I had an epiphany several years ago during a lunch time conversation with a co-worker. He was bemoaning the fact that I could wolf down huge quantities of food and still remain slim while he would eat half the quantity and still be pudgy. I jokingly told him that his body was just more efficient at digesting the food than mine was, and that I probably shit out a perfectly good meal.
That conversation has sat with me for years, lurking in the back of my mind. It brought up this question: If the human body has so many natural variations, why do we treat the unit of energy derived by digesting food (the calorie) as a universal constant? Individuals have huge variations in blood pressure, VO2 max, cholesterol, IQ, perspiration, etc. Why do we assume that the energy derived from a chocolate square is the same for me as it is for my wife? Considering how complex the human digestive system is, I’m surprised that calories consumed for a particular food are assumed to be constant across ALL people. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the caloric benefit that I derive from a chocolate square varies day-by-day, week-by-week. It probably varies greatly based on what other foods I’ve eaten.
In fact, we know that the caloric absorption varies based on what we eat: Chitosan, Conjugated linoleic acid, Green tea extract and Guar gum are popular weight-loss supplements which work by messing with how food is absorbed by the intestines (hence the nasty side-effects like diarrhea, constipation, and “other gastrointestinal problems”). If OTC laxatives move food more easily through the intestines, doesn’t it make sense that some of that caloric benefit cannot be extracted?
Of course, measuring the truly “digested calorie” would require some nasty lab work. Typically, the food is burned in a calorimeter and the calories calculated from there. I (unfortunately) think the proper way is to have people eat the food (and only that food), then burn their poo in a calorimeter, and subtract the result. I think the most interesting results would be in the variations: for 1000 calories of food consumed, would some people have 100 calorie poo, and others have 400 calorie poo? Then there could be whole industries around measuring your personal poo calories so that you know the best and worst foods for you. Maybe I better patent this right now…
I’ve been solidly engaged in weight training for around 3 months now, first with the YMCA Fitstart program, and now with my own home-grown variety. I am by no means an expert in the field, but I wanted to take a moment to jot down some of the conventional wisdom I’ve gained from several sources on weight training. So here (for my own reference mostly) are the nuggets of wisdom I’ve gained so far.
- Do something. Seriously. Most of the benefits of any exercise program start the moment you get off the couch. Don’t let yourself get mired in the details. Start with something basic, and if you feel like it, move to something a little less basic later. But as much as possible, keep doing something.
- Don’t do too much. You have to let your body recover, so it is generally accepted that you shouldn’t do the same thing two days in a row. For people like me (still at the beginning) that means exercising three days a week. Some people get fancy and work different stuff on different days. I don’t have that much time or dedication yet.
- Eat healthy foods. If you are going to take positive steps to improving your health and fitness, do the best you can at getting rid of the bad stuff.
- Stop when it hurts. Don’t stop at a little discomfort, but if it hurts, stop doing it. Where that level of pain is for you will depend on you. But don’t ever push past the point where you think “Ouch, that hurts.”
- Change the routine. Your body gets used to doing something, and eventually gets the best that it can at doing that task. If you start to get bored, or find you aren’t making improvements, then you need to change things up. There are so many ways to change a routine: with new exercises, a new order, new grips, different speed, etc. Its amazing how small changes (overhand to underhand grip, for example) completely change the challenge level of an exercise.
- Take time off. All the sources I’ve read have said that you can take a week or two off and not backslide significantly, if at all. In my three months so far, I’ve taken one week off. I needed the break mentally at the time, and physically it didn’t hurt me at all. I came back the following week, able to lift the same weight for the same total reps.
- Vary the routine intensity. In the more advanced programs, this is called undulation and is very closely calculated for maximum effect. I think for most people it is another way to change the routine a little without a lot of thought: some weeks, push yourself really hard, and take it easy on others. Let your body be your guide.
- Genetics control a lot. You cannot control the shape of your nose, or the length of your tibia. Likewise, you cannot control the number of muscle fibers in your body. But you can have some influence on the ability of those muscle fibers to do work. Some people will have way more of those fibers than you, some people will have way less. Therefore some people will be stronger, some weaker. Exercising should be about you, and you alone, not about how you compare to other people. I know this is tough to remember for a vain race. But an exercise program has to be about internal goals, not external ideologies.
- Get enough sleep. This is hard for me since my current schedule is best suited for a morning workout and an evening with my wife and kids. Either I skimp on time with my family, get a little less sleep than I should, or skip a workout. So far, I haven’t skipped a workout, except for one week off. The other way for me to balance it is to exercise in the early morning twice a week (e.g. Tuesday and Thursday) and then late morning or mid-day on Saturday or Sunday.
There you have it. My current conventional wisdom about exercising, gained through a beginning weight training program. I think my brother-in-law put it best as the Exercise Trifecta: exercise hard, sleep well, and eat right. Don’t just pick two–go for the complete Happy Meal!
OK, for real now, people are praying for lower gas prices.
“Lord, come down in a mighty way and strengthen us so that we can bring down these high gas prices,” Twyman said to a chorus of “amens”.
“Prayer is the answer to every problem in life… We call on God to intervene in the lives of the selfish, greedy people who are keeping these prices high,” Twyman said on the gas station forecourt in a neighborhood of Washington that, like many of its residents, has seen better days.
If “prayer is the answer to every problem in life”, then why is the answer to every prayer to restore a severed limb always, ALWAYS, NO?
Its unfortunate that people still believe in the god of the gaps. They don’t understand the complex economics that goes into controlling gas prices, so they pray to god (of the gaps) to fill in the details for them. Pathetic. They would have spent their time better if they’d checked out a basic economics book at the library. They might have learned that high gas prices are caused by high (relative) demand (Good Morning China!) and low (relative) supply (can you say “oil cartel”?) Do they want god to reduce demand, or increase supply? Maybe god could send another natural disaster to some miscreant country, reducing demand, so these residents could spend less on gas and more on chili cheese Fritos.
While we were in the hospital visiting with family, and Anne’s grandfather, a commercial for a religious/inspirational music CD came on the TV. The CD, I Can Only Imagine: Ultimate Power Anthems of the Christian Faith, has, what seems to me, an incredibly ironic name. If god is really so incredible, so amazing, so wonderful, why must one “only imagine”? It seems to me that if god were so great, there would be no need to imagine.
I understand that the album is titled after a song (which I’ve chosen not to listen to). I’ve read the lyrics, and it’s about death, and how the singer will react when he/she finally comes face to face with Jesus in heaven.
Surrounded by Your glory, what will my heart feel
Will I dance for you Jesus or in awe of you be still
Will I stand in your presence or to my knees will I fall
Will I sing hallelujah, will I be able to speak at all
I can only imagine
I guess the most charitable I can be about it is: you can only imagine because you don’t know anything about what happens after death. No one does. None of the promises in the bible mean a thing because we have no reliable evidence that anything happens after death. Therefore, we are left to imagine. That, to me, is not a song of inspiring faith–its a song of despair.
