Obesity is a frightening and dangerous — even deadly trend that has only gotten worse in the last thirty years. Yet far too often people who are obese go to seek help and are brushed off by being told that all they need to do is go to the gym and eat less.
Last night, New York City Mayor Bloomberg announced a new plan banning the sale of sugar soda over 16 oz:
In New York City, where more than half of adults are obese or overweight, Dr. Thomas Farley, the health commissioner, blames sweetened drinks for up to half of the increase in city obesity rates over the last 30 years. About a third of New Yorkers drink one or more sugary drinks a day, according to the city. Dr. Farley said the city had seen higher obesity rates in neighborhoods where soda consumption was more common.
The ban would not apply to drinks with fewer than 25 calories per 8-ounce serving, like zero-calorie Vitamin Waters and unsweetened iced teas, as well as diet sodas.
A relatively new breed of dieters out there are looking to lose weight and get in shape by sticking to a simple diet, similar to the kind embraced (by necessity) by the people living in the Paleolithic era.
Being Vegan is a blessing and a curse. It’s a blessing because Veganism can immediately change your health for the better just by changing what you eat. Vegan is a curse because so many people misunderstand the lifestyle to be some sort or religious radical movement dedicated to upending the red meat tabernacle when it is not. Veganism is only about making wise food and living choices that enhance and support life. We don’t condemn. We encourage. We offer a better way. There’s no good that can come from condemnation.
There is a new icon here to help Americans choose what food to put on their plate, and while it took me awhile to realize its true beauty, it finally struck me recently that the guide is both more helpful to people looking to improve their diet than previous graphics published by the government but it also in a way legitimizes both vegetarian and vegan diets.
I love it when cities are shamed for the bad behavior and poor performance of their citizenry, and now we have empirical evidence of the fitness index of some of our major residential areas. Out of the top 50 urban cores, the New York City metro area placed 30th. Not so great.
There’s nothing quite as filling as a hot bowlful of steel cut or rolled oats in the morning. You are filled up, sustained, and comforted by all that fibrous goodness. Oatmeal starts your day off right. When I read McDonald’s planned to offer oatmeal with fresh fruit, I was giddy that the mega-fast food giant was finally turning a health corner and doing the right thing.
Nearly seven years ago, I wrote an article for Go Inside Magazine called Sloth! Apathy! Myopia! in which I argued that much of society’s ills boiled down to three distinct problems — sloth, apathy, and myopia. In the article, I told a fictional tale of a family that, not wanting to spend the time and effort to make themselves a healthier meal at home, go out to an unnamed restaurant with a cheerful yet sinister clown in the front.
When you are surrounded by Taco Hell, you get to thinking that a calorie is a calorie is a calorie. If we are to believe the results of the so-called “Twinkie Study,”of course they are all the same. If we try delving anywhere into a place I would like to call reality, however, we find that not all calories are created equally. Let us not forget the shameful deceit of corn sugar, for example.
As an avowed Vegan, I am loathe to share this story with you, but share it, I shall. A married couple we know and love — yet, they resolutely demanded not to be identified for this story — lost an incredible amount of weight over three months of “dieting” by eating two meals a day at Dunkin’ Donuts.
First, the cookies came out. They were loaded with eggs, milk, and not much positive. Then the drink cart rolled on through the aisle. I had brought a few sleeves of Starbucks Via and I thought asking for hot water, sugar, and soy milk would be okay. They didn’t have the soy milk, and so I had the coffee black but sweetened.
I have written about New Year’s resolutions in the past but with this article, it is all going to end. My new years resolution this year is to never write another article about the problems inherent with New Year’s resolutions. Wait — let me rethink that. On second thought…
I have a vague memory of the late 1970′s in Middle America where every female member of my extended family was on a daily diet — at least when in the public company of others. The standard 1970′s diet plate — in case you need reminding or edification — consisted of the following:
I have discovered a way to lose six pounds in three days. The process is simple, if painful, and I wouldn’t recommend it for the faint of teeth. I suffer from having a “meat trough.” If you don’t know what it means to have a meat trough, then color yourself lucky and move along!
