anivair

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

So when people who are overweight, unhealthy, and in a bad place go low carb or paleo (or both) they are often told to go ahead and eat as much as they need and not worry about calories. This is not a lie per se but it is a misleading oversimplification. It is probably the single biggest one in the paleo community and it is responsible for a lot of let downs after initial weight loss (especially after a year).

So let's talk about that. The Paleo community is fond of saying that calories don't matter. Is that true? No, it's horseshit.
Conventional Wisdom is fond of saying "calories in, calories out". Is that true? No, it's horseshit.

The truth is they both matter. No, a calorie is not a calorie. Never was. A calorie of sugary processed food or complex carbs (ie: sugary processed foods) is digested and handled differently by your body than a calorie of meat or animal fat or vegetable matter. It's this difference that can lead to insulin resistance, leptin resistance, diabetes, etc. And once you're in one of these metabolic states, you're pretty much screwed. Your metabolism crashes, your cortisol gets out of whack, your blood sugar yo-yo's and basically in this state you can bring in a very small number of calories while still gaining weight and getting fat and unhealthy. Why? Lots of reasons, but the biggest reason is that your body is eating your muscles and fat while storing all your carbs as new fat. You get fat and weak and you eat less and less. Your metabolism keeps going down. This is how the people on reality TV can eat an average amount of food and still weigh 600 pounds.

Okay, so that's Conventional Wisdom being wrong. Big surprise. What about the paleo lie?

At a certain point calories matter. Of course they do. And for the same reason faulty science has been telling you they do all along. You use X calories per day to run your body. You eat X+200, you will be gaining weight. You eat X-200 you will be losing weight.

Yes, that weight will be gained and lost slower if you're eating paleo, but it can happen. But, to be honest, almost nobody who began as overweight gains weight on a paleo diet. Far more common is the person who loses a bunch and then stops losing and hangs at a weight that is more than they'd like. And here's why:

Let's take an average overweight person. They're metabolically deranged, sure, but they are also eating poorly. Let's say they get up and have 3 Egg McMuffins and a large coke for breakfast. Then for lunch they go across the street to a Italian bistro and get a small pasta with cheese sauce and a soup and some bread. More soda. Dinner is a chunk of meat with rice-a-roni and some veggies from a bag that have a cheese sauce. More soda. After dinner they sit on the couch and watch TV while snacking on some pretzels. Another soda. This person is not eating a giant amount of food. These were pretty reasonable portions. That person also consumed around 4000 calories. If that person is a male over six feet tall, we're talking the BMR of a person over 500 pounds. So is it any wonder that on this diet you gain weight? Sure, some days you eat less and some days you get triple dessert and you eat more. But that's not an insane amount of food.

So now let's assume that very same person goes paleo and let's assume they do it properly. So for breakfast they have eggs and bacon till they're satisfied. That comes out to 4 eggs and 4 slices of bacon. Then for lunch they have a giant salad with chicken breast, egg, and oil and vinegar dressing. Dinner is a big hunk of pork shoulder, a lot of steamed vegetables with butter, and some frozen blueberries for dessert. During the day they snack on almonds (about 2 handfuls). Maybe they also have 2 pieces of dark chocolate. That's a lot of food. You'd be hard pressed to find anyone who would not be satisfied with that. It's also 2000 calories. That's about the BMR if someone who is a six foot male weighting 250 pounds. So in a year's time, right on track, you are no longer metabolically deranged, your body is good at burning fat and making ketones, and you're weighing in at 250 pounds.

Good for you. You're healthy, if a bit overweight. But that's not where most people want to be, not even the big guy we started with. He wants to weight, say, 200 pounds.

Well, now we're going to have to ratchet it down a bit. And he can, of course, if he looks at what he's eating, does the math, and lowers his calories. Want to do it effortlessly instead? Okay, the you have two options.

1: stay at the weight your body is maintaining. It's not unhealthy, and clearly you're isocaloric. Yay for you!
2: lower calories by eating a bit less and eating foods that are more satiating and lower in overall calories. What that means is lots of protein and very little carbs and less fat. So get rid of the almonds, lose the added fat on most stuff, and try some leaner cuts of meat. Eat more vegetables and do most of it at home. That will get you there, sure. But it's not as much fun as all you can eat bacon and pot roast, which is what stops a lot of people.

So take your food temperature. Is it more important to you to get your weight down or to eat whatever you want? You do have to pick and choose a little bit. But if you just eat a little bit hypocalorically (that is leave yourself feeling a little bit hungry sometimes or at least not super full) this is not that hard. But what it has to be is consistent.

Remember how reasonable you've been about food lately? That day you barely ate anything? I do. I remember it well. It happens all the time. But looking back on my food log what I learn is that of the last 7 days, there was one day like that. It's just that I can see that one day standing out so clearly in my faulty memory that it seems longer and bigger and more impressive than the day that I ate a lot. Days when you eat a little more than you should never stand out. The days when you eat way too little or way too much do. So if you want to really get real about it, keep a food log. I recommend My Fitness Pal. It's a really easy food log and it helps me keep track. I modified by macronutrient defaults for paleo and I was good to go.

And now, for the trap.

Note that I did not list, as an option above, to exercise more. The easiest trap to fall into here is thinking that you can exercise and "earn" more calories. That's not why exercise matters. Yes, muscle burns more calories than fat. Yes exercise makes you mobile and fit. Yes, it's good for your metabolism. Yes, you have to exercise. But you don't earn back calories exercising. Almost all studies show us that in a free eating environment, people will generally bring in extra calories to account for exercise. Yes, if you want to lose weight you can try to avoid that, but honestly, if you just get used to restricting a little bit before you exercise, it won't be an issue.

If you really want to get your exercise on to lose weight combine some metabolic conditioning (ie: stuff that gets you breathing heavy, but not a ton of it) with some lifting heavy stuff and weekly bouts of sprinting (a set of Tabata sprints will do just fine). More than this will just ramp up your eating. Most importantly, do something you like.

In the end, the real truth of the matter is that calories matter, but quality matters, too. Eating foods that are nutritionally dense and satisfying is the key to doing any diet right and avoiding processed crap, calorically dense crap, and foods that jack up your body is going to be the right choice. Once you get settled into the lifestyle you've chosen, than you can look at the details if you want to see more change. Don't be afraid to do so. That knowledge is what gives you the power to change your body.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

In ADF, there is one pretty general basic study program. It's call the Dedicant Path (or Dedicant Program, depending on how you're discussing it). It's basic function is to serve as an introduction to Druidry. It's a year long (or more) study course that gives someone an overview of Druidry in a context that is both modern and historical. If you come into ADF knowing next to nothign about your faith, it's a primer. if you come into it knowing a bit or a lot, then it's an in depth study of what you believe and often it helps shape the person in the program so that when they become an ADF Dedicant they have a real pagan identity and a real understanding of what their faith is. it's not for everyone (there is plenty of room for folks who come to rituals, have faith, and don't feel the need to do more study or work) but among those who have undertaken it, I have never heard even one person say that it was a waste of their time.

This is, of course relevant to this post because MY DP WAS APPROVED LAST NIGHT!

This makes me an official ADF Dedicant. Now, let me give you a little background so you can appreciate this.

I joined ADF in January of 2002. At the time I was the sort of Druid who reads Douglas Monroe (which is like being the sort of catholic who reads the Da Vinci Code for religious inspiration) and I was doing a smattering of stuff that was really mostly Wicca. I continued on like this for about a year, despite some good resources at my disposal. I didn't really do much with my membership for a while. In June of that year, I was contacted by Reverend Michael J Dangler (pretty sure he was a Mike at the time) and between the two of us, we founded the Three Cranes Grove (then a protogrove). The first addition beyond us as Jenni Hunt (also now a Reverend). We all sort of started working on the Dedicant Program at the same time (that is to say, not that long after. the program was only about 3 years old at the time). That was about 2003, to be generous. While they were busy finishing the DP and becoming Priests, I took a break from the grove to be a douche (I think it's obligatory at that age. I'm sure Mike was being douchy in his own way while being insanely productive).

As most of you know, I was called back to Druidry around 2008. I even wrote a blog entry about it. I started working on the DP again sor tof part time and it was about 2 years ago that I decided to really buckle down and do it. What happened last night is the direct result of that.

Sometime in the near future I'll get all my documentation up online for ease, but for now let me give you a good look at what a Dedicant is expected to do insofar as course work. It's actually pretty brutal.

• Written discussions of the Dedicant's understanding of each of the following nine virtues: wisdom, piety, vision, courage, integrity, perseverance, hospitality, moderation and fertility

This is a minimum of 125 words each. I ran closer to 200, though they like you to stay fairly close to the originals. It's basically a series of essays to show that you understand the virtues of ADF Druidry (ADF has no real dogma, but these virtues are pretty commonly held, though they are not universal, nor are they the only virtues that you can hold or even write about, but they are the ones that I hold to personally)

• Short essays on each of the eight ADF High Days including a discussion of the meaning of each feast.

This is basically code for "show us that you know what the High Days are and why we celebrate them. Samhain, Yule, Imbolc, Eostara (or just "the Spring Equinox), Beltane, Midsummer, Lughnasadh, Mabon.

• Review of 1 Indo European Studies book.

Bear in mind that these are not the "So you Want to Be a Pagan" books you see at Borders. These are college level works at least (some of them are post graduate level to be honest). Mine was The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory (I also reviewed some of the better known critiques of the work along with it). It's a review of the idea of a female-centered goddess-worshiping prehistoric past, whether it's likely based on archaeological and cultural evidence, and what the most likely history is. it also speaks volumes about how such theories affect the modern world. Interesting read.

• Review 1 Modern Paganism Book

Okay, for this one you can get a little closer to "So You Want to Be a Pagan" but not all the titles are that. Most are things like Drawing Down the Moon. Being an overachiever, I read The Complete Idiot's Guide to Paganism. To be honest, it's a really amazing book. Who'd have thunk?

• Review 1 Preferred Ethnic Studies Book

This gets into some review. ADF is focused on Indo European Druidry. The only real benchmark we have of saying who was and was not a part of the collective "Druid" culture is by sorting these cultures linguistically (into what is called the Indo European language group). Some of the most prominent cultures in this group are Celtic (Irish, Welsh, Gaulish, etc), Greek/Hellenic, Norse, Proto Indo European, Roman, Slavic/Baltic, and pre-Hinduism Vedic. It's a LOT of history and most people in ADF settle into one of these pantheonic hearth cultures, though not all do. My worship is largely Irish, so I went Celtic and read The Druids by Ellis. Very good read.

• A brief description, with photos if possible, of the Dedicant's home shrine and plans for future improvements.

This sounds deceptively simple, but what is means is that you have to, at first, build a home shrine. it doesn't have to be complex, but it has to be something that is a permanent or semi-permanent fixture in your living space. Then you take a look at it and see what it needs and improve upon it. Mine went through three revisions till I got to the most recent version.

• An essay focusing on the Dedicants understanding of the meaning of the "Two Powers" meditation or other form of 'grounding and centering', as used in meditation and ritual. This account should include impressions and insights that the Dedicant gained from practical experience.

Two Powers is a pretty standard pagan meditation. You draw energy from above and below you (often using the imagery of yourself as a tree drawing energy from the sun and from the ground). But understanding it and implementing it actually takes a lot more work than you might think. But that's okay, because you'll have time to work on it while you're doing this:

• An essay or journal covering the Dedicant's personal experience of building mental discipline, through the use of meditation, trance, or other systematic techniques on a regular basis. The experiences in the essay or journal should cover at least a five months period.

Yes, that's a five month meditation/trance/journeying journal. It was actually pretty rough. Once you get into the habit of doing it, it's not that bad, but then getting yourself into the habit is the point and it's not always easy. This requirement is the one that people have the most trouble with. Because, of course, if you go a week without writing in it, you're getting iffy. beyond that and you're probably going to have to start over.

• An account of the Dedicant's efforts to work with nature, honor the Earth, and understand the impacts and effects of the Dedicant's lifestyle choices on the environment and/or the local ecosystem and how she or he could make a difference to the environment on a local level.

This is another one that sounds easy till you realize that you actually have to do this work. You have to try to work with nature and improve the way you interact with it. Maybe you start recycling, or taking regular nature walks, or hunting. Whatever it is, you actually have to do it and then do it long enough that you see an impact. It's not always a cakewalk.

• A brief account of each High Day ritual attended or performed by the Dedicant in a twelve month period. High Days attended/performed might be celebrated with a local grove, privately, or with another Neopagan group. At least 4 of the rituals attended/performed during the training period must be ADF-style.

ADF-Style here means that you have to follow the ADF Core Order of Ritual. For those of you who can't or won't click that link, it basically means that you follow a series of steps like you would if planning a catholic mass. What? Did you not think there was a set order of Catholic mass? Then why does everyone know when to sit and when to stand and when to kneel? And when to pray? Trust me, it's like clockwork. ADF liturgy isn't quite so rigid, but it's pretty rigid if you want to get right down to it. And, of course, there's the fact that you can't do these early or late or all at once. This takes a full year of participating in rituals.

• ONE essay describing the Dedicants understanding of and relationship to EACH of the Three Kindred: the Spirits of Nature, the Ancestors and the Gods.

The Kindred are the Druid version of the pantheon of a faith. In Christianity this would be God (and/or the Trinity) as well as angels an saints. In Islam this is God, the Angels, and Prophets and the like. For Judaism, think about divine beings plus k’doshim. Same general idea. And just like in those faiths, they're not simple concepts.

• A brief account of the efforts of the Dedicant to develop and explore a personal (or Grove-centered) spiritual practice, drawn from a specific culture or combination of cultures.

This seems simple, but it's probably the most important. It's the core of the DP. It's you figuring out your spirituality. It means you really come to understand who and what you interact with. Most people focus on their divine patrons and matrons (gods and goddesses that they regularly work with and invoke in ritual and with whom they are comfortable and familiar) but it also includes things like totem animals and guides, ancestors that you feel particularly close to, and any cultural focus you may have gained in this time.

• The text of the Dedicant's Oath Rite and a self-evaluation of the Dedicant's performance of the rite.

The last thing you do is write an oath as a Dedicant. Then you perform this oath as part of a ritual and write up a review of yourself. Many study programs have this sort of self review. My oath was particularly long, but I think it was good. I made offerings to my patrons and guides, swore stuff, laid down consequences for failure, and called it done. Among other things the Dedicant at this point swears that they are a Druid and that they will continue to be one for the foreseeable future. It's sort of like the last test. If you don't know for sure by this point whether this is the right path for you, then you'd better hold it and think about it long and hard. It was a pretty easy choice for me, but it still felt nice to have it done. If you've done the whole DP and get here and decide that maybe Druidry isn't for you, that's also acceptable! I mean, you won't pass, no, but part of the goal is to help people find their path and Druidry isn't everyone's path. This is sort of like the emergency break portion of the DP.

So that's the work. It took me two years and it was more effort than most of my semesters of college. Possibly combined. But then I cared about this more.

So from now on when i mention being a Dedicant (if I ever do) you will know what it means.

What's my next goal? First, it's to take some time off study programs to catch up on my life. After that? We'll see.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

Sometimes, I smell.

You do, too. it's okay, we can admit it. Everyone smells a little ripe from time to time whether it's because you got too sweaty in bed overnight or because you did an hour long workout and now you're ruminating in funk. It happens. One might say that it's perfectly natural.

... and just there, you've tripped my paleo sensors, haven't you? We are looking at a natural problem and that means that there is likely a natural solution, wouldn't you think? You might wonder if smelling bad is really a "problem" from an evolutionary point of view. Well, let's look at it this way: one of the primary goals of life is to reproduce. Do you want to reproduce with a stinky person? You do not. Nobody taught you to hate BO. You didn't need to be told that it was bad. it just smells nasty.

That's because, in nature, it's less of a thing. Your body has natural oils and bacteria that keep it clean. All they really need to help them out is the occasional dose of water (or sand if you can't find water, but water is best) and they should, in theory, do their job. Yes, you might smell a little bit after, but not so bad that you'll frighten off a mate, right?

Sounds like a good theory, but does it pan out? I decided to find out.

So two weeks ago I decided to take a break from soap of all sorts for showering. That includes shampoo. I'll guinea pig for you.

How did it go? Well, many of you have seen me a lot since then, so I guess I should ask you if I smell like garbage, but I have been told that I do not. I certainly don't think I do. My skin feels fine (and in fact, it seems to be in better shape than it was 2 weeks ago in places) and it is no worse for wear. It felt a little weird for a few days, but now it feels just fine.

How about my hair? Well, it was dry for a week or so, but now it seems to be calming down. It isn't better than before this whole thing yet, but it is no worse either. Seems like it responds best when it is given a solid rinsing every other day or so. Daily seems to dry it out.

But what about odor? I can truly say that after a week and a half the only problem i ever had was ye olde underarm smell. It wasn't any worse than before, in fact it was better than before ... but it wasn't gone. I had stopped using deodorant for those 2 weeks and it was bugging me. I kept hoping it would go away entirely and maybe it would have, but I'm not willing to wait any longer on it.

So I did what any sane person would do. I listened to my wife who told me to find an all natural alternative if I wasn't willing to put aluminium under my arms. I got on the internet and looked for all natural methods of making deodorant. I mean, I want to smell good, but not at the cost of putting crap chemicals on my skin. Most commercial deodorants make me irritated anyway. And what did I find?

For starters, I found Wellness Mama. She wrote up a recipe a while ago. I gave it a whirl and it's pert near perfect.

• 6 tablespoons of coconut oil (softened)
• 1/4 cup of baking soda (for odor management)
• 1/4 cup of corn starch or arrowroot powder (for wetness) (I went with corn starch)
• a few drops of essential oil if desired (I did tea tree oil and lavender)

Basically you mix it all up till it's even and then use it. The stuff will dry pretty solid (like deodorant). In the morning I rub my fingers around in the bowl it's in and get some on the tips and then I just rub it into my underarm area (yes, perv, you can probably use this on any area you want).

So, does this work as well as normal deodorant? No, it works better. At least for me. First, I don't have stank anymore. Gone. 100%. Second, it doesn't irritate me at all. In fact, since the coconut oil is super healthy, it not only keeps things from growing down there and making funk, but it moisturizes while it's at it. Nice. Finally, it's a lot cheaper and smells a lot better. How can I argue with that?

Next time I make this I'm going to pour the resulting mash into an empty deodorant tube and let it set up to see if I can use the old tube to apply this stuff just like any other tube of the stuff you'd buy in the store. If I can, I'm sold for life. If not, I'll come up with a way to make it work.

So, so I mean you have to stop using soap and store bought deodorant? Probably not. Most of you will not. That's okay. But maybe what I really mean here is that you should not take things for granted. It's all conventional wisdom. Sometimes conventional wisdom is right and sometimes it's wrong. It tells me to eat my veggies and that's probably a good idea. It tells me to eat my grains and that's garbage. It tells me to wash with soap every day and that's clearly not 100% required. What else is it wrong about?

Have I used any soap since I started? Yes. On my hands while preparing food. While I firmly believe that it would be perfectly healthy not to do this and that my food would not suffer, to be honest, i'm not willing to keep preparing food with hands that feel gross. So I kept that habit. And I'm glad I looked at options for the deodorant, because this may be the last type I ever use.

So think about the things that you do just because they're done by everyone. And try looking for alternatives. Even if they don't work for you, at least you tried. And you never know what you will find if you don't try.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

Okay, so I know I've said this before, but I'm going to keep saying it over and over till it sinks in everywhere (including into the minds of people who do not read this blog). Paleo is not a historical re-enactment. Period.

About every few weeks I hear about some expert saying that eating paleo is fine, but the diet is stupid because the paleolithic is a very long period and we don't know what ancient humans ate.

Okay, I'm going to break this down for you.

a) we sort of do know what they ate. Not for every meal, nor how it was prepared, but we have a pretty good idea of what lived and died in that (very long) era.

b) it doesn't matter what they ate. Not specifically. Does it matter if a paleolithic man ate gazelle and otter versus cow and duck? No, it does not. Does it matter if one tribe ate a lot of tubers and fat tissue while another lived almost entirely on meat and blood? No, it does not. Both groups were eating natural foods that they were designed to eat. They're not difference species. A hunter from he tuber tribe could go live with the other tribe and in 2 weeks his body would totally used to the diet of meat and blood.

c) What they ate is WAY less important than what they did not eat. Paleolithic man did not eat pizza and pie. He did not drink milkshakes. He ate natural foods.

The paleolithic is a long time period. And what's more, there were hunter gatherers among us for thousands of years after. There still are. And some of them eat a lot of carbs and some eat a lot of meat and some eat a lot of fat. And they're all healthy. So that tells us that the exact diet is less relevant than the type of foods in general. Because what these people are not eating is a lot of fructose, a lot of processed grains, and a lot of easy calories in the form of packaged processed crap.

Some hunter gatherers even eat a little grain (gasp). Granted, this is naturally occurring grains that they did not farm. So, if you want to live that lifestyle, by all means go walk 5 miles to gather some spelt and then bring it home and whip it into a flatbread or gruel after soaking it. But that is not an excuse to eat a big mac.

Just saying "there was no one paleolithic hunter gatherer diet" is correct. it's also useless information, because there is no one modern paleo diet. I used to eat very low carb. Now I eat a little bit more moderate carb, because I've lost some weight. Some people on a paleo diet eat sweet potatoes (or white potatoes) with every meal. Some people eat a ton of fruit. Some people eat nothing but raw meat and eggs. Some people eat bacon and eggs every morning and have a ton of big salads. These people are all eating a paleo diet (just like our ancestors were when they ate woolly mammoth and a bunch of tubers that don't even exist anymore). The fact that they are different diets is a feature, not a bug. The paleo diet is not Nutrisystem. You can eat the foods you like and need. Make it work for you.

On that subject, I want to talk about fish for breakfast real fast. Lots of cultures do this. It's good for you and satisfying. Seriously, give it a shot. Nut up and try fish for breakfast. If the only thing that's holding you back is the cultural pressure of eating eggs and bacon for breakfast, you're doing yourself a disservice. Kick that conventional wisdom to the curb. In most countries, fish is a normal part of breakfast (in Japan and Norway it's huge). Do this.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

So before I get into the second part of my experiment, I want to talk a bit about how I feel today. Yesterday I had parts 1 and 2 of the experiment (that is 2 helpings of fishy goodness). Aside from one very terrible moment of gassiness (which my wife may never forgive me for) it was smooth sailing. Also, I feel good this morning. That might be because I got good sleep or because of my workout yesterday, but today I got out of bed early, made bacon and eggs and got a shower and was awake. Could be a coincidence.

Anyway, part 2 of this vast experiment was another type of fishy snack that is actually a lot more common than sardines if you're in the UK. Kippered herring.

A herring is, obviously, a type of fish. To kipper it means to split it from head to tail (though in this case I got neither heads nor tails). It is gutted, salted or pickled, and then cold smoked.

Well, I love things that are cold smoked and also both salted and pickled, so I figured I was all in for this treat.

What I've learned from the website is that my fishies contained herring, salt, and smoke flavor. that means to me that they probably were not classically smoked and are probably not the best kippered herring out there. The other thing that tells me this is that they are made by Bumble Bee, a company that makes tuna so bland it was featured in a Mephiskapheles song. They were, however, the only kippered herring in the store.

The packaging is not inspiring, but I am noticing a trend of salted fish coming in a red package. What is that about, I wonder? Are the fish going to be red?

So far, no red. This tin is just as uninspiring as the last one, so I took this "action shot" in the hopes that it would excite you. I know most of you are toggling back and forth between this and porn, so it probably takes a bit more to inspire or excite you, but what if I offered to peel back the skimpy outer layer ans show you the creamy white flesh underneath, eh?

Okay ... now here's the thing. That doesn't look very appetizing. It honestly looks like the afterbirth from the Antichrist. But whatever, maybe it'll be delicious. It does make me feel a little strange that this portion of fish meat actually looks less appetizing to me than the sardines which were basically whole fish sand heads. Let's go through the rigmarole.

First Smell: This tin actually smells not nearly as nice as the sardines did. It's much fishier. I got complaints from my office for hours after it was in the trash, too. It still isn't overwhelming, but it's pervasive. Also be aware that I work with whiny bitches.

First Taste: I went straight for the fork here. No dainty tails to grab and no cultural precedent aside from a cracker which I do not eat. My first bite was ... considerably fishier than the sardines. A brine flavor that mimicked sea water, but not in a really bad way. I could tell it was artificial, though. This isn't the saltiness you get from a fresh oyster, but rather a parody of it. Also the bits of skin found on these was a bit like a gel. It wasn't slimy per se, but it was like a thin chicken skin would be. Not crispy like the best chicken skin, but a little soft and pliable like the stuff from the bottom. Okay, but not my favorite.

In the end I did manage to finish this can and I even gave you the proctologist-angle-camera as proof. Was it enjoyable? it was okay. Not as nice as the sardines, but not as bad as I'd feared. The texture was just like any other fish and the smell was the worst part. the flavor was a moderate amount of fishiness and brine, but not overwhelming.

These are much lower in calories than the sardines I had (by about half). They have slightly less Omega 3, more sodium and overall are a less brilliant package. If I were to make a recommendation (so far) to the paleo world (or the world in general) it would be to eat the sardines. They're cheaper, tastier, and have better stuff inside.

But wait! There's more! At least there will be. I've still got anchovies and another type of sardine to try, so come back later for that fun!

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

It's time that I begin my GREAT FISH EXPERIMENT!

I've been wanting, for some time, to try some sardines, anchovies, and kippered herring. They're supposedly jam packed full of healthy stuff, super paleo-friendly, and really cheap. Who can argue?

Well ... everyone I've mentioned it to, of course. Everyone "knows" that these things are gross, right? It's basic common knowledge. Sardines and anchovies are cultural shorthand for stuff that isn't delicious.

Sardines are basically what happens when you take a tiny fish (sardines, kippers, brisling, sprat, whatever) and eat it. generally you cut off the head and then steam it till it's cooked. Then it's packed in some sort of oil, water, or other flavoring and you eat them. That's really it. It's a really old food source. Why? Because tiny fish are stupid, numerous, and easy to catch. Primitive man probably considered them a gift of easy eating when they were available. I feel that way now, since they are cheap, easy to find, and contain a lot of nutrients. Or at least, that's the hope.

But will they be super gross? Time will tell. Because it is time to crack that can! (I need a better slogan for this).

First, we look at the packaging.

So far so good. it's all red and appetizing, though I usually associate blue with seafood, myself. They're really pushing the Omega-3 thing, though i'm not sure it's doing them any favors since I've seen chocolate bars pushing the same pitch. On the other hand, every time I see the word brisling on there I think that the little fish are bristling at the thought of my eating them. Come to think of it, they might be. I doubt they love it.

Now we crack that packaging and get to the meat and potatoes of this potatoless meat.

Okay, that's uninspiring. You can't even press a cute little cartoon fish into the thing for me? Some on, Oscar. is that any way for a king to behave?

Sure, though, it will be more interesting when we crack this baby open, right?

Well, that sure is more interesting. Maybe not more appetizing, but more interesting. At this point, I thought i might have rather consumed the packaging. Now, here's where I know it will get bad. These things have got to stink, right?

First smell: Oddly, this smells almost exactly like tinned tuna fish, but less pungent. Like a mild tuna.

Okay, but that sort of thing is to be expected after some airtight sealing. Now the moment of truth, though. I have to eat one of these things. I reach my hands in and grab one of these little guys by the tail. I know I could use a fork like a civilized being, but in the movies they always eat them with their fingers, so I'm trying to stick to what I know.

First taste: Oddly, the taste is almost exactly like a mild tuna flavor as well. The texture is nothing like putting a fish in your mouth at all. it is just like eating a strip of fish meat (this experience is in all ways like eating mild tuna so far). I'm actually trying hard to pick out anything that might be off-putting and so far the only thing that comes anywhere near close to bugging me is a faint tinny aftertaste: the byproduct of packaging. Nothing else about this is bad. Why am I not gagging? Shouldn't this be gross, salty, and unpalatable? Instead it's mild, easy to eat, and sort of just flavorful enough that i want more. What is that about?

Well, that was sort of a let down. I was expecting this to be vile and difficult. But to be honest, I keep going back for more. They're pretty good.

Finished: It's gone now. I ate it all. I don't feel bad or weird. The aftertaste in my mouth is the teeniest bit fishy, but not really in a bad way. Again, no different than tuna salad would be. In fact, I find myself wondering if I could turn this into a neat little salad.

While we're waiting on how I feel is about fifteen minutes, let's talk numbers.

What I just ate was one serving (3 ounces) of sardines in extra virgin olive oil. It was 240 calories. It contained 2.5 grams of Omega-3 fatty acids (which is a hair under my daily dose, but it's coming at me in a way that will absorb better, so I call it a win). Lots of fat and protein and no carbs. Sounds like a pretty good breakfast food (it was, in fact, my breakfast). Side note: the protein/calorie ratio is almost exactly the same as an egg. I have trouble arguing with that. What was in this concoction? Just sardines, olive oil, and a little salt. It didn't taste salty, though. This also carried with it a good amount of calcium, some vitamin A, some Iron and selenium.

Aftermath: It's been close to half an hour. I feel okay. Maybe a little hungry still, but I'm used to eating more for breakfast. If I were to do this regularly, I'd add something else (fruit or eggs or whatever). Fish burps level is low to moderate at best and seemingly no different than anything else I eat (though most of those things don't end up with fish in their burp descriptor). I feel good. The verdict here is that these fishies are safe to eat.

But an even more important verdict is that you, my readers, have been lied to. You were told that sardines were slimy and salty and gross. In fact they were none of these things (even in olive oil they were not slimy in the least). they were sort of flaky and tender and mild tasting. It wasn't exactly a party in my mouth, but it was pretty good considering I cracked the can and inserted the contents into my gob hole. There's not a lot of foods that taste better than that without some work.

So if you have the stones (and a dollar thirty) go get a tin of these and give it a shot. You might be surprised.

Stay tunes for parts 2 and ... maybe other parts. Unless I get bored. Where we will discuss sardines in water, anchovies, and kippered herring.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

*thank to my brilliant wife for inspiring this post

There's a lot of conflicting information about High Frustose Corn Syrup in the world. We of the paleo mindset already know that we should avoid the stuff, right? I mean, it's bad. I think. And Concentional Wisdom now tells us that it's bad because it's all processed and omnipresent and stuff (conventional wisdom fifteen years ago was telling us that it's fine because it's cheap and natural, but whatevs). And we ... like? Conventional wisdom?

We do not, of course, because it's a senile old fart who has no real idea what it's talking about. Conventional wisdom is the mutant love child of "I read this online" and "what I wish were true" coupled with some odd genes from "my religion/politics/baggage". So no, let's actually think about it.

The producers of this stuff (I'll just call it HFCS from here on out) would have you believe that it is "just as safe as sugar". In fact, they have taken to calling it corn sugar to help with that public image.

Now, if you take a look at how the stuff is made you'll see that the jist of it is that you steep corn like tea leaves in hot water (that is a touch acidic) for many many hours to soften it. Then you mash the crap out of it, add some enzymes to shift some glucose to fructose (my understanding is that it doesn't jumble the chemical formula so much as it "digests" one into the other in a chemical way), and strain it. What you're left with is basically HFCS. Yes, that's a lot of processing. But here's the important thing to bear in mind: that's a lot less processing than your body actually does to the stuff. Is eating HFCS a lot like eating corn? Not really, but the effect is similar, if on a larger scale. So, for the purposes of this post, I am going to accept what the corn magnates say. Let's take a look at their claims.

1: All sugar you eat is the same regardless of source. This is the idea that sugar is sugar is sugar. We know, right out of the gate, that this isn't 100% true, because if you compare sugar or HFCS to, say, honey we see that honey contains about 100 different compounds that sugar does not. Same with HFCS. So, okay, it's not exactly the same, but is the sweet-making part the same? Mostly, yes (the big difference is that honey is almost always eaten in smaller doses). Okay, so far so good. Eating HFCS is a lot like eating sugar. So what is eating sugar like? Turns out it's like a bender. Sugar, it turns out, is digested in your body just like alcohol. It causes insulin resistance, metabolic derangement, and type 2 diabetes. I know, you're shocked.

2: HFCS is a useful ingredient because of its sweetness and ability to blend with other food and beverage ingredients. When methods for producing HFCS improved, food and beverage companies replaced other sweeteners with HFCS. That is a direct quote (used for educational purposes) from the international food council. What does that say about your consumption? Pretty much it means "this stuff is cheaper to use so we use it". I cannot even begin to fathom why they think this is a selling point. Also, do you remember back in the day when soda was made of real sugar and it cost twice as much? No, neither do I. It's because it costs more now that they're using cheaper ingredients than ever before.

3: Like all foods, sweeteners should be consumed in moderation as part of a balanced diet. That's a quote from cornsugar.com. What does it mean? It means that they're telling you not to eat too much of the stuff, of course. Which is a lot like that tiny label on a beer case that says "drink responsibly". In fact, since sugar metabolizes just like alcohol, it's exactly the same.

The rest of these facts go on to talk over and over again about how HFCS is just like sugar. "It's no different than sugar," they cry, like a small child pointing at another kid who just got away with the crap they're being punished for. "Nobody said anything when sugar did it!" And maybe not, but that's because we didn't know to. HFCS basically pushed real sugar out of the mainstream before most people had a chance to look at it with a thoughtful modern eye.

But are they right? Should this stuff be used in moderation? I don't know. What is a moderate dose of poison? What is a moderate dose of heroin? Do you use bullets to the leg in moderation? What is wrong with these people that think you should engage in "everything in moderation"?

The truth is this. It's bad for you, just like sugar, just like gluten, just like liquor, just like smashing yourself in the face with a hammer. Can you do it occasionally and get by? Of course. It is harming you every time you do it? Sure, if only a little.

Think of eating sugar or gluten or drinking a good amount like hitting yourself in the leg. You can punch yourself in the leg - hard - once in the morning. You probably won't even feel it by lunch. If you punch yourself in the leg ten or twelve times in the morning you might feel it for days, but you'll get over it. If you punch yourself in the leg 3 times a day, every day, eventually your leg is going to be badly broken. It just won't work right. It will constantly be in a state of pain, disrepair, and structural damage. What's more, you will never be able to build good muscle in that leg, because building muscle is basically healing and if you're always healing the smashing damage, you won't properly heal the new muscle.

That's the deal. Don't eat this stuff. Yes, I know you will. On your birthday you'll have a piece of cake. Or twelve. Once in a while you'll sweeten a drink (please use honey) or have a treat. Great. You will heal and get over it. But look around you at HFCS. Let's grab an average day real fast.

You get up and make some instant oats. Oats are healthy, right? Not really, but we'll pretend they are for the purposes of this article. Most of them will have HFCS in them as flavorings. Then you add more sugar on top of that! Already you're into the stuff.

You swing by a gas station or a coffee joint on the way to work and get a big beverage. There's another hit. And more sugar.

You get hungry around 10:30, but it's not lunch time yet, so you have another coffee with more HFCS (probably in the form of non-dairy creamer) and sugar. And you might snack on some chips. If they're any flavor other than plain, they have HFCS. If they are plain, they're fried in corn oil and you're almost as bad off.

At lunch you don't have much time so you run to McDonald's. Well, you'll be glad to know that the drink, the burger, the cheese, the bun, the condiments .... those things all have HFCS. Not just one thing, all of the things.

Around 2:00 you have a chocolate break. 3 guesses what's in that candy bar.

You get home and snack on some crackers (more HFCS) and decide that it's time for a "healthy" dinner. You grill up some turkey burgers (the ketchup and bun have HFCS even if the turkey does not and often it will). You eat some microwaved green giant veggies on the side (they're asian zing flavored! The "zing" is HFCS!). You have a salad (dressing = HFCS). Then you treat yourself to desert in the form of a few small scoops of ice cream (you guessed it, more HFCS).

Your sugar load today was astronomical. And that ignores most soft drinks (almost positively your beverage of choise for dinner and the post dinner couch sitting).

If you think your intake is "moderate", think again. The bottom line is that this stuff is bad for you and it's everywhere in processed foods. Your best choice, of course, is eating unprocessed natural foods. The convenience of a mass produced burger for a dollar always comes with a trade off and that trade off is almost always your health.

In closing, eat wisely, eat natural, and skip the corn anything, esspecially the corn sugar. HFCS is just the same as sugar, it's just that sugar is also poison.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

I know, those of you who regularly read this blog have been waiting in breathless anticipation to know what I think about vaginas. Why would you not be? After all, i'm qualified to talk about the subject. I'm a man, I have never had a baby, and I am not a medical scientist. I ought to be serving on a committee, right?

Well, that seems to be what Congress thinks and I won't regale you with all the stories that have come out lately about how republican leaders are intentionally keeping women and people with opposing viewpoints out of their meetings regarding female reproductive health and rights. Because that would be boring. So without boring you with all the talk about who can and cannot speak to the subject (I think anyone with a brain can, especially since contraception is not strictly a female issue) I will tell you what I think is actually going on and let you figure out the rest.

Opposition is stating that Obama and his people (who, I can only assume, they believe are members of the Wu Tang Clan) are forcing religious organizations to provide contraception to women in opposition to their religious views. they are, as a result, crying that their freedom of religion is being attacked. That's the long and short of it.

Okay, so let's break down what is really being said.

The president proposed that people providing healthcare should have to be pretty inclusive and that one of the things he wants them to provide is access to birth control of some sort. Now, this isn't really revolutionary. More than half the states in this country already force Insurance companies to cover contraception (and by way of comparison, most of them cover Viagra prescriptions ... just in case you want an analogue). The states that do not are lower in population (especially the insured population) than states that do not, which means that most people who have insurance are already receiving benefits that cover contraception. It may not be a huge margin, but most are. That doesn't mean much, though, except that this is not new.

When Republicans got up in arms about how a Church should not have to provide such things because it violates their faith Obama responded with what I consider to be a pretty good compromise: the Church doesn't have to do anything. the insurance company will
<href="http://www.cleveland.com/nation/index.ssf/2012/02/obama_health_insurers_not_chur.html">talk to the woman themselves and they will provide the service. The Church need not be involved at all. That is a compromise, by the way, that I do not think he needed to make, but it is a good one. It takes the Church out of the equation entirely.

But, of course, it's still not enough for them. Because ultimately they seem not to are whether or not they're involved. if someone somewhere is using birth control, they're going to be bunching their papal panties.

So right now, i'm going to break down this argument. If you hate the idea of birth control or think the Pope is magic, you might want to close the window.

a) Your freedom of religion means dick and squat. I know, it's a harsh reality because freedom of religion is a really great right. It means that the President can't come pounding on your door and say, "Hey! You! Stop practicing all that Catholicism!" Bully for us. It sounds like the sort of law that you shouldn't need. Like any sane person would say, "Do we even need this?" But we do, because of course that's exactly what happened at various points in time in history. People were told to convert and if they did not, they were killed. Historically it was the Catholic Church who did the majority of the burning, but they are not the only guilty party. So you have the right to be whatever lame religion you want from right wing nuts who hate gays to left wing nuts who hate men to money wing nuts who hate thetans. But that, really, is as far as it goes.

See, religions believe some out there stuff. And by and large, you do not have the right to do anything you want. You can, for example, belong to a religion that believes in human sacrifice, but you may not actually kill humans. Sorry. If your religion tells you that Latin folks are inferior to other races or that they should be slaves, you're still out of luck (and a dick). Ask pretty much any Rastafarian who has been arrested for smoking weed. Violation of his religious rights? No, of course not. Just a dude doing something illegal. It doesn't matter what he thinks about it.

So we see that just because your faith has an opinion about something does not give you the right to act on it at all.

b) A Church stops being a Church when it hires you. This one might be a bit more fruity as a concept, but here goes. Let's say that you have a family and a wife and kids and a job where you employ five people to drive around trimming people's pubes. Are you a boss, a husband, a father, or a son? All of the above? Sort of. But really, it depends on the situation, doesn't it? Your employees don't call you a "crappy son" when you make them reuse old razors to save cash. Your wife doesn't call you a distant boss when you don't have time to play with your kids because you're "researching pubic fashion" on YouPorn. The trick is that you are each thing in turn.

A church is a religious organization when it's ministering to the poor or holding services. But when it comes time to cut your paycheck, they're a business. Just like any other business. And they need to behave like a business and be treated like a business. They're still a church when the mass starts, but come payday they're a business. We know this is true, because they are bound by all the other laws a business is bound by. They have to pay taxes unless they are tax exempt like any other business. They have to pay you minimum wage and offer you breaks like any other business. They have a lot or business rules they have to follow.

The Business end of the Church is what we're talking about here. Not the Church end. The Church end can have an opinion on birth control, but the business end does not have a right to that opinion. My church, for example, has some pretty strong opinions of the environment, but that doesn't mean we can just do whatever we want. We can't start raising wild animals in the city even if it's a religious choice. Rastafarians aren't allowed to grow weed wherever they want, even though it's a part of their faith. If I work for a Christian Science book publisher, they still have to provide me with basic insurance in most cases. The Church can have all the opinions they want and can tell me I'm going to hell if I do XYZ - they can even usually fire me for it - but they are not immune to the law just because they have an opinion. Just like anyone else.

c) I don't care about assholes. This is probably the biggest one and I think the most important. Contraception is terrifyingly important to some people. It's a really big deal and women have it hard enough as it is. Making sure they have easy access to contraception to let them actually control part of their life is important. If you have some sort of moral code that contradicts that, I strongly suggest you rethink your moral code. Again, if your moral code sucks it is likely that code that is at fault. If your moral code demands that you picket the funerals of soldiers or demean women or belittle other races or hurt people then you need to rethink it. Because doing those things makes you a dick. And I don't much care about dicks.

Now, let's be clear. You have the right to do those things. And those are important rights. When Fred Phelps protests a solider's funeral with big angry signs saying that God Hates America and that our acceptance of homosexuals causes soldiers to die, he is exercising his freedom of speech and that right is one of the most important rights anyone can have and I will defend it's existence to the mountaintops. He has every right.

And he's a giant asshole for doing it. Because just having a right is not enough. You have a lot of freedom. You can do most anything you want. You can go to the midnight premier of the Half Blood Prince waving around a big sign saying that Snape kills Dumbledore. You're allowed. And doing so makes you an asshole.

There is simply no reason that we should, as a society, treat assholes like they are doing nothing wrong simply because they're not doing anything illegal. There is a vast difference between what is legal and what is acceptable and we have a right, as a society, to maintain social standards. Can we stop those protesters? No. Can we punch that guy with the sign? No. But does that mean we need to pretend that what he's doing is okay? No. I suggest you walk your kids over, point, and say, "See, son. This is what an asshole looks like." That way they'll know.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

Every few weeks the Paleo Community (and the Internet at large) goes a little crazy over bacon. Can I eat it? Is it bad for me? Is it good for me? Does Muscles Glasses really talk like that? Before I go into the miracle of my favorite method of bacon cooking, I'm going to cover that just a bit.

If you mosey (or click) on over to the Whole 9 you'll pretty easily be able to track down what the brilliant Melissa Hartwig has to say on the subject. (To be honest, that might also have been Dallas, but she's pretty verbose and it was a wordy article, so I'm going to assume). The long and short of it is this: the bacon you buy will almost always be a bad cut of meat from a poorly treated pig who was fed a garbage diet. It's factory farmed crap and not only that, but it's full of nitrates and enough salt to kill a horse (or at least a pig). And she makes the excellent point that the excitement over bacon is largely because of the social stigma. At once point in time we were all told "no bacon, it's bad!" and we were sad. And now we know that fat isn't bad for us and we think, "I'll show that vague voice from my past! I'll eat bacon all day!"

it's sort of like bronies. Holy crap! i'm a fitness enthusiast eating bacon! Look at this! Can you believe it! But before you know it, you're addicted.

And that's because bacon is delicious. It's also full of protein but it has enough fat that you are sated pretty early on. Contrary to what Epic Mealtime would have you believe, most people don't eat many pounds of bacon in a siting. They eat maybe 5 pieces. And most people don't even eat bacon every day. So what's the big deal? And how do we fix it so we can eat bacon?

Here's what i say. Bacon is low quality meat. Supplement it with good quality meat (fatty fish) or fish oil. That will help. On any day where I eat a lot of bacon, i take an extra gram of fish oil. Also, don't eat a freaking pound at a time. And drink a glass of water somewhere in there to make sure you're hydrated enough to handle that salt.

The best thing you can do is to track down someone who raises their pigs right. Pastures them and feeds them bugs and veggies and things. And then butchers them well and doesn't use nitrates and crap to cure their bacon. Yes, this will cost more. Yes, it will be delicious. Do it. If you can't do that, find some nitrate free bacon. Even Oscar Mayer makes some now, so don't cry about the wallet or the convenience.

Okay, enough small talk, onto the meat. You want the best bacon experience you can have? You have been told to put bacon on a hot skillet and let it pop and crack and cook into bendy strips that sizzle in it's own fat. There's a time and a place for that, but if you really want to taste real bacon, this is your method.

FIRST: Get yourself some cooling racks that can go in the oven.

SECOND: Set those over some sort of baking dish. You will hear people say to use a cookie sheet, but trust me, get something deeper, or that bacon fat will slosh all over you. Just make sure it's a hair bigger than the racks (or at least make sure the bacon doesn't hang over the edge).

THIRD: Set your oven to about 225 F.

FOURTH: lay the bacon out on those sheets (no touching) and pop it in.

Now comes the hardest part. It may be the hardest thing you ever do. You sit in a house that slowly smells more and more of bacon for about THREE AND A HALF HOURS!

You might want to go bowling or something.

You'll know it's done when the bacon has shrunk. It won't curl much if at all and it will darken considerably.

You might want to rotate the bacon during cooking. to do this pull it out, flip all the pieces, then rotate the stack (if you have a stack) so that the bottom becomes the top. This will also help drain off more fat.

When you're done cooking play with the racks a bit to drain off as much fat as you can. The bottom of this dish will literally be swimming in the stuff. Most of it will be clear, but there may be some hot spots.

First, set the bacon aside to cook a bit. Mop it with a paper towel if you like.

Then (and this is important) collect all that delicious bacon fat! Use it to make eggs later or to saute vegetables. I strain mine with a very fine strainer and put it in a jar in the fridge for later.

THE RESULT: Bacon that is not fatty, not burned, not too crisp and tastes of nothing but the delicious smoked meat that you should be tasting. This experience will quite literally change your opinion on bacon forever.

You want to play around with this recipe? Fine. Candy it or add spices or whatever, but do it this way first. Make more than you think you'll need, because this prep method serves itself really well to storing this bacon wrapped in a paper towel in a plastic bag and then reheating on the fly. It will be almost as god after 15 seconds in the nuclear machine as it was when it came out of the oven. I have a dozen strips in my fridge right now (unless my wife has gotten to them by now).

Go forth and eat bacon. Just eat good quality bacon and don't forget to eat other stuff. It can happen.

Originally published at invisible druid. You can comment here or there.

Not true, I can do a pull up (but only one or two tops). But whenever you talk about them, most people will say something like that. And since there's nothing else worth reading today thanks to the SOPA and PIPA blackouts (which always combines in my mind to sopapilla) I'll tell you why.

It's because you're only DOING half a pull up. Or less.

How do you work a pull up? Probably, you grab that bar and you pull as hard as you can and you make it up a few inches and you do it again the next day.

If you're smart, you do them with bands or with another reduced weight method (like with your legs partially assisting you). What you've probably been doing is the fitness equivalent of making dough. You had the ball and you've been working the bottom half of it for a long time. Now the bottom half is ready to be bread, but the top is still lumpy and you're not sure why.

Unlike, say, a bench press or an arm lift, a pull up is not one muscle group doing it's thing. It's a lot of them. You start my engaging shoulders, and biceps or triceps to get going. Then the muscle group works toward the big angry muscles of the back: muscles that get shit done. But towards the top we're looking at forearms, your fiddely lats, and some more shoulder. And unless you have been going hard all the way up, you have not been working those muscles to get from 0% to 50%.

How do you fix that? Well, your best bet is to realize that the last 50% is the hardest part. When you pull up in practice, don't be satisfied with halfway. if you are using a band, really make sure you're up over that bar. if you're using your legs to assist, there will be the urge to kick them in at the last second to just get the thing over with. But that last few inches is where you really need to let up with the leg and do the work yourself as much as you can.

And don't be afraid to work just that part if you need to. Get a chair or ladder under that bar and work from the midpoint up. Do reverses down. If you have rings, do just the top half of a pullup to get up and then do a reverse pullup to let yourself all the way down as slow as you can.

In the end, it's a little more work, but you will end up as a proper ball of dough, not just a half formed one. And then, when you have that ball of dough ... throw it out and go eat some meat.