Product Endorsement

Ever since turning fourteen I have been plagued with a bad complexion. Not full-blown acne, just prone to break outs that I find quite embarrassing, especially now that I have reached middle-age. I thought it was only supposed to last a few years not thirty-five years! Anyway, a significant percentage of the population does suffer from bad skin for a very long time and I have often wondered why. Is it hormonal? As the onset of pimply skin comes with puberty I always believed it was but then maybe it is just the change in the composition of the skin - it becomes oilier once reaching maturity and pores get clogged.

A few years ago I went to the doctor prior to traveling to New Caledonia for a singles week at Club Med and I asked if there was anything that would help give me clear skin. She prescribed a mild anti-biotic that worked really well, almost over night, returning my confidence. It was called mino-tabs I think. However it's effectiveness seemed to wear off over time and I wasn’t too keen on taking anti-biotic for a long time anyway.

Exercise and mainstream healthy eating didn’t seem to have any effect except perhaps to make it worse. The sweating associated with exercise probably doesn’t help. Then I began to think about why the anti-biotics worked. The reason must be because the problem is bacterial. Sweating feeds the bacteria or gives it a nice, warm, damp place to live. I often noticed that patches of bad skin would spread and frequent washing seemed to only make it worse.

The answer is to kill the bacteria. Now there is a readily available product that does just that. It’s a miracle and I urge anyone who has a problem like this to seriously consider using it. The product is Johnson & Johnson’s Clean & Clear Continuous Control Acne Cleanser.


I used it twice daily for two or three weeks and then just daily in the morning. Now my skin is perfectly clear – it’s amazing. The active ingredient is Benzoyl Peroxide. It gives a nice cool-burning sensation and you can just feel those nasty little bugs dying by the millions. Some chemical remains on the skin after rinsing and this continues to work during the day.

Most Active Survivalists wont have a requirement for this product but their children or even grandchildren might.

Highly Recommended!

Update: I still use this product at least five times a week however I am starting to wonder if my change to a more paleolithic diet and intermittent fasting has brought about a cure. The only way to prove this, sort of, is to stop using it - I am afraid to do that though because my skin is so good now.

The Magic 200 Minutes

After much thought and practical experimentation I have come up with the figure of 200 minutes as the ideal total time per week to perform reasonably rigorous exercise. That's exercise like running, fast cycling, weights and other gym type exercises - exercises that leave you puffed and sweating. This equates to about four hours per week which is actually 240 minutes but then it takes into account periods of resting during the routines.

Four sessions of one hour each per week, say on Tesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday should suffice. This is actually not all that much although it is enough to reshape muscles and ward off weight gain and probably not enough to risk over-training. Any more than this and one runs the risk of over-exercising and experiencing a bit of metabolic breakdown resulting in a forced rest period of several days to a weeks duration.

This advice is for the middle-aged and above as I am sure a younger person could safely do more. However I see no benefit in doing more for the Active Survivalist unless they are training for a specific event. This level of exercise should be able to be maintained indefinetly forming an exercise habit.

If more exercise is required my advice would be to increase the intensity of the exercise rather than increase the time it takes to exercise. Run faster, lift heavier in carefully adjusted stages so that you move the joints the same amount of times but do more work. This will build strength and reduce the risk of repetitive strain injuries. You should also go hard on occasion so that training routines are not stale old slogs. After all when you are out there pushing hard, heart pounding, sweat dripping and gasping for breath you are truly alive. To be able to do this is what being an Active Survivalist is all about - it is Active Survivalist heaven.

Actively Turning Back the Clock

"A sedentary lifestyle increases the propensity to aging-related disease and premature death. Inactivity may diminish life expectancy not only by predisposing to aging-related diseases but also because it may influence the aging process itself,"

The above quote is from a recent study done at Kings College, London. You could title this, "inactively speeding up the clock." One thing is for sure and that is staying active is not going to do you any harm as long as you are careful. It becomes more and more essential as you age. Eventually aging will get get a stranglehold on you but you can delay its onset considerably so why grow old before your time? People don't seem to realise that by being inactive and overeating you are accelerating yourself toward an early grave

A Sad Week


From TheTimesOnline April 16:

Six students and a teacher were killed when they were swept down a flooded river during an adventure course in rugged New Zealand bushland yesterday

The 16 and 17-year-old students were part of a group of 40 from Elim Christian College in Auckland who were attending a week-long course with the Sir Edmund Hillary Outdoor Pursuits Centre near Turangi, 320km (200 miles) north of Wellington.

So young with so much to look forward to and now no more. I believe these children were let down by adults and by a culture that believes that outdoor adventure sports are essential for young people. They were barely more than children and they were canyoning in the mountains of New Zealand during stormy weather. Adventures are risky and are really the realm of expendible young men who know and take the risks. We shouldn’t expose children to such dangers.

Why am I writing about this on my Active Survival blog? Well, if we manage to prolong life dramatically it will be interesting to see how we approach adventurous activities. Let’s say they manage to prolong life indefinitely. Do you think people would still race motorbikes or sky dive? If your body regenerated itself forever how long would you expect to live for? It seems a strange question but regeneration will not guarantee immortality. A fatal accident could still occur and while I don’t have a reference I read somewhere that Insurance company data predicts that we will have a fatal accident every 1600 years on average. If your body never aged eventually your plane is going to crash and burn.

The Active Survivalist needs to stay sharp, stay alert and not take undue risks.

Advice to parents: Don’t let your children get involved with anything to do with rivers – they’re fukkin dangerous. I’m quite angry about it actually.

Overeating

It may be overeating and not obesity that causes health problems. When you think about it obesity is generally a result of overeating and weight gain is probably a healthy sign. After all the body is processing the extra calories and storing them for use at another time. The ability to gain weight is a healthy sign in an individual whereas unexplained weight loss while one is eating plenty would be an unhealthy sign.

When the fat starts to build up in places where it shouldn’t then severe health issues are to be expected. Fat in and around the heart and liver and inside the cardio-vascular system are potentially fatal.

Experiments with mice have shown that limiting calorie intake has greatly increased life expectancy and this may not be because the mice have stayed slim but that their vital organs have remained free of clogging fat.

Metabolic Syndrome Triggered by Overeating, Not Obesity – This article is about research that has shown Metabolic Syndrome is a result of too much food sloshing around the system and not simply weight gain.

I would think that the way to avoid this syndrome is to take my advice and go for long periods without food while doing at least four hours a week of decent exercise, ie more than just walking.

Animal Fat – Is it bad for you?

A lot of people have bought into the idea that eating animal fat makes you fat. I guess it seems logical that fat = fat. Yet is this true? The success of the Atkins Diet seems to defy this simple logic.

I wonder if the pathway from ingested food to fat cells has been well studied. I’m sure it has and I will endeavour to find out. Does food enter the stomach, get digested, enter the bloodstream and then get deposited into the fat cells? Or is it a bit more complicated? The muscles have their own store of energy in the form of sugars for immediate use and this store can weigh up to two kilograms. Once this store is topped up I imagine that excess food is stored as fat. It is possible that fat is transported directly to the fat cells and bypasses the muscle stores however Atkins Diet which can be high in fat seems to prove that this is not the case.

Are carbs converted into fat? Certainly people on high carb low fat diets can get fat. What about people on high fat diets? Well there aren’t too many of those around but there are some. Inuit people traditionally lived on whale blubber and certain Indian tribes ate almost exclusively fresh meat. These people did not get fat. Western people who lived with the Inuit for extended periods of time found that they had to eat animal fat rather than just the lean meat in order to stay healthy.

The fact is that people are getting fatter and eating less fat. Many products in food stores are labelled as low fat but you only find out that they are high in sugars if you read the fine print. A sure way to gaining excess weight is to eat a lot of carbohydrate.

The next argument is that eating fat can clog your arteries. This may be true but my feeling is that you would need to eat quite a lot and be sedentary and have other bad habits for this to be a problem. If you ate a moderate amount of fat and exercised hard for at least four hours a week my guess is you would be ok and probably more than ok. Your body needs fat and cholesterol to function probably much more than it does carbohydrates.

Of course everything in moderation but don’t be afraid to enjoy meat with a bit of fat or eggs fried in dripping. Roast potatoes done in dripping are great also. Stay focused on keeping fit and eating natural, minimally processed foods that your body has to work on to digest. Meat and fat is natural, far more natural for human consumption than bread or rice for instance.

Dieting

I was reading in the news the other day that dieting is going out of fashion and that the diet industry is making less money today. It seems that people are starting to think that exercise is the most important factor in the quest for weight control. I believe this is a common misconception and that people should focus on diet first and exercise next if their objective is to trim down. In the park where I do most of my cardio exercise I have noticed the same people year after year performing their exercise, which is usually just walking, yet not getting any lighter and maybe getting even larger.

For the obese person exercise can be rather inhibiting and off-putting and indeed it can be dangerous. For those carrying many pounds of excess weight the act of exercising will put an extra strain on joints and muscles that the lean person would not experience. This could lead to extensive damage of key areas like knees and ankles that could result in being practically crippled. The obese person should approach exercise with caution and develop an exercise routine that has the least joint and tendon impact as possible. Cycling and swimming come to mind as exercises that would be good at least until a normal weight has been achieved.

That said, exercise will have little impact on controlling weight. The key is calorie restriction. It is extremely difficult to work off an up-sized McDonalds meal yet it is very easy to forgo the meal altogether and eat an apple or a banana. You would probably have to run for twenty miles or more to burn off the excess calories consumed in a McDonalds combo.

Exercise is more important for controlling weight gain once the ideal weight has been achieved.

So back to dieting. I have devised all sorts of diets for reducing weight and I think that nearly all of them would work well which brings us back to the concept of the effectiveness of calorie restriction. The key is to avoid high-energy foods. Foods that are packed with easily accessible calories like processed foods high in sugar. These foods are digested almost immediately and saturate the blood with food that cannot be burned off quickly and so is converted to fat. If you avoid all processed food and that includes bread and rice and just stick to fruit, meat and vegetables you cannot go wrong. Forget about the totally wrong food pyramid above where you are advised to eat six to eleven servings or more a day of bread – have they completely lost their minds? Think about bread as a food developed by the masters to feed the slaves that build pyramids. The food pyramid is for active children or very fit and active adults.

It is true that exercise for many people is a bit of an appetite suppressant yet you could use other tricks like suppressing the appetite by drinking lots of water or even coffee. Exercise is great but don’t damage yourself by going at it too hard and making the mistake that exercise will make you thin.

The key is healthy eating in moderation with long gaps of five hours or so when you eat nothing at all. Avoid all snacks and try to have long periods where your blood supply is not saturated with food. Forget about breakfast being the most important meal of the day and take advantage of periods when appetite is low to fast - just don't over do it mid-morning when craving for food returns. Eat fruit instead of bread and never eat biscuits, candy or cakes.

Once you have brought your weight down you can then focus on exercise. You will notice that you will be more motivated to do exercise due to the increased energy and feeling of wellness that healthy eating brings about.

Rest, Nutrition and Exercise

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately about the relationship between rest, nutrition and exercise. Getting the balance just right between these important components of a healthy lifestyle is more difficult than it first appears. The balance is even more difficult for those advancing in years as younger bodies have considerably more flexibility and bounce back than older bodies do. The story is further complicated if your intention is to lose weight simultaneously with gaining strength and stamina.

There is considerable risk of doing some damage by over-doing the dieting and exercise that could lead to the complete opposite result of what was intended. Yet how to tell if one has done too much or eaten too little?

Listen to your body is what I recommend. If you exercise hard one morning and during the following hours you feel energized and slightly euphoric and possibly a little smug that everything is going well you have the mix just right. Post exercise feelings are the most important indicators of overall health and fitness. If on the other hand you found it difficult to complete your routine and the routine was just a normal routine for you then your body is telling you something. Either you are not getting enough nutrition or more rest between exercise intervals is required or both. During the day you may feel tired and a little sore. If this happens step up the eating a little with more healthy and energy giving foods. Take a two or three day break from exercise or just do a bit of mild exercise like walking or easy cycling.

Ignoring this advice may lead to feelings similar to flu where the body temperature rises, heart beat increase and you generally feel lousy. This is not a good place for the Active Survivalist to be. Full marks for pushing yourself to the limit but it is important to recognise that the limit has been reached and the time has come to back off. Now is the time to focus on getting enough sleep and possibly over eating a little on the best and most nutritious food you can lay your hands on. Take the opportunity to exercise the mind a little instead of doing that cardio. Reflect on your exercise routine and try to restore the balance.

The objective is to get that feeling back of post exercise energisation. Staying in this zone is all-important because it feels great and your body is getting the most benefit. It will also encourage you to stay fit and well. It will be almost impossible to stay in this zone and over doing it will be inevitable if you are dedicated to the program. The good news is that your body will tell you when things have gone too far. You just have to listen.

A Fat Gut and Dementia?

A new study published in the journal Neurology reveals the following:

The study involved 6,583 men and women who were ages 40 to 45 when they had checkups between 1964 and 1973. As part of the exam, their belly size was measured by using a caliper to find the distance between their backs and the surface of their upper abdomens. For the study, a distance of about 10 inches or more was considered high.
The researchers checked medical records to see who had developed Alzheimer's or another form of dementia by an average of 36 years later. At that point the participants were ages 73 to 87. There were 1,049 cases.
Analysis found that compared to people in the study with normal body weight and a low belly measurement:
_ Participants with normal body weight and high belly measurements were 89 percent more likely to have dementia.
_ Overweight people were 82 percent more likely if they had a low belly measurement, but more than twice as likely if they had a high belly measurement.
_ Obese people were 81 percent more likely if they had a low belly measurement, but more than three times as likely if they had a high measurement.

It's not conclusive but why look silly and take the risk of being demented as well?

Just for the record, I am 48 with a measurement of seven inches. At my largest I would guess I was around 11 inches. A fat belly can be reduced. One thing to remember about a fat belly is that a lot of fat can build up under the abdominal muscle layer. This is the strangling fat I have mentioned before that pushes the abdomen out and envelops the vital organs.

What shocked me the most about this study was the high number of people as a percentage of the group that suffered from dementia. It's made me think that I will have to concentrate more on mental exercises and other things to keep myself functional. It seems that staving off dementia may be more challenging than just keeping physically fit and will require a multi-disciplined approach.

Active Survival – What is it?

I was talking to a morbidly obese man at work one day about diets and he mentioned a diet called the Warrior Diet. It sounded interesting so I decided to research it a little. The designer of the Warrior Diet, Ori Hofmekler wrote,” Not actively surviving is passively dying” and this statement impressed me. Exercising and eating well is actively doing something about the state of your health. If you don’t exercise, your muscles are wasting away and your cardio-vascular system is deteriorating. Fat is building up, trying to strangle your internal organs – you are passively dying. You are lying about doing nothing to stop it. The challenge is on to fight back and actually improve the body and mind as we age.

I decided to take the concept a little further and develop the idea of the Active Survivalist. This is someone who is interested in surviving as long as possible and in the best condition as possible. The last part is important as no one particularly wants to live a very long time in a decrepit and miserable state. So the intention is to expand the middle years – basically have middle age extend beyond the sixties and into the eighties and nineties. It will be no good to enter the eighties in an overweight and feeble state. If that happens you may well live to be a hundred but you are just passively making it through with a considerable loss of enjoyment of life and prone to more disease and discomfort. You will also be more reliant on those around you to nurse and care for you. People have successfully got to their eighties and nineties and managed to remain independent and active - the Active Survivalist consciously aims to achieve this.

The Active Survivalist is also interested in any technology that prolongs the human life beyond the natural. Why not remain active well beyond a hundred? Currently it seems a difficult challenge yet new discoveries that enhance longevity may be just around the corner. The Active Survivalist is training for the day when some genetic engineering marvel arrives on the scene and saves the day. You will have a much better chance of taking advantage of these discoveries and inventions if you are in good shape. Imagine a new ‘elixir of youth’ drug becoming available yet you are no longer in a position to benefit from it because your body has gone beyond repair? How sad that would be.

Aside from the possibility of living forever it feels good to be fit and slim no matter what age you are. Largely it is a matter of developing the right habits and over time it becomes very easy to maintain a healthy lifestyle. There really is no excuse for someone to let himself or herself go and become a burden on all those around them.

Your body and mind are the most precious things you possess. A healthy body is worth an incalculable amount and it is a true under statement to say that it is worth preserving. Preserve it at all costs.

Caffeine and Other Drugs

A while ago someone told me that if you stopped drinking coffee you would find that you had more energy and that your life would be transformed. I took this onboard and gave up coffee and any other caffeinated drinks. My abstinence lasted about a year and I can faithfully report that my general well-being was unaffected which was quite disappointing. I was eagerly awaiting transformation - maybe it was a bit like the time I took St John's Wort hoping for a miracle when a colleague pointed out that you actually have to be suffering from depression for an anti-depressant to show results. What I can report is that first coffee after a year had a terrific enlivening effect – I wondered why I had gone without for so long. Whoever suggested that coffee was bad for you was a complete party pooper. Indeed I can’t think of another readily available drug that is so useful for the Active Survivalist.

I always drink a couple of cups of coffee before exercise and recommend that others do so as well. It appears that there are no bad things to say about coffee. It increases endurance, may fight cancer, may delay Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s and tastes good too. Sure you can drink too much coffee and feel a bit jittery. I tried this just the other day as an experiment, drinking about eight cups in a morning and can report that this is probably not a good idea. There’s no sense in over doing it as caffeine will reduce in effectiveness if too much is taken. The connection to Parkinson’s seems quite compelling and this alone seems enough reason to imbibe regularly.

The all good news about coffee has led me to think more about the possibility of other drugs being beneficial to the Active Survivalist. Resveratrol and Glucosamine look like promising substances too. Possibly green tea too which I have started to take daily.

The links in red above are worth the time to follow - who'd have thought that mice get Alzheimer's? Transgenic mice, half mouse half man...coool. Active Survivalists should have a bit of mad scientist in them. After all there is only so much healthy eating and exercise can acheive. To push the human life span beyond what it is now will require some extreme measures.

In case you were wondering the above brain images are those of a healthy patient and one suffering from Alzheimer's.

Mental Fitness

As one ages it is often perceived that the mind becomes less sharp. Concentration is not as good and reaction times have reduced. I suspect that we become a little hard on ourselves, interpreting a momentary lapse in memory as early onset Alzheimer’s or dementia. What good would a fine body be if the brain was totally shot? So we fear the breakdown of mental faculties more than we fear the aging of our bodies. Yet I remember making an awful lot of dumb mistakes when I was younger – the most spectacular being while on a first date, thinking that the play, Fiddler on the Roof, was finished when it was only half time. Needless to say that was the first and only date with that particular young lady. I saw her a few years later and she had put on a spectacular amount of weight on her thighs making her look extremely odd. It was a super dumb mistake but then maybe it was for the best - I am just sooo shallow. Yet I didn’t put this faux pas down to mental illness or even think it was that bad a mistake at the time – I remember thinking for a short time that I still had a chance with her – how retarded is that? I’m sure I would not make this mistake today so people probably improve with age. The older brain does have some advantages over the younger one. It might not be as quick but it is generally wiser and mellower. It is not so susceptible to boredom as it doesn’t perceive the passing of time quite the same. In some ways this is an advantage because it makes tedious cardio workouts quite a bit more bearable. I remember when I first started jogging when I was in my early twenties that the first mile was almost unbearably long yet now it seems very little and is over in no time. These days I have to think about reducing my cardio workouts.

Nevertheless it seems that the brain should be exercised along with the body. It makes sense that mental faculties could diminish with lack of use much like every other part of our bodies. When I started studying for exams again a good fifteen years after having sat the last one it seemed impossible. My mind was just useless for any sort of learning. Yet after a bit of perseverance and especially after a successful exam pass I soon got back into it and succeeded spectacularly. I noticed that my alertness improved. I could remember things a lot more easily and found study to be a useful exercise for many other aspects of my life.

Eating Disorders

Inevitably the Active Survivalist will be accused of having an eating disorder. When it comes to reshaping the body and fighting off the effects of aging diet plays a large part. Too much food is deadly. Almost everyone eats too much and it's a wonder that people aren't even fatter than they already are. Fat deposits are building up around the vital organs of almost everyone and those deposits are solidifying and become harder to dislodge with every passing day. Food is everywhere, forcing the Active Survivalist to engage in a relentless battle against aging and decrepitude. Obsessive behaviour or tremendous discipline is required to prevail against food and those offering it. Obsessive behaviour does have its dangers and it is possible for people to go too far but one shouldn't worry about being accused of having anorexia. Indeed an accusation is a sign of success. Your appearance is now noticeably different. You are leaner than almost everyone else around you. And you know that you are on the right track because you are stronger than ever before and feeling better than ever before. Diet is used to fuel and build the body not to be social or alleviate emotional stress. The amount of food taken and the time it is taken should be carefully considered. It is always better to eat too little than to eat too much. Keep in mind that those who do have disorders eat practically nothing, which is entirely counter-productive for those who seek a longer healthier life.

The Ultimate Active Survivalist: The Cyberman

The previous post showed a natural human form however if we are to avoid complete bodily breakdown and death it will be inevitable that parts will need to be replaced. It is already happening now with replacement joints being quite common. Obviously it would be best to avoid getting replacement bits for as long as possible but when the time comes to do a bit of modification I say embrace it.

The Cybermen replaced almost all parts of their bodies except parts of their brain although some say that even this was totally replaced t00 - probably a good idea.

Here is a link to a website that has details on all the different Cybermen models and more.

Cybermen were constantly adjusting and improving their design. This is what makes them the ultimate Active Survivalists!

The Perfect Body

Michelangelo's statue of David depicts the perfect body shape. This is why it is so famous. All male Active Survivalists should aspire to acquiring a body similar to this. Actually if I look at myself in the mirror I think I am not too far off. Men do tend to see themselves as much better looking than they really are however - LOL. The next two years will be largely spent working on shaping my body. I wonder what percentage of body fat David would have? The torso looks lean but not over the top ripped.

Exercise and Longevity

Longevity is the principal goal of the active survivalist. There is a link between regular exercise and longevity along the lines of "if you don't use it you lose it". Muscular strength, coordination, balance and flexibility all decline with age until the unavoidable (so it seems) terminal conclusion. While this may be inevitable the process can be delayed. A new study confirms this:

The men ranged in age from 47 to 71 and had been referred to a VA medical facility for a clinically prescribed treadmill exercise test sometime between 1983 and 2006. All participants were asked to run until fatigued, at which point the researchers recorded the total amount of energy expended and oxygen consumed.

The numbers were then crunched into "metabolic equivalents," or METS. In turn, the researchers graded the fitness of each man according to his MET score, ranging from "low-fit" (below 5 METS) to "very-high fit" (above 10 METS).

By tracking fatalities through June 2007, Kokkinos and his colleagues found that for both black and white men it was their fitness level, rather than their age, blood pressure or body-mass index, that was most strongly linked to their future risk for death.

Every extra point in MET conferred a 14 percent reduction in the risk for death among black men, and a 12 percent reduction among whites. Among all participants, those categorized as "moderately fit" (5 to 7 METS) had about a 20 percent lower risk for death than "low-fit" men. "High-fit" men (7 to 10 METS) had a 50 percent lower risk, while the "very high fit" (10 METS or higher) cut their odds of an early death by 70 percent.

"The point is, it takes relatively little exercise to achieve the benefit we found," noted Kokkinos. "Approximately two to three hours per week of brisk walking per week. That's just 120 to 200 minutes per week. And this can be split up throughout the week, and throughout the day. So it's doable in the real world."

Link to the above: A little Regular Exercise Extends Men's Lives

The really interesting thing about this study which confirms the principle of active survivalism is that those who exercised the most survived the longest. Body fat wasn't a major factor although I suspect those that exercised the most had the lowest body fat.

One thing I have noticed, especially among people who are a generation older than me, is that they do almost no exercise. My parents generation invariably did little or no focussed exercise. That is exercise for exercise sake focussing on developing heart health, muscle strength and endurance and lung capacity. Some of them claimed they got all the exercise they needed doing the gardening or going on an occasional walk. This is not enough. Exercise should focus on developing the body and should be a little bit tough if not extremely taxing. Pain is necessary and desired. Aching joints and muscles are to be expected. The active survivalist will suffer a little more due to the nature of an aging body and recovery times will probably be longer than that of a young persons. This is to be expected and battled against.

Cycling

The bicycle makes a great piece of exercise equipment. It is probably the best alternative to running for sustained cardio exercise and also has some interval training qualities when traversing hilly territory. Too much running for the mature person will inevitably result in damaged knees and tendons. The bicycle provides virtually injury free cardio and also makes a great and cheap form of alternative transport. All active survivalists should have a bike.

The bike shown above is my wet weather night rider. It's kitted out with dual headlights, rear light, mud guards, road tyres, after market front suspension and a kick stand. It is an early Marin mountain bike that has few original components unchanged. It is setup for all riding conditions and is very rugged and reliable.

Should I Exercise Every Day or Every Alternate Day?


There isn't an easy answer to this question. It depends on what you want to achieve. If general fitness is desired then every second day could be beneficial as it allows 48 hours of recovery time between each session. If weight loss is the objective then a daily exercise regime that burns off 300 calories or so would be desirable. Perhaps if both weight loss and strength gain is desired then alternate days of cardio and weight training could do the trick.

As this blog targets the mature individual facing the imminent prospect of old age the answer to the question should be relevant to this group. I don't know the answer. I do think that every second day is likely to result in missed days that extend the period between workouts. Generally for those pursuing 'active survival' exercise should be obsessional as diet should be also. Exercise everyday and then some unless physical injury is being experienced.

Alcohol Consumption

It is pretty well established now that alcohol consumption is beneficial to physical and mental well-being. Numerous studies throughout the world have highlighted the benefits of a glass or two of wine a day. It also seems to not matter too much what sort of alcohol one dinks be it wine beer or even spirits. Societies who shun alcohol such as Moslem ones and Seventh Day Adventists give no inspiration to follow suit.

My take on this is that alcohol helps ease the mind and relaxes the body and if taken in moderation has no adverse health effects. In my own family I have noticed that the uncles and aunts who imbibe regularly and what has often been regarded as a little too much are still alive and kicking. My own parents are now both dead and probably could have benefited from a little more drinking. It seems to take a quite a lot of alcohol taken over a long period of time to seriously damage ones internal organs. It takes less alcohol to temporarily damage ones coordination and decision making – something to be kept in mind if important things need to be done like driving a car or signing important documents for instance. It reduces sharpness of mind and body and often it may be better to drink a couple of cups of coffee at night time if work needs to be done.

That said it is really up to the individual to decide what is good for them. Some people should perhaps never drink anything – especially those people who lose all control once started or simply cannot handle it.

In general the mature individual interested in active survival should drink in moderation. Red wine preferably as this goes well with food and doesn’t seem to be in the least bit fattening.

My rules would be drink no more than two glasses or half a bottle of red wine a day. Drink with food if possible or if taken late at night, once all chores are done, drink a glass of water with each glass of wine. The reason for this is that alcohol is a bit harsh on the stomach. Have an alcohol free day twice a week or maybe even for a whole week occasionally. My reason for this last rule is that quite often it is hard to stick to the two glass limit and drinking everyday for me seems to reduce my feeling of wellness. When I awake the next day from an alcohol-free day I always feel a lot better. A long period of no drinking only seems to be beneficial for a week or so and then adverse psychological effects weigh in. It’s nice to have a glass of wine to look forward to and there is absolutely no reason to deny oneself this pleasure for too long.

This image is Ouroboros the serpent that forever consumes itself and a symbol of "Eternal Recurrence". I am one of the few people who take this theory seriously as did Nietzsche. We are doomed or blessed, depending on your viewpoint, to live this same life again and again for eternity. As a code for living it has the advantage of making you think about the things you do and encourages you to enjoy every minute of life as it will be better to have more enjoyable moments than miserable ones if you have to relive them for eternity.