I’ve read once in one of my fitness magazines about Gym Etiquette. Most of it makes perfect sense to me. For example, the fact that people shouldn’t bring their laptops to the gym to surf the net  or use their cellphones while they work out; the fact that they shouldn’t use the gym as a coffee place when they meet up with their friends to chat and/or have a coffee; wiping the machines after use is also a no-brainer to me. However, telling me that I should share the equipment while I’m on my 10-20 seconds break between the sets is not what I’m going to be willing to do! I don’t come to the gym to share or socialize with strangers and trust me, it would require socializing if I was to get of the machine and share it with somebody else. Next thing I would be counting repetitions for the other person and that’s a paid interaction between two people where I go to the gym, it’s called being a personal trainer. Don’t believe me? Come to my gym and you will see that that’s about all that the personal trainers from around here do – count and note your repetitions and sets ! But that’s a topic for another whole blog entry, so let me get back to my point… If I got to any given machine first I will use it until I’m done. You can line up if you wish to, but the fact that you are hovering around is not going to intimidate me to the point of giving up on my workout.

Tosca Reno in a Capitan's Chair

Up until this morning, I have not had to make it a point that I disagree with this unspoken rule (I didn’t sign any agreements that would outline any required behaviours at the gym). This morning however I had to share with one little gym goer my attitude towards this “rule”. I planned to do some Leg raises and since I don’t feel strong enough I didn’t feel like doing them hanging on the chin-up bar, so I used the Capitan’s chair to do it. I’ve done 2 sets when I saw our Gym Queen approach and stand pretty much in my face. I realized she was waiting for me to be done and during my 3rd 10-20 second break between sets she asked me if she could jump in with her exercise while I was resting. Now, I know this person to have a very I-own-this-gym-you-should-move-out-of-my-way attitude and it pisses me off every time she displays is, which is always. So, instead of saying yes to her request, which is clearly what she was expecting otherwise she wouldn’t have asked me, I said that she can use the machine to her heart’s content once I’m done with it. She did not expect this answer so walking away she threw in “OMG This has never happened to me before!” She looked as if though she was just about to run crying to the real gym owner, but instead she hid in the workout room. Before she disappeared behind the glass door I threw in ” You do see that the machine is being used, right ?” I did a couple of more unexpected repetitions just to make my point that much more clearer and louder and then got off the machine. Mind you she was right behind me and I wasn’t even given enough time to wipe off my sweat, I hope she enjoyed it.

Now, why do I have a problem with this ? Why don’t I just be a good girl and share?  Besides what I have already written, I have a problem with a person who thinks that somehow their workout is more important than mine. I know what you’re doing. You have your workout planned out, you’re probably doing supper sets or tri-sets or extended sets (exercises done back to back) and you are not supposed to have a break in between the different exercises so you want that machine NOW. I get that, I do that too. But what I don’t do is to expect the person using the machine before me is going to jump off that equipment in time for me not to have a break between my sets, unless it’s my partner :O Just kidding! Why on earth would you think that I’m going to do that? My exercise routine is as much important to me as your is to you. Get over it! I also believe that we are both paying the same membership rate so I don’t think you have any more privileges to use the equipment than me. Now, if it was anybody else, I might consider sharing, but this particular one just gets on my nerves with her bossy behaviour.

So next time you see me using the machine of your choice just wait, preferably somewhere where I can’t see you.

</RANT OFF>

Now on to a different topic… that of food preparation. I remember the time when I cringed at the thought of having to prepare lunch for the next day. The reason for this unpleasant feeling was due to the fact that I don’t just eat my lunch during the day. Each day I have to make sure to have 3 meals with me for work: 2 snacks and lunch. Before what I would be doing is eating supper and then in the evening I would go in the kitchen again and start preparing the next day’s food. This was not very efficient, because I’d feel like I was spending the entire evening in the kitchen. So what am I doing differently ? I started thinking about the next day’s food while preparing supper. Once everything needed for supper is happily getting cooked/roasted/boiled etc. etc. I’m starting the preparation of food for next day. This way I’m finished with both by the time I am ready to sit down and eat my supper and don’t have to interrupt my evening with another trip to the kitchen. It’s a no brainer for me. I’m quite obsessed with this idea of having everything done in time to the point of forgetting that I don’t have to do it when I’m on vacation! Sometimes I’d include another technique which is preparing a big pot of chilli/curry/soup over the weekend that I can consume for lunch for good part of the week. That means there is no lunch prep during the week, just loading it up into containers.

We’re sitting in our coffee shop right now and I’m hearing all sorts of languages around me: French, Italian and Polish

1. Counting them by myself based on the nutritional info on packages! – didn’t work because most things I eat don’t come in a package and it became more of a chore than anything else.

2. Using various websites and/or applications – they never had the product brands that I’ve used and as a result the calorie count was never accurate.

Yesterday I came across www.livestrong.com and I am searching no more! Why is it good? It’s good because it takes literally no effort to compile a day’s worth of meals, it has virtually ALL product brands, it remembers foods already used in a meal, it is accurate and does all the calculations and additions for you. Once the day is done, you can export a table with all the numbers (see the links at the bottom of the post).

Here are some snapshots:

Here is where you add your foods and/or fitness activity

Once the food entered a list of possible entries pops up

And here is your compiled info on the meals with totals for each meal

Next daily and weekly totals

Here is my menu for July 5 2010. My totals and fitness activity are here.

ps. Ok, there is one thing that I don’t like about this calorie counter. It doesn’t break down nutrients into, for example fats into saturated, unsaturated, mono- and poly- unsaturated and trans. Same for sugars and carbs, there is no way of knowing where they came from unless you analyze the food list. But that’s something I can live with.

Menu for July 6th.

Revenons à nos muttons**….. Right now I’m pretty content with the measurements, but I’m still working on my body fat, I want to get to a happy place with it, even though I don’t know what that number would be, mostly because I have no idea what my body fat percentage is right now. I guess I’ll just go by the look. So I did my research and came across a simple principle of carb cycling, it’s used in bodybuilding circles quite liberally in order to lower the overall body fat percentage. Like I said it’s quite simple provided the pantry is already clean of junk food! There are 3 days in this diet that need to be cycled: day 1 is high carb day, day 2 is low carb day and day 3 is no carb day. On your high carb days 4 out of 6 meals will have carbs (or 3 out of 5), on your low carb days 3 out of 6 meals have carbs ( or 2 out of 5) and on no carb days you eat no carbs except for vegetables which are eaten on all days.

Lean Protein sources include:
Chicken (white meat)
Turkey (white meat)
Tuna Fish (can)
Fish (flounder, tuna (fatty or not), salmon, shark, etc.)
Shellfish (all types)
Protein (preferably whey post workout, and casein before bed; MRPs must be low-carb)
Lean beef (including lean cuts of steak)
Cottage Cheese (0 or 1% fat)
Egg whites (egg beaters)

Higher fat Protein sources include:
Chicken (dark meat)
Turkey (dark meat)
Eggs (half whites, half whole eggs)
Steak and other meats (not exceptionally high fat cuts)
Cottage Cheese (Whole Milk)

Approved fat sources:
(Natural) Peanut Butter
Flax Oil
Heavy Whipping Cream
Mayonnaise
Hemp Seed Oil
Olive Oil

Approved carb sources:
Brown rice
Oats (Slow Cooked Preferred)
Sweet potatoes or Yams
Fiber One (All Bran) Cereal
Starchy Veggies (corn, peas, etc.)
Beans/Legumes

Approved Yet Limited Carbohydrates:
Whole-wheat pasta
Whole grain breads, pitas, etc.

You cycle those 3 days for as long as you wish. I just finished 1 cycle and decided to give it a try for a month, if I can make it. As you can probably gather the no carb day was the most difficult mentally and physically. It was easy to not include carbs in my meals, but the mood and the energy were droopy to say the least. I found it difficult to stay awake at work and there was no way I was going for a bike ride or to the gym in the evening. I just did not have the necessary fuel in me to do any mental or physical activity. So why would I be doing it to myself? Well, apparently the idea is that playing with the input of carbohydrates makes the body guessing as to where it’s supposed to get its energy from. When you cut carbs, muscles give up stored carbohydrates – called muscle glycogen – as energy. In general, when glycogen levels fall, the body increases its ability to burn body fat. The no carb day will deplete your carbohydrates reserves which allows the body to use up muscle glycogen and and if protein intake is sufficient the body starts burning body fat for energy. Next, on your carb days you will replenish the muscle glycogen by eating more starchy in order for the body to never use muscles for energy.

So my sample menu for 3 days looks more or less like this:

Day 1 high carb:
Breakfast: 1/3 cup of dry oats + 1 cup of berries + 3 TBSP of no fat plain Liberté yogurt + dark coffee (2 egg whites + 1 whole egg – optional)
Mid-morning snack : 3 TBSP of no fat plain Liberté yogurt + 1/2 cup berries + 1 Tsp of natural hazelnut butter
Lunch : 3oz chicken breast + 1cup green beans + 1 cup lettuce and shredded carrots + 3 oz brown rice
Mid-afternoon snack : 1/2 can tuna in water + 1 TBSP vegannaise (mayo without eggs) + 1 egg white + 2TBSP brown rice
Supper : 3 oz chicken breast (or turkey or fish) + 1 cup greens + 3 oz brown rice
Night snack : Tea

Day 2 low carb:
Breakfast: 1/3 cup of dry oats + 1 cup of berries + 3 TBSP of no fat plain Liberté yogurt + dark coffee (2 egg whites + 1 whole egg – optional)
Mid-morning snack : 3 TBSP of no fat plain Liberté yogurt + 1/2 cup berries + 1 Tsp of natural hazelnut butter
Lunch : 3oz chicken breast + 1cup green beans + 1 cup lettuce and shredded carrots + 3 oz brown rice
Mid-afternoon snack : 1/2 can tuna in water + 1 TBSP vegannaise (mayo without eggs) + 1 egg white + 2TBSP brown rice
Supper : 3 oz chicken breast (or turkey or fish) + 1 cup greens
Night snack : Tea

Day 2 no carb:
Breakfast: 2 egg whites + 1 whole egg + veggies for omelette + some left over chicken breast + 1/2 grapefruit
Mid-morning snack : Tuna salad without rice + egg
Lunch : 3oz chicken breast + 1cup green beans + 1 cup lettuce and shredded carrots
Mid-afternoon snack : apple + hazelnut butter OR Tuna salad without rice with carrots in oliveoil dressing
Supper : 3 oz chicken breast (or turkey or fish) + 1 cup greens
Night snack : Tea

I’m trying to cut out my night snack which usually is way too much peanuts or some sunflower seeds. Instead I’m only having some fruity tea.

* abbreviations:
ch – chest
w – waist
a – arm
t – thigh
h – hips
c – calf

** Revenons à nos moutons – Let’s get back to the point

I’ve always associated vegetarianism with healthy foods but I’ve come to realize that this couldn’t be further from the truth. Vegetarianism CAN be a healthy diet but in my search for healthy vegetarian dishes I have learned that vegetarianism can be just as unhealthy as “omnivorism”. I’ve found countless of blogs and online resources on how to become vegetarian and I must say that most of them disappointed me in that they didn’t offer healthy choices. I have bought several vegetarian cookbooks, all of which didn’t account for healthy eating. Heavy sauces, sugar, white four, refined grains were all present everywhere! Yes, I suppose I could just skip those ingredients and adapt the recipes to my liking. But that’s not the point. The point is that I have been duped! I have been lead to believe that vegetarian equals healthy and that is clearly not the case. Another problem was the fact that many of the cookbooks did not include very many MAIN dishes. They were full of sauces, dips, salads and deserts, but when it came to making a main dish all they offered were Veggie BURGERS or rice and noodle bowls! I don’t know about you, but for me loading up on refined carbs is not my most favourite thing to do. Yeah, it might be yummy for 20 minutes it takes you to consume them, but it’s not so yummy or fun when 60 minutes afterwards you feel hungry again!

So, I officially quit vegetarianism and I don’t feel bad about it. Of course I’m still open to good quality, healthy veggie dishes, but I will no longer freak out at the sight of meat (mostly chicken, turkey and fish). I have never given up my yogurt anyway, so I have never been truly vegan or anything. Part of it has always felt to me a little bit like a fad thing.

Now that I have this bit off my chest I can move on

Here is some vegetarian humour for you:

Downloading corn

What do Humanitarians eat?

Lettuce

Food chain position

First things first: I have a rather time consuming habit of reading food/health/fitness blogs/articles/magazines/books. I like to be up to date on scientific health data, I like to read what other folks have to say about their food intake/preparation you name it. As I’m browsing through all these blogs, articles, websites etc. I’m noticing the following trends:

You are either:
1. Health obsessed and writing good quality stuff about nutrition and exercise OR
2. Health obsessed but can’t tell the difference between a carrot and a package of cookies labeled “only 100 calories”, “Good for you cookies” or “healthy cookies without bad fat” OR
3. Food obsessed and providing the reader with good, well balanced dishes to try OR
4. Food obsessed, providing the reader with probably good tasting but nutritionally devalued (fat and sugar laden) recipes and on top of that you call yourself a personal trainer!

I usually stay away from # 2 and # 4, but I can’t resist their audacity to actually say they know what they are talking about. So from time to time I will read what they write only to get frustrated, post a comment and hear from them that they still know what they are saying. Like this fat, personal trainer who puts bacon, heavy cream and sugar in every dish she makes. She wanted to teach me how to get my six pack without actually giving one single advice on how to do it. Yes, you heard me right, she said there is no formula for a six pack, just that a six pack is made in the kitchen. I get that, I even agree, it’s almost become common knowledge that in order for your abdominal muscle to show you have to shed the fat that’s covering it first. But as a personal trainer she doesn’t tell her “clients” what to eat to achieve that. Oh well, gotta move on.

Then there is a “health” blogger disguised in a gadget food costume! This one is less exciting and less offensive than the previous one, because it’s a simple gullible kind. He/she claims to be eating healthy foods, supposedly eats the right amounts of the right things. But then once in a while, or should I say every post he/she will tell you about a gadget food he/she discovered the other day while grocery shopping. What is a gadget food? A piece of something, in most cases something artificial that pretends to be food or a replacement for food that you can consume when you are on the run. In this category you could place a protein bar. Why on earth do you need a protein bar if not so that you can eat some empty calories and tons of sugar in some form or another! Have an apple or a banana, it’s convenient and can be eaten on the run. If you are in the office, have some almonds, piece of low fat cheese or grilled chicken breast, they all will provide you with much healthier protein! This group of “health” bloggers will also heavily indulge in “healthy” cookies, cakes and other pastries. Move on, have real food that will not undermine your efforts to be healthy, fit and of the right size.

These have been the things I have been reading, sometimes amusing, other times plain simple frustrating, but today my reading list has expanded! There is another category of food/health/fitness blogging on my reading list:

The Fat Nutritionist

5. The fat nutritionist!

Even saying the two words together just sounds plain wrong and offensive, let alone being that person. It’s like saying “the pedophile priest” – it offends me just as much. But yes, it’s true. There is a person (and others who practice the same religion but under different names) who is fat, about 260lbs at 5’4” and she “teaches” people about nutrition. No, she won’t tell you that sugar is bad and veggies are good. She will “teach” you how to be happy with your figure. In principle this is not a bad idea and that’s why I went on to read more of her blog. She is promoting good body image practices in young adults. Sounds positive, doesn’t it? Well, not really. When you read enough of her blabbing you realize that she condones stuffing your mouth with garbage. She explains what normal eating is by quoting her unhealthy-eating-guru in saying that it is:

“….giving yourself permission to eat sometimes because you are happy, sad or bored, or just because it feels good.” - NO, you eat because you’re hungry, you eat to sustain life, not because it feels good or you have nothing else to do!

“….mostly three meals a day, or four or five, or it can be choosing to munch along the way. It is leaving some cookies on the plate because you know you can have some again tomorrow, or it is eating more now because they taste so wonderful.” – NO, that’s not listening to your body when it tells you it has had enough!

“…. overeating at times, feeling stuffed and uncomfortable.” - NO, that is binge eating!

“…. trusting your body to make up for your mistakes in eating. Normal eating takes up some of your time and attention, but keeps its place as only one important area of your life.” – NO, your body will not make up for your mistakes in eating, it will PAY for it dearly!

She claims that one should be able to eat whatever the heck they want and however much they want and these habits will lead to a healthy, well rounded (the pun intended) individual who will learn to love his or her body. Bullshit! You will expand in all possible directions and develop poor nutrition aliments and diseases.

This attitude, however absurd, intrigued me a bit, because she did have a good pool of readers and followers (well, have a look for yourself**). Mostly people who congratulated her for her “guts” in being a nutritionist regardless of her size and culinary habits. Clearly, they must be just as fat and as mentally unstable as her, or more. Another thing that struck me while browsing through her page was the fact that she is quite aggressive in her writing, swearing right, left and centre, which makes me believe that she is not in the end as happy with all this fat covering her as she would like to have us believe. After a while of reading about her nutrition services (100$ a session for 12 sessions!) I was very close to dismissing the whole thing as a hoax or as somebody just trying to make her living by teaching what they know to do best – how to eat garbage and be fine with it. But then I clicked on couple of links on her site and I discovered that she is only a tip of an iceberg and the rest of it is “hiding” underneath!

There is a whole fat-o-revolution going on behind our backs! Or at least behind my back. There are others who are doing the same thing! They are fat and they are trying to convince the whole world that you should not strive to be thin and fit because…. well… because it’s too hard and it’s easier to get and stay fat and that’s ok! According to this crowd there are no repercussions of being fat, you just have to learn to love the fat and you’ll be ok. It’s unbelievable, but you go ahead and have a look too:

Voilà Mme Kate Harding who claims that the airlines should redesign their planes if a fat person can’t fit in one seat!

And Mme Marianne Kirby who wrote, together with Kate Harding, Lessons from the fat-o-sphere, can be seen here, here and here (nothing of any substance, mind you).

I did a search at amazon and apparently there are “writers” with actual books defending obesity: Linda Bacon, Marilyn Wann, Crystal Renn and the list goes on. Remind me to write one too!

Not to mention TV shows!

It blows my mind that in the age of obesity epidemic where you can’t leave the house and go grocery shopping and not see at least one obese person, there are people protecting and defending their fat state by debating whether or not it’s ok to be fat!

On one side you have a fat person who claims she is happy and healthy the way she is accompanied by a plus size model who claims she has suffered from anorexia to be a model but came out of it and now is modelling for plus size catalogues*** On the other side you have a person who used to be morbidly obese but through proper nutrition and exercise came out of it and a person who is of normal size thanks to proper nutrition and exercise but who genetically speaking should be just as obese as the rest of her family (proving this way that the genetics argument is bull).
Let me tell you, if you haven’t figured it out yet, that there is not a single good argument on the fat front!
There is no happy medium either in this debate. There are only extremes, it’s either being obese or anorectic! The fat will defend their state by showing you examples of unnaturally thin models saying that that’s unhealthy so they would rather be fat and hell yes, it is unhealthy to starve yourself, but so is being morbidly obese. Nobody will ever convince me that you can be healthy being obese!

* I’m openly taking my inspiration for this title from the fat front
** I was debating for a while whether or not to link to her in my post… By no means do I want to create publicity for her. But then I thought about it some more and I researched some more and came to the conclusion that people should be warned against the absurdity of her writings but they should also be able to create their own opinion based on primary sources. And since I know I’m not the only one condemning her beliefs in “fat is beautiful let’s embrace it and learn to live it” I don’t have a problem with linking to her.
*** You can’t just simply decide you are no longer anorexic!

I have been adding new foods to our diet lately so I inevitably googled them with relation to our symptoms. Nothing came up. So I tried searching for random food related bitter/metallic taste in mouth articles and soon enough I came across an array of articles explaining how an unknown kind of pine nut imported from China is reported to give people a bitter metallic taste that lasts between 2 weeks to 6 months! That was it! My home made pesto was making us not want to eat anything! What’s the point of eating if all that you put in your mouth tastes like garbage and makes you want to puke? Today is day 3…. And I am utterly sorry for unknowingly causing this. It might sound weird, but once I figured it out, I breathed a sigh of relief, as if though it wasn’t so bad.  Needless to say that day was day 2, so far the worst of it.

Here are some resources for those of you who think I’m joking: 1, 2, 3, 4 and on and on.

PS. This is totally unrelated to my “pine mouth” but driving on the highway this morning I had this urge to acknowledge that: “I’m finally learning how to use the highway and it’s all thanks to my lovely geek, who’s been very patient with me teaching me to drive, parallel park and now to navigate on the highway.” Just so you have the big picture I need to point out that I’m learning all this as an adult. I’ve never got my driver’s license as a 16 year-old, so I haven’t seen the road from behind the steering wheel until I turned… well recently. Driving an automatic isn’t exactly difficult, but using the highway is, especially if you didn’t grow up in a car, being driven to places and you grew up in another part of the world. I now truly believe that real navigation doesn’t start until you know how to use the highway, so I would like to extend my deepest thanks to the man who’s stuck by me, teaching me all the ins and outs even though I can be a difficult student. Thanks hun!

The moral of the story is that as a kid I’ve been told (implicitly and explicitly) that you have to have meat as part of a “healthy” nourishing meal. My breakfast had deli in the sandwiches, my lunch (which in Europe is a main meal of the day) had to have meat and my supper was again my trusty sandwich with deli. That was it, I was an omnivore going on to be a carnivore… because they instilled in me this idea that if you don’t eat meat at every meal, you somehow don’t give your body the necessary building blocks, that somehow your meal isn’t complete if you don’t include meat in it!!

Mind you, I was never overweight as a child, if anything, I was underweight. I’d be told constantly to eat more, because my frame was too bony. All those potatoes and meat combos were not doing it for me. Or was it my metabolism that was through the roof, not letting me put on too much weight, burning all those calories? Or maybe it was the fact that snacking only happened once a month, when parents got paid? Yes, we did not snack on chips, chocolate, sodas etc etc everyday, but about once a month….

Then I moved out and didn’t think twice about changing anything. What’s more, by moving to North America I found myself in the land of plenty and of convenience! I learned that I don’t need to spend hours and hours preparing the food, I can buy it already prepared and simply put it in the oven, wait 30-45 minutes and then serve it! How convenient indeed! Snacks were abundant as well. I didn’t all of a sudden become a rich person, far from it, but “food” was much cheaper on this side of the North Atlantic Ocean! My blind infatuation with this overabundance lasted about 4-5 years, that’s how long it took me to realize I was slowly killing myself with “this convenience”! All my adult life I was about 50-53kg, now I was weighting a whooping 70kg! For a while I was convincing myself that it was due to the fact that I “just” gave birth to my child. But the weight would never come off, that is until I saw my nutrition habits for what they really were – JUNK.

To make a long story short, fortunately I have informed myself on the deadly habits I’ve been subjecting my body to and understood what had to be done to reverse those 5 years of junk in the trunk. I’ve ditched all processed foods and turned to natural healthy ones. I shed my extra weight and was finally back to my original jeans. Since then another 5 years passed, my weight fluctuated a bit and today I find myself at a point where I’m overflowing with information on food, food industry and treatment of our food and I’m no longer happy with the choices I’m making mostly because I no longer know what’s in the food I’m consuming and feeding to my family! I’ve watched countless documentaries on the food industry and can no longer subject myself to the garbage they produce. So after reading on raw foodism, vegetarianism and veganism I finally decided it is time to abandon meat and most meat products and turn even more to natural foods like vegetables, fruits, nuts, grains and seeds. I’ve contemplated the idea for a while, by reading various blogs on the matter and I must admit it was slow coming. Simply put it was difficult for me to envision my life without meat. Upon learning about my conversion my geek even pointed out that he has suggested ditching the meat a while back to which I “freaked out” saying that there won’t be anything else to eat for us. I don’t recall this outburst. Needless to say today is my 3rd day without ANY meat and these are some of the meals I’ve been consuming:

Zucchini spaghetti with home made tomato sauce

Spinach salad with nutritional yeast

Creamy pepper soup

Curry Lentil crackers with Sweet pepper hemp pesto

In the end, after reading on my options I decided that this is going to be a semi-rawlacto-vegeterian diet, which means that many of my meals are going to be raw (as in not cooked) and I will forego all meat and eggs, but will from time to time allow dairy products (I just can’t see myself not eating yogurt for now).