Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Loving The Alien

This morning's number: 225.2lbs. Again, my running of imaginary marathons has suited me well (see previous post). I really want to hit that 223 number I have talked about by the end of the week so I better start eating more. Yes, that's right, more. Why? It all has to do with what I eat during the day and stoking my metabolic fire a bit. I am going to push up my protein intake tomorrow morning and we'll all see what happens at the Friday morning number weigh in.

Now for a change of pace, I would like to tell you how to gain weight. It's really easy, eat more fruits, some types of grains and some select vegetables. There you go. Now off with you and your skinny ass. What? You don't believe me? Now c'mon have I ever truly lied to you on purpose on a Wednesday before? Okay it looks like I am going to have to prove it, off to the ScienceMobile! Whoosh!

I can understand your skepticism, I truly can. We were told by our parents, television and school teachers to eat our fruits and vegetables and our grains, weren't we? I can hear the warbly voice of a school science film in my head saying, "To grow strong and healthy, it is important that young people eat their fruits and vegetables. Oh and little Billy, don't forget your bread! Ha ha ha." Well it is mostly crap. Seriously.

If you have ever done any Middle School, High School or Junior High sports where weight can be a factor, you have probably went through the old "starve and crap" routine or "eat until your sick" routine. Basically, to drop weight you starve yourself and hope you can crap your way down the weight ladder so you don't get pummeled by someone in a higher weight class or you try to bulk up by eating to have enough mass to compete in your weight class. It makes a huge difference where you sit weight wise. If you want to get bigger there are some tricks like eating wheat germ. This is actually good if you are working out since wheat germ is better than whole wheat by weight and contains fiber and protein along with the carbs. It will bulk you up muscularly but if you are sedentary it will help pack on more pounds. To speed up the process of weight gain eat lots of corn, potatoes (any tuber really), fruit, rice and white bread products. As you balloon into your new sumo status, just write me a letter of thanks.

If you want to see what effect a diet of fruits and vegetables (fruits mainly) have on a population look no further than our friends the Samoans. No not the Girl Scout cookie, that's a Samoa and the recipe can be found here. The only truly fit and athletic looking Samoans I know of are in the NFL (like I have known a plethora of Samoans, racist much?). Now this is a vast generalization (though confirmed statistically) but folks from Samoa are almost always morbidly obese. They are among the most obese people in the world as a matter of fact. The primary components of their diet? Fruit and fruit juice and fruit soup (poi) and fruit sandwiches and fruit steak and fruit cake and tubers. Fruit.

"Hey, but doesn't fruit have the magical sugar fructose that takes longer to digest and don't they also have vitamins and stuff like that?" Why yes they do little Billy. But just because something takes longer to digest, doesn't mean it won't go to your belly, butt or thighs eventually. A sugar is a sugar is a sugar. As for tubers? Well starch, what most of a tuber is made of, turns into sugar and it loves to attach itself to your fat stores like a fat kid loves cake. Think about that before you think mashed potatoes or those sweet potato fries are healthier options than the steak or salad. Oh and corn is a whole grain by definition but don't get all twitterpated about gorging yourself on polenta or cornbread anytime soon. Corn has lots of natural sweetness which means sugar. There is a reason the Nebraska Cornhusker mascot looks like he needs to eat less corn on the cob and stay away from the corn syrup. Away we go in the ScienceMobile! Whoosh! Thus ends the science portion of today's blog entry.

I think we all have been brought up or told to believe the strangest things about our diets in America. We believe the oddest things, we embrace the alien over common sense.

I remember talking to a friend of mine, who is a dietitian, and we discussed low carb diets. It just seemed sort of the antithesis of everything I had been taught and told. She told me that low carb diets with a few minor tweaks are how we were suppose to actually be eating but we seem to stretch the advice we are given. Sure, eat your fruit but don't do it everyday and certainly don't consume them like Simba the Dancing Elephant. Besides, fruit can be very bad for men. It increases iron absorption and could lead to serious medical problems later on or almost immediately. Women if you want more estrogen then fruit is your friend in low doses, men eh not so much. You know you also can get all of the same nutrients from vegetables if you like.

I was thinking if I reached my end goal about two months from now, I will buy myself a snazzy tight fitting three/four button swinging London style suit and take the wife somewhere nice. That is my evil plan, to terrorize the great city of Phoenix as a stylish skinny person with my beautiful wife.

No comments:

Post a Comment