Ombailamos

quick tests of fitness

There is plenty of advice out there about exercises to do when you're starting an exercise routine, but I haven't really seen much to help the average couch potato do a little self-assessment.  So I noted a few things that may be of aid in such an endeavor.

Disclaimer: Nobody reading this should do anything I write about just because I write about it.  Everybody needs to approach health and fitness from a place of knowing about themselves; I write from a position of knowing about myself, and how my own body works, so be careful.

The first test: can you get from a standing position to sitting on the floor, and back up to standing, without using your hands?  

There will be many, many people out there who cannot do it.  People with knee injuries probably shouldn't even try. 

This is a test that will assess balance, strength, and flexibility.  If you can't do this, you have some work to do.  Ever seen that ad about "I've fallen and I can't get up"?  Don't be that person.  A huge proportion of falls are due to lower-body instability.

The second test: can you walk up forty steps at a pace of two steps per second without getting winded? 

This is the equivalent of ascending two floors in a regular office building and is kind of a minimum amount of exertion a healthy person should expect to be able to perform. 

This is a test of cardio fitness - the efficiency with which your heart moves blood through your muscles to supply oxygen to the tissues.  If you get winded, it's because your heart is in less than optimal condition, and you need to start walking.

The third test: can you hold a plank position for at least thirty seconds, breathing normally? 

This is the classic yoga position that looks like the starting point of Marine Corps push-ups: facing the floor, weight suspended between the hands and feet, arms straight below the shoulders and body straight from shoulders to heels. 

This is a test of core strength and muscular stamina.  Many people cannot do this because they lack strength in the back, shoulder girdle, abdomen, and legs.

Obviously, these three tests do not constitute a complete fitness assessment.  But if you can't do all three, then you do have some fitness deficits. 

And here's where it gets easy: just by practicing the tests, you can start to address those deficits.

If you pay attention to body alignments: 

• keeping the leg joints all neatly lined up, for example, when climbing stairs and not letting the knees flop in or out, keeping the feet straight and not turned in or out;
• keeping the back and shoulders straight and the neck long when practicing plank (don't round the back between the shoulders; that's cheating);

you can practice these tests safely.  Breathe as normally as possible and don't over-do things.

Building a solid fitness foundation starts with knowing what your deficits are. 

You can't pour the slab until you level the ground.  Whether you go to a gym, work with a trainer, or work out at home, make sure to check in with yourself; don't just always do the same things, and don't kid yourself.  It's important to know where you are before you set off for your destination.

a few (too many) words about fat

Because it is summer, the media is full of stories about losing weight, "getting in shape for summer," and other such stuff.  The same stories keep cycling in over and over again.  One that I've seen multiple times from 2008 to now is "can a person be both fit and fat?"

It would be nice to think that as long as you "feel healthy," overweight doesn't matter. Unfortunately, fat does a lot more than make your clothes tight. Fat is metabolically active tissue and changes your body chemistry, including your immune system and your endocrine system, as well as affecting your body mechanics.

The more I read about the science of overweight, the more clear it seems that any significant degree of overweight poses serious long-term health hazards. The most thoroughly-discussed is what's called "metabolic syndrome," a group of borderline disorders including high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and insulin resistance (a precursor to diabetes). This commonly occurs in people with visceral fat - aka hard belly.

Subcutaneous fat is the jiggly, dimply stuff right under the skin. Visceral fat is fat tissue that grows in the abdomen, around the visceral organs, underneath the superficial abdominal muscles. This is what causes the firm, rounded potbelly type of configuration. 

If you have some belly fat that you can actually pinch a roll of, that's subcutaneous fat. If you have a potbelly that is firm or hard, and you are not pregnant, you have visceral fat. Visceral fat, all by itself, changes the way your internal organs work - and not for the better.

Of course, most people with visceral fat also have subcutaneous fat. The combination aggravates the body's inflammatory response and increases the likelihood of autoimmune disorders, including type 2 diabetes. People with significant overweight are more likely to develop asthma, cardiovascular disease, and arthritis, all of which can be characterized as inflammatory disorders, than people of a healthy weight.

As doctors Mehmet Oz and Michael Roizen concluded in 2009, there really isn't such a thing as "fat but fit." If you've been telling yourself everything's fine because all your numbers are in the "normal range," you might want to look at some different numbers.

One number frequently stated is, women should try to keep their waist measurement under 32 inches, and men should try to keep theirs under 35. Here's a reality check on that. I am five feet and just-under-six-inches tall. I wear a size 8 and my optimal waist measurement is 28 inches. Being a muscular woman, I weigh about 135. (If I had the same measurements but less muscle, I'd probably weigh about ten pounds less.)

If my waist measurement were 32 inches, I would have to wear a size 12, and I'd weigh at least 150. All of the difference would be fat. I would have to be six feet tall for a waist measurement of 32 inches to be proportionate and healthy.

Maybe a better guesstimation is the suggestion that one's waist measurement should be no larger than one's inseam. My inseam is 31. But what about the normally-proportioned woman who happens to be only five foot two? Her inseam might be 26 or 27 inches. A long-bodied woman of that height? Her inseam might be 24, or less. 

And actually, that makes the inseam not a bad guideline. A woman who keeps her waist measurement less than her inseam could be fairly confident she is not carrying too much fat.  And by "too much" I mean "an unhealthy amount."

NBC's "The Biggest Loser" and other shows, up to and including "Dance Your Ass Off," are doing their bit to tell people what a difference overweight makes when it comes to health and fitness - how those extra pounds don't just change the way you look, or how you feel: they can kill you. The doctors come right out and say it; some of the contestants admit that's the only reason they're finally motivated to do what it takes to lose the weight. 

Losing just 10% of body weight can, in many cases, reverse Type II diabetes - and also can put PCOS into remission, reduce inflammatory disorders, reduce blood pressure, improve sleep, and consequently greatly improve health.

It's easier to keep it off than to lose it. But if you've already got it, don't just choose to look at the numbers that make you feel better about it.

life is too short for a wine cellar

Mr. P and I are, in a word, wineaux. 

We both love visiting wineries and tasting rooms, we love the geology and landscapes of wine country, our future international travel plans largely involve places where wine is made (fortunately that's almost everywhere now), and we go through an average of 1.5 bottles a week at home. 

So far I have successfully resisted the gadget-lover's hints concerning a wine refrigerator, or other such storage device. 

We have a bar cabinet that accommodates 18 racked bottles, as well as a few standing up (screw-cappers, or sparklers). 

At any given time this is at least half full, though we do draw it down before a planned trip to wine country.  So we are not in danger of running out of things to drink. 

As if that would happen anyway.  Here in La-La-Land, you can buy everything from beer to wine to Jim Beam at the drugstore, which in our case is 1.5 blocks away.  And let's not even talk about BevMo.

After all these years of successful resistance, I am pretty sure the wine-refrigerator has fallen off the conscious wish list.  I hope to keep it that way, because really ... wine is made for DRINKING. 

Wine, chez nous, is an essential component of a good meal.  Occasionally, it's an aperitif, and once in a great while it's the fuel for a party.  It's not an investment, and it's not going to be written up in the wills.  It's not something to hide in the basement and save for a "special occasion." 

Life is short, and life is uncertain, and I for one do not want to be lying under a bus thinking "We should have drunk that Stag's Leap cabernet."

 

And, in that spirit, let me recommend the new play "Sideways," adapted by the book's author Rex Pickett, currently playing at the Ruskin Group Theatre in Santa Monica.  Profane, funny, sexy, and heartfelt - great entertainment!

http://ruskingrouptheatre.com/

stop gardening now

She is officially bored with this project.

the cruelest cut

I have completed the decapitation of the ficus tree. 

It is absolutely furious with me.  From the day after the first cut, it started a serious campaign of re-growth.  Since I was cutting in stages, this meant I had to cut off some of that new growth, and though I apologized every time, the tree was not having it. 

Now that the "topping" is complete I have to embark on the even-more-risky project of pruning the roots.  That will begin soon.  In the meantime, some of the re-growth from the new top of the tree is already to a point where I need to start shaping it.  I had to order some bonsai shaping wire. 

If the tree survives the root pruning (and I do expect it to) I have a space reserved for it on the top shelf of my again-rearranged patio garden. 

For me, quite apart from the pang I feel when I have to injure a plant, by far the hardest part of this was cutting off and discarding the branches that still had leftover hummingbird nests.  I sure hope I get a new nest next year.  The fun factor of my garden has definitely suffered from the absence of Torino and his harem.  Flowers are great ... but not the same. get off my lawn

coffee & chocolate

Once upon a time, I was perfectly happy with a bag of M&M's. 

Well, actually, I was perfectly depressed with a (family-sized) bag of M&M's, but it wasn't the candy's fault.  I thought the candy was just great. 

I'm not depressed anymore, though. And decades of self-indulgence have now reduced me to ... the gourmet aisle.  There really is a difference between passable chocolate and excellent chocolate, and since all of it has a hell of a lot of calories, I save my chocolate calories, for the most part, for the premium stuff. 

Occasionally I can be bamboozled into trying something that I suspect will be marginal.  Usually when I am both physically hungry and mentally fed up.  Recently, that was the new "all chocolate" Snickers bar.  Now, an original Snickers bar is a fine thing.  The saltiness of the peanuts undercuts the sweetness and gives you that feeling of virtue, like "peanuts! protein!"  Right? 

I've tried a couple of the variations they've attempted, and nothing has beat the original.  This new thing didn't either.  It had milk chocolate over "chocolate" caramel with "chocolate" nougat.  Unfortunately the caramel and nougat just tasted like a whole lot of sugar.  I ate it: but I won't eat it again.  

A much more successful recent experiment was a dark-chocolate "Awesome Walnut Square Bar" from See's. http://www.sees.com/prod.cfm/Candy_Bars/Awesome_Walnut_Square_Bars

I'd definitely eat that again.  In fact, I'm pretty sure I will eat that again.

The best mass-market chocolate I've found, and the one I generally turn to when I want a midafternoon snack of villainy, is the Milky Way Midnight.   Milky Way has always been one of my favorites, but when they came out with the Midnight I was a happy woman.  The dark chocolate coating actually tastes of dark chocolate.  Not the waxy bark of Reese's dark peanut-butter cup, but real well-tempered chocolate. 

It's a small bar and it has fewer calories than even the mini chocolate muffin at Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf.  If you have to stoop to villainy, this is good villainy to stoop to.  And speaking of coffee ... 

I work in an office and they provide us with coffee.  I am grateful for this, as I do have an addiction; without a cup of coffee by 11:00 a.m., I have a withdrawal headache that is no joke.  The bedbug in this blessing is that they have those coffee pod things.  Which are incredibly wasteful, for one thing.  And incredibly inconsistent. 

I never know from one week to the next which "flavors" will turn up in the breakroom, and there are only a couple of them that I can tolerate without adding sugar, which is NOT something I want to routinely do. 

These coffees are thin, acidic, and mean.  I seriously enjoy Nescafé Clasico freeze-dried instant coffee more: it's got a surprisingly rich flavor (and a whole jar costs about the same as one packet of Starbucks Via). 

I used to walk to work past an array of coffee shops, which naturally (HA!) meant that I got a fresh misto or latte almost every day.  I now restrict myself to one latte per week, but I still have to do something about all those other days.  As laughable as it seems, I plan to get a jar of Nescafé to stash in my desk drawer.

observations on a six-week challenge

A friend of mine and I have been doing a "daily chicken challenge" (daily check-in), in an effort to keep ourselves on track with losing an inch or two here or there.  We are both dancers and we both are highly motivated to look decent in relatively skimpy costumes.  Hence, the chicken. 

This has been great, because even though Mr. P is a fitness professional, he is not a great fitness partner for me.  A great DANCE partner, yes.  Fitness partner, not so much. 

My job involves sitting at a desk; his involves driving from client to client all day long and, with each client, doing specific and more or less draining physical work.  Mr. P is not the trainer who stands in a corner and watches someone do a circuit.  So, long story short, at the end of the day he's done.  He'll practice a dance routine, but that's it.  

Whereas I, after 8 hours in a desk chair, have a pretty high energy level in the evening as long as I eat at the correct intervals. 

So I've had to come up with ways to increase my activity level without impinging on our time together, on our time to practice, or on the time I need to do the various household and personal projects that await me on a daily basis. 

I've found that I can fit quite a bit into my office day - doing incline push-ups, for example, off the counter in the break room while my oatmeal is in the microwave.  I've increased from a set of ten to three sets of ten.

I did accomplish my goal for the first six-week challenge, but I will need to adapt some of the practices I've established in order to accomplish my next six-week goal.  One thing I've learned is that trying to stick to a 20- or 30-minute daily walk is not going to fly. 

Why?  Walking is the easiest thing in the world! 

Well ... that's kind of the problem.  My fitness level is already such that a 20- to 30-minute walk doesn't burn enough calories to be worth the time.  In terms of burning calories (which is necessary to lose body fat, which is part of what I'm doing), I am much better off doing 10 to 15 minutes with my weights and calisthenics.

A short walk like that - an urban walk, on level surfaces - also doesn't increase my fitness level.  My body is really efficient at walking.  A walk is not a challenge.  If taking a turn around the block got my heart rate up then it would be worth doing.  I'm better off doing a 10 minute vinyasa. 

And on top of that - and this is not trivial, actually - the places I have to walk are just not very appealing.  My views are sidewalk, roadway, and cars.

Another adjustment I need to make concerns food.  I've been much better about dinners (and wine) over the past six weeks, but my office lunches have been, let's say, not the high-nutrient and lower-calorie options I'm going to need to get used to.  This makes me sad.  (Or, frankly, annoyed.)  Because it means I'm going to have to start packing a lunch a few days a week, and that means more time in the kitchen and less time doing other things. 

The difficulty with lifestyle changes - and the reason so few people are able to maintain them - is that it's forever.  I can't live on yogurt and bananas for six weeks, get where I want to be, then go back to pizza and beer.  Because the day I go back to pizza and beer (this is a metaphor by the way) I am on my way downhill again in terms of fitness, and uphill in terms of measurements. 

So the next six-week challenge will have to include a series of experiments to determine the best nutrition balance that I can achieve with the least amount of work.  Since I'm going to be stuck with it as my baseline, it has to be at least as satisfying, and EASY, as the food from the lunch counters downstairs. 

the supervisor is exhausted

It is just so tiring watching me water the plants and mutilate the ficus.  He has to rest now.

putting it out there

I have taken the momentous step of publishing my master's thesis.

Thanks to Amazon and the Kindle (as well as other services), self-publishing is no longer the expensive and sometimes humiliating endeavor it was in the past.

Self-publishing used to mean paying to have your book printed, with no guarantee that you wouldn't end up hauling around twenty cartons of books in the trunk of your car for years, trying to hand-sell them, before finally giving up and having a bonfire.

Now, a person like me can just upload the thing and if anyone happens to want it, they get it. No fuss, no muss, cheap and easy for everyone involved. I love it.

A thesis, of course, is never going to be a bestseller and I may never sell more than the copy I buy myself to check the formatting! But the work was already done, it costs me nothing to publish, and at least the thing is Out There now.

If anyone is interested in a short treatment of social/cultural history via a turn-of-the-19th-century novelist, I'd love to get comments and feedback. The book is now available for Kindle and in paperback.  Search title "Other Voices" or author Alexandra Caluen.  :-)

  http://www.amazon.com/Other-Voices-Commentary-Frances-ebook/dp/B007ZL0U6Q/ref=sr_1_7?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1335983426&sr=1-7

she likes mirrors

This little critter ... every morning, part of her routine is "helping" me get my face on for the day.  Of course that involves pacing back and forth over the sink (shedding in it) and making sure the medicine-cabinet door is promptly closed each time I open it.  

Also, it involves looking at herself in the mirror.  She likes to sit where she can be picked up by the medicine-cabinet mirror, and the big one.  She is maybe a little vain.