Accidental Death, Evil Empire, and Other Pleasant Sunday Subjects

Some blogs go sensibly dark on the weekends; others just keep plugging away as though their authors and readers had no actual lives. Welcome to Cranky Fitness!

At some point Crabby may well have to explore the "dark" side herself, and think about taking weekends off. She seems to be blogging all the time now. Yet she has a novel to finish, a Crabby McSlacker self-help book to consider, and a Crabby McSlacker Health and Fitness Empire to build. (She will, at some point, fill readers in on her Sinister Scheme for World Domination).

For now, however, Crabby is mostly just blogging and there will usually be something here for loyal readers to peek at, even on weekends. Maybe not both days, but at least one of the two.

A warning, however: weekend posts may be short and random and disorganized.

Well, okay, sometimes weekday posts will be like that too.

So lacking an elegant transition (it being a weekend) Crabby will just present you with some random research and news that she didn't fit in during the week.

Accidental deaths have been rising, and are up twelve percent, worrying those who track such things. In particular, there are more drug overdoses, more old people falling in their homes, and, wait for it, more Baby Boomers wiping out on motorcycles. Crabby isn't kidding about that last one--feel free to write your own punchline.

Speaking of weird causes of accidental death, a teenage athlete died from over-use of "muscle cream" (think Bengay, Icy Hot, etc). Apparently she was a cross-country runner who used "topical medication to excess" and absorbed too much methyl salicylate, an anti-inflammatory. Yet another (strange) reminder: everything in moderation!

And to continue our cheerful theme, Crabby was just passing a newsstand and spied a headline on a newspaper rack that's become all too common these days: "Five-year-old finds gun, kills himself." Should Crabby venture her opinions on guns, gun ownership, and the general idiocy of the American legal, cultural, and political systems when it comes to this issue?

Perhaps not, at least not on this sunny Sunday. Another day.

Enjoy what's left of your weekend, folks!

Vitamin D and Cancer Prevention; Also, Important Instructions!

So another study is out suggesting that Vitamin D may reduce the risk of cancer. New research found that "vitamin D cut the risk of several types of cancer by 60 percent overall for older women."

The study was small and was really supposed to be more about bone health. And one Skeptical Guy said: "I don't think it's the last word." (Okay, so Skeptical Guy was a nutrition and cancer researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health. Whatever.)

But apparently there were some cool methodological aspects of the research which managed to get Other Less Skeptical Scientists pretty excited. (Crabby won't go into these here, because she doesn't want to start getting a reputation for scientific rigor or thoroughness. But go ahead and click on the link if you want to know more).

If fact, Cedric Garland got so excited he declared the findings "a breakthrough of great medical and public health importance!" Who is Cedric Garland? "A prominent vitamin D researcher at the University of California San Diego."

Crabby must pause for a moment at this juncture to note that this would be a great answer to that tiresome cocktail party inquiry: "And so what is it you do?"

"I'm a prominent Vitamin D researcher at the University of California San Diego!" Cedric might exclaim, turning down a proffered martini in favor of a big glass of milk.

(Or perhaps not. Crabby feels especially entitled to tease UCSD researchers because UCSD is her alma mater. Or one of them, anyway. And she wants to know: is there still a fountain in the plaza of Revelle College into which undergraduates are thrown on their birthdays?)

Anyway.

Vitamin D is the one you get from the sun, but watch out for skin cancer. It's also found in foods, like salmon, tuna and fortified milk. But apparently many people in the U.S. don't get enough from diet and sun exposure.

How about supplementation? As usual, the experts can't seem to agree on whether to take supplements or how much to take. Some support raising the guideline from the 200-600 range it is now to 1000 units a day. On the other hand, a guy at the American Cancer Society warns that more than 2,000 units may be dangerous.

You scientists duke it out. Crabby, having heard rumors of Vitamin D's anti-cancer potential, takes a pill with an extra 400 units. She's also heard there may be some association between vitamin D deficiency and MS, but she'll save that for a future post because she doesn't feel like looking it up at the moment.

And now for the promised Important Instructions.

Have any of you wandered here from some other site, thought there was something you might want to say, (like Hi Crabby, luv ur blog! or whatever) but couldn't quite figure out how to do it? It's not all that obvious.

Fortunately, our good friend Katieo at Sister Skinny has carefully explained the whole process. Go there, read this post, notice that the Sisters have a great blog going on, bookmark the commenting instructions, (and this is the important part) race back here to practice your new-found commenting skill! And then go back to Sister Skinny, of course, and practice a whole bunch more.

Thanks Katie!

Crabby Admits: Not All Vegetables Taste Terrible

Constant complaints here at Cranky Fitness about how lousy most vegetables taste, especially when compared to hot fudge sundaes, might lead readers to the wrong impression.

Crabby doesn't hate vegetables.

Okay, she hates celery and beets and probably some others she doesn't even remember because it's been a long time since anyone made her eat them. But all and all: it's not true. She eats vegetables all the time and rarely even makes a face. Depending on how they are prepared, Crabby's feelings range from somewhat indifferent to almost enthusiastic.

But here's what sets Cranky Fitness apart from many other health or food blogs: Crabby doesn't pretend that an ordinary vegetable, even one sauteed in something tasty and sprinkled with something crunchy, is in the same league as a juicy steak or a three layer chocolate cake with buttercream icing.

A great vegetable is still just a vegetable.

Crabby will give some examples of vegetables she actually likes. It will not be an exhaustive list, because if Crabby is still blogging in future months and years, she's going to run out of topics. She doesn't want to feel that she's completely used up "vegetables she kind of likes" as a future subject. You won't even remember this post by then, but still, should you find it in the archives you'll think poorly of her if it's the exact same list.

Oh, and another thing. She doesn't give a crap about actual botanical taxonomy. A tomato is a vegetable, for example, because Crabby says it is.

1. Fresh sweet tomatoes in some combination with garlic and basil and olive oil. This can be over pasta or as bruschetta or snuggled next to a slice of fresh mozzarella.

2. Roasted or grilled asparagus, especially if lightly coated with olive oil and cooked way longer than most people like it. Crabby is not sophisticated and doesn't like her spears al dente. She likes them a little bit shrivelled.

3. Sweet in-season corn on the cob. Don't tell Crabby corn is a grain or a starch. As far as she'd concerned, it's a vegetable. She will concede, however, that it still needs to be served with another vegetable, because it only partly counts.

4. Pretty much any vegetable if it appears in a really tasty Thai curry or stir fry.

5. Broccolini sauteed in (again) olive oil with a Whole Ton of garlic.

6. Okay, if we're going to keep sauteing everything in garlic, lets just say garlic! Onions too! Anything tastes good when sauteed with garlic and onions.

That's enough for now. Crabby will do more later.

So how's this for a boring question: do you folks have any favorite vegetables?

Second Hand Smoke Hurts Kids

So yet another study is out detailing the dangers of second hand smoke; this time the research focuses on the damage it does to kids who are exposed to it.

Said one of the researchers: "Even a little exposure to smoke at home or in the public environment can be harmful to the cardiovascular system of healthy schoolchildren."

Second hand smoke is a known killer; every day non-smokers who have to breathe it die of lung cancer and heart disease.

The whole issue makes Crabby very angry. People who don't choose to smoke themselves should not have to endure the associated health risks. Especially not children.

The fact that smoking is harmful is not news--people younger than about 50 years old knew damn well when they started that they were risking their health. Crabby knows nicotine addiction is incredibly powerful; had she become a smoker herself she's not sure she would have been able to quit, though she certainly hopes so.

But if she hears one more smoker whining about how his "right" to smoke in public places is somehow more fundamental than the rights of others not to die of cancer, she's going to slap someone--and it's not going to be a non-smoker.

Crabby figured out by the time she was about ten years old that if smoking was bad for people, breathing second hand smoke was probably not too good for you either. She has been waiting since that time for the rest of society to catch up so that she and all the other nonsmokers out there don't have to choke on any more obnoxious and dangerous smoke. Times are finally changing, a bit. But people are still taking up the foolish habit and other people around them are still having to deal with the consequences.

Crabby lives in a metropolitan area that actually bans smoking in most indoor public places--but even this isn't quite enough to keep it at bay. At some of the trendy bars, for example, smoking seems to be making a comeback. (Crabby is not the least bit trendy, but she has friends who are, so she's found herself at these places on rare occasions).

She was appalled the first time she saw people at one of these places starting to light up. Surely they knew it wasn't allowed? However no one said a word. It was clear everyone was just supposed to just shut up and be "cool" about it. How could this be happening again?

"Would you mind putting that out?"

Crabby has braved the wrath of those around her to ask that question, but it makes her feel like a freak. She longs for the day when no one has to say it anymore because it will seem so obvious: smoking indoors, in public, is unacceptable. Unfortuately, we're not there yet.

Sitemeter!

This is another bloggy post that has nothing to do with health. Immediately preceding this one, however, is a nice boring study about Tea. Readers, you know who you are and what you want to read about--feel free to skip either or both of these.

(Similar to Crabby's 90/10 rule for healthy eating, she has a rule about what she writes about: every now and then, if she's managed enough broccoli sprouts and strength training and Omega 3's, she gets, as a treat, to indulge in a post about blogging itself. She is somewhat obsessed with blogging, being brand new at the whole business, and has reluctantly given herself a diagnosis of blogitis, which may or may not be a real disease).

So Crabby, as a blogitis sufferer, naturally finds herself totally infatuated with Sitemeter. For those nonbloggers who've hung in this far, "Sitemeter" is a toy that bloggers can use to see if anyone is coming to visit them. (Statcounter is another version).

Did you notice Crabby was gone for a few seconds just then? Well, she was. She went off to see if any new readers arrived while she was composing the first three paragraphs.

Yes, it's that addictive. At least it is to Crabby. She has a serious problem with Sitemeter.

Do other more seasoned bloggers have any advice? Does this disease go away on its own?

Readers, do not be alarmed, because Sitemeter does not know who you are. But depending on your computer and ISP and such, Sitemeter might know what country or city you live in. (When it guesses at a city, however, it's often wrong. It doesn't care so much where you live, as much as where your Internet Service Provider lives. (Or at least that's Crabby's guess). However, countries are good too. For an introverted blogger, the fact that folks in Singapore or Italy or Brazil are popping in for a visit is thrilling enough.

Sometimes Sitemeter knows how you got to the blog, other times not. Sometimes it can tell if you left right away; other times, depending on how you leave, it has no idea how long you were there.

(Hint: we bloggers like it when you hang out for long periods of time and go through the archives! Do remember that many of us are narcissists and need to feel as though someone is paying attention to us. Pathetic? You betcha).

On days when the Sitemeter is popping along at a good clip, Crabby is happy! On days when it pokes and sputters, Crabby is sad. Crabby needs, she fears, some sort of intervention.

It's easy to anticipate that in a few months, Crabby will find herself very embarrassed by this post. The affliction will have passed, the numbers (she hopes) will have grown enough so that the need to track the coming and going of virtually every visitor will seem laughable.

However that day has not yet arrived. Oops, excuse Crabby for a moment... she'll be right back.