April's CR Diary

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June 29, 2005

Blog Readers Pick April's Dinner!

Laura calls these situations "Challenges" and I think that's brilliant because it puts us in a frame of mind that is optimistic and energetic, not nervous and despairing.

Tomorrow night I am going to a celebration dinner for the bargaining committee of nurses at the hospital where we just settled that great contract! The dinner will be held at a restaurant that I absolutely love called the Iron Hill Brewery. Interestingly enough, it is located right next to a Trader Joes! Hmmmm... Trader Joes! Anyway, I want you bloggie readers to pick out what I should have for dinner. Here's where you find the online menu. Just to give you some background: I'm hitting about 1200 calories per day these days -- usually around 1100 but still having those up days at least once a week. I'm going to take it light during the day so as to save a bunch of calories for dinner. The morning will have right on 200 cals between eggwhites, flax oil, and grapejuice chaser for creatine. That's 29 g protein right there in the eggwhites. Then lunch will be 10 g hazelnuts for 66 cals plus 130 cals non-fat fruit yogurt, for 40% of the RDA of calcium and 12 g protein. Dinner is at six, and I'll be very hungry! So let's choose what's best for me to eat. May the best bloggiefriend win!

Tonight my mother finally got back from her long trip to Chicago, and she took me out to eat at Ruby Tuesdays, home of the amazing salad bar. I filled up on veggies, salsa, olives, fruit, and a small dollop of chocolate pudding! I adore their salad bar. They also have a calorie controlled "Smart Eating" menu (Click on nutrition information to get the calories, fat grams, net carbs, and fiber) that I read with interest. MR and I have been talking about how much fun it would be to go out to these places like the RT and Applebees that have calorie controlled menus. MR almost never goes out because he is exact about his daily calories, so I would be quite excited to be the first woman to take him out to dinner in goddess knows how long. Of course, I will expect something in return. I have very old fashioned ideas about dating: I buy you dinner, you owe me a fresh batch of megamuffins. And if you don't want to put out, don't accept the invitation.

This weekend I'm heading out to NC to visit my father and step-mother. My father is the pastor of a church, and I am honored to be participating in his official installation service. They're installing him as pastor, that is -- it's not like there's a worship service around installing a new air conditioning system or something. Though in NC, there probably should be! It will be great to see that set of parents, and we will also stop over to see my fabulous grandparents, the adoreable ones who wear matching suits and go dancing. They've been de facto CR'd their whole lives. They eat a little fruit plate with yogurt for brunch, then a little dinner of usually a piece of fish that they split, a salad, a vegetable, and a tiny portion of rice. Every morning they weigh themselves, and if their weight is up, they eat less that day. My grandmother drinks coffee like a Starbucks employee, and my grandfather drinks a drop of wine now and again. They are extraordinarily healthy and in their nineties. I hope I have their genes, and I hope I stick to the healthy kind of lifestyle that has gotten them this far.

Speaking of parents, MR's Mom had an interesting experience the other day. She owns a children's clothing store, and she hosted an event for new moms in her town. She made up some delicious sounding healthy food: two of my dip recipes (artichoke heart and walnut dip with olive oil and fresh lemon, and tapenade with olives, capers and olive oil), plus fresh veggies, fruit, and yogurts. She also made up a flyer on good nutrition (with editing from her son) and handed these out to the new moms. She was horrified that they didn't seem all that interested, and they didn't eat much of the food! If I had been there, there wouldn't have been a drop of food left on the plate! MR's mom is serious about feeding kids healthy food, and I think it's one reason why MR has been so successful in his CR. He was raised with the idea that gak is bad! Those of us who had health-conscious moms and dads are so lucky. I really admire all you parents out there who fight the hard fight. As you know, I don't plan to deal with it. Though I do have fantasies of keeping my niece on a weekend or two once she's old enough to appreciate it, and feeding her healthy food and taking her shopping. I really want to spend a lot of money on some fashion conscious girl-child, and the King of Prussia Mall is nearby and fantastic. All the cute outfits we could buy! Dresses, shoes, makeup, perfume! I want to be Crazy Aunt April who spoils her niece rotten and teaches her to love Chinese vegetables and Quorn. When she returns home, she will say to her parents, "Mom, why can't we have Quorn like Aunt April?" One of my main aims in having no children of my own is to have the money to spend an absurd amount of cash on my niece once she's at the Age of Fashion (about 12). We've got ten years to go... so I'm not quitting my day job!

Tell me what you want me to eat for dinner tomorrow night. I await your wise instruction.

Posted by april at 4:19 PM | Comments (11) | TrackBack

June 28, 2005

I Don't Want Kids Anyway

WARNING: For you soft-skinned folks in the boys' cabin our our little bloggie summer camp, this entry is going to touch on "Women's Issues." So if you can't handle that, go read The Economist or something.

Two of my favorite bloggiefriends have had interesting things to say lately that inspire me to once again delve into the topic of "women's issues." Now why it is that when people say that, they usually mean "women's reproductive health issues," as though that's the only issue women have, is another story. I will leave it to Christina to de-construct.

Here was Christina's question in a recent comment:

Also - uh - I wonder if exercise in combo with cr is/has/will provoke that nasty, unmentionable - amenorhhea? If so, is that a tolerable side effect for you?

That's a very good question! I suspect that the exercise is increasing my hunger, and you're absolutely on target about the timing. Exercise is super important for bone and cardio health, not to mention that I find it great for my mental health too. It also keeps MR from worrying that my bones will all collapse fifteen minutes before the introduction of the immortality pill (or pardon me... the "indefinite postponement of age-releated disease and disability pill." ;) So I'm not going to quit exercising. And I'm on a quest to drop my calories further. Is this likely to result in amenorrhea? Probably, eventually, yes.

How do I feel about that?

YIPPIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I absolutely hate being a menstruating female. Now I'm sure there are some eco-feminist types out there, blessings be upon them, who think we should rejoice in these symbols of our womanhood, worship our fertility, be thrilled to death about cramps, maybe even enjoy natural childbirth. Not I.

Like, uh, gross.

I used to have really, really bad cramps. So bad I would almost pass out. So bad that my doctor put me on birth control pills at 15 because I was taking so much naproxen sodium for the pain that I was in danger of eating a hole in my stomach.

I spent more than ten years on the Pill. Pumping hormones into my body. I discovered, upon going on and off a few times, that the Pill makes me hungry (uh, duh, it mimics pregnancy!), moody, makes my sex drive go down (really great when you've just gone on it because you've started a relationship, then your sex drive drops. Lovely.) and basically makes me a miserable, unhappy person.

So I went off it. For good. Shortly before I started CR. Now I have cramps.

They're not nearly as bad as they used to be pre-CR, but they're still bad enough that I once took about 6 Zinc tablets thinking they were Advils and spent the entire night in agony waiting for the medicine to kick in. Then I figured out that they were zinc, but you've already heard that story.

The entire process is silly. I hate it, I don't want to do it anymore. So if I am headed for amenorrhea, then I'm absolutely thrilled. It may become my favorite CR side effect.

Now everyone is going to freak out.

Isn't it just unnatural for a woman not to menstruate?

Well, I don't care. I don't know if anyone has noticed, but there's something a bit unnatural about controlling one's calories so that one can extend one's lifespan. I'm not trying to win a Natural Woman contest. I dye my hair, I shave my legs, I wear make-up and high heels. I get my nails done professionally, because if I try to paint them myself, it looks like Jackson Pollack was my manicurist. I am not interested in natural. I like nature just where it is... somewhere in the national park system. I don't bother it, it doesn't bother me.

I will not be doing any camping, unless you consider having a glass of pinot noir on the balcony of the Marriot camping out. (I stole that line from something my mom said about 25 years ago, btw.)

BUT WON'T I DAMAGE MY FERTILITY?

Frankly, I doubt it. The data that seems to point to fertility damage from long term amenorrhea is taken from anorexics, and they don't have much in common with us. They damage their heart, lungs, internal organs with malnutrition, while we improve the functioning of just about everything by being super-vigilant about our ON and keeping our calories low. The rodent data points to old rats becoming Mommy Rats when re-fed after years of CR'd amenorrhea, just about the time when their fat rat sisters are getting old and grey. So I'm guessing that if I wanted to have kids later in life, say at 40 or so, I'd be in better shape to do it if I were to up my calories after years of CR than if I were to eat ad lib between now and then.

And guess what? I don't care! Because I don't want children!

I don't like children. When I was a child, I didn't like myself. I don't find babies cute. I find kittens, puppies, ferrets (yes, I am trying to get Goodgle adSense to put the ad for the ferret store on the blog again) and tarantulas cute. I find CR'd genius boys cute. I find eggwhites cute, and men with geeky watches. I don't find small children cute at all.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm okay with other people's children. I actually like my niece, and I have enjoyed the occasional conversation with a five year old. But none of that makes me want children of my own.

Part of my not wanting children comes from genuine appreciation for the sacrifices that parents make. Parenting is the hardest job on earth, and I don't want to do it. Parents give up so much of their own identities to bring up healthy, sane children in an impossible environment. I admire and respect the parents I know, and I don't wish to join them in their self-sacrificing lifestyle. I'd rather contribute to the species through my work and my blog and my cooking than by raising another human being or two.

MR doesn't want children either. Never has. Isn't that convenient?

Besides, do you really want to encourage the creation of skinny red-headed mini-creatures that would go around telling everyone not to eat that???

The world is better off without.

Our parents are not committing suicide because we don't want to produce grandchildren. MOMR already has grandchildren (thanks Chris!), my dad has a grandchild with my step-mother, and my mom is the biggest advocate of me not having kids aside from MR. She knows how much work it is to raise children... she had me! And I was a really, really good kid. The kind of kid who actually enjoyed sitting quietly in the library reading the books while mommy worked late.

Which brings me to Wanderingfeet's recent post (see DAY 36 for the issue in question) re: the pressure to get married, have kids, all in a compressed time frame. Women do feel a whole lot of pressure to get married and have kids. I know that during the time period when I wasn't seeing anyone, for quite awhile before I met MR, I would frequently be questioned about why a nice girl like me wasn't married. Lots of my friends were seriously stressing about the husband hunt, and complaining that their biological clocks might be ticking. Now don't get me wrong... I found singleness pretty darned annoying after awhile... in large part because CR hasn't dampened my libido one bit... but I've never heard so much as a peep from my "biological clock." Everyone kept saying I'd turn thirty and suddenly start coveting Kenneth Cole diaper bags and trips to Babies-R-Us. It didn't happen. I haven't even wanted a new kitten, or a houseplant. I'm just not a having kids person. So the mild risk of injuring my fertility is just about as significant to me as the possibility that CR might impair my ability run for President of Bolivia. It wasn't going to happen anyway.

There are health concerns that may be associated with amenorrhea. One of them is possible bone loss. I am combatting that through what strikes me as a pretty darned agressive supplementation program including Strontium, K2, and no doubt other things I don't understand but take cause MR says to and brings me my supplements in bed. They are expensive, and I often joke that MR spends as much money on supplements as I spend on my car, but it's worth it to protect my bones.

I also am doing bone building exercise, both cardio and weight lifting. I actually like doing push-ups... makes me feel so, well, cool. I'm a girl who can do push-ups. Wow. I am impressed with myself.

It seems silly to me, now that I've determined that living as long as I can, as healthy as I can, is a top priority in my life, that I would sacrifice the ability to do so because a) I'm afraid of losing my fertility, which I don't want anyway or b) I'd rather die with big bones.

Of course, CR is a sliding scale, a slippery slope, and there are benefits to any level of CR. But I want the benefits to the hardcore level of CR. I'm having so much fun now... why not maximize my chances of having fun longer???

So to answer your question: amenorrhea is a side effect I can live with.

And if MR and I develop any bizarre urges to parent, we'll raise prize winning CR'd mice.

Posted by april at 9:19 AM | Comments (15) | TrackBack

If You Love Somebody, Feed Them Eggwhites

That's bad grammar, isn't it? But ever since the Sting song, we've been saying it that way.

There has been a lot of talk lately on the CR Society List about eggs and cholesterol. I thought that MR had put the chatter to rest with this post, but apparently not... there's been more and more questioning, including quoting of my old idol John McDougall (yes, I can admit it!) and finally resulting in MR reminding folks that if they must have an omlette, they can do so with the humble eggwhite!

If it were possible to be in love with a food, I would be in love with eggwhites. Eggwhites are so yummy, easy to prepare, versatile, cheap, and just plain cute. (Cute?) I urge you to use them whenever you need to add some fat-free, no cholesterol, vegetarian protein goodness to a meal.

It's been said before that eggs aren't just for breakfast anymore (it was eggs they were talking about wasn't it? or was it orange juice? Hmmmm) and the same goes for eggwhites. Here are some suggestions on how you can use eggwhites that might not be as obvious as the scrambled, omletted, or sunny-side-up versions (yes, I am joking about sunny-side-up, no need to point out that eggwhites don't have yolks!)

Eggwhites, like tofu, can pick up the flavor of whatever you put them in. Unlike tofu, most non-vegetarian people have not already developped an aversion to eggwhites, and you are unlikely to hear that refrain so familiar to those who have tried to cook tofu dishes for non-vegetarians, "I just don't like the texture!" Try microwaving eggwhites, allowing them to cook, chopping them into bite-sized cubes, and marinating them in whatever. Lately I've been marinating them in Carolina barbeque sauce... yum! Try adding them to a salad for protein, after marinating them in your own homemade oil and vinegar dressing. Here's my "Greek" salad recipe with eggwhites:

Romaine lettuce
Kalamata olives
Capers
Bell peppers
Red wine vinegar
Extra virgin olive oil
Dried Oregano
Eggwhites
Pepper

Mix about a fourth cup of vinegar with a tablespoon of olive oil. Add a bunch of oregano and pepper to taste. Marinate the eggwhites (cubed) for an afternoon or however long. Arrange the salad on the plate like you think that the eggwhites are feta, use the reserved marinade liquid as the dressing.

Here's another favorite way to turn a no-protein recipe into a... dare I say it... Zoned recipe.

Eggwhite Gazpachzo
(or call it Protein-rich Gazpachzo if that sounds weird.)

V-8 juice, tomato juice, or Clamato (Clamato rocks.)
Bell peppers
Red onion
Cucumber
Fresh tomatoes
Juice of one lemon
Tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
Tabasco
Wochestershire Sauce (spelling, Aubrey?)
Black pepper
Tarragon vinegar or white wine vinegar

In the food processor, blend the cucumber, bell pepper and onion until they seem like gazpachzo texture. Stir them into a big bowl with the vegetable juice. Chop the tomatoes into bite sized pieces and add. Add olive oil. Add remaining ingredients to taste (you have to figure out what you like... I'm not going to tell you how much Tabasco to put in it. I may be able to help you de-program yourself from the layers of gak-eating that coat your tastebuds, but once you have been set free, you have to find your own True Taste.) Stir in the eggwhites (cubed). Then put it in the fridge, covered, Go away for a day. WARNING: The tastes get stronger as they marinate, so don't freak out on the tabasco cause it seems bland. It will get stronger. Serve after at least overnight refridgeration; serve cold. This is an amazing summer lunch. A little yogurt with berries on the side and a drop of hazelnut oil and you've got a fancy summer lunch with dessert. If you're having a brunch party, throw in a drop of vodka to make it a Bloody Mary Gazpachzo.

I am working on a recipe for eggwhite/yogurt quiche, and you can be assured that once I have it worked out, I will post it under the title "Real Men Don't Eat Quiche... Unless It's Made With Eggwhites."

Whenever we talk about eggwhites, the question invariably arises: what do you do with the yolks? Nothing!!! Cause you buy them in cartons at the grocery store! Please... do I seem like the type of woman who would spend all day separating eggwhites from yolks??? As if!

Enjoy your eggwhites, my friends. If you have eggwhite worshiping recipes to share, please comment!

Posted by april at 8:15 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 27, 2005

My Long Term Hunger Management Strategy

WARNING: This may not work for everyone. In fact, it probably won't work for anyone but me.

I have been dealing with the issue of hunger: real hunger, not the "I am feeling a bit peckish, need a snack, it's noon and lunchtime, I'm bored so I'll eat" kind of "hunger" but the real thing. The, "I'm at a weight where my body thinks I must be joking when I talk about further CR." kind of hunger. The "don't let me loose in a Quorn factory!" kind of hunger. The kind of hunger where I really, really enjoy my food with a vigor that I never imagined possible pre-CR. Where eating becomes an ecstatically sensual experience.

I have gotten some wonderful advice, most recently from Dan the Man, on how to deal with hunger, and I appreciate all. I have a strategy that I think will work, but it probably wouldn't be the strategy of choice for everyone.

It's a two-fold strategy, involving a) distraction b) accountability.

a) Distraction. It has occurred to me that if I can find something more entertaining to do than eat, I am likely to do it, even if I am hungry. I quest earnestly after entertainment, and if I can have fun doing something that has no calories, why would I consume excess calories???

b) Accountability. We all lost weight at the CRS Conference. Why? Cause we don't like to eat when other CR folk are around. The constant need to fit in with the group, when the group is healthy and focused on good nutrition in as few calories as possible, makes us do what we wish we were doing anyway.

So here's my plan:

In a month, the Orange One is going to arrive on a plane. And he's not going back to Canada till Solstice. And then, if all is going well, we're going to spend Solstice with his family and then return here... both of us... get it?

So in the middle of the night, if I get hungry, I will just roll over and wake up my Orange Angel and demand that he entertain me until the urge to consume life-shortening calories passes.

To do otherwise would be actively killing me. To avoid being a murderer, he must distract me from any late night urges to eat a pile of Quorn.

And do you think I'll be stuffing myself with high cal happy hour appetizers with my friends when I know that my Orange One is waiting at home with a delicious, low calorie, perfectly Zoned, extraordinarily nutritious dinner? Never! I'll have one glass of pinot noir and watch them go crazy on the nachos, content that my reward is just a half a mile or so away in the eternal peace of the Zone, the high protein wonderland of the Orange One.

Just a month to go, and we will move into our new house. A big kitchen, a deck, a porch swing, three bedrooms. Plenty of room for him to set up his office and for my cats to frolick (actually, they mostly sleep) without driving him crazy.

You are all invited to the birthday/housewarming party on Sunday, August 7. It's your big chance to meet Aubrey de Grey, who I am pleased to say will be in attendance. Maybe we can convert him to CR...

I am a very lucky CR girl, to have such an easy solution to the problem of hunger.

Don't try this at home.

Posted by april at 6:41 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

You Ain't Nothing But A Quorn Dog

Alas, my dinner probably should have been more substantial. I wasn't very hungry when I left the house yesterday to go out and meet some friends at a pub in Center City, so I just ate two Quorn dogs and a cup of nonfat organic blueberry yogurt and 10 g hazelnuts. I wasn't hungry for more at the time, as I had eaten my normal diet earlier in the day (including a giant salad with plain yogurt mixed with salsa) but by the time I had consumed a glass of cabernet at the pub and the others had gotten their food, I was starving. So I ate a few of the delicious fries that one of my friend had ordered, and helped another finish her Caesar salad. It had been so long since I had French fries... sure enough, they're still pretty good! Every once in awhile won't hurt, I'm sure, but in retrospect I wish I had eaten more before going out so that I wouldn't be hungry. I usually don't mind eating nothing while others are eating these days, especially in this group where no one cares. But when I'm really hungry, it's hard. Another landmark on my CR journey... actually being really genuinely hungry from time to time. Totally different feeling from what I used to consider hunger. Fascinating.

Today is back to quotidian, back at the office, and I'm getting ready to pack my lunch and leave. More soon.

Posted by april at 5:58 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

June 26, 2005

625

Well, you asked for recipes, and recipes you shall get. This one is tailor-made for those of you who have Trader Joe's nearby, and I owe the idea for it to VLC. For this recipe you will need:

1 bag of frozen shrimp
1 bag of frozen mangoes (Trader Joe's has great ones)
1 jar of Trader Joe's mango salsa
1 bag of Trader Joe's frozen bell peppers: green, red, yellow, orange
flax oil
olive oil

Take 200 g of shrimp, frozen and thawed. Stir fry in a big pot with 100 g frozen mangoes and 100 g frozen bell peppers. Once it's all cooked through and the shrimp are the right color, add in 1 teaspoon of flax oil and 50 cals of mango salsa.

Serve with 100 g brocoli steamed and 100 g brussels sprouts lightly steamed. Put one teaspoon of olive oil over each set of veggies, and squeeze a touch of fresh lemon on top. Throw 5 g of hazelnuts on the side and a 3 oz glass of pinot noir.

Here's the crunch:

Food List : MR shrimpdish.FLS
DATE : 06/26/05
Num. Foods : 9
Food #1 : Crustaceans, shrimp, mixed species, raw 200 g
Food #2 : Salsa, med. chunky 50 cals
Food #3 : Mangos, raw 100 g
Food #4 : Oil 1 teaspoon flax, 2 teaspoons olive
Food #5 : Broccoli, flower clusters, raw 100 g
Food #6 : Brussels sprouts, raw 100 g
Food #7 : Alcoholic beverage, wine, table, red 3 oz (89 g)
Food #8 : Peppers, sweet, green, frozen, chopped, boiled, drained, without salt 100 g
Food #9 : Nuts, filberts or hazelnuts, dried, unblanched 5 g

NUTRIENT TOTALS:

Abs. Values %RDA/SA

Calories 625.00__cal 31%
Protein 51.21__gm 93% RDA
Total Fat 20.74__gm 32%
Sat. Fat 3.91__gm 20%
Mono. Fat 10.44__gm 36%
Poly. Fat 4.16__gm 62%
Carbohydrate 51.04__gm 17%
Fiber 7.78__gm 26%
Cholesterol 405.91__mg 135%
Vit. A 8618.07__IU 172% RDA
Vit. B6 0.88__mg 55% RDA
Vit. B12 2.33__mcg 117% RDA
Vit. C 285.15__mg 475% RDA
Vit. E 7.72__mg 96% RDA
Thiamine 0.40__mg 36% RDA
Folacin 166.96__mcg 93% RDA
Riboflavin 0.39__mg 30% RDA
Niacin 8.27__mg 55% RDA
Panto. Acid 1.66__mg 33% SA
Calcium 297.29__mg 25% RDA
Copper 0.88__mg 44% SA
Iron 8.26__mg 55% RDA
Magnesium 161.91__mg 58% RDA
Manganese 1.38__mg 46% SA
Phosphorus 594.98__mg 50% RDA
Potassium 1685.75__mg 84% RDA
Selenium 81.75__mcg 149% RDA
Sodium 1058.30__mg 44% SA
Zinc 3.32__mg 28% RDA
Tyrosine 2.38__gm 248% RDA
Lysine 5.72__gm 794% RDA
Phenylalanine 2.81__gm 293% RDA
Leucine 5.34__gm 556% RDA
Valine 3.34__gm 397% RDA
Methionine 1.78__gm 594% RDA
Cystine 0.78__gm 259% RDA
Tryptophan 0.90__gm 502% RDA
Threonine 2.87__gm 597% RDA
Isoleucine 3.25__gm 452% RDA

P:C:F = 33:37:30

625 is a magic number for me because it's the number of calories in MR's dinner. It has to be Zoned, and it has to involve a 3 ounce glass of pinot noir, and it should almost always be vegetarian. You'd think that these regulations could make a person crazy, but in fact, I find it quite fun to create delicious dinners according to the law of MR. It's actually quite easy to do it with my software... the majority of the work is the done on the computer, not in the kitchen. I can imagine a scene where I am working dilligently on my computer and someone says to me, "What are you doing?" "Cooking."

There are a few cheap tricks that make the calorie and zone perfection easier to achieve. For instance, throwing hazelnuts or oil on the side. Adding eggwhites for protein. The software plus an accurate to the gram scale makes it possible to do most anything.

Those of you CR boys out there who can eat 625 calorie dinners might enjoy the series of recipes that I'm working on so that I have a stockpile to pull out anytime I'm cooking for the Orange One. To adapt for my calorie level, I cut his in half, then I throw another three ounces of wine on top to make a real glass of wine... his dose is medicinal, mine is recreational. Go measure it... 6 oz of wine is still less than a restaurant pour.

More 625 recipes to come.

Posted by april at 10:14 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Trust Is More Than A Chemical Reaction

I heard this line on "Fresh Air" with Terri Gross a few weeks ago and saved it as a possible title for a blog entry. I'm always saving possible blog titles for later... you never know when they will come in handy. She was interviewing an author of a book whose name escapes me, talking about how some people are biochemically wired to be more trusting than others. It may come as a big surprise to you, but I seriously doubt that I am one of those people. I question everyone and everything, even the people I love the most. Especially the people I love the most. If you need proof, I can provide you with a list of phone numbers and email addresses of the people closest to me who have had to argue me through this or that transition (flash back: arguing with Francis for hours after every Student Labor Action Coalition meeting. Turns out, he was right. But that didn't stop me from heeping curses upon his long-haired head at the time!)

The recent comment war had led me to reflect on why we trust the people we trust for nutritional advice. There's so much disagreement among various sources, from the USDA food pyramid (or is it now a rhombus?) to the Atkins people to the Ornishites (I was one for years) to the Zonies to the people who have given up entirely. How is a non-expert supposed to figure out what to eat for breakfast? Or whether to eat breakfast at all?

I've been through a lot of phases with food... from my lowfat vegetarian years to my hardcore vegan years to CR babysteps to my current vaguely Zonish eggwhite worshiping high-ish protein diet. I've spent a ton of time refining my dietary practices, and a lot of mental energy reading and researching to figure out what I believe is the healthiest way to eat.

When I first started out on the journey, I had no idea how to evaluate any sort of evidence. Reading the CR Society list in its entirity every day (it took awhile for me to figure out that most people delete most everything) really gave me a crash course in understanding medical studies. Watching people argue taught me that a) there's a lot of disagreement among well-intentioned, well-read, smart people out there b) there's a lot of bad reasoning out there too.

When I first started reading MR's posts to the list, I was impressed with his ability to make sense out of a mountain of scientific evidence and explain in such a way that non-specialists could understand exactly why he made the suggestions he made. His ideas about nutrition ran completely opposite of what I had believed up to that point: I used to be a fat-phobic vegan who threatened to slap the next person who asked, "Are you getting enough protein?" I used to rant at length about how there was no osterperosis in China, how you couldn't suffer from protein deficiency unless you ate a diet consisting of only Snackwells. etc. etc. etc. There are a lot of witnesses to this phase of my life... they can tell you about the whitering looks I used to give people who asked if I was concerned about calcium.

So I was by no means pre-disposed to go joining MR's cult of CR'd Zonishness. I have written extensively about my transition from Priestess of the High Carb Darkness to where I am now... I won't rehash. But the end product is this: through my own research and an extensive series of experiments on myself, I came to a diet that makes me feel much better than my previous nutritional creeds ever did.

That's not to say that I've stopped tweaking. I love to play with my DWIDP, come up with new and exciting ways to get optimal nutrition in fewer and fewer calories, manage hunger, and throw dinner parties for seven. I'm always struggling with social issues, and trying to find that calorie level where I'm not wiggy with hunger but consistently pushing myself just a bit harder, etc.

Mary once said, "Maybe if MR had a cult I would join it." We got a huge laugh out of that. She went on to say that CR folk tend to be a very free-thinking bunch, always challenging each other and pushing each other to get better. I find it to be so.

I didn't blindly follow the orders of a charismatic cult leader who cast a spell on all of us to make us think we need calcium when we don't (though one of my CR brothers once accused me of falling under MR's spell... I asked later and MR has no memory of casting such a spell, but if he could in fact magically cause people to clean up their diets and improve their health, don't you think people would be lining up around the block to sign up?) I read and researched, then I tried different things until I figured out what works for me. I had concerns that differ from MR's: for instance, I have to do a certain amount of social eating for my job, and I also genuinely enjoy going out to eat from time to time with my friends. It's worth a compromise here and there for me, and I'm usually pretty happy with my choices. I do worry that it won't be enough... that while I'm getting the benefits of obesity avoidance and don't have to fear an early heart attack, I may not get the full benefits of CR's effects on slowing the entire aging process until I go deeper. And as we all know, the clock is ticking. So I view my CR as constantly in motion as I adapt and change and make decisions about what's important and what's not.

When it comes down to it, it's my choice. I'm not doing CR to pick up guys (y'all knew I was joking about that, right?) or to look like a supermodel (I am way too short and will never look that skinny even if I am that skinny!) I want the most I can get out of life, and getting the most out of live means being young and healthy to me, not eating a dessert.

To paraphrase Walford, why focus on gluttony when there are so many other wonderful sins?

We all have to make our own choices about what is most important to us... things that matter to me may not matter to you. Willie and Wanderingfeet have been talking about the challenges of CR when you have kids and unsupportive spouses. That's a good example of the tough choices we face. I am lucky that the Fancy Feast and Science Diet Light that I feed my cats doesn't tempt me at all. Salmon breath -- yuck!

Before CR, I felt like I was seeing my youth slip away. Doing CR has given me a very deep sense of empowerment. I had lots of professional, personal and creative success in my life pre-CR, but I was becoming aware that none of it would be any good to me if I lost my health and vitality. The crisis finally came at the party I told you about in yesterday's entry, I looked around and saw everyone around me eating tons of high saturated fat, high calorie food, and looking older and sicker than I wanted to look.

Then I looked in the mirror and saw that I was starting to look the same way.

I was desperate enough to put aside some of my long standing nutritional beliefs (hello, John McDougall! Hello, Dean Ornish!) and try something new. I took advice from others... thanks to Little MR for opening the door to the world of the true protein and Zoned happiness. I made some hard choices. I made some stupid mistakes. I made a really disgusting cream of broccoli soup with vanilla whey powder. Ick!

But I changed my life. I had a great time at the party yesterday... it was a lot like last year's, only this time I'm thirty-three pounds lighter, a foot taller, and healthier than I've ever been. It was a little creepy to return to the scene of one of the most rock-bottom moments of my pre-CR health crash, but it gave me a great opportunity to reflect on how far I've come.

I am happier than I ever imagined I would be.

And no, I am not really a foot taller. I was kidding about that part.

Posted by april at 5:38 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

June 25, 2005

The Goddess Triumphant -- And Bearing Hors d'Oeuvres

This afternoon I'll be going to a fundraiser for a US Congressperson at the home of one of my co-workers. It's a significant event because the last time I went to this co-worker's house, it was also for a fundraising party for this Congressperson (then candidate) and I had one of those realization-of-health-crisis moments that led me to start CR.

It was Februrary 27, 2004, just a month before that bright and glorious March 26th when I embarked upon my CR journey. I had spent what seemed like forever trying to find an outfit I wanted to wear because at 137 lbs, I felt like everything I put on made me look fat. I got to the party early because I was helping out with the food, and ate a ton of bread with cream cheese based dips before the guests even arrived. I stood around munching on deviled eggs, brie and crackers, and watching everyone else in the room do the same.

At some point I went up to the bathroom, and I have this distinct memory of looking in the mirror and being so horrified at the direction in which my health was going that I thought to myself, "This must stop."

I spent the rest of the evening eating and drinking and feeling out of control, fat, and powerless to do anything about it.

To paraphrase Don Henley, I dropped down and I called out to heaven send me some wy to save my own life. Heaven shot back, you get the health you create for yourself. And I started CR.

Now, 33 pounds lighter, in the best health of my life, I will return to the scene of my dramatic revelatory moment in triumph. In a really fantastic blue dress that I couldn't have gotten into this time a year ago. And bearing a tray of delicous CR friendly finger foods.

Remember how I got that book High Calcium, Low Calorie as a present from my friend whose wedding I was in? It had lots of recipes using fat free ricotta, so I started using ffr and have discovered that I love it. For only 60 calories in a fourth of a cup, you get 30% of the RDA of calcium. Now that's a steal. In a truly MR-esque move, I noted the other day that ffr was on sale, 2 for $4 instead of the usual 1 for $2.99, and decided to make a ffr dish for this party so I could take advantage of the sale. I also bought 5 twelve packs of TAB while they were on sale, 5 for $10, marked down from the usual 1 twelve pack for $2.99. That's a savings of $5! I am starting to get the hang of this buying food on sale thing, and may have to acquire a larger house to accomodate all my stockpiles.

Anyway, here's the recipe for Goddess Triumphant Pizza Bites:

multiple red peppers, organic or well washed
fat free ricotta
fresh basil, washed and diced
half salt
garlic powder
1 can tomato paste
extra virgin olive oil

Slice the red peppers such that each red pepper yields four pieces that are slightly concave. Mix the tomato paste with a tablespoon of evoo and spread a thin layer of tomato mixture on the inside of all the red peppers. Mix the ricotta with garlic powder and half salt to taste, spread ricotta mixture on top of the tomato mixture on top of the red peppers. Sprinkle with diced basil. Serve cold on a pretty dish.

Not sure on the exact crunch because it depends on the size of your scoops of ffr and your peppers, but it's a very low calorie dish for a fairly high volume. It's even vaguely, though not perfectly, Zoned... just like me, vaguely but not perfectly Zoned.

May the Goddess accept this humble sacrifice of red peppers and fat free ricotta as a sign of our gratitude for our new life in CR. And until the dawn of radical anti-aging biomedicine when she comes in triumph, bearing drugs that will reverse biological aging and wearing a fabulous outfit, let us keep the (low calorie) feast.

Posted by april at 3:05 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 24, 2005

For Once, I Zoned My Breakfast

I went in this morning for my blood tests, all the while trying to block out the memory of the last time I had blood drawn. It didn't go well. It was 1998, and I was seriously involved with an ICU nurse. I demanded that he get an AIDS test before we, uh, got to know each other better. I know enough nurses who have had needle sticks that I wanted to be absolutely sure all was well. Child of the eighties... I could win a paranoia contest. Anyway, in the spirit of equality, I said I'd get one myself, even though I knew I had absolutely no risk factors whatsoever. So we went down to Planned Parenthood and his test went just fine, of course. Then they got around to drawing my blood. Couldn't get a vein. Tried four times. Then they got another tech to try... couldn't get a vein. By this time, I am in tears, and feeling like a failure as a patient. One thing about working with nurses is that it makes you want to be the perfect patient, the one who never causes any stress and always has a vein readily available. I was clearly turning out to be way more trouble than I was worth. My then boyfriend, the ICU nurse, was getting so annoyed at their inability to draw my blood that he said, "Just give me a butterfly needle and I'll get it out of this vein here," pointing to a vein on my hand. For liability reasons they wouldn't let him do it. So they had to refer me to the central blood drawing clinic, where it took, again, two different nurses to finally draw my blood. I named the vein that the second nurse successfully tapped after her, so I have a vein named Ellen.

I also have a vein named John, after the anesthesiologist who started an IV on me ages ago, after the nurse couldn't find one.

The fact that I have two veins with proper names tells you that I am not, I repeat, NOT, an easy stick.

So I was quite shocked when my doctor, whom I've now decided I like, got it on the first try. I wonder if it is easier now that I am so thin? I was fairly thin last time too... probably about 115. Anyway, now I have a vein named Marc, out of respect for the doctor who got it in the first try. He was so good. It reminded me of watching the vet tech give fluids to my cat. The cat wiggles and squirms and is impossible when I do it... when the vet tech does it, she turns into docile Angel Kitty. Such that the vet tech can't understand what my problem is and thinks I am an idiot. In my defense, I will point out that my vet tech/kitty sitter used to work at a zoo where she gave subcutaneous fluids to lions and tigers on a regular basis. Makes my seven pound calico seem like, well, a pussycat.

Getting the blood drawn barely hurt at all... in fact, I'd say it hurt a lot less than getting my eyebrows waxed, which I do about every two weeks because I'm not coordinated enough to handle tweezers anywhere near my eyes. The actual taking of the blood went just fine, and I complimented the doctor on his skill. Then I stood up to leave and you know what happened.

I didn't quite faint, but I came very close, and the doctor ordered me to lie down immediately. So I did. Then the nausea hit. I was fairly convinced that I was going to throw up, so I asked if it would be better for me to risk passing out on the way to the bathroom to throw up, or to just throw up right there. The doctor said to stay where I was, as it really threw a wrench in his day every time he had to pick up a passed out patient off the floor. I somehow restrained myself from pointing out that at least I would be a whole lot lighter than the rest of his patients, and therefore very easy to pick up. So I remained on the table and eventually, miraculously, the nausea passed.

He took my blood pressure and it was 90/50. I remained seated for awhile longer. Then he told me that I should immediately pop into the deli next door to the office and buy a beverage with sugar in it to get my blood sugar up.

Aha, thought I! An excuse to drink a sugary soda! Something I never do! Very exciting. Doctor's orders!

So I collected myself, still feeling quite light headed, and purchased a Cherry Coke next door.

Coke has a way of settling my stomach, and the sugar seemed to help a bit. I sat in my car and drank about a fourth of the can of soda before venturing to drive. Next time I have blood taken, I will not be driving myself. Luckily the doctor's office is very near my home, so I didn't have to go far, but it really wasn't a good idea to drive when I was feeling so faint. I just couldn't figure out what else to do... both my mom and my best friend are out of town, and I couldn't think of anyone else who would be around at that hour to call to rescue me.

So I made it home safely, though slowly, and proceeded to make my traditional eggwhite and flax oil breakfast. And then it dawned on me: with that fourth of a can of Cherry Coke, I had added carbs to my breakfast! For once, I Zoned my morning meal.

Something tells me that Cherry Coke was not what Mary had in mind when she suggested that I add carbs to my breakfast. But in this one case, I think it was okay. I poured out the rest of the soda, figuring that I didn't need extra calories and sugar once the initial freak out was passed, and enjoyed my delicous breakfast.

I thought I felt better, but I realized that I was still a bit out of it. For instance, I opened a brand new bottle of Peak K2, an AOR supplement designed by my very own forumlation wizard, to pack my little pill box for the day. I dropped the pill in its lunchtime slot, then I put the bottle away. About three minutes later I realized I was still holding the cap to the bottle, and had put the bottle away without its top! CR girls in space!!! Mental note: do not schedule anything important on the morning of getting blood taken. Next time I do this, I might just get crstudy@calorierestriction.org to carry me. If I have to get all these tests done frequently so as to provide scientific evidence of what CR is doing to us, it seems like the least I can expect for my trouble is to be carried home. And the fact that crstudy can very easily carry me about should put to rest any silliness about hardcore CR turning men into fragile, frail, freaks. He can open jars really well too, which is good because as we all know, I was brainwashed early in life into believing that I need a man to open jars.

So I survived my blood tests, and I should get the results in 7 - 10 days. I hope it won't be a hassle to actually get all the print outs... you know how doctors like to just say, "Everything is fine," or "It's all normal," without telling you what's up. Of course everything is fine... that's not the point!!!

I really, really wish I had done this earlier. But at least we'll have a baseline of what I was like at what I supsect for me is "moderate" CR, and when I go more hardcore (which yes, I am still planning to do... I have a master plan you see that will make this all much easier, and it does not involve sacrificing small children to the hunger gods, nor does it involve making tarantulas my main protein source, though I appreciate all your recipe suggestions.)

Meanwhile, my mom is at a meeting in Chicago, where they are having their hottest day in recorded history or something like that. She writes to update us on her progress:

April and Bloggie Fans,
Just a quick note from Chicago where I'm attending the annual conference of the American Library Association
Imagine the opportunities for CR here with 25,000-30,000 librarians. Librarians work hard, don't make a lot of money, and spend more time helping others. Not much time to focus on healthy eating. Much like nurses.
Well, now the good news. I'm at a Marriott Courtyard and walked down the block yesterday and found the most wonderful Armenian Restaurant. While I'm not strict like MR and April, I do like to eat healthy and have been to the Armenian Restaurant for both of my meals so far--lunch and dinner. I've had two bowls of red lentil soup, red cabbage salad in a very light dressing, tabouli, and shrimp kababs (didn't eat much of the rice). Pardon the expression....the icing on the cake was a lovely glass of Riesling.
Plan to go back today and get take-out to put in the fridge in my
room.
I also found a street fruit market with fresh cherries.
Yum.......Well, safe again on the road.
Your friend,
Mother of the Blog

I haven't been writing much about my food lately cause it's been pretty darned boring since I got back from Calgary. Very quotidian, which I found out I spelled in French last time I used the term... must be all those Canadian food labels going straight to my head. Eggwhites, yogurt, kale, red peppers, brewers yeast soup with cruciferous veggies, a night out at the Ruby Tuesday's salad bar. That's about it. The newest innovation in my food life is that I've been mixing my plain nonfat yogurt with this amazing salsa that's cheap at my grocery store. It's called Dessert Pepper, (not to be confused with Diet Dr. Pepper) and my favorite flavor is called "Twelve Olive" and is inexplicably fat free. Actually, MR offered an explanation for the miracle of fat free olive tasting salsa: they take the olives, press all the oil out of them, and then throw in the corpse. Delicous! I love olive corpses! I also like the salsa to be fat free, so that I can use my own organic olive oil on my salad instead of consuming heaven knows what kind of oxidized stuff they put into non-fat free salsas. Robert K really freaked me out about oils oxidizing when we ate lunch in Charleston. Makes me want to run home and make sure that my flax oil hasn't sprouted legs, jumped out of the freezer, wandered onto the balcony and decided to sit in the sun and oxidize.

Tonight I have a mini-girls' night out planned. It is a mini-girls' night out, as opposed to a Girls' Night Out, both because it will be a short night and because both the girls are mini. VLC and I haven't popped into town for a drink in quite awhile, and so we decided to go out straight after work and head to a great restaurant/bar called 20 Manning, which is interestingly enough located at 20th and Manning. They have outside seating, so we can enjoy our heat tolerence in the beautiful sunshine. I will be covered with sunscreen, worry not, as always... I won't let anything happen to my redheaded Scottish fair skin. We're going to have a glass of wine, then she is heading off to her exciting evening events and I will either pop to the art museum (which is free because I have a membership) or just go home. As we all know, I do not like to stay up late, so a girls' night out that ends before 8 pm is just right for me.

Posted by april at 10:14 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

June 23, 2005

An Excuse to Skip Breakfast!

Hahaha!

I have been eating breakfast, as you know, ever since I read that MR post that says "There's whacks of evidence that not eating breakfast makes you wacko and stoopid."

When I first read it I thought:

1) Is "whacks of" a Canadian expression? Americans do not say that.
Just like straight American males rarely say, "You go girl." Whereas two Canadian men have said that to me. Interestingly enough, they are brothers, so maybe it's just their family. Their father, whom I've also met, has never to my knowledge said, "You go girl," and doesn't seem like the type to say it, but one never knows, hopefully we will all live long enough to find out.

2) Oh great, now I have to eat breakfast. I hate eating breakfast!

My entire life, I was a big breakfast person. I ate weird stuff for breakfast, like chicken noodle soup, and I hated all cereals (except for Grape Nuts which I do like but not in the morning and not with milk), but I ate breakfast. But back in about 2000 I stopped eating breakfast and lost a bunch of weight. I got in the habit of not eating breakfast. Then, during the margarita and nacho era, I went back to eating breakfast, but this time with the Dunkin Donuts bagel with cream cheese and coffee with cream and sugar as the breakfast food of choice. So when I first started CR, I dumped the breakfast entirely.

Then MR said I had to eat breakfast. Well, he posted to the list that we in general should eat breakfast but as you know I take everything he writes very personally. So I figured I'd better eat breakfast.

Then we had the exciting adventure with the whey protein, and finally the dawn of the eon of eggwhites.

But I've never quite gotten used to the idea of eating in the morning again, and I don't usually eat nearly as close to rising time as MR thinks I should. I tend to get up before 5 am and eat breakfast as late as 7:30 or 8, making it the last thing I do before leaving for work. MR thinks we should eat breakfast within an hour of rising, else it becomes brunch and something terrible happens to us. I point out that eating breakfast later gives my Strontium time to dissolve... MR is not impressed with this argument. I eat breakfast at the right time when he's around, of course, because we like to enjoy our CR meals together. It's fun to eat my tiny eggwhite breakfast in a minute or two and then have half an hour to watch him consume a salad the size of what I eat in a week... I've always enjoyed watching men eat vegetables... but I digress.

A part of me has always rebelled against the dictatorship of the breakfast people.

Well, now I've got it. The perfect excuse to skip breakfast. The one and only reason for forgoing that morning eggwhite and flax oil and Carolina barbeque sauce mess that I've come to love so much that I lick the plate after eating, but secretly wish I could eat at 10 am (which for me would be five hours after rising, and definitely not breakfast.)

I'm getting my blood tests tomorrow!!!

Of course I should have gotten this done long ago. But I finally got my family doctor to order the tests, as you will recall, a process which involved actually contacting the random dude listed on my insurance card and attempting to explain CR to him. And after climbing a long and agonizing phone tree at my insurance company, I finally got an assurance that for a $5 co-pay I can get all the tests done and insurance will pay. Yea!!! It's amazing what they'll do if a doctor orders it. Maybe my health insurance isn't so bad after all... all you can eat bloodtest buffet... sounds like it's tailor made to appeal to vampires.

So I'm going in at 8 tomorrow morning to have blood drawn and guess what that means... no breakfast! Haha! I don't have to eat breakfast! I am looking forward to it already. Think of all the exciting fun things I can do with the extra five minutes freed up by not cooking my eggwhites! Maybe I'll scrub the kitchen floor, or take my cat for a walk on the balcony! Maybe I'll add another ingredient to my lunch salad, one that would require chopping! Maybe I'll... blog.

There is one small problem, however.

No coffee till after the blood tests.

You can bet that the first thing I do after I am relieved of a little bit of my blood will be to run straight over to the neighorhood corner Starbucks (where the employees have health insurance so they too could get their blood drawn and have an excuse to skip breakfast!) and order a Venti coffee, no room for cream, no sugar, no splenda, no artificial sweetener, dash of cinnamon and cocoa on top. Or if it's hot outside: Venti iced coffee, extra ice, not sweetened, not shaken, not stirred, totally undisturbed, please do not jar the icecubes in my iced coffee it makes them melt faster which makes the coffee less icy cold, and as we all know, I like extremes in everything, from the temperature of my beverages to the personalities of my friends.

I'm not going to eat breakfast... you can't make me... and you have to be happy about it!

So there.

I will now attempt to go back to acting my age. CR seems to have not only slowed my rate of biological aging, but caused a temporary (I trust) regression in my emotional maturity, so that I am currently more fit for the elementary school playground than for my responsible, high-powered job in which I supervise people and hold important aspects of nurses's lives in my tiny little hands.

Sticks and stones may break my bones but old posts can't make me eat breakfast! Saturated fat may clog my arteries, but I get to skip breakfast!

For one whole day!

Posted by april at 7:27 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack

June 21, 2005

Ways to Worship the Tomato

With excellent tomato season finally just around the corner, I've been racking my brains for new and exciting ways to worship my favorite vegetable/fruit. In my lowfat vegan days, I used to make an excellent pasta sauce with just fresh tomatoes at their ripest, simmered in dry white wine with fresh garlic and fresh basil. These days, I'd add a teaspoon of olive oil to it and serve it over spaghetti squash instead of pasta. But what about protein? I was thinking as I was flying all day yesterday that it would be great if I could come up with a high protein side salad kind of dish. Finally it dawned on me: an imitation "Greek" salad with eggwhite cubes instead of feta!

Here's the idea. Microwave a cup of eggwhites, cool, chop into bite-sized cubes. While the eggwhites are cooling, blend 3 tablespoons of red wine vinegar with 1 teaspoon of olive oil, 1 teaspoon of flax oil, and 5 g capers along with about 3 - 5 g fresh oregano in the food processor. Pour the dressing over the eggwhites and marinate for a few hours in the fridge. Then serve over 50 g romaine with 50 g diced green peppers, 15 g loose capers, and 120 calories worth of kalamata olives. Put a 60 calorie scoop of nonfat cottage cheese in the middle for a bit of cool calcium and some more protein. Wouldn't that be a lovely salad to serve with the spaghetti squash and summer tomato sauce? Throw in a 3 oz glass of pinot noir and you have a nicely Zoned, 620 calorie meal.

Here's the crunch:

Food List : spaghettisquashtomatogreeksalad.FLS
DATE : 06/21/05
Num. Foods : 14
Food #1 : Tomatoes, red, ripe, raw, June thru October average 150 g
Food #2 : Alcoholic beverage, wine, table, white 30 cal cooked down
Food #3 : Garlic, raw 3 g
Food #4 : Basil, fresh 5 g
Food #5 : Squash, winter, spaghetti, cooked, boiled, drained, or baked, without salt 300 g
Food #6 : Egg, white, raw, fresh 1 cup
Food #7 : Lettuce, cos or romaine, raw 50 g
Food #8 : Peppers, sweet, green, raw 50 g
Food #9 : oil 1 teaspoon flax, 2 teaspoons olive
Food #10 : Olives, ripe, canned (jumbo-super colossal) 120 cals
Food #11 : Capers, canned 20 g
Food #12 : Alcoholic beverage, wine, table, red 3 oz
Food #13 : Vinegar, red wine 3 tablespoons
Food #14 : lowfat cottage cheese 60 cals
NUTRIENT TOTALS:

Abs. Values %RDA/SA

Calories 620.52__cal 31%
Protein 41.50__gm 75% RDA
Total Fat 21.50__gm 33%
Sat. Fat 4.17__gm 21%
Mono. Fat 12.04__gm 42%
Poly. Fat 3.66__gm 55%
Carbohydrate 48.51__gm 16%
Fiber 12.20__gm 41%
Cholesterol 53.85__mg 18%
Vit. A 12511.02__IU 250% RDA
Vit. B6 0.73__mg 45% RDA
Vit. B12 0.98__mcg 49% RDA
Vit. C 111.07__mg 185% RDA
Vit. E 7.34__mg 92% RDA
Thiamine 0.34__mg 31% RDA
Folacin 151.80__mcg 84% RDA
Riboflavin 1.52__mg 117% RDA
Niacin 4.53__mg 30% RDA
Panto. Acid 2.12__mg 42% SA
Calcium 460.60__mg 38% RDA
Copper 0.77__mg 38% SA
Iron 8.71__mg 58% RDA
Magnesium 124.88__mg 45% RDA
Manganese 1.78__mg 59% SA
Phosphorus 276.53__mg 23% RDA
Potassium 1539.22__mg 77% RDA
Selenium 55.06__mcg 100% RDA
Sodium 2717.40__mg 113% SA
Zinc 1.80__mg 15% RDA
Tyrosine 2.84__gm 296% RDA
Lysine 5.62__gm 781% RDA
Phenylalanine 3.64__gm 380% RDA
Leucine 6.22__gm 648% RDA
Valine 4.19__gm 499% RDA
Methionine 2.09__gm 697% RDA
Cystine 1.24__gm 412% RDA
Tryptophan 0.95__gm 525% RDA
Threonine 3.29__gm 685% RDA
Isoleucine 3.86__gm 536% RDA

P:C:F = 27:42:31

My DWIDP doesn't have fresh oregano, but assume that it's the same as cilantro and add about 5 calories for a nice sized pinch to blend into the dressing, bringing us to to total of 625. 625 calories is a nice dinner for a CR'd boy. To adapt it to a girl, cut out the cottage cheese cause all girls eat their cottage cheese for lunch. Half the rest of the recipe. Make the 3 oz glass of wine a 6 oz glass of wine, because everyone knows that girls drink grown up sized glasses of wine because girls actually like to drink wine, while boys merely drink 3 oz because the evidence says it's good for them. That will make the girl's meal slightly lower protein, but since all girls eat 29 g protein for breakfast, that's okay.

If making recipe for company, serve with a dessert of small tart green apples sauteed in spiced rum and sprinkled with cinnamon over a dollop of nonfat organic vanilla yogurt, no artificial sweeteners. Or, if berries are good, simmer blueberries, raspberries and organic strawberries in port, sprinkle with cinnamon, serve in tiny shallow Revereware dishes, a different color for each guest.

If serving to cats, substitute a large dead salmon and several raw shrimp for the above. Add a generous dish of cool but not cold water, garnished with a leaf of fresh catnip.

Posted by april at 6:46 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Bizarre Diet Advice

Last night I was in the Chicago airport enjoying a glass of pinot noir between one long flight and the next and chatting with a friend who watches her diet carefully, stays in great shape, and is one of those people others look to for diet advice. She had just gotten some very bizarre diet advice from an acquaintance of hers. I think it went something like this:

1) Drink a glass of water with the juice of half a lemon upon rising.
2) Eat a tablespoon of organic apple cider vinegar before every meal.
3) Drink two glasses of water before every meal.
4) Eat two tablespoons full a day of some bizarre ground vegetable meal.

My friend was asking me if this advice really was as goofy as it sounds, and once I stopped laughing I agreed that it sounded pretty goofy to me. I mean, if you like lemon in your water, that seems fine, but I doubt that it will accelerate weight loss. And I love vinegar more than almost anyone on the planet, but I can't see the point of eating a tablespoon before a meal. If anything, I think that would make a normal person feel a bit ill, and not eating because you are sick on vinegar all the time is definitely NOT CRON.
The explanation offered was something about vinegar making toxins not stick to the colon. Huh? Anybody want to take a stab at making sense out of this one?

I thought I might start collecting bizarre diet advice that we have all gotten over the years. I bet my bloggiefriends have some stories to tell, so comment away! If you know how to cook a bug, I'm sure you know lots of other weird stuff too.

On to my very own, hopefully not too bizarre CRON advice... I will address some of the questions from my commenters.

Re: artificial sweeteners: The CR community is divided on this but the CR community is divided on almost everything. There's very little we agree on, other than that fewer calories = more life, and that we should pack as much nutrition as possible into every calorie. Beyond that, it's all over the map. I tend to follow MR's advice because a) he always backs up his advice with whacks of evidence from real studies b) he lives by what he preaches, and it's working on him c) every time I've made a change that he recommended, it's made me feel dramatically better d) he's really cute. So as to artificial sweeteners: some people won't touch them, some think they're no big deal. I used to drink tons of diet soda and now just drink some, and I occasionally use Splenda in my tea. MR uses only real sucralose, which is very hard to get and must be ordered from a guy named Warren and served with spoons that you use to feed baby sea monkeys. But MR will occasionally have a sip of my Diet Dr. Pepper and he doesn't freak out about me drinking it in moderate amounts, so I figure it's okay. Like anything, if you have a bad reaction to something, by all means, avoid it. My Light and Fit is the plain, so it's not sweetened. I like to make a savory Indian-ish dish out of it by squeezing in the juice of a lemon plus some garlic powder, chipoltle Tabasco, salsa, etc. It's great on a bed of strong greens. For my fruit yogurt, I eat Stoneyfield Farms fruit on bottom, which doesn't have artificial sweeteners.

MR did freak out about my sodium intake when we first met, so I switched to half salt. I probably use too much of that, but it's a lot less than I used to consume.

Re: processed foods: Most CR folk will not eat too much processed food, but then you get into a question of what that means. Some would call cottage cheese processed, but it's a very good food (assuming you're not allergic to milk). Some CR folks prefer not to cook their food much, and I imagine that those of us who do steam our veggies cook them a lot less than our grandmothers did. Lots of veggies become more nutritionally available (that sounds like a pick up line in the making... "Hey baby, are you nutritionally available?") once they're cooked. Tomatoes are a good example of this. Adding a bit of fat, IIRC, increases the absorbability of most veggie nutrients too.

When starting CR, it helps to cut back on or entirely eliminate most of what most people will consider "processed" foods because you'll make yourself insanely hungry if you try to eat a calorie restricted diet that isn't nutritionally sound. I feel like an odd treat here and there is no big deal, as long as you're getting the basics covered and are comfortable with your pattern. MR eats sugar free jello for dessert sometimes... we're thinking of stocking our fridge with little jars of sugar free jello to feed to our friends for treats when they come over. The image of lots of serious, grown up people sitting on the deck discussing important topics and eating sugar free jello out of jars is really amusing to me.

Re: dealing with setbacks. Wow, do I know that feeling. I am exactly like that. I really hate that feeling that I didn't do it right, no matter what *it* is at the moment. Ick. It's really hard. I had to deal with a spell when some of the people around me gave me trouble about my weight loss, and it's always awkward when people act like the price of admission to the social club is willingness to eat gak. Since finding a partner who also does CR is not a practical solution for everyone, the best advice I have is to confront the situation directly. When I first decided to start CR, I told my closest friends and family that I would be making some changes and that I needed their support. I also made it clear that I didn't expect them to adopt CR or even healthier eating habits... I just wanted their understanding when I made different choices. Overall, this worked really well. But there have been problems... a very close friend of long standing who dealt with serious eating disorder issues in her life felt sufficiently ambivilent about my CR that she didn't think it was a good idea for us to see each other. That was definitely very hard for me. Ideas around food are so messed up in our culture that it's hard for a calorie to be just a calorie... it's too bound up in people's heads with all sorts of emotions. It's hard, I think, for some people to understand how very happy and healthy we can be once we stop seeing food as the enemy and start seeing it as something we can use to nourish our bodies, not beat ourselves up with. I feel like I have found a pretty good balance in my life, but it's taken a long time to come to, and I still have days when I think to myself, "Why did I eat that???" The pressure is HARD to deal with, and I find myself gravitating towards other people who have a live and let live attitude towards feeding practices. It's so incredibly nice to have a CR'd partner... we really have fun cooking for each other, enjoying our food together, etc. Food really is an important part of life.

Glad the the weekdays on, weekends off starting approach worked for you Emma! It really is good to prove to yourself how much better you feel doing CRON, rather than to feel like you're just following a set of rules. Maybe I'll republish Girl's Guide to Starting CR... it's around here somewhere.

As much as I love and am fairly comfortable with my CR practice now, I do occasionally get nostalgic for those early days. The excitement of feeling so radically better when I dropped my calories... the weird euphoria that everyone seems to feel during the fat loss stage... the massive infusion of strength when I upped my protein intake... the calming feeling of Omega 3 and 6 balancing... all without hunger cause I was burning off my 35 pound tank of fat fuel. Watching the scale go down and my clothes get too loose to wear and gradually figuring out that I was turning into one of those thin girls. Now we know that I was burning mostly fat, as my body fat percentage has gone from 33% to 18.1%. I had little lean body mass to start with, so it's good that I'm doing some strength training now as well as walking/treadmilling. Gotta keep strong bones!

It's harder now that I get really hungry if I go too low on my calories, and I have to pay more attention to packing up good food so that I don't hit that "ready to eat the neighbors" point while I'm on the road or working, etc. It's good to reach for a megamuffin in times of need... like a bridge over troubled water, it will calm, soothe and satisfy.

Posted by april at 9:09 AM | Comments (13) | TrackBack

June 19, 2005

You Shouldn't Eat A Live Tarantula

Brewers yeast has tons of excellent nutrients, including many B vitamins and copper, so that's why I eat it. It's DEAD yeast. While I can see some argument for not eating LIVE yeast, extrapolating that therefore you should not eat dead yeast is like saying that you shouldn't eat a live tarantula, therefore killing one and eating one would be equally bad. If a tarantula had tons of B vitamins, that is. The point is, eating a dead, B vitamin-rich tarantula that has been cooked and delicately seasoned would be a much different experience than having a live one crawl around your digestive tract.

Ya still with me, bloggiefriends?

MR will soon update his flax oil rant to answer all those questions, but here's a preview: ground flax seeds are an excellent source of cyanide.

Dairy doesn't make me stuffy or seem to cause me any other ill effects. I have a great control for that because I was a hard core vegan for five years, so I know what I felt like without dairy and I know what I feel like with. I know several people who seem to be negatively effected by dairy, but I don't appear to be one of them. You're right to be skeptical about the requirements for high calcium, but the most conservative approach at this point is to take the RDAs (recognized to be the human requirement for health) and at least meet them. Since we CR people have to be careful about our bones, it makes sense for me to get the RDA of calcium, which my dairy intake (and I supplement) allows me to do. I also do weight bearing exercise, cause I kept having nightmares about my bones collapsing. I actually like doing push-ups now... there's a whole lot less to push-up now that I weigh 104 as opposed to 137! I also speed-walk at 4 mph to 4.5 mph at an elevation of 4 on a treadmill for thirty minutes at least four days a week, usually more. I used to lift weights a lot, and am looking forward to joining a gym that has better weight training equipment than my apartment gym. And Liz is going to fly out to be my personal trainer, right Liz?

Re: The China Study. If you're talking about the Cornell China health study, this is about the worst example of science out there. It's not even proper [prospective] epidemiology: they took population data from different counties in China, and compared their diet and their health outcomes for the entire county, not for the individuals in it (as opposed to specifically asking people what they eat and to share their personal medical history, as in the Nurses Health Study) and then drew conclusions. It's like saying that they smoke more in Japan, but they die less of lung cancer (which is true!), therefore smoking causes a decrease in cancer (which it obviously does not!)

Tall MR and Little MR both wish I would Zone more. My breakfast is very low carb because I find that eating a very low carb breakfast prevents a morning anxiety spike. Because my mental state seems to be very closely tied to what I eat at various times of day, I sometimes make food choices that involve that calculation as well. In the absence of that issue, I would Zone my breakfast more. But Mary, aren't you excited that I'm now eating hazelnuts with my afternoon yogurt? And lunch is quite nicely Zoned. Dinner is higher carb because after the giant shot of protein early in the day, I usually can't afford to cram in more protein into dinner than the brewers yeast provides (16 g) unless I am willing to go to what even I think may be excessive protein.

I really appreciate all the time and energy all have put into thinking about my diet and commenting. It's such fun to have a conversation! For so long I wondered if anyone was reading the blog at all... and many thank you's to those of you who have been with me from the beginning. Keep up the chatting!

Nutrition is a subject that you could spend your entire life studying, and for the lay person, it can be tricky to navigate the evidence without giving up your day job to read medical studies. I spent TONS of time searching the CR Society archives and many other sources while I was in the process of creating my current dietary habits. Now I benefit from the advice of someone who actually spends tons of time reading medical studies and has for many years. The fact that he happens to cook really well helps too! It sure does make it easier now that I can just turn around and ask him a question instead of always having to hunt for it myself, though I'd have to say that process of figuring out my diet myself was a very empowering experience. Even now, MR marvels that I get so much into so few calories.

I think what Emma is saying makes a lot of sense. People are different. My needs and Mary's needs are similar in some ways but different in many others. She has allergies, I don't. I feel anxiety spikes when I eat too many carbs early in the day... most people don't. I have to eat things that are stored on low shelves because I am short and can not reach things on high shelves. The point is: one-size fits all is pretty darned difficult. That being said, there are some things that pretty much everyone needs to do, and I think I have those covered.

Because I have lived the lowfat vegetarian (Ornish style) and no-fat vegan (McDougall style) lifestyle for years each, I know how those effect me, and I don't like it. Yes, I was thin, but I was also hungry and eating all the time, anxious, and carrying giant tupperwares of rice and beans around all the time. I feel a whole lot better now that I get much more protein, and I get it with very little saturated fat.

Another interesting data point. MR has one of those Tanita type scales, and it says I have 18.1% body fat. Now these things tend to be terribly inaccurate for the extremely skinny of the very atheletic but I am neither, so chances are it's not far off. When I started CR just over a year ago, I was 33% body fat. Wow. CR is not about body fat percentage or weight or anything like that, but it's still kinda cool to watch where that number has gone. I was shocked... I still look so normal, like a slim but not "skinny" girl, that I expected it to be at least 20%.

Thanks again to all for your wonderful comments!

[No tarantulas were harmed or even mildly inconvenienced in the production of this blog entry.]

Posted by april at 5:24 AM | Comments (9) | TrackBack

June 17, 2005

Blog Excitement!

Wow, it's really fun when the blog generates controversy! Thanks to all for your comments!

Let's have more!!!

So here's my "quotidien" diet... a good example of how I eat on a weekday when I'm going to work and going about my normal activities. Note the simplicity and easy to tupperware nature of it all. I don't publish the nutrition info every time I eat it because I would just be publishing the exact same or nearly the same thing over and over again, and of course it changes some from day to day, but this is pretty representative. A common variation is that I will switch up or add in the veggies in or around my salad or soup, such as adding tomatoes, green peppers, mushrooms, brussels sprouts, or squashes. I also eat a fruit salad containing berries and other fruits about twice a week, usually at the fantastic salad bar at a restaurant I frequent for lunch with my co-workers.

So Scott offered to give me suggestions on how to improve my diet, and I would welcome them, as well as suggestions from any of my other esteemed bloggiefriends. Here's the info you need on what I'm eating on an average day, complete with nutritional breakdown courtesy of Dr. Walford's Interactive Diet Planner, or DWIDP for short.

The breakdown by meal is:

Breakfast
1 cup of eggwhites scrambled topped with 1 teaspoon flax oil
5 g wheat bran, soaked and drained

Lunch
Kale and arugula (giant) salad topped with one cup of plain nonfat yogurt mixed with salsa, plus 1 teaspoon olive oil

Afternoon snack:
1 carton of non-fat fruit yougurt plus hazelnuts

Dinner:
soup of 1 cup fat free organic chicken broth mixed with broccoli, cauliflower and carrots plus two tablespoons Lewis Labs brand brewers yeast and 1 teaspoon flax oil
1 6 oz glass of red wine

I also eat a 20 calorie calcium chewy supplement in the evening, but I'll go into more detail on my supplement program once I get comments on the food. I actually have a back issue that I believe is called "What You Always Needed" that details my supplement program, but it may still be over at the old blog. Just so you don't have a panic attack, I am supplementing with Zinc, as well as about a zillion other things. I can take most of the credit for my quotidien diet, but MR gets the entire credit for my supplement program... before I met him, I was taking Hello Kitty Chewable Vitamins. Now I even have my very own little pill box that I carry with me to work! Isn't that cute???

Comment away!

Num. Foods : 17
Food #1 : Egg, white, raw, fresh 1 cup
Food #2 : Oil 2 teaspoons flax, 1 teaspoon olive
Food #3 : Dannon Light and Fit Yogurt 1 cup
Food #4 : Kale, raw 50 g
Food #5 : Arugula, raw 20 g
Food #6 : Salsa, med. chunky 2 tablespoons
Food #7 : lowfat cottage cheese half cup
Food #8 : Yogurt, fruit, low fat, 9 grams protein per 8 ounce 1 container (140 cals)
Food #9 : Nuts, filberts or hazelnuts, dried, unblanched 10 g
Food #10 : Brewer's Yeast 2 tablespoons
Food #11 : Alcoholic beverage, wine, table, red 6 oz
Food #12 : Soup, chicken broth cubes, dehydrated, dry 1 cup
Food #13 : Nuts, filberts or hazelnuts, dried, unblanched 10 g
Food #14 : Wheat bran, crude 5 g
Food #15 : Broccoli, frozen, spears, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 25 cals
Food #16 : Cauliflower, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 25 cals
Food #17 : Carrots, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 25 cals

NUTRIENT TOTALS:

Abs. Values %RDA/SA

Calories 1055.20__cal 53%
Protein 78.75__gm 143% RDA
Total Fat 29.44__gm 45%
Sat. Fat 5.44__gm 27%
Mono. Fat 18.17__gm 63%
Poly. Fat 3.96__gm 59%
Carbohydrate 117.01__gm 39%
Fiber 14.88__gm 50%
Cholesterol 116.12__mg 39%
Vit. A 18955.30__IU 379% RDA
Vit. B6 3.37__mg 211% RDA
Vit. B12 2.05__mcg 102% RDA
Vit. C 159.01__mg 265% RDA
Vit. E 8.17__mg 102% RDA
Thiamine 1.33__mg 121% RDA
Folacin 192.38__mcg 107% RDA
Riboflavin 3.23__mg 249% RDA
Niacin 11.43__mg 76% RDA
Panto. Acid 14.50__mg 290% SA
Calcium 1378.75__mg 115% RDA
Copper 1.87__mg 93% SA
Iron 6.25__mg 42% RDA
Magnesium 254.37__mg 91% RDA
Manganese 3.73__mg 124% SA
Phosphorus 2433.68__mg 203% RDA
Potassium 2664.25__mg 133% RDA
Selenium 132.34__mcg 241% RDA
Sodium 2674.69__mg 111% SA
Zinc 4.96__mg 41% RDA
Tyrosine 5.80__gm 604% RDA
Lysine 11.00__gm 1528% RDA
Phenylalanine 6.74__gm 703% RDA
Leucine 11.71__gm 1220% RDA
Valine 8.53__gm 1015% RDA
Methionine 2.78__gm 925% RDA
Cystine 1.51__gm 503% RDA
Tryptophan 1.85__gm 1027% RDA
Threonine 6.70__gm 1396% RDA
Isoleucine 7.52__gm 1045% RDA

P:C:F = 30:45:25

Posted by april at 8:04 AM | Comments (13) | TrackBack

June 15, 2005

More Huh?

My delicious dinner in Calgary:

vegetable stew of shiitake mushrooms, mustard greens, asparagus, broccoli, pumpkin, kale stems, avocado, yu choi, celery, napa cabbage, eggwhites, homemade pickles (low sodium) hazelnuts, slice of orange (peel included), olive oil (1/2 teaspoon), with garlic and ginger powder, and lemon juice

6 oz (1 glass) pinot noir

glass of low sodium V-8 with red Thai chili paste added for flavor

Uh, no, I rarely eat grains. Of any kind.

And I do not imitate the nutritional habits of Aubrey de Grey... I admire his work on engineering approaches to the problem of aging, not on nutrition. He's not into nutrition, as he'll plainly tell you... he's working on something that will be much more effective than CR, CR mimetics, or any sort of nutritional approach (let alone supplements or exercise.) to slowing the aging process.

Jay mostly covered the flax oil question... see Jay's comments or search the CR Society archives.

Re: RDAs: If you had actually read the Institute of Medicine's report, you would know that the current IoM RDAs are actually well-grounded in the available science, contrary to supplement industry propaganda.

It strikes me as quite odd that someone who calls himself a "nutrition longevity expert" would dismiss CR out of hand. That's just goofy, when all the available evidence is that CR is the ONLY currently available method that retards biological aging in mammals.

Wow, I had the greatest dinner.

Posted by april at 9:47 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack

Huh?

Hi all,

I just got to Calgary, and while I'm getting ready to enjoy my delicious breakfast of eggwhites and flax oil, followed by a delicious lunch of a giant salad with about five kinds of greens, tomatoes, and green peppers topped with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and salsa, with calcium rich cottage cheese on the side, followed by a dinner that I will describe once I find out what it is (MR is cooking for me tonight!) I thought I'd answer Scott's unfortunately ill-informed comment.

Hi Scott,

Thanks for checking in on my blog, but it's obvious
that you haven't been reading it for long. If you
had, you would see that almost all days, I eat three
meals a day, and as tracked on Dr. Walford's
nutritional software meet or exceed the RDA's of all
essential nutrients, and supplement carefully where I
fall short. I also, on almost all days, drink
precisely 6 ounces of wine, aka one glass, which you would I doubt
call excessive.

If you had been reading my blog for more than a few days you would also note that I exercise daily and follow a supplement program designed by someone who actually knows what he is talking about.

I hope that you continue to read my blog and do not
judge my diet by one or two days. I have worked very
hard at evoloving a CR practice in which I get all my
RDA's in a diet that is low in calories, delicious,
and easy for me to prepare and fit into my very busy
lifestyle.

I look forward to your comments after you've read a
bit more. While I occasionally go out with friends and eat unusually or drink more wine (and much less than most people do when they go out) I consider this flexibility a positive part of my CR program, making it possible for me to integrate CR with a lifestyle that is really quite normal. My ordinary diet is so nutrient rich and low in calories that it more than makes up for the occasional less-than-perfect day.

Also, check out Mary's CR blog, at
www.crdiary.blogspot.com. I think you will find that
while her diet is different from mine, she also gets
almost all the RDA's every day and supplements where
she does not.

Thanks,
April

Posted by april at 5:52 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

June 13, 2005

Pink Eggs and Lettuce

No, it's not the title of a Dr. Zeuss book! It's what I ate for lunch!

I regret to report that this week I have been the victim of my own good planning. In preparation for my trip to Calgary I have emptied my fridge of all perishables, including my usual cottage cheese and yogurt. So other than a few hazelnuts that live in the freezer, I didn't have anything to pack for my all day meeting today. Had to, as the Black Moth puts it, "live off the land."

The lunch food was pretty awful at the meeting. Cold cuts and cheese, mayo covered pasta salad, basically nothing I would touch with a ten foot pole. VLC and I were the first in line to attack the lettuce, tomato and onion on the garnish tray for the sandwiches, and I put a dollop of mustard on my lettuce to make it seem like it had taste.

The highlight of the day was the pickled eggs. These are quite the delicacy in central Pennsylvania, and because I love anything pickled, I love pickled eggs. I ate four. Yes, 280 calories of hot pink pickled eggs and a side of shredded iceberg lettuce with tomatoes and mustard was my lunch. That's living off the land for you.

After we drove the two and a half hours home from the meeting, my two co-workers who rode with me stopped in for a glass of wine on my balcony. We enjoyed sitting in the sun... I especially enjoyed it with my SPF 15 sunscreen and my CR-increased heat tolerence.

Now I'm packing for Calgary, organizing my supplements and figuring what I need to pick up while I'm there. It's nice to go somewhere where I can be sure that excellent CR food will be provided. Takes me back to my first trip out to Calgary where among the many truly amazing things I discovered was the feeling of being totally safe eating someone else's cooking!

Low carb pancakes await me Wednesday morning...

Posted by april at 8:30 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

June 12, 2005

Is A Tomato A Fruit Or A Vegetable?

That's what my new friend the Beautiful Red Head said to me last night when I asked her what her favorite vegetable might be. We all know that tomatoes are technically fruits, but they feel like a vegetable. I am going to make dinner for her and her husband in a few weeks, so I wanted to start planning the menu now.

Speaking of planning, Saturday was an example of good planning, while Sunday became an example of bad planning.

On Saturday I had my regular breakfast (eggwhites with a teaspoon of flax oil), then I had my brewers yeast soup, a cup of fruit yogurt and some hazelnuts for a very late lunch because I was going to a lecture at five then going out afterwards with some friends, and I figured the food would be inedible. So I filled up on a very late lunch with all my nutritious brewers yeast and veggies and wasn't hungry at all when we all went out to dinner at an Irish bar downtown. It was so nice... some people ate, some people didn't, no one asked me what was up. I asked the Beautiful Red Head (BRH) and she said no one bothers anyone in that group about much of anything, and besides, some of the people are too broke to be eating out so no one bugs them about it.

I had another truly amazing evening with BRH and her crowd, stayed out till midnight again! BRH and I had one of those conversations where we just kept finding more and more things we have in common. It was wonderfully creepy and made me very happy. She had picked up a Hello Kitty carrying case for me at a flea market, so we bonded over the power of Hello. It's so fabulous to find a girl I like to hang out with.

By the time I got home I was pretty hungry, though the three glasses of cabernet I consumed over the course of about five hours as we all hung out provided some sugar calories and resveratrol. I ended the evening with a cup of cottage cheese and a teaspoon of flax oil, straight not on the cottage cheese, and went quickly to bed. Overall, not a bad day for going out... I overindulged in the wine, but other than that had my regular food. I also tried a bite of BRH's Guiness Brownie Pie, which was heavenly and so rich that one needn't eat more than one bite.

Today was less successful. I ran out the door without eating breakfast and was facing a long day: took two trains to get to New Jersey to meet up with some friends who then drove two hours north on the NJ Turnpike to go to the birthday party of my former boss and long time close friend. I knew I didn't want to show up at the party starving, so I stopped at a great take out burrito place and got a chicken burrito with black beans and tons of veggies. It was delicious and God knows how many calories, but it kept me pretty full. We got to the party, which was mostly friend foods and beer, at around 2:30, and I drank two beers and stayed away from most of the food. I was however tempted by the broccoli nuggets: little fried pieces of broccoli and cheese. I ate five (take five, they're small) and made a plate of the raw vegetables (no one ever touches the vegetable tray) topped with hot wings sauce. Eating the broccoli nuggets wasn't the best choice, but they sure were yummy and I didn't stuff myself!

No dinner for me tonight... I finally got home just past eight from the extremely long travel day and I'm exhausted. All day meeting tomorrow two and a half hours away, so I'll spend five hours in the car and at last five hours in meetings. Then Tuesday I fly into the arms of my Orange Angel... well, I fly into the airport in the city where he lives, but you get the idea. At some point I need to pack. But now, to bed.

Posted by april at 8:47 PM | Comments (8) | TrackBack

June 10, 2005

Whose Fantasies Are We Fulfilling?

The other day I was reading Wanderingfeet's new blog, CRON 101, and came across some of her thoughts on CR and weight loss:

"I have a lot of issues with diets and dieting, starting with resentment at being expected towhat society thinks is the right way for me to look as a woman, which seems anyway to be based on male fantasies which women have apparently internalized. I'm not saying it's wrong to want to look good in a bathing suit, but I personally don't want to be judged by how my body stacks up against the 'breed standard.'"

It made me think about the role of weight loss in CR, and my own personal feelings about weight loss as a side effect of the only known method for retarding biological aging.

I'm beginning to suspect that you're onto me, and I want you to hear it from me first.

CR is not, for me, about living longer. It's not about health or even looking good well into old age. This whole thing about wanting to help you do CR so that we can welcome the dawn of radical anti-aging biomedicine together is just a front. For me, CR is about conforming to an ideal of beauty that some people think is impossible.

You see, bloggiefriends, I really like skinny guys.

And I don't mean just sorta skinny, like on the lighter side of normal, or "healthy" or "slim." I mean *skinny*.

I've always liked skinny guys, as long as I can remember. When I was in school I noticed that the skinny guys were usually the nerdy guys... I guess the non-skinny guys were too busy getting their heads bashed in on the football field or in the hockey rink to learn much. Those fit, athletic, weight lifting types just never did anything for me at all. While I've dated some guys who were on the slightly heavy side, I don't think I've ever dated a muscle-man underwear model type. All that traditional male beauty just leaves me cold.

But give me a skinny nerdy geek boy any day.

You know the quote from Revenge of the Nerds, don't you?

Same for glasses: I just assume that men wearing glasses are smarter. I can't help it, I feel that way. People assume that blondes are dumb and that pretty women are flaky -- well, I assume that skinny glasses-wearing boys are smart.

I also really like men who can type. I can never develop even the slightest bit of interest in a man who can not type. But when a guy can type really well... I could watch that for hours. I could fall asleep listening to the "click click click" of long skinny fingers against the keyboard.

I have given up computer geeks for Lent. Several years in a row.

But enough about me. Let's talk about CR, and why by now you've started to figure out that doing CR, for me, has nothing whatsoever to do with life-extension. I am doing CR cause it's a great way to meet skinny guys!!! And it worked! I met the skinniest, smartest, most perfect guy on earth!

But that's not enough. I must spread CR throughout the world, not because I want people to be healthier and happier, but because I want all men to be skinny! It's not enough for me to impose my personal idea of male beauty on just one guy, no, I will not stop until every man in this country is chopping vegetables in a desperate attempt to get a BMI of 15.5!

Hey, if the fashion industry can convince us girls that we want to look like Kate Moss, why can't I convince men that they want to look like MR?

Abandon your weight training programs, all you men out there! Abandon those protein shakes that are supposed to make you "bulk up." Put down the cheesesteak, take up the mustard green! You too can become nothing but bone, muscle and brain. Men may make fun of you and try to beat you up, but women will swoon and think you own a software company.

Be proud, all you skinny geek boys, of your gorgeous bodies. Throw out those baggy clothes and get a decent suit tailored to fit you! Skinny guys are beautiful!

Men have been slow to internalize my fantasy of male beauty, but that doesn't discourage me in the slightest. Though Hollywood now glorifies bodies like that of the Governor of California, it won't be long until men look at him and say, "Oh my God, his butt is so big!"

And then I will know I have won.

Start chopping vegetables, boys. We girls have internalized your fantasies long enough. It's about time you fulfilled mine.

Posted by april at 9:42 AM | Comments (9) | TrackBack

June 8, 2005

Conversation Piece

Tonight I have been invited to go to a happy hour at the Philadelphia Racquet Club with a couple of my friends from college whom I see every few months. The friend who belongs there can get us in for free, and I've been a few times before. The drinks are good, quite decent wine, and there's always a huge spread of food that I will not be eating. My friend who invites us says we're there to improve the investment bankers to humans ratio (no offense to any investment bankers out there!) I'm as you know a union organizer and the other friend who is attending is a slightly offbeat freelance journalist who just returned from a trip to India to investigate something or other. Between the fact that I have a weird job and I eat weird food, I am a walking conversation piece.

In these situations I try to avoid talking about my work because I just don't enjoy arguing with people about unions when I'm supposed to be having a good time. I actually don't love arguing with people in general, though I do enjoy talking with people in order to move them to do something. I do, however, enjoy watching MR argue with people. He got into a rather fabulous argument recently and I am just tortured that I wasn't there to watch it. I realized this morning that I love to watch him argue so much that I have been subconsciously looking for people for him to argue with. Preferably people he will like on a personal level but have intellectual disagreements with. In fact, I don't really care what the subject of the arguement is. I just like to watch him think. We all recall the now infamous debate of Friday night of the CR Society Conference. The rest, they say, is history. And the bloggers write the history.

Meanwhile, the past two days have been fairly good food-wise. Yesterday I had my traditional breakfast, and was planning to eat the lunch I had packed for work, but had to leave the office at lunchtime to have my poor little car inspected. They actually made me drive it to their offices. I was so terrified that I begged a co-worker to come with me and follow me in his car. I was glad I did because when we got there the insurance inspector said, "Other than the fact that the hood might fly up in your face at any moment, it seems okay." Uh, huh??? I refused to drive it one foot further and made them tow it to their repair shop to deal with. Apparently the other insurance company has two years to pay them, so I may as well kiss my $500 deductible goodbye. Not happy about this.

My co-worker and I decided to hit the Ruby Tuesday's salad bar after the insurance fiasco, and I had a fantastic lunch of greens, tomatoes, green peppers, onions, hot peppers, olives, cottage cheese, salsa, peaches, pears, oranges, and a ton of vinegar. Oh it was so good. Just what I needed... a salad to soothe the soul. For dinner I had brewers yeast soup with broccoli and asparagus and flax oil and an 80 cal snack pack of cottage cheese. I took a walk into town, loving my CR inspired heat tolerence, and had a glass of cabernet while reading at one of the local pubs. Very relaxing. Walked home, visited my mother's cat and the Outside Cat (we're calling him the OC). Blogged. Went to bed at a decent hour (10).

Up at 4:40 am to resume my normal daily activities. Loving that CR inspired decreased need for sleep.

Today I had my traditional breakfast, followed by 80 cals of cottage cheese and the leftover shrimp, peppers, tomatoes and apples in NC bbq sauce with a side of broccoli for lunch. I forgot my hazelnuts, so I put about 5 g of cheese on top of my salad for a drop of fat. I never use nuts for protein, just for fat, but hazelnuts are a great fat source. VLC and I ate lunch outside on the patio next to the office cafeteria. We both brought our lunch, but they don't care if you don't buy anything, which is wonderful since we rarely buy anything at the overpriced cafeteria. Had a fruit yogurt for snack, and was of course still hungry which always happens when I forget to pack my hazelnuts. It's so true that eating too lowfat makes you hungry. Grrrr. A co-worker gave me a banana. Not optimal, but I was getting pretty wiggy with hunger.

I'm going to eat before this happy hour (needless to say!) and IIRC, there is usually a very good vegetable tray that I will no doubt find in pristine condition since no one ever touches the vegetable tray. The "not one bite" rule must be observed with the happy hour appetizers... once I start these days it's hard to stop. Now that I'm actually hungry sometimes, instead of in super fat burn mode, I have to be more careful than before. When you're ambiently hungry and you eat something that just tastes wonderful and hits all those evolutionary starvation relief buttons (fat! Sugar!!! fried thing!!!) something in the brain switches off. I imagine it might be how teenage boys feel around girls. Safer not to go there. I have better things waiting for me in life than fried popcorn shrimp and the Philly racquet club. Like zillions of years of happiness with the Orange Angel. Like being on the cover of Vogue in 2074. Like getting that insurance money... someday.

This has been some boring food content, but it occurred to me that you haven't gotten boring food lists in awhile and you might be missing them. The hardcore bloggiefriends can't live without the mention of eggwhites for long.

More philosophy soon, I assure you. Oh yes, my little bloggiefriends, (imagine the Wicked Witch of the West saying, "Oh yes, my pretty!") you will have all the philosophy you ever wanted. And then some.

Posted by april at 4:42 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 7, 2005

The Price of the Thrill

The other night I was having a discussion about the dues of various organizations, and whether or not they were worth the price. I mentioned that I belong to a group whose dues are $85/month, and the assembled crowd looked at me like I had just landed from Mars. This is a group of folks who are quite accustomed to being looked at like *they* just landed from Mars, so I guess I had to be pretty weird to belong to a group whose dues are so much.

Then today I got out my Suzanne Vega "Nine Objects of Desire" CD, one I hadn't listened to in quite awhile, and was listening to "No Cheap Thrill." Remembering how when I first joined the Three Hundred I said to someone who questioned my willingness to put out so much money, "It's just the price of the thrill." I felt like I had already gained so much health and life from my practice of CR that I owed at least $85/month, and that the prospect of finding real anti-aging therapies that could do far more than CR or CR mimetics could dream of was more than worth the financial commitment of the Three Hundred.

I have always been willing to pay a lot -- in terms of money, time, effort, of emotional energy -- for something to be enthusiastic about. The other day I was the home of a couple I recently met, and on their fridge door was a bumper sticker that read "In Search of the Eternal Buzz." Wow, could I identify! And as someone who has always been too terrified to try any drug stronger than red wine, I've had to look to non-chemical sources for entertainment.

Certainly there is nothing like the thrill of helping workers organize: being the vehicle through which their dreams and passions can take some form of reality. I've paid the price of being an organizer in many early mornings, late nights, and lots of heartbreak.

CR has been one thrill after another. From the initial euphoria of weight loss to the shocking discovery that my anxiety seemed to disappear when confronted with low calorie levels to the achievement of a level of health and happiness that I'd never known existed, it's been worth far more than the $35 I paid to join the CR Society. And it's been worth the price in time and effort, in brain cells used up by memorizing the complete works of MR, the price of social struggles and accusations of anorexia and dealing with the oddness as well as the joy of being thin.

I won't even attempt to take on the subject of falling in love. If you've been there, you know. I won't trivialize the experience by attempting to account for it in terms of any material price. Nothing I ever could have done or ever might do could make me worthy of the joy I have experienced since I first held my orange angel in my arms. You see, I am a Protestant... I do not believe that one gets MR through works, only by divine grace. Though the blog certainly helped get his attention.

I am willing to pay a high and unusual price for the life I lead: hard work, strange looks, occasional hunger, stepping away from the "normal" life of marriage, children, and the things that women of thirty are supposed to want.

I think that I have been willing to pay a comparatively high price because I am very clear about what I want. A long, healthy life, full of youthful energy when I am old and wise. Many years to stare into my angel's eyes. To remain beautiful long past the time when women are supposed to have grown out of such things. To live long enough to see the insurance money from that car accident I had two and a half weeks ago.

When you believe in something, you're willing to sacrifice for it.

In fact, a good way to find out what someone truly believes is to see what he or she is willing to pay for it. Not just in terms of money, but time, effort, energy. Some say they want to live a long and healthy life, yet they're not willing to put the effort into preparing healty foods.

Who would turn down the drug that would restore them to youth and health? Who would not sacrifice everything the had to give this pill to someone they loved, someone they could not imagine living without?

Yet today, who is donating to the Mprize?

What we do now, today, with our money and our time and our efforts, will decide whether or not real anti-aging biomedicine will exist in our lifetimes.

Or in the lifetimes of those we love.

Have you seen Star Wars, Episode 3 yet? If you haven't, stop reading now.

Aniken turns to the Dark Side because the Chancellor (soon to be Emperor -- you'll recognize him as he gets a little green) offers him the chance to save his wife from what Aniken believes to be certain death. The Chancellor says he knows the secret of Immortality, and that it comes from the Dark Side. Aniken wants nothing more than to save the woman he loves. And who can blame him... Natalie Portman is hot!

At the time when I saw the movie, I thought to myself, "This will not be good for the Mprize. People will think that Aubrey is the Chancellor, and that MR is Aniken turned to the Dark Side."

I would like all to know that I am not pregnant with twins, or anything. How horrible. I think I can speak for both of us when I say that we consider children more terrifying than aging.

My point being, Aniken gave up his soul in an attempt (failed) to save the woman he loved. No one is asking you to turn to the Dark Side... all we're talking about here is donating money!

We have the choice, right now, to do something that will add years of health to our own lives and to those of the ones we love.

So why haven't you donated to the Mprize? Cause you don't believe in it? Why not? Do you think that it's a waste of time to hope for a future in which our lives are not ruined by debilitating disease, just as we are finally learning how to be grown-ups?

Do you have a better idea?

All of you can donate to the Mprize. You have the money to pay for an internet connection, you can donate something small to the Prize. If you really care, you can join the Three Hundred.

You get the future you pay for.

Posted by april at 7:48 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

June 6, 2005

If You Eat Healthy, That's Good.

Those were the truly inspired words uttered by my family physician upon my first visit ever. I gave him the letter from MR, the packet of articles, and a nice friendly smile as I explained about CR. He wasn't too interested, but agreed to give me most of the blood tests that MR said I should get. I had to argue with him to get a ferritin test (did I spell that wrong? I keep confusing it with a ferret, and I know I don't need to get tested for ferrets, as I do not now nor have I ever owned one. Not that I wouldn't. I like ferrets. Clever little creatures. Though they smell, so perhaps I wouldn't like one. A tarantula would be better, but exotic pets are such a hassle, and my life is complicated enough. I will stick with the two cats I have. But I digress.) I thought it odd that he would think I didn't need one, but he agreed to do it.

My blood pressure was 110/60, not bad but I suspect it would have been even lower had I not been forced to listen to the President talk about CAFTA on Fox News for fifteen minutes while waiting for my appointment. I kept thinking, "This is *literally* raising my blood pressure." I did try to do a little relaxation ritual by picturing myself in my darling Orange One's kitchen, chattering happily while he chops vegetables. I got my heart rate down that way, which was good as my heart beats really fast when I'm scared, and facing going to the doctor, I was scared.

Weight came in at 105, thanks no doubt to the extra water weight from tons of exercise and those lovely salty flatbreads and hummus last night. I was just as happy to see it closer to 105 than to 103... that's only three pounds "underweight" and less likely to attract attention.

The doctor didn't seem to get the idea that I wanted all these blood tests because I want to participate in a *study.* He kept saying, "You don't need that," as he read through the list. I just said, "Can I have it anyway?" and on most of them he said "Sure." I get the feeling this guy has been battered enough by life and people with health problems that he would be happy as long as I refrained from expiring on the examination table.

The doctor gave me a huge lecture about melanoma, as apparently his sister died of it. I am fanatical about sunscreen and staying out of the sun (though there are people more fanatical than I, for sure... I would wear a hat all the time if only I could find just the right hat that would conform to my fashion sense. Perhaps something with a Hello Kitty theme?). I check my skin all the time because I am very fair and redheaded and Scottish-ish. The doctor wants me to go get my skin photographed at the skin cancer clinic every year to make sure nothing changes. I may do so, if it's free. Why not? Might help us document how CR and staying out of the sun makes our skin beautiful until the end of time.

The doctor asked if I was taking Vitamin D and I said I was, but he said I needed to take 1000 IU a day. MR has me taking 1000 every other day, so I'm going to clarify with MR. Needless to say, I will be following MR's advice, not my doctor's.

All in all the doctor's visit was totally non-traumatic and only slightly annoying. He clearly didn't beieve that CR was going to do anything, but I don't care what he thinks as long as he orders my blood tests. This dude clearly won't be much help if I get hit by an SUV... have to work on those wallet-sized cards explaining who we are and what we do. I think I may put some effort into finding a doctor who is actually pro-CR, or at least moderately clueful. It would be nice to have someone I could work *with* instead of just getting around.

In other news, food has been okay so far today. Usual breakfast, 160 cals of cottage cheese and 15 g hazelnuts for lunch. Was planning to eat a kale salad but the one I had left in the fridge last week had started to smell so I threw it out. Will get tons of veggies for dinner. I have some tall, skinny asparagi waiting for me in the fridge. They really love to be drizzled with flax oil and the juice of a fresh lemon, sprinkled with brewers yeast, and then eaten head first. Ask them, they'll tell you. It's their favorite thing.

Posted by april at 9:48 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

And the Moral of the Story Is...

Even I, Supreme Early Riser, Queen of the Dawn, Mistress of the Morning Shift Change Leaflet, She Who Does More Before Nine In The Morning Than Most People Do All Day, sometimes do not feel like getting up.

This was one of those mornings. I couldn't get to sleep last night until after 11, even though I took melatonin and took two (not one, two) three mile walks and took a nice relaxing shower. Very unusual for me to have trouble falling asleep... usually I fall asleep fine but wake up at 2 am feeling wide awake and ready to start that day. That's when I call night shift nurses at work. Anyway, couldn't sleep. So when the alarm cat went off at 4:40, I wasn't sure I wanted to get up.

The nice thing about alarm cats is that they won't snooze until you feed them. I've trained my cats to wake up at 4:40 and howl at me until I get out of bed, open their cans of cat food, and serve. Usually I just pop happily out of bed before the cat alarm goes off, but even on days when I'm tired, there's no chance of sleeping past the meow. It gets a little dicey around daylight savings time change because the cats don't know they're supposed to reset, but with a few days of training they usually get the hang of the new schedule.

So I got up, fed the cats, poured myself a Diet Dr. Pepper, and contemplated whether to take a shower or fall back to sleep on the couch listening to the BBC.

I was feeling distinctly foggy, sleepy and unmotivated. It's Monday, the day when I usually blast into my weekday routine full of enthusiasm (I am not being sarcastic -- I love my job and am excited to go to work.) but this morning I wasn't feeling like moving. So I decided that desperate times require desperate measures.

I put on my Snoop-Doggy-Dogg CD, the one where he does a duet called "Signs" with Justin Timberlake. This is one of my favorite songs these days, for reasons that will no doubt be incomprehensible to most if not all of my readers. I find that without fail, when I am feeling down or tired or just plain blah, this song always picks me up. By the first chorus of "Don't think about it, boy leave her alone," I am invariably feeling bouncy. And by the time Snoop gets to "Come here baby tell me why you leaving," I am dancing around. Sometimes I pick up my twenty pound tabby cat and dance with him, which he accepts as a necessary part of life since I've been doing it since he was a five pound kitten.

Now you might think that in a small apartment, putting a Snoop-Dogg and Justin Timberlake song on continuous repeat at 4:40 am would be considered an act of war on the neighbors. Before you start feeling sorry for the couple next door to me, let me assure you that I played the music very, very softly, and danced with the cat very quietly. I am a very nice, quiet person, and would never want to incur the wrath of my neighbors, who have been known to invite elephants to walk across their living room floor at odd hours.

So I played my happy song, took my shower, and set about my morning activities. Am pleased to report that I am back to going to the gym, after the short break at the end of the contract campaign. Did forty minutes this morning on the treadmill at 4.3 mph and an incline of 5. Also did a ton of push-ups. I am still doing girl push-ups but I can do a lot of them now, as opposed to pre-CR when I could barely squeeze out three. My arms are starting to look skinny, so I want to make sure that I have a little muscle. And I don't want MR to worry about my bones.

I felt great after completing all of my morning activities, and took another shower, making it three in twelve hours. One last night upon returning from my second walk of the day and before going to bed, one when I first woke up, and a third after my workout. I just can't stand to a) go to bed sweating b) leave the house without showering and washing my hair c) go to work after working out without re-showering if it's hot out. So three showers in twelve hours. No wonder I go through so much shower gel. My hair stylist will be pleased to know that I only wash my hair once every twenty-four hours... to do more would be potentially damaging.

The moral of the story is: sometimes, when you don't feel like doing it, just do it anyway. Get up and go. Have you ever thought to yourself, "Gee, I really wish I *hadn't* gone to the gym. I wish I had stayed in bed feeling like a slug instead." No, you never say that. You stay in bed feeling like a slug then think, "If I had gone to the gym, I might not feel like such a slug. Now I feel like a slug who lacks self-discipline and motivation."* (* This is not meant in to in any way impune the character of slugs, who I'm sure are very nice once you get to know them. I hear they like to drink beer. )

Here's another fable for you, it's called The Little Girl Who Exercised A Lot Before Going To The Carb Castle.

Once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away, there was a little redheaded girl who wanted to go for a walk. It was a beautiful day, so she went for a big long walk. When she got home from her big long walk, she decided to go read with her mother's cat, because her mother was out of town and her mother's cat likes to read. So she picked up her very big book that her very brilliant Orange One gave her and went off to her mother's house.

Little did she know that she was entering The Carb Castle. She opened the door to the fridge, looking for some cold water or even Crystal Light. And she saw The Hummus.

Roasted Red Pepper Hummus, that is.

Then she looked to her left and saw Low Calorie Sugar Free Flatbreads.

The spirit of the hummus and flatbread, combined with her low glycogen levels from the long walk, overwhelmed her, and the Little Girl ate some hummus and flatbreads.

Now the entire time she was eating them, she thought to herself, MR would not approve of this hummus and flatbread. In fact, if he were here, he would be lamenting the extra minutes that I am shaving off my youth and health by eating this flatbread and hummus. I could be home eating eggwhites, or even non-fat yogurt, but no, I am here eating carbs carbs carbs!

The Little Girl ate 380 calories worth of hummus and flatbread and felt a bit like she was in a coma... a carb coma, if you will. She laid down with her very heavy book and her mother's very sweet cat and wondered if she might be able to locate a fairy godmother (or fairy godfather? I think they have those in New Jersey, though they get really annoyed if you leave in the "fairy" part -- you're supposed to just say "godfather." Or perhaps I am thinking of that radio program I heard about Martin Scorsesse) who could cast a magic spell that would relieve her of carb cravings forever.

The moral of the story is: Don't exercise a lot and then enter the Carb Castle. I was so stuffed from my carb extravaganza that I didn't eat anything else all day, so stayed right around my calorie requirement, though not so good on nutrition (I didn't have the heart to DWIDP it, but the total calories were 1040. eggwhites flax oil half cup cottage cheese fruit yogurt kale glass of wine hazelnuts carb extravaganza.) Then I woke up at midnight starving. Luckily, I had nothing tempting in the house, so I ate a handfull of grape tomatoes, re-brushed my teeth, and went back to bed. The moral of that story is: don't keep tempting foods in the house. I don't know how people who have to live with non-CR folk do it. If I had tempting food in the house all the time I'd probably eat it.

Wow, I have a lot of fables and morals today. I feel like I've been getting a lot of moral support as of late, and that's no doubt encouraging me to have more morals.

Today is my doctor's appointment day, and I am printing out the note that MR wrote me describing what CR is and why it's good. I am strangely not apprehensive... I will probably clutch the articles that MR sent me and my note as if they were a paper security blanket, but I'm not all that worried about it. The doctor can't stop me from doing CR, and who knows, maybe he won't be a total idiot and will actually be supportive.

I've had this strange urge lately to convert people to CR. Usually I try to keep a lid on my missionary zeal, but sometimes I just feel my claws going into someone and I have an intense desire to tell them about the miracle of eggwhites. I was talking with this really nice redheaded woman the other night at that party and thinking to myself,
if you convert to CR, we could be twins. We had already spent a moment bonding over Hello Kitty, so it seemed the next logical step. Then this guy was saying something about protein and how his girlfriend is a vegetarian so he eats vegetarian most of the time but doesn't feel good if he doesn't get enough protein and I was thinking to myself: eggwhites. You need eggwhites. And you might even like MR's whey protein, which I bet he would give you a sample of just to be nice.

I can't just bust out the DWIDP in the middle of a potluck and start analyzing everyone's nutritional issues -- even the most accepting of folk find that a bit off-putting. It's a slow, gradual process in which one never criticizes or instructs but leads by example. If people want to know, they'll ask. Till then, I'll just try to bring the best, healthiest dish to the potluck.

Just wait till I throw a dinner party. Then we got 'em.

Posted by april at 8:05 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 5, 2005

Live And Let Live -- As Long As You Want!

Don't fall over dead (that would defeat the purpose of doing CR and might lessen your motivation to donate to the Mprize) but I stayed out until midnight last night!

I was invited to a potluck with some new friends. I love to cook for potlucks, and had put a great deal of thought into the dish I brought, including consulting with MR's mom about food safety. I diced green bell peppers, grape tomatoes, and red apples, then I roasted some red bell peppers and chopped them. Then I marinated all in tangy Carolina barbeque sauce. In a separate jar I marinated whole cooked shrimp in the same barbeque sauce, such that people who didn't care for shrimp could still enjoy the dish without. I packed up the vegatables in a big tupperware bowl, and I put the shrimp jar in my cooler bag with two freeze packs to keep it cold for the trip, as I took the train into town.

The event took place at a really cool apartment in my favorite section of town... the sorta Haight Ashbury of Philadelphia, aka South Street. Just down the street from a Whole Foods. The host had a fabulous gray tabby cat who in regal cat fashion ignored the gathering and monopolized the largest chair. Everyone LOVED my food... or at least they said they did, and as they ate almost all of it I believe them. Someone brought sandwich fixings, there were chips dips, excellent Athenos hummus with pita, etc. One woman had made tabouleh that was the best I've had in ages, and another made baked chicken, which I didn't try since I was getting my protein from my shrimp. Someone brought red wine, of which I had a small glass. My food went fast. In almost any social group, I like to occupy the role of Chief Potluck Chef, so the fact that all were impressed by my food made me very, very happy.

The dinner had started at 5:30 so I was expecting to catch the 8:30 train home and be in bed early. As folks were leaving someone said that a group was going to hang out for awhile and meet up with another friend who was coming into town from Eugene, Oregon. It was only 7:15, so I decided to hang out with them until it was time to catch my train. Four of us went to a coffee shop and sat outside on South Street, watching the crowds go by and sipping iced coffee (no calories, lots of niacin) while we waited for the other friend to show up. I was planning to exit the gathering and catch the 8:30 train, but I was so caught up in the conversation that by the time I asked the time, it was 8:15 and I didn't want to have to run to catch the train (we've heard about how I do not like to run to catch public transportation.) So I decided to stay another hour and catch the 9:30 train.

We continued to chat, and eventually I asked one of my new friends (who oddly enough has glasses broken in the same exact way that mine are broken -- and has gone seven months without fixing them) to check his watch so I could figure out if I needed to leave. It was 9:15. "Oh no! I've missed another train!"

They pointed out that there were worse things than hanging out with them for another hour, and I was having such a good time that I didn't mind at all. Eventually the friend from Oregon showed up and she was hungry after a long flight, so we decided to go somewhere to get her dinner. I decided to take the 11:30 train, but pointed out that I absolutely had to catch the 11:30, as it was the last one!

We went to a middle eastern restaurant and she ordered a combo platter that had hummus, baba ganoush, and all sorts of wonderful things, that we were all to share. I had a few bites, and it was delicious... I had had a very light day before going to the events (as I try to do when I'm going to unfamiliar food situations) -- only 340 calories -- so I wasn't too worried about a few extra bites. I drank a beer, and they noticed that my Southern accent was coming out after the first three sips or so... I had pointed out earlier, when queried about why I had no Southern accent, that it comes out only when I'm tired, slightly buzzed, or talking to my parents. By this time I was looking very sleepy, and they were quite amused at my description of my morning routine: starting at 4:40 am, I achieve more before 9 am than most people do all day. I asked if I could get a written statement from each of them attesting to the fact that I was up, functional and happy after 10 pm, and they agreed to do so if anyone accused me of making it up.

I finally got home, fed my mother's cat and the outside cat she's been feeding, fed my cats, and crashed. I haven't been out so late in ages! I definitely felt wild and crazy for staying out so late... I doubt that it will happen often, but every once in awhile it's fun!

I felt very comfortable with the eating situation. Everyone loved my food, and while I tried other people's food, I don't think it would have been an issue if I hadn't. One of the people who went out with us later didn't try the shared hummus plate, and no one cared. This particular group is rather accepting of all forms of free thinking, I think, so no one is going to try to make me eat food I don't want. What a relief. Live and let live... as long as you want!

Posted by april at 9:36 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

June 3, 2005

Who Wants To Be Cinderella?

This morning I was listening to NPR (as I usually do in the morning... see, MR, I do listen to news radio!) and an interview with Ron Howard, director of the new movie Cinderella Man, came on. Howard spoke of how during the Depression when so many people had lost so much, the character of the boxer who came back from oblivion to become the World's Heavyweight Champion allowed many people to live their dreams of a triumphant return from ruin.

It got me to thinking about how we love the Cinderella story, and how the incarnations that it takes tells us a lot about the time we live in. For example, I just read a book called From Fat to Fabulous, (yes, I do sometimes put down my cat-eaten de Grey articles and read chick lit), a book about a young woman who is very overweight, but then goes on a reality TV show about weight loss and loses some weight, but in the process transforms her life and speaks out for overweight people everywhere who have been discriminated against. It's actually a pretty good book, and unlike a lot of books dealing with the issue of weight, it doesn't include the heroine magically becoming a size 0 in six weeks. It deals pretty realistically with weight loss, and has some great commentary on how very shallow people can be about appearance.

Reading the book got me to thinking that the Cinderella story of our time often involves a physical transformation from fat to thin. The heroine is fat, unhappy, in a dead end job, unable to find love or in a bad/abusive relationship, and then she takes control of her weight and then meets the man of her dreams and lands her dream job.

Well, you should know by now that I'm not going to dismiss that as a shallow or stupid theme. To my mind, there's nothing wrong with wanting to be thin and beautiful. Who doesn't??? I'm not even going to complain that there's too much emphasis on beauty and not enough on health, though I think it is demonstrably the case that healthy people are much more beautiful than people who are thin yet unhealthy. In fact, the thin and unhealthy can be downright creepy looking, while the extremely thin CR folk look like they just walked off the set of Lord of the Rings, where they were playing the role of elves. Truth be told, I'm all for beauty, and I don't think that's shallow at all. We love art, we love beautiful music, we love pretty cats... well, I love pretty cats. I love ugly cats too. I love all cats, the way some people coo over any and all babies. But I digress.

Point being, I don't think it's so bad to strive for beauty, as long as people are taught that the only way to be both healthy and beautiful is to eat *right*, not eat *nothing*. But I think it's telling that in our times, the Cinderella story is about losing weight.

To make a story a fairytale, it has to be fantastic and unbelievable. The kind of thing that doesn't happen to you and me. I believe that the transformation from fat to thin is our Cinderella story because for most people, becoming thin seems just about as likely as being picked up by a carriage and transported to a ball where you meet the handsome prince and become a rich and fabulous princess. Peasants once dreamed of becoming kings and queens... now the average person (which in this country means the overweight) dream of becoming thin like movie stars. And the quick fix, just like the glass slipper, is what everyone is after.

This is the point where I'm supposed to say that there's no quick fix for health and weight problems, but I'm not going to say that because for me, the transition to CR really was a pretty quick fix. I lost 35 pounds in about seven months, and began to feel dramatically better almost the instant I started to cut my calories. Every time I made a change in my diet (upping my protein, cutting back on carbs, cutting down on alcohol, adding flax oil, etc.) I felt so much better that it was like magic. Of course the process took time, and it would have taken a lot longer if I had started heavier and sicker. But the process of changing my life happened oddly over night. One minute, I was a margarita drinking, nacho eating, size 8 wearing short girl who was on the way to being pretty fat, and the next day I was eating low fat cottage cheese and dreaming about a very tall, unusually thin, genius boy handsome prince from a far away land that is frozen much of the year, imagining that at any moment he would appear with exotic vegetables and a really amazing blender to take me away from all this.

Okay, that doesn't sound all that romantic, but this is MY fairytale, so deal with it!

It is my honest belief that health and beauty are attainable for everyone. It's not easy, and I know that because I make good money, have no children, am not cursed with a spouse who doesn't approve of CR, live near a decent grocery store, have the education to be able to understand MR's writings, own a gas stove, and live in a country with basic sanitation, I am ahead of the game. I'm not saying it's easy or blaming anyone for *not* yet being at their health and weight goals. In fact, when I look at women who have had several children, held down a job or two or three, cared for a spouse who is less than supportive of their health goals, and somehow managed to avoid having a heart attack, I am filled with admiration. When my mom and I used to go to Weight Watchers we would meet so many of these women, and one of my goals in writing the blog is to provide some simple, easy to follow lifestyle advice that can be incorporated into even the busiest of days.

I wouldn't do it if I didn't think the Cinderella story was in reach, not just for me but for many, many people who just don't know where to start.

That leaves us with an important question: can one wear glass slippers after Memorial Day?

Posted by april at 10:18 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Refresher Course

I just had the most fabulous experience... one of the people who works in my office building stopped me and asked what I was doing to have lost so much weight. I said, "Protein. Unsaturated fats. Lowfat dairy. Olive oil." He asked if I had a manual of some kind, and I said not exactly but gave him the address of the blog. So I figured today might be a nice time to go over some of the basic principles of April's Brand of Calorie Restriction.

DISCLAIMER: As always, note that I am not a medical professional, nor a scientist, nor a skinny redhead. Wait, I am a skinny redhead! But not that skinny. Anyway, take my advice with a grain of half salt if you want, but since someone asked, I'll tell what I think works.

I do Calorie Restriction because it's the only known way to slow down biological aging at this point in time. And because I really like to look good in a string bikini. Weight loss is technically a side effect, but a side effect of that side effect is that a lot of people ask me how to lose weight. Here's what I'd recommend, based on a) what I did b) MR's advice, which is largely responsible for what I did/do c) avoiding some mistakes I made.

1) Cut out basically all grains and unnecessary sugar from your diet. Drink red wine instead of mixed drinks. Stop eating bread, pasta, bagels, rice, desserts, candy, potatoes. Obviously do not eat things that are fried.

2) Up your protein, but get it from lowfat, mainly non-meat sources. Don't become one of those people who eats chicken all the time... that has tons of cholesterol and a not insignificant amount of saturated fat. Here are my favorite protein sources:

a) eggwhites. buy them in a carton at the store, scramble them like they're scrambled eggs, top with pepper, salsa, barbeque sauce, whatever you like.

b) lowfat/nonfat dairy. Cottage cheese, yogurt, skim milk.

c) occasional (but try for not every day!) fish, shellfish, chicken, turkey

d) if you can eat more calories than I can, beans are good. for me, they're too high calorie to eat all the time, but I enjoy them as a treat

3) Dramatically increase the amount of vegetables you're eating.
This was less of a big deal for me because I've always eaten a lot of vegetables, and even now, volume is not that important to me for food satisfaction, so I don't fill up on the huge veggie bowls the way some people I know do. However, especially for men, this is often a big step. Make big salads with greens other than just lettuce: kale is one of my favorites and is very filling. Eat tons of tomatoes, bell peppers, squashes, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, asparagus.

4) Eat unsaturated fats, but try not to eat saturated fats. A simple though not technically accurate rule is that unsaturated fats are vegetable fats and saturated fats are from animals. So don't eat steak (this is not Atkins!!!) eat olive oil. Put a little extra virgin olive oil on your salad mixed with balsamic vinegar. Eat hazelnuts and almonds. Nuts make a great snack, but be careful not to eat too many because they're very calorie dense. I like to eat about 10 hazelnuts with my non-fat fruit yogurt cup in the afternoon as a snack. I'm a girl so I have very low calorie requirements: if you're an active male, you'll need more food than I do. But the basic principle remains the same.

For most people who wish to lose a few pounds, just the steps outlined above will lead to significant weight loss, especially if combined with exercise or an active lifestyle (physically demanding work, sports, chasing toddlers around the house.) If you've lost weight and you're happy with where you are, just keep to those habits. You can maintain your weight pretty much indefinitely eating like that.

If you want to extend your youth and health using the only method currently known to science to do anything of the sort, read back issues of the blog and keep following it for advice and examples of how to cut your calories while maintaining excellent flavor, quality of life, social life, and a healthy interest in pop music.

Here are some sample menus that I made up for someone bigger than I am. It's more than I eat, but since the person who asked me about it today is a male with a very active job, I'll make up some stuff that might be do-able for him.

Breakfast:
1 cup of eggwhites, scrambled, with salsa and 1 teaspoon olive oil
10 hazelnuts
1 orange or other fruit
coffee with skim milk (adding a teaspoon of sugar is fine too)

Lunch:
-salad with romaine lettuce, tomatoes, green peppers, beets, 1 teaspoon olive oil, vinegar, scoop of chickpeas, half a cup of lowfat cottage cheese (they sell snack packs at Clemens that are the perfect size.)
-cup of some kind of bean soup or chili: basically take a can of beans and mix up with chicken or veggie broth, canned tomatoes, barbeque sauce or salsa, in whatever combinations. this process takes a total of two minutes and can be tupperwared and microwaved.
-water or other non-caloric beverage

Afternoon snack:
-- container of non-fat fruit yogurt
-- 10 hazelnuts

Dinner:
-6 oz turkey, baked or roasted (I like it topped with bbq sauce)
-half a bag of frozen broccoli, cauliflower and carrot mix, topped -with 1 teaspoon of olive oil, lemon juice and pepper, dash of salt
-salad with romaine, tomatoes, green peppers, any other greens or veggies you like, topped with 1 teaspoon olive oil and vinegar and/or salsa to taste
-piece of fruit
-glass of red wine if you like to have a drink with dinner

Note the themes: lots of protein, no grains, lots of vegetables but not hard to prepare ones (I came up with the lunch salad based on the ingredients of my office building's salad bar, though I strongly advise you to pack your own salads cause the office building salad bar is so over-priced that it isn't worth it for every day), frozen veggies that can just be thrown in the microwave for five minutes and won't go bad in your fridge. Easy to prepare soups and stews that you can vary endlessly. I'm all about easy food preparation, so that you can fit being healthy into an active, crazy busy lifestyle.

If you like to cook, check out Mary's Menu Blog for great meal ideas.

Long time blog readers will note that I'm talking about a lot more food than I eat, but I am a very small female whose exercise is limited to walking, treadmilling, light weight lifting, and carrying huge bales of cat liter home from the discount pet supply store. If you have an active lifestyle and you're mostly looking to lose weight, not actively do CR, this should work.

Here are some variations on the theme of easy every day soups and stews to make and tupperware for work:

Black Bean Chili:

1 can of black beans
1 can of diced tomatoes
a few pickled jalepenos from a jar
a little salsa or taco sauce

Mix, heat, eat. How easy was that???

Vaguely Middle Eastern Stew Cause It Has Chickpeas In It:

1 can chickpeas (garbanzo beans)
chicken broth, either from a can, carton or bullion
juice of one lemon
salt or half-salt and pepper to taste

Mix, add 1 teaspoon of olive oil just after heating but before serving. You can add frozen or fresh veggies to this one too.

Easy Vegetable Soup:

Vegetable or chicken broth
1 bag of frozen vegetables, whatever kind you like

Put it in the microwave, add 1 teaspoon of olive oil before serving.

Spaghetti soup:

1 can of fat-free jarred spaghetti sauce, marinara type
1/2 bag of frozen veggies, preferably broccoli or a broccoli blend
broth if you prefer it to be less thick

Heat, add olive oil at the end.

These are all mind-numbingly easy recipes, but the point is that even if you have absolutely no time at all, you can eat healthy. All you have to do is save some jars for a week or so (salsa and spaghetti sauce jars are the best) or use Chinese food soup containers and pack your food in the five minutes before you leave for work. Some people do a few days in advance... I usually don't, I just throw things together at the last minute.

One of my favorite tricks lately is to buy a new variety of salsa every week or so and try it in my favorite recipes. This also yields new and exciting jars.

Hope this helps!

Posted by april at 7:25 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

June 2, 2005

We Need To Get Our Heads Out Of the Sand And Deal With It

I was just listening to "Fresh Air" with Terri Gross, the excellent NPR show that is taped in Philadelphia, and the last line of an interview floated out to me as a good headline. Of course the interview had nothing whatsoever to do with CR, but has that ever stopped me before?

My mother picked me up from work and we travelled out to pick up our dry cleaning (I still don't have a car. Ugh. Fought with insurance companies all day.) and she told me about an interview she had heard with Bill Clinton on the Larry King Live Show. Mom told me that President Clinton spoke some about the obesity epidemic, and pointed out that low income people have very few choices in terms of food because many poor areas don't have real grocery stores. So people are forced to eat at MacDonald's or buy their food at convenience stores. So the poor have no access to healthy food, and the obesity epidemic becomes worse. Then the uninsured need health care for the inevitable results of a life time of bad eating.

Who has any interest in dealing with this problem? Public health authorities are rarely models of what they preach, even with access to the best of information and all the trips to Whole Foods a tenured professor's salary can buy. The food industry makes money off people's addiction to sugar and fat. The weight loss industry makes money off people's desperation (though I believe that there are many, many in the weight loss industry who really do want to help people.) Who is going to step in and say enough?

It has long been my prayer that as our health care system lurches closer and closer to collapse, the giant health insurance companies would finally decide to do to obesity what they did to smoking: all but destroy it. If health insurance companies and HMO's with all their power were to go up against the food industry the way they went up against the tobacco industry, I think we would see some change in the food offerings that we have access to. Just like state governments offer free, accessible assistance to people who want to stop smoking, they should offer help to people of all economic levels who want to end destructive eating habits.

The problem of obesity seems simple -- just eat less, right? But the fact is, most people don't have even the vaguest idea of how to truly eat healthily, how to control their appetites, how to cook a decent meal for a family. These skills aren't taught in schools, and parents these days have no idea how to put anything other than pizza on the table. The roller coaster of high carb, high saturated fat food is addictive, just like cigarettes or alcohol. People deserve a fighting chance to claim their own health. It's not just about willpower, it's about tools and skills.

Our culture is so filled with tempting, inexpensive gak foods that trying to lose weight and get healthy while living in the real world is like trying to quit smoking if you live in a smoke filled bar with all your friends begging you to have just one cigarette. No one would do that to a smoker who was trying to quit without incurring the wrath of all public health minded folk everywhere. Yet, it's considered somehow pathological and weird to refuse to eat even one bite of gak. In a rational world, MR would be the norm. But no, we all have to prove we're "normal" by taking a bite of this and a bite of that, tempting our old addictions to carbs and fat and making ourselves feel like crap.

We need to get our heads out of the sand and deal with it.

I don't know how you parents do it. Keep fighting the good fight... and I will keep being grateful that I have no children and that my Orange One doesn't want them either. I have enough trouble keeping my cat from totally pigging out on Science Diet Light for Hairball Control.

Today was another day where my original plan was subverted, but to good results. A co-worker asked if I wanted to grab lunch at the place with the excellent salad bar, so I agreed. I ate a salad of lettuce, beets, tons of olives, about a cup and a half of cottage cheese, tomatoes, onions, and balsamic vinegar and about a fourth cup of delicous chickpeas. Beans are such a treat! I was so stuffed that for dinner I barely wanted anything, but I've gotta get my nutrition back up after this last week, so I just dissolved my two tablespoons of brewers yeast in a cup of chicken broth and drank it, along with an icy cold beer left over from my recent trip to North Carolina. Here's the nutritional info for today. Isn't it great to be back to my DWIDP???

DATE : 06/02/05
Num. Foods : 14
Food #1 : Egg, white, raw, fresh 1 cup
Food #2 : Flax 2 teaspoons
Food #3 : Olives, ripe, canned (jumbo-super colossal) a lot
Food #4 : Cottage Cheese Lowfat Light and Lively a cup and a half
Food #5 : Chickpeas (garbanzo beans, bengal gram), mature seeds, canned 1/4 cup
Food #6 : Lewis Labs 2 tablespoons
Food #7 : Soup, chicken broth or bouillon, dehydrated, dry 1 cup
Food #8 : Alcoholic beverage, beer, regular 1 bottle
Food #9 : Tomatoes, red, ripe, raw, November thru May average 130 g ish
Food #10 : Lettuce, cos or romaine, raw about a cup
Food #11 : Beets, canned, drained solids a lot
Food #12 : Coffee, brewed, prepared with distilled water a lot
Food #13 : Grape juice, frozen concentrate, sweetened, diluted with 3 volume water, with added vitamin C 1.0 servings
Food #14 : Wheat bran, crude 5 g

NUTRIENT TOTALS:

Abs. Values %RDA/SA

Calories 1080.24__cal 54%
Protein 72.61__gm 132% RDA
Total Fat 41.65__gm 64%
Sat. Fat 14.21__gm 71%
Mono. Fat 19.92__gm 69%
Poly. Fat 5.49__gm 82%
Carbohydrate 91.96__gm 31%
Fiber 21.89__gm 73%
Cholesterol 91.17__mg 30%
Vit. A 2581.08__IU 52% RDA
Vit. B6 1.03__mg 65% RDA
Vit. B12 0.66__mcg 33% RDA
Vit. C 41.26__mg 69% RDA
Vit. E 9.33__mg 117% RDA
Thiamine 1.10__mg 100% RDA
Folacin 233.31__mcg 130% RDA
Riboflavin 2.59__mg 200% RDA
Niacin 11.26__mg 75% RDA
Panto. Acid 1.76__mg 35% SA
Calcium 903.51__mg 75% RDA
Copper 1.01__mg 51% SA
Iron 15.47__mg 103% RDA
Magnesium 172.36__mg 62% RDA
Manganese 1.64__mg 55% SA
Phosphorus 693.50__mg 58% RDA
Potassium 2106.52__mg 105% RDA
Selenium 119.58__mcg 217% RDA
Sodium 4156.63__mg 173% SA
Zinc 3.53__mg 29% RDA
Tyrosine 1.56__gm 162% RDA
Lysine 2.96__gm 411% RDA
Phenylalanine 2.52__gm 262% RDA
Leucine 3.95__gm 411% RDA
Valine 2.87__gm 341% RDA
Methionine 1.38__gm 461% RDA
Cystine 1.00__gm 333% RDA
Tryptophan 0.72__gm 400% RDA
Threonine 2.05__gm 428% RDA
Isoleucine 2.58__gm 358% RDA

P:C:F = 27:38:35

Terri Gross just finished an interview with a woman about whom a book called "The Prison Angel" was just published. That's a nice title. I wonder if I should start calling MR The Nutrition Angel. That has a nice ring to it.

Love angel music baby... blood sugar, sex, magick... eggwhites brewers yeast flax oil mustard greens.

Maybe someone did design the universe after all.

Posted by april at 8:24 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

Back Away From the Bagel. Push Away From the Table.

I had lunch today with one of my good friends who isn't into CR but who usually has a clever line or two about food. Today he composed what sounded like a poem:

Back away from the bagel
Push away from the table.

If VLC had been around she would have no doubt composed a CR haiku, as she is an excellent haiku-ist. But alas, she's away at a wedding in Ohio.

That bagel poetry reminded me of how important it's been for me to cut grains out of my every day diet and turn them into a food that I eat as a special treat, not as a staple. When I look at other people's diets, especially people who consider themselves "healthy" eaters, I usually indentify grains as a big source of empty calories. In addition to the lack of nutrient density in most grains, the effects on blood sugar seem to cause extra hunger. I even experience anxiety spikes from eating things like bread or pretzels. It's not worth it.

I got into an interesting conversation yesterday about CR vs. ON. One of the participants was asserting that it was nutrition that really caused the CR effect... a point which has been demonstrated to be false many times. Alas, it's Calories, Calories, Calories. Those rats were fed the nutritional equivalent of Slim Fast. Now I'm not saying we should all go out there and eat Slim Fast -- as you know, MR and I are fanatical about our nutrition (okay, he's more fanatical than I am, but I strive for greater fanaticism in my every day life!) and he's constantly attacking people on the CR list if they have low calorie diets that are devoid of nutrition. But the fact is, simply "eating healthy" and exercising isn't going to extend your life. Go read the RANT again.

The topic came up because I was sharing how I've really gotten to that point in my CR where I feel like I'm finally fighting my body's natural weight and calorie level. Who would have guessed that after an entire lifetime of weighing much more than I do now, I would find that my natural weight, or the one my body seems to cling to, is considered "underweight" on those height and weight charts! Funny funny funny! And I still don't look skinny AT ALL. Tell them, MR's mom! MR may be skinny but I look like the kind of girl who might eat a wasabi pea now and again.

The friend was saying that I shouldn't worry so much about dropping my calories and that I should just keep doing the ultra healthy eating I've been doing. I argued of course that I want to not just avoid obesity, diabetes and a heart attack, but I actually want to slow down my biological aging process. Hard to get this across to people. No wonder... it took forever to get it through my head.

I am gradually dropping my calories, and my weight has started to drop again, though at a pace that would make plate tectonics look fast. I am looking forward to six days of perfectly controlled measured no eating out CR food nirvana in Calgary at mid-month. It's just so easy to do CR when I'm with MR. Everything in my environment actually supports my CR practice, instead of fighting with me and pushing me to have "just one bite." (The "just one bite" rant is working itself out in my head... stay tuned.) Eating really good food at regularly timed intervals with excellent company is such a help to staying on the straight and narrow.

I really don't know how people who are involved with non-CR practitioners do it. Or worse yet, with people who are hostile to CR. Food is so important, and it's so much fun to share good food that noursihes the body and the soul with someone you love. I think we CR folk really enjoy our food much more than the non-CR'd. We're actually hungry by the time we sit down to eat! When no one else is around, we lick our plates to make sure that we aren't leaving any extra calories behind. Okay, chances are most CR practitioners don't do that, but MR got me started when I first visited him and now I do it at home too when I'm by myself. Especially my breakfast dish, which has flax oil mixed with Carolina barbeque sauce left over at the end. Yum! I usually end up with a bit of it on my nose, but it's a small price to pay for the most delicious part of breakfast. Don't worry, we only lick our plates when no one else is around. And what MR and I do in the privacy of our own home is none of anyone else's business!

Posted by april at 5:01 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Back to "Normal"

Not that anything with me is ever normal. But with the contract settled, a period of relative calm sets in. In fact, the calm is less than normal... being super-busy and working a whole lot more than 40 hours a week is more normal for me than not. But in any case, the food challenges of the week have been survived and today it's back to my happy normal diet.

I am so stressed. The insurance company of the person who pulled out directly in front of me wants to split the liability. As I did nothing wrong, I'm fighting it. But I still have no car, and my poor little Wendy (that's my Geo Prizm's name... she's named after the girl in "Born to Run.") is sitting sadly in the apartment parking lot. Looks like I'm going to have to pay something upfront to get the car fixed while the insurance companies fight it out. This is an unnecessary nightmare. My attorney (okay, my good friend who happens to be an attorney) says that he's sure I'll win it, but that it might take forever. I'd better keep doing CR so that I can live long enough to see the insurance money!

I am so relieved to have the challenging food situations of the week out of the way. Chopping up my kale salad this morning I was almost limp with relief. As easy and boring as my weekday food is, I really love it. Of course, I love the MR breakfast salad a lot more, since it is infused with chipolte salsa and love. But when my Orange One is several thousand miles away, I can content myself with kale.

I feel like I owe you a fabulous entry since I haven't had time to write much lately. I have a couple of entries floating about in my head, but they are still without form and void. I promise I'll write you something good soon.

Posted by april at 9:24 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack