

7:40 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
Often, a visit to the doctor's office starts with a weigh-in. But is a person's weight really a reliable indicator of overall health? Increasingly, medical research is showing that it isn't. Despite concerns about an obesity epidemic, there is growing evidence that our obsession about weight as a primary measure of health may be misguided. Last week a report in The Archives of Internal Medicine compared weight and cardiovascular risk factors among a representative sample of more than 5,400 adults. The data suggest that half of overweight people and one-third of obese people are “metabolically healthy.” That means that despite their excess pounds, many overweight and obese adults have healthy levels of “good” cholesterol, blood pressure, blood glucose and other risks for heart disease. At the same time, about one out of four slim people — those who fall into the “healthy” weight range — actually have at least two cardiovascular risk factors typically associated with obesity, the study showed. To be sure, being overweight or obese is linked with numerous health problems, and even in the most recent research, obese people were more likely to have two or more cardiovascular risk factors than slim people. But researchers say it is the proportion of overweight and obese people who are metabolically healthy that is so surprising. “We use ‘overweight' almost indiscriminately sometimes,” said MaryFran Sowers, a co-author of the study and professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan. “But there is lots of individual variation within that, and we need to be cognizant of that as we think about what our health messages should be.” The data follow a report last fall from researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Cancer Institute showing that overweight people appear to have longer life expectancies than so-called normal weight adults. But many people resist the notion that people who are overweight or obese can be healthy. Several prominent health researchers have criticized the findings from the C.D.C. researchers as misleading, noting that mortality statistics don't reflect the poor quality of life and suffering obesity can cause. And on the Internet, various blog posters, including readers of the Times's Well blog, have argued that the data are deceptive, masking the fact that far more overweight and obese people are at higher cardiovascular risk than thin people. Part of the problem may be our skewed perception of what it means to be overweight. Typically, a person is judged to be of normal weight based on body mass index, or B.M.I., which measures weight relative to height. A normal B.M.I. ranges from 18.5 to 25. Once B.M.I. reaches 25, a person is viewed as overweight. Thirty or higher is considered obese. “People get confused by the words and the mental image they get,” said Katherine Flegal, senior research scientist at the C.D.C.'s National Center for Health Statistics. “People may think, ‘How could it be that a person who is so huge wouldn't have health problems?' But people with B.M.I.'s of 25 are pretty unremarkable.” Several studies from researchers at the Cooper Institute in Dallas have shown that fitness — determined by how a person performs on a treadmill — is a far better indicator of health than body mass index. In several studies, the researchers have shown that people who are fat but can still keep up on treadmill tests have much lower heart risk than people who are slim and unfit. In December, a study in The Journal of the American Medical Association looked at death rates among 2,600 adults 60 and older over 12 years. Notably, death rates among the overweight, those with a B.M.I. of 25 to 30, were slightly lower than in normal weight adults. Death rates were highest among those with a B.M.I. of 35 or more. But the most striking finding was that fitness level, regardless of body mass index, was the strongest predictor of mortality risk. Those with the lowest level of fitness, as measured on treadmill tests, were four times as likely to die during the 12-year study than those with the highest level of fitness. Even those who had just a minimal level of fitness had half the risk of dying compared with those who were least fit. During the test, the treadmill moved at a brisk walking pace as the grade increased each minute. In the study, it didn't take much to qualify as fit. For men, it meant staying on the treadmill at least 8 minutes; for women, 5.5 minutes. The people who fell below those levels, whether fat or thin, were at highest risk. The results were adjusted to control for age, smoking and underlying heart problems and still showed that fitness, not weight, was most important in predicting mortality risk. Stephen Blair, a co-author of the study and a professor at the Arnold School of Public health at the University of South Carolina, said the lesson he took from the study was that instead of focusing only on weight loss, doctors should be talking to all patients about the value of physical activity, regardless of body size. “Why is it such a stretch of the imagination,” he said, “to consider that someone overweight or obese might actually be healthy and fit?”

World's oldest man dies at the age of 138

7:39 PM, Oct. 15, 2008 .. 0 comments .. Link
A great-grand father believed to be the world's oldest man has died at the age of 138. Habib Mian passed away early yesterday morning after a brief illness at his Home in the Alwar district, Rajasthan, India. According to records Habib was born on May 28, 1870. The grand old man was a witness to the life and times of two kings of Jaipur, the dominance of the British Raj and the decades after the Jaipur princely state of the erstwhile Rajputana merged into the Indian Union after Independence. The Limca Book of World Records recognises him as the oldest living man in the world in its 2005 edition. But the Guinness Book of Records did not give him this recognition because his pension papers say he was born on May 20, 1878 at Rajgarh in Alwar district. Habib Mian also held the distinction of being the oldest Haj pilgrim having visited Mecca in 2004 and the longest beneficiary of old age pension which he has received since 1938. Dead at 138: Habib Mian is burried in Jaipur Habib, who outlived his wife by 70 years, was buried at the Ghat Gate graveyard in the Alwar district, after the "Zuhar" (afternoon) prayers. Though his birthday had become a public event ever his age came to people's notice, Habib Mian did not celebrate the day this year as he was distressed by the May 13 serial blasts in the city that claimed 68 lives.

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