Archives for January 2011

When Time Runs Out

Yea, 30 is the new 20. 40 is the new 30. …And 50?

See, that’s a harder pill to swallow, at least to my mind. While there are innumerable rites associated with aging…and this has to go back eons, there’s a point where in your own mind if nowhere else, you have to concede that the gig is up, and now you’re an “elder” member of society.

And while there’s a certain discontent, going from “the new 30s” to elder status in a day, there’s also a certain embrace of the thing for me that I’m finding comfortable. Perhaps it’s time. Can family and society be comprised only of “young people?” Can one still be young at heart while at very least, show some elder maturity; some wisdom; some sense that one has had some experiences, learned a lesson or two and that just perhaps, it’s worth listening to?

This goes even to listening to one’s self. I wish I’d an inkling 5-10 years ago of what I now understand as the constant cycling of global markets, rises and falls (randomness, in a word). I’d easily be 1/2 million richer. Instead, I find myself scrambling to recapture what I already had in my grasp (and bank account). Then again, the lesson I now take home seems not that far off from what I observed in terms of the behavior of my four grandparents who had survived a massive World War (that renders us all pussies in comparison, by mere circumstance), along with a global depression of huge proportion as icing. Most oft, I saw their behavior as outdated, fear motivated, or even quaint and cutely endearing. Not profoundly wise as I do now. My bust.

I’d have always loved to have been willing and of sufficient gut to be the big risk taker…so long as I came out on top; or alternatively, been quickly devastated so as to recognize clear failure quickly and reverse course. But how often does that former instance work out and, perhaps I watch too many movies. In reality, I did take risks, lots of ’em, and for the most part, managed. But I feel as though I played too much of a middle road, never making it HUGE, never putting so much on the line as to potentially knock the fuckin’ shit out of myself, so that I could try something else entirely. But in many ways, it feels beyond that, now. I have responsibilities.

I suppose I still could. That’s an ongoing internal debate. But it’s not for now, at least in this post. Right now is the time I reflect on what is, how it came to be like this, and what I can do now. And that has a lot to do with taking serious account of experience and paying the fuck attention to it.

Now, “50-years-old” is as arbitrary as anything else. For instance, you’re not incompetent to drive a car one day and fully vested in trust the next, when you turn 16. And it’s not like you can’t handle a few serious beverages at 20 years and 364 days but magically, get a super-liver, metabolic godhood and some fine sense in a day.

We have many arbitrary rites of passage in our world. How was it way back when? Well, I suppose they could have and did count the passing of seasons. Puberty would have been a biggie, for obvious reasons (more hunters, more gatherers…musta been cool for the guys back then). But how about the more nebulous reasons after that? I dunno, but I would surely like to imagine that age was knowledge. That would be a perfectly meritorious means of counting for age. You could easily imagine there being a 10 years or more range in terms of physical age, plus or minus, counting on just knowledge, experience, effectiveness, success and results.

But now we’re a collectivized equivalent of an ant hill or bee hive, and you have your place. And some bees & ants are created more “equal” than others, and they have parents, relatives and friends of influence in the hill & hive. And your place changes with age and decrepitude. We have arbitrary ages for everything and they count for nothing real except the arbitrary turning of the Earth around the Sun (at least we finally got that right). It goes hand-in-hand with the neolithic notion that we’re subjects who require masters; and far from being able to manage individual prowess, they arbitrarily assign age. It’s the given, now.

And so that’s of course why I fought it for so long and in fact, did a good job I think in making the last 3-4 years of my 40s pretty remarkable, counting my own progress, the growth of this blog resource, and the many hundreds who have reported their own results — even for many long ago “Old Fuckers.”

So in the end, this post is somewhat of a thinking out loud. In all my reflections over the past weeks the issue of this blog has never been in doubt — only how to continue to grow it and build influence while keeping the fuck-you spirit alive. I have no idea how to do it other than to simply do what I do. Passing this threshold only makes me more serious about my reality of life (fuck that “gift” shit). In turn, that makes me more serious about those things I pay a lot of attention to and spend a lot of time on.

To sum it all up into something very simple: I’m somewhat in awe that I’ve reached this age at the physical and mental state I am. I am as lean as I was in college, far stronger than any time in my life, feel great all the time (excepting the current neck & shoulder issue that will pass), and yet have some uncertainties about what I really want to do.

Even simpler: Make the 2nd 50 even better than the first.

Good luck, 20-fucking-sumthings. If you’re smart, realize the questions never end: they just become different. And if you’re smarter, you know that already. And if you’re the rare smartest, you’re trying to anticipate and resolve them even now. And good for you if you are.

~~~

I want to take a moment to thank all the commenters in my recents post for one, wishing me a happy birthday…and it was, in spite of pain (but I self medicated). For second, I got all sorts of advice and insight on my shoulder injury and so much of it was useful. As it stands now, I likely have no shoulder injury, but rather something causing a sort of nerve impingement/inflammation around c4-5 in my neck. It was the guys at Janzen & Janzen who figured that out, without imaging. But in poking, prodding and putting pressure on those areas of my neck, they can send me into writhing pain the likes of which is precisely what I have been feeling combined with an excruciating intensity I have never felt. Most likely a herniated disc in the region, since x-ray revealed no bone abnormality.

Next up: an MRI (and a prescription of Vicodin)

Oh, an if there’s anything here worth sharing, please do so with the Facebook and Twitter buttons up top.

Oh Noes!

Don Matesz has a different take on an aspect of Paleo-ish than I? Well, this means war! First it was the Johnsonian "War on Poverty;" then, the Nixonian "War on Drugs;" and then, we got used to always being at war with someone over something. We’re America, goddammit! We’d better be at War! Indeed, love is War. Peace is War. Life…is War.

Suppose I’ll have to head out to Phoenix, sos we can have it out — Don & I —  mano-a-mano, as I think they say it out in those backwards places. I mean…his post…on the heals of mine…

I’ve been dissed! Don dissed me!

Now, if what I was representing was mainstream media something, and Don, something else, equally mainstream…y’know, something like an abducted, likely raped and dead pretty young bond white  girl — and certainly not a black one (especially not black black – we prefer our mulattos), hispanic, asian — or my God forbid, a male….then even this little disagreement could take on national, yea, International proportions (so long as ad bucks flowed, news whore suckers).

Or maybe not. Will human nutrition ever take on a prominent stage, or is food-in-boxes the last real word and it’s really, going forward, only about treadmills? …The jury will now retire to deliberate.

Ok, so after a long prelude to a short post, I think Don wanted to use good science to defend a sweeping dismissal of vegetables, which I would support. I, on the other hand, simply used the article like a cheap whore to bolster my nagging impatience with those who can’t seem to say, "yea, my diet? Well, when I’m not consuming animal flesh and devouring livers, hearts, other internal organs and the cornucopia of varietals of animal fat, I’m doing my best to choke down a bit of spinach."

Now assuming that’s not hyperbole, which it certainly is, which is better?

And that’s my point.

To belabor it, I am not dissing vegetables per se. Rather, I really want to see them on just about every plate, in their place. Here’s a fact: the variety of flavor and texture in fruits and vegetables (and herbs & spices as subs) is unmatched by animal products. Conversely, the quantity and quality of essential nutrition in animal products is unmatched by fruits and vegetables.

And so, marriage seems appropriate and that’s why we’re always setting them up on our plates. And it’s a good marriage.

It’s just that sometimes, the guy like to be alone.

Rib Tips

And sometimes, he likes to stray altogether, but in a light, tasty sort of way.

Adultery

Inspiration for that later was provided by my main local bud, Robert Chon, with whom I, Bea and his wife Julie just spent the weekend in San Francisco. Robert will walk barefoot for miles on bare glass for just a lick of cucumber.

Just ask him. :)

Did this piss you off, enlighten you or poke you in the eye? Tell your Facebook Friends & Twitter Followers. Button up top.

Back when I was just transitioning into Paleoish eating, one goal was to get off my prescription medications I’d been on for a long time. One of those was for seasonal allergies that I had come to have to take year round for the previous decade. The other was various Proton Pump Inhibitors prescribed for what I called "nuclear heartburn," officially knows as Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD).

What I found in the end is that I just began forgetting to take both, eventually realizing I didn’t need them.

That was a few years ago, and after some experience with family members and anecdotes I’d heard over the years, I had a pretty good idea how one might successfully go cold turkey when I got an email from a reader a couple of weeks ago.

I have a question or 2 for you. I remember reading that you used to take anti-gerd medicine (prilosec?). My question is, do you wean yourself off it (going from every other day to every 3 days, to once/week) or did you quit cold turkey? …

For what it’s worth, the Paleo-ish is going well. I’ve lost a couple of inches around the waist and feel great. I say paleo-ish, because I’m doing the 80-20 thing. I allow myself one pasta meal/week, although I make sure to do it the Italian way and not have pasta be the dominant item on the plate. And as a nod to my Bavarian heritage (born and raised), I drink one wheat beer a day with dinner. I can claim that the beer is medicinal, when I was in the hospital in Munich recovering from kidney stones, my doctor told me that if I drank a wheat beer a day that I’d never get another one. 23 years of following his advice and I haven’t had one since.

Basically, I just asked myself what I’d do if I were back at the start to go cold turkey, knowing what I know now. My 1-2-3 reply.

Best to go cold turkey on the GERD meds in my view. Here’s a couple of tips to help you if you have problems:

1. Go pure paleo for a few days to a week, no added fat, i.e., lean meats & veggies with at most a drizzle of olive oil.
2. No alcohol, coffee, tea, or tobacco during that pure paleo week. Water only.
3. Supplement with sodium bicarbonate (baking soda), about a level tsp mixed in water after each meal if you get heartburn.

Most people seem to get back to normal within about a week. But you’ll definitely want to forego the pasta and the beer for that week.

Congrats on the success.

How could it be any simpler? And for this reader, apparently it was pretty simple, for I received this email just a few days ago.

Worked like a charm. Now working on getting rid of the lipitor. And after I’ve lost 20 lbs, I’ll be able to convince my doctor to drop the blood pressure meds. (as I did doing Ornish/Pritikin).

Glad he could follow the simple advice, advice he’d likely never get from a drug pusher in a white coat.

Any other tips from self-experimentation experience? I know some recommend betaine HCL, probiotics, digestive enzymes and such, but personally I have never noticed any benefit with any of those for myself.

In terms of learning everything you always wanted to know about GERD, what it really is (too little, not too much stomach acid), how devastating PPI GERD meds can be long term and why you want to get off them, Chis Kresser is the go-to guy on this. See his multi-part series at The Healthy Skeptic.

For the newbies just leaning about how to go Paleoish, here’s a primer with links to follow.

Know anyone with nuclear heartburn? Then forward this along, share it with Facebook Friends, and Tweet it using the buttons at the top of the post.

Just a quick note before heading out for the weekend.

I was contacted by Julie Deardorff of the Chicago Tribune for some supplemental info for an article she was doing. And here it is: How to give up soap. I was particularly gratified that she got in a few bits about Paleo, particularly that it’s not reenactment.

Proponents of a paleo-type diet generally avoid dairy and grains and try to eat as our ancestors once did. Nikoley said he isn’t trying to emulate a caveman, but he lost 60 pounds and his health improved after he eliminated grains, sugar, modern processed cooking oils, and most dairy.

"My high blood pressure normalized, I got off allergy meds I’d been on since college, and GERD meds I’d been on for a decade," he wrote in an email. "In other words I do it because I get excellent results, feel better, have stable energy, and so on."

Giving up soap, he reasoned, was primarily a matter of convenience as long as the results were acceptable. But then he found that washing only with water was actually better than using soap.

Still in a bit too much shoulder pain to blog much, but we’ll give ‘er a try as soon as possible.