Eighty percent of all people use plants as medicine to treat everything from digestive distress and fever to muscle pain and asthma, according to the World Health Organization. Did you know that eating spices like garlic, ginger or paprika can reduce the number of free radicals in your body? Free radicals are organic molecules responsible for aging, tissue damage, and possibly some diseases. These molecules are very unstable and look to bond with other molecules, destroying their health and further continuing the damaging process. Antioxidants, found in many spices and herbs, are molecules that... Read More

Poverty breeds desperation. I’ve never been poor. Sure, money has been tight, and there have been times where I’ve had to, shall we say, get creative with my finances. But I’ve always occupied the middle-class strata, even if I’ve occasionally drifted down near the bottom rung of that particular ladder. But being straight-up poor is different. That’s when you don’t necessarily have a roof over your head, and you get to spend a fun-filled night in the car. Maybe you say, “Hey, just for grins, let’s only have two meals today!” Buying a new... Read More

The company you keep has a lot to do with your success at losing weight. According to a story in the journal Obesity, if you want to lose, you might have more success dropping pounds by including thinner people in your social circle. Researchers asked about 9,000 adults ages 18 to 65 about their weight goals and their friends. In addition, they were also asked to describe the physical build of their four closest friends in relation to their own. The group was tracked for a year. Those who wanted to lose weight often spent more time with people who were also carrying extra pounds, but when they... Read More

The sky is massive in West Texas. It seems to go on forever, stretching out as far as the eye can see, and eventually meeting the dusty landscape in a far off horizon. When you’re under that sky, there’s a sense of insignificance, a feeling that you matter about as much as the scrub brush. Maybe that’s why the Texan identity has always been so outsized. It’s a way for the citizens to try and measure up to that vast sky, to prove to themselves and the universe that what they do has meaning. Maybe that’s why the bonds of family seem to be a little bit stronger, there’s a pride of familial... Read More

It’s no secret that our children are not the healthiest in the U.S.  One in three children in America are overweight or obese. Today’s toddlers can expect good health until about age 65 and live about 76 years. By contrast, Japanese children have the highest healthy life expectancy in the world, with Japanese boys and girls expected to live to 73 without any major illness or disability and overall life expectancy in the 80s. Why is this the case?  The Japanese eat fewer calories per day including more fish, more vegetable products, less meat and dairy and consume more reasonable... Read More

First, a warning: If you’re the parent of young children, and you consider packing them into the family truckster to see the new animated film Sausage Party, purely based on the fact that it’s animated…don’t. As a parent, your job is to check out any media your kids consume before they consume it. Animation is not strictly for kids. Do your damn job. Next, a quick anecdote: A good friend of mine worked for a major airline for many years. During a company gathering, it was decided that the employees would get a kick out of a screening of the comedy Airplane. As it turned... Read More

This week on Yahoo Health, I read what Olympic god Michael Phelps eats in a day.  Recently, I read in a magazine what Olympic runner Allyson Felix eats in a typical day. If you want to be like Mike, you may be thinking about eating what he eats.  If you do, you might be wearing your elastic pants very soon. Here’s why. An Olympic athlete’s life is about training.  Michael Phelps trains 5 hours a day, 6 days a week.  If you put in that much gym time, you could eat an entire pizza and a pound of pasta per day. This lifestyle is roughly akin to the days when Americans were primarily... Read More

Once in a while, a movie changes everything. 2012’s The Avengers is one of those movies. During its theatrical run, it made over $1.5 billion dollars, and it became one of the highest-grossing movies in the history of cinema. It was the culmination of 5 other films, beginning with Iron Man in 2008, and due to mostly careful* planning over 4 years, it represented the triumph of Marvel Studios. Naturally, Hollywood learned the wrong lessons. Instead of intuiting that audiences responded to well-defined and likable characters, studios came to the sketchy conclusion that audiences actually want... Read More

  “Eat less, move more” is a mantra I’ve heard and advice I’ve given many times over the years.  While both calorie intake and physical activity are important factors in weight loss, which one is more important? Physiologically speaking, weight loss and gain revolve around the concept of calories in, calories out. In a nutshell, we lose weight when we eat fewer calories than we expend. Conversely, we gain weight when we eat more calories than we expend. Many of us have been advised to add physical activity to our weight loss plan to increase our calorie burn and improve... Read More