f13.net

Mormons get their Holy Undies in a twist:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/03/24/mormons.coffee.ap/index.html (http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/03/24/mormons.coffee.ap/index.html)

I think when a belief system applies for protection with the USPTO, it is pretty clear what it is and what it is not.

I always found it amusing that the lead angel for Mormonism was Moron with an -i added to it.

While I do give organized religions alot of shit for their demands for authority, I still like most of the people who adhere to their various tenants.  I think this quote from South Park sums up the situation best:

Look, maybe us Mormons do believe in crazy stories that make absolutely no sense, and maybe Joseph Smith did make it all up, but I have a great life, and a great family, and I have the Book of Mormon to thank for that. The truth is, I don't care if Joseph Smith made it all up, because what the church teaches now is loving your family, being nice and helping people. And even though people in this town might think that's stupid, I still choose to believe in it. All I ever did was try to be your friend, Stan, but you're so high and mighty you couldn't look past my religion and just be my friend back. You've got a lot of growing up to do, buddy. Suck my balls.

Yeah.. they may all be batshit fucking crazy, but I can't think of a practicing Mormon I've met who I think, "wow that guy's a prick."  I can point you to innumerable practicing Catholics, Baptists, and others, however.  I've always found that a bit odd.. it's got to be a lack of #'s problem.

Hey, if they try and convert you and you resist, they can be pretty damn hateful and spiteful.  I had to pull the other half away from their clutches a few times several years back.  They didn't like me much for it.

Try and get a deal done in Utah if you don't believe, then tell me they aren't the same. Christians just have the noticable "and well hindsighted" history on them, and the Mormons hide their predjuices well.

Isn't OSC a mormon ?  He's a prick.

Yes he is.

Edit: Err... he's a Mormon.

OSC? *blank look*  Who the hell's that?

See, this is why I mention things.. people always come and point out their experiences.  Knew it had to be a lack of exposure.  :-D

Orson Scott Card.

I don't know him personally though and couldn't verify if he is a prick or not.

Ender's Game was not too bad, had to read it in High School. 

I tried to read one of the sequels recently and had a hard time believing the plot.  It seemed rather forced.

Never realized he was a Mormon.

There's only a handful of these shirts left and they are not making any more. You can't buy them online / mail order. So if any of you folks are near Salt Lake City, drop by and pick up some collectors items.

I would love to take all these nice ladies to a coffee shop we have here in Seattle called Coffee Messiah. The entire decore is Jesus and the heavenly host sipping java.

I thought about it when this story was in the Salt Lake Tribune, but then decided I didn't care enough to trek over there.

Oh, and the "I haven't met any asshole mormons" is probably a sample size problem more than anything. There are legions of them here.

(http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y222/Abagadro/moranitw4.jpg)

Read Lost Boys.  He's so much a mormon in that it physically hurts.  It's like when koontz wrote that book about the aliens that turned out to be the rapture.

Fucking people call themselves writers.  Godammit.

On the plus side, Mormonism brought us Battlestar Galactica, at least the original series.  I haven't seen the latest one to know if the religious themes are still there.

Edit:  Check out this teacher being carried out of a high school because he cracked the BYU=Breed 'em Young University joke in class and was fired but refused to leave.

http://www.columbiabasinherald.com/articles/2007/03/22/news/news01.txt (http://www.columbiabasinherald.com/articles/2007/03/22/news/news01.txt)

Oh, they're still there.

The thing that is funniest to me is how Mormons are not supposed to drink coffee.  Next they might offer shirts of the Pope handing out condoms.

I believe it is the caffeine which they oppose.  I had a friend who was raised Mormon until around the age of ten.  He talks about it with alternating bile and incredulous amazement at some of their beliefs and what he has seen with those who stuck with it.

Wait, what ?  Coffee ?  Now it is my turn to ask 'Are you Serious ?'


My mind, she boggles.

I've read a lot of his work since my Mom's a huge fan. Most of his books/series borrow heavily from Mormon themes and a lot of his work just seems to Mormon lore/history wrapped in a fantasy/sci-fi package.  The Ender's series seems to have the least amount of overtness but it pops up all over the place.

I don't really mind when a writer interjects some of their personal beliefs in their work, but at times it can be a little cringe-worthy.  I'd rather they sometimes let the story speak for itself and not have the main character prattle on about his moment of clarity concerning abortion and the destruction of fertilized eggs for use in in-vitro. 

However, I can forgive the guy since he's a huge Firefly/Serenity fan.

Caffeinated beverages are one of those things that fit into the "cultural" not "religious" category. It's pretty strong. But there's no actual prohibition. It's more that it's a tradition that has become associated with the religon, but is entirely unofficial. (Sort of like treating women as chattel or voting Republican.)

Honestly, I'm in the category that any religion that rejects coffee worships a false god.

And yes, OSC is VERY LDS. One of his series is little more than the Book of Mormon rewritten as an SF novel. (And OSC is definitely a better writer than God because his plots are a lot better than God's.) He's also written temple pageants and some other things for the LDS community.

And he's one of the best writers I've ever read, but from my experiences with him on AOL, yeah, he's a major prick with a lot of issues with himself.

The Homecoming Saga is the one that it straight ripped out of the Book of Mormon. I didn't know that when I picked it up after reading the 3 Enders Game books but about 100 pages in I was like "waaaaait a minute..."

The caffeine thing is a bit more than just "cultural" although that is a huge part of it. It is part of the Word of Wisdom that Smith came up with that prohibits, among other things, "hot drinks" which people have come to associate as coffee and tea, and hence caffeine (although bizarrely not hot chocolate). People sorta pick and choose on it though because domestic meat is on there (unless in winter or time of famine) and everyone ignores that and some people go further and say no caffeine in sodas either. You can't get a caffeinated soda on the campus of BYU for instance. Other's don't go that far and it is a bit of running joke how much Diet Coke Mormons around here drink.  It's sort of a sliding scale with some things very, very bad (alcohol, tobacco), some very bad (coffee), some bad (caffeinated soda) and some ignored with variations depending on what community you happen to be in. The running joke is you always take two Mormons fishing with you because if you only take one he will drink all your beer. One of the funnier things was when a colleague and I went to a deposition at the big firm here in town that does most of the legal work for the LDS Church. They asked if we wanted anything and our standard response from pure habit was coffee (which is also standard fare at any deposition as most lawyers will probably attest). We didn't get it and sort of forgot it as we dove into the depo. About 20 minutes later a guy came in with two cups of coffee from 7-Eleven. The incongruity of the glass & marble law firm atmosphere with our gas-station coffee cups was rather amusing.
 
Historically (just like everything else) Smith basically ripped off the Word of Wisdom from the health gurus of the 1830s who were advocating this type of thing such as the guy who invented the Graham Cracker as an anti-masturbation food.

'Treason' was OSC as well, wasn't it ?

That one went well out into la-la land.

I can't even re-read it as an adult before I run screaming.

My version of the bible goes something like this:

Chap 1: Genesis.

1: In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
2: And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
3: And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
4: And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5: And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
6: And seeing that it was now morning God said, Where is the coffee?  And lo, there was coffee and it was hot.

That's about as close as I get to a prayer these days.

I think it was Blackadder that added something like:

"And on the fifth day the Lord created the creeping things that slither across the face of the earth, and the French ate them."

http://www.geocities.com/karenleigh74/frog/caffeine.swf (http://www.geocities.com/karenleigh74/frog/caffeine.swf)

I don't even know where to start with that. Graham crackers are so yummy, but I don't think they could ever replace that empty gnawing that can only be quenched by rubbing one out.

I knew about the Graham Cracker thing too.  Very weird.  Look up the history.  It is all really there!

I had heard about coffee being discouraged not based on caffeine but that it was hot.  I didn't know what to think of it at the time other than, "Well, they believe lots of other crazy stuff, so why not this?"

I was told they will not consume anything that is hotter or colder than room temperature.  Why?  Because the horse thief told them so.

The cold thing is apocryphal. No restrictions on those.

Maybe you're supposed to put them in your pants or something. Those wacky 19th century people.

I'm not a Christian, but I found this list (http://www.irr.org/mit/bombible.html) to be interesting.  I found point 3) to be particularly disturbing.  Are mormons really this entrenched in their racism?   

Like many other religions, LDS had a history of racism. In their case, this was institutionalized in the form of a stricture against anyone with any part "negro blood" being ordained into the Priesthood (which in LDS is really more akin to being confirmed, it's something that virtually all males receive). This was revoked in 1978 when a revelation was given that the practice was to end. One of the strengths of the LDS faith is that it believes that God is still speaking to humanity through the upper levels of the church, which allows them to receive revelations allowing them to change the basic strictures of their faith in response to social changes.

LDS is really not at all unique in holding racist views. Religion was one of the mainstays of racism throughout history and most Christian sects were following the same line of reasoning as the LDS was. For example, peeking at Wikipedia, we find that in 1968 only 11% of SBC churches would allow black members. The Christian Reformed Church in South Africa was also one of the main defenders of apartheid.

I wasn't trying to suggest that they were unique in this view.  I was more surprised by the blatant language of it.  I happen to be in a region where we have a large number of LDS folks.  Many of my students are LDS and I find them to be diligent and quality people.  What continually surprises me is that so many people embrace religion through upbringing or for acceptance and rarely give it any cause for doubt or question.  Personally, faith is something I'm never very comfortable with. 

Christian racism goes as far back as Jews vs. Gentiles. That was part of the reason that the Jews hated Jesus, because he preached to the unclean rabble. It would be no different for a white preacher in the 19th century touring the negro countryside to spread the good news.

There is always a part of the church that thinks of some type of person as "unworthy" of God because of some reason or another. I think the closest we'd find today would be homosexuals.

It's of course completely a coincidence that the 1978 revelation about blacks in the priesthood came when the IRS was investigating revoking their tax exempt status because of the racial discrimination. Good to have a direct line to god in such circumstances as he is obviously concerned with the finances.

DUM DE DUM DUM DUM DUM DUM!

Damnit, that one cost me a keyboard... unless I can somehow remove the diet coke I spit into it while laughing.

Mormonism is a cult. We have two guys that volunteer here now and again (often a different two guys, lots'o'churn). I overheard them talking today about how their priority is to stop this other guy from leaving the cult, even if they have to stay home and keep him from physically leaving.

Wow. Someone's diety is insecure.

Probably didn't occur to anyone at the time, refrigeration not being a common thing in the early 19th century :P

God don't roll with ice.

He's God, he don't need no bling, yo. He created this bitch.

The revelation about polygamy being bad came down right when polygamy had to go as a condition of Utah becoming a state.  I've met Mormons who insist that the change had absolutely nothing to do with that- apparently, it was a coincidence.   :lol:

Smith's revelation about polygamy in the first place happened after he started shacking up with other women who weren't his wife and then backdated ("oh, he just wrote it down in 1843, he had it much earlier"). Lots of coincidences going around that religion.

Seriously.  Once you go through the 7 dinners, get invited, make the vow and get confirmed, you AIN'T getting out except in a box (and that's not even enough as they will baptize you as a corpse).  I can't imagine anything more like a cult than that.

Let it dry out and it'll probably be okay.  One of Diet Coke's most wonderful properties is that it doesn't dry sticky.

That and the crack they put in it.

That shit is disgusting. Diet soda puts a terrible taste in my mouth; barely better than vomit.

I'm absolutely convinced that diet sodas make people fat.

I mean, look around, who do you see drinking diet soda?

Spurious logic aside I do think that the massive intake of artificial sweeteners has some negative effect on the body that probably outweighs the benefit of reduced caloric intake.  I know guys that practically inhale diet soda all day, granted a 1200+ increase in their caloric intake wouldn't be a very good idea if they switched to non-diet drinks but they are NOT healthy looking people.

I tend to drink several cans of diet coke per day, although I gave it up for lent (something which I have not enjoyed much at all).  While I think I'm fine drinking it, I wouldn't like to think what people (women in particular, due to their potentially heightened osteoporosis issues) who do little high-impact exercise but drink a liter a day or more of the stuff are doing to their bone mass with all that phosphoric acid.

Also, I remember turning up in the US once with a bottle of Pepsi Max in my luggage, and my American friends looking at the ingredients and saying "look, this chemical was banned here years ago!".

If you live in America, you'd recognize that most people are not healthy looking.  I especially love going to the doctor for my annual physical and seeing all the fat healthcare givers.  Way to set the bar high!

Yes, I drink diet soda and yes, I'm likely to grow a third arm because of it.  Water is the only thing people should be drinking... we all have our vices.

Remember, even too much water can kill you.

Especially in the lungs.

Hyponatremia and the Wii.  We had that thread already.

So far as I've seen, they also have an amazingly high proportion of smokers.

"Healthy-looking" is pretty broadly defined. I think most people look healthy, unless they are visibly wounded or ill.

Just reading some stuff about the bullshit surrounding the 'obesity epidemic', and I'm in a constant struggle to reject society's conditioning (fat people are bad!). My favorite part is where he makes a connection to the anti-smoking campaigns for the obesity thing. It's the most sensible thing I've heard on the subject, certainly makes more sense than any diet fad.

I've been drinking Diet Coke since I was a skinny kid when it first came out. The biggest I've ever been was Beer Gut. I eat and drink whatever the hell I want, whenever I want. It's genetics and the lack of bingeing (due to depriving my cravings) that keeps me from becoming overweight (and I don't mean in a bullshit BMI way).

You know why so many people are overweight? The $50 billion weight loss industry imo.

What the hell is with the BMI system anyway?  At my height (6'5"), I have to be something like 165lbs to be in the "good" weight range and even now that I'm 195lbs it says I'm obese.  Sure, at 300lbs I was fat and could concede it, but now?  I'm convinced that the whole system was made up just to get people to feel bad about themselves so that they will spend money on something...  Personally, I still eat whatever the hell I want, I just eat in moderation and actually exercise now (gives me an excuse to play video games for 90 minutes a day).  No special Dial-A-Meal plans and special food that changes based on the phase of the moon.

I really can't stand diet anything.  Although diet Dr. Pepper is something I will tolerate when nothing else is around.  I don't rag on anyone for drinking them though - the sheer amount of millitant "DIET ASPARTAME BAD" people I've run into is shocking.

The BMI system is mostly horseshit. I'm supposed to be 160 just to be in normal range for 5'10". I haven't weighed 160 since before I started training for sports in 8th grade. The BMI is based completely on a non-athletic body type, which seems to be "anti-health" to begin with.

Yeah, the BMI is mostly BS. For instance, at my height, my USAF will allow me to weigh up to about 175. I weigh 144 right now, and while I could stand to lose at least 5 lbs, I couldn't get my weight up to 175 if I tried.

I eat what I want, when I want. My exercise is beyond minimal. I'm somehow still within the "normal" range on the BMI chart. I'd have to drop well more than 15 lbs to be "underweight," which I'm not sure I could do either.

...Gogo high metabolism?

Yeah, but it slows down.

I'm fast approaching 33 and the slowing evidence is, er, growing.  I used to be rake thin.  Now I'm 'healthy'.  In six months I'll be my dad.

:(

Yep, 33 or 34 was when I started having to train during the off-season in order to make each August's pre-season training less vomit-strewn, and to avoid going into it carrying 5 or 6 extra pounds.  Until then, it was easy.  Now... well, rather less so.   And, even during the season, I now have to keep more of an eye on what I eat.

It is also horribly noticeable in the number of days it takes for the muscular pain to go: previously Sunday was the sore day.  Now it lasts 'til Monday.

Ah, I'm relieved. I thought its only me.  :-D

No it's part of getting older. At the start of university I was at 75 kg. I'm now at 95 although I do not eat more than 5 years ago. Metabolism slows down as you get older and you don't burn as much calories because you sit around much more in your Office.

Which matches, oh, 80+% of the US population.  Most folks sit on their ass for at least 10 hours a day even IF they work out.  It's much more likely to be 15+ hours of pure sedentary behavior.  The BMI seems more realistically aimed at the current American lifestyle, and how to keep at a healthy weight for it.


Damn.. I forget what city you live in, Sky.  You really notice it when you live in the midwest near or in one of the 'fattest cities.'  I should go around a few malls here in Cinci and get some photos for you.  Hell, I could even just go to work, as the co-worker who started the same time as I both have commented on the very round state of the majority of the staff.   I'm not exaggerating when I say there are 7 women in my dep't of 25 whose weight I'd put down at 195 or better.  The guys are a lot better off, but that's because the 4 who were large have quit or been fired in recent months.  The rest of us are teetering on the "better watch it" brink - including myself.    I'd say we've got 4 people at a 'healthy' weight.

Then you go out and see all the kids.  "Normal" kids in the mall around here would have been called "the fat kid" when I was in school.  My daughter's considered skinny, at a size I would have called normal.   Yes, we're definitely getting fatter as a nation.

I just looked around, and there are 27 people in my office right now: I'd say 4 are overweight to some degree, and two of those are carrying real bulk: not the comedy round stomach look but easily 30 pounds extra.  As a technology department, we're easily the worst in the building.  And at the beginning of the week I was wakling into work with a friend discussing a news item on obesity we'd seen which said that one in three of us in Scotland was clinically obese.  We saw about one in 15 or so.

I think it's really quite tightly focussed, geographically and economicaly, here at least.  If I go to Ayrshire, or Lanarkshire, or one of the sink estates like Blochairn, Muirhouse, Castlemilk or Easterhouse then I see a lot of very overweight people, especially above the age of 40 or so.  But most of the middle-classed office-dwellers I see on my way through central Edinburgh are pretty healthy-looking.  The sedentary lifestyle is to some extent balanced out by education, the money to eat a bit better, and the time and money to play hard in our spare time: we get free gym membership, we have half a dozen sports teams in an office with 160 people etc...

The impression news items from the States give is that it's far less split on class/wealth lines, but I honestly don't see a huge amount of obesity when I go to America, which I do quite a bit.  Am I just missing the real fat states?

Go to a mall in Houston, Texas.  The sheer amount of truly fat people astounded me the last time I was there.

6' and 180 lbs is 30lbs overweight according to BMI.  I think everyone can see how stupid that number is for anyone that's even a little active but we all know that the news is going to look at a set of numbers and interpret them in the absolute most FUD invoking, ad selling method they can.  So the result is that the more active and healthy people are the worse the obesity epidemic gets and the more ad revenue CNN makes.

But if you want to see a high proportion of fatties, Walmart is certainly a good bet.  It must be the 10 lb economy priced bags of snickers.

I suppose that, since I only go to the US for a week or two at a time, I'm missing a lot of places like that.  I've always meant to go to a Walmart: ammo *and* bread is surreal to a tame Euro.


Again, i went to Houston once, but I didn't go to any malls.  Given that the heat and humidity almost killed me, i can see why someone carrying a spare gut might have been sticking to the aircon.

In any case, I take back my blanket statement.  I once went to a steakhouse in Duluth, and couldn't believe the size of my fellow diners, until I saw the dish that offered both chicken and prawns as accompaniments to a steak big enough to bend light.

I was maybe 120 lbs when I graduated high school and I hated how thin I was. I looked like a strong breeze could knock me down. Now I'm 200 lbs and eat less than I did back then, alot less.

So yeah, metabolism slows down as you age. I've gotten to a point where I am seriously considering going to a health food store like General Nutrition and seeing if they have some kind of natural metabolism enhancer that isn't caffeine. (As I age I get more sensitive to caffeine, more than one a day and I'm up til 1am and have to get up at 6am the next day. That doesn't work for me like it did when I was 20.)

That and I'm breaking down and getting a treadmill. I feel like a damned yuppie or something.

I'm seeing quite a bit of the aforementioned bias against big people here. In a lot of cases, there's nothing wrong with being big if that's your bodies' natural size genetically. My family in Mississippi are all huge, even the 'skinny' ones would be considered fat here in NY. Meanwhile, they tend to live well into their 70s, with several into the 90s, healthy as people can be. I'm not completely dismissing that there are health problems that can arise from being heavy, type 2 diabetes in particular. But I think the whole thing is WAY overblown (and I suspect a profit motive from the industry and also a healthy dollop of snobbery).

And the snobbery is what gets me the most. Why is it ok in our politically correct world to make fun of fat people? Why not make fun of people with AIDS? Why not make fun of heroin junkies? If being overweight is indeed a health problem, we should be sympathetic. If it's not we should shut the fuck up and let people look however the hell they want.

You say that as if we don't.

Um.  I do make fun of heroin junkies in the SAME way as I make fun of fat people.  In both cases it's usually a lifestyle choice.

Or a medical condition.  Like Cake-Retention.

I tend to agree. Its not like people run around pricking them with heroin needles and they are magically Heroin junkies all of a sudden.

There are too many conditions that are a good excuse for being fat that you can't make blanket statements about them. But Heroin junkies? Every day of the week.

You're equating heroin, a terrible life-destroying substance that is so horrible that even if you can bear to quit you still think about it nearly every day, that causes vomiting and fever for weeks as withdrawal symptoms, to people overindulging in food?

Also, it's funny to point and laugh at both.

You people make me sad.

It's wrong to mock anyone Sky.  Anyone.  Even if you're attempting to promote changes in behavior, there are much more effective methods.

Drugs are the ultimate overindulgence. At least you need a certain amount of food to survive.

Indulgence, sure. Overindulgence? Not for most people, though it's certainly possible in some cases.

Fair enough, I should have written "Hard Drugs like Heroin". Soft drugs are just an indulgence most of the time. Hell, one of the thing still pissing me off despite being anti-every-possible-druglike-substance personally is the illegality of Weeds.

People would have to give up the high that comes with self-righteousness if they stopped mocking others.  I know I'm a judgment junkie.  But I'm trying to temper my cynicism with compassion these days.  Somedays I'm Buddha; others, I'm King Prick.

Its only a high if you don't have to pay for it. It stops being funny when your health care system has to pick up the bill!

Especially in Ohio... Case in point. http://direct.where2getit.com/cwc/apps/w2gi.php?template=state&client=bww&STATE=OH&map=default_shadow_names&FullStateName=Ohio (http://direct.where2getit.com/cwc/apps/w2gi.php?template=state&client=bww&STATE=OH&map=default_shadow_names&FullStateName=Ohio)

I don't go to the mall often, but I can vouch for this.

95 degrees and 90% humidity is nice around here. :evil:

For any interested, the CDC has posted a report on the economic consequences of obesity in the US. (http://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpa/obesity/economic_consequences.htm)  Unhealthy lifestyles of all types cost everyone. 

 

Do you really want to base legislation on whether things incur a health care cost in some situations? It'd be a shitty world, then.

I'm also calling bullshit on that CDC report. Vague as hell, and the CDC is a fairly shady organization anyway. Not as bad as the FDA, but close.

Well, if you can attribute the rising rates of heart disease and type II diabetes to something else, I'm all ears.  I work in healthcare.

Nah, I want increased health care rates for people who deliberately play hazard with their own health just for fun. Then they can pay for each others cancer and heart failures. Just like I have an additional insurance for the risks I take while biking.

Perhaps I take for granted what I see on a daily basis.  Lifestyles in this country are out of control and it's obvious to anyone that currently works in pediatrics.  With the passage of the prescription drug bill, the costs to taxpayers for sedentary lifestyles are staggering.  It's quite commonplace to see adults in their 40's and 50's to be on 10-15 concurrent medications, many of which could be eliminated had the patient maintained proper diet and exercise over the course of their life.  If you'd like some examples, I'll be happy to provide them.  The evidence is far beyond anecdotal in this country. 

I'm 100% in agreement with you on this subject, but if you have some that aren't too much trouble I'd be interested in seeing them.

It's easy to make fun of fatties because, 99% of the time, they could eliminate the problem by Not Eating So God Damned Much.

Seriously. Believe it or not, but the PA/South NJ/North Delaware tri-state area has quite a high percentage of fatties. This is anecdotal, of course.

And you know why they're fat? Cause they eat like fatties. It's embarrassing. I probably eat a lot...when I eat. I eat Maybe twice a day, and the kind of food we have around at home is...well, I'm told it's different than what most households stock. Not much "instant" stuff at all, which is partially why I don't eat so much (I hate to cook).

People just eat Way Too Much.

99% of the time, assholes could elimiate their problem by not talking.  Hasn't slowed you down either.

Here's a medications list for patient in their 50's suffering from heart disease that I ran across yesterday. 

Toprol XL (metoprolol succinate) 50mg qday

Lipitor (atorvastatin) 80mg qday

ASA 325mg qday

Plavix (clopidogrel) 75mg qday

Lisinopril 10mg qday

Digoxin 0.125mg qday

Spiriva (tiotroprium) 1 puff qday

Advair (salmeterol / fluticasone) 250/50 1 puff BID

Albuterol MDI 1 puff q4 hours PRN

Zoloft (sertraline) 100mg qday

Ultram (tramadol) 50mg q4 hours PRN

This is not all that uncommon and I can think of several other medications that could easily be added (for diabetes etc.). 

Yes and no. There are some people who that is the case for, like my girlfriend's 400 pound room mate. That fat bitch eats an entire bag of chicken nuggets in a meal. I'm talking those Tyson bags you buy at Walmart or wherever. They last me for a couple of months usually, maybe one meal or two a week for my girlfriend and I both.

Now...I weigh 200 pounds and am about 5'9". I'm overweight but not morbidly obese. I eat 2 meals a day, soup for lunch (sometimes with a small bag of potato chips), I drink 1 can of Diet Dr Pepper per day, otherwise it's water or grape juice for my fluid intake. For dinner I usually have some kind of a meat and green stuff, like maybe peas and a baked chicken breast.

The only time I have lost any weight was when I was very ill and had stuff coming out of both ends. Then I lost about 10 pounds in a week.

I think my problem is similar to many, it's not my eating that is killing me it is my lack of exercise. I'm going to be moving a treadmill into my house that used to belong to a relative in hopes that this will help things.

Hur, I didn't say I did. Honestly, I don't give a shit, because not only is it not my problem, but for most people, it's a problem with an easy, realistic solution. Seriously, most people can tell if they're overweight or whatever. It should be easy enough for them to change their diet, at the very least.

All the boohooing in this country over obesity is retarded. Far too many people think it's not their fault.

Yes, that probably is the case for a good portion of overweight people. It's just the crying about it that gets to me. The lack of self-responsibility. And the tendency for so many people to insist there's "omg so much more to it" than diet and exercise.

Yes, I suppose genetics Can play a part in the equation, but it is only a part. And how many people actually know that they have a genetic disposition to carry weight, compared to the number of people who just have...unhealthy lifestyles.

Sorry.  Didn't realize fattie was a term of endearment.


It is entirely within their power.  People are still overweight, almost none of them want to be, and there is a social cost to bear as a result.  It's not "boohooing" to say that there is a social problem, or to say that it's improper to tease or insult them. 

But it is "boohooing" when so many people refuse to accept responsibility. Instead, far too many people come up with excuses and blame some other entity.

McDonald's doesn't make anyone fat. People choosing to eat at McDonald's makes those people fat. Most people, whether they want to or not, choose to be that way through their actions, or lack thereof.

Fuck Fatties.

Fuck them.

I hope they die running away from something that they can't possibly outrun.

Fuckers.

It doesn't. You would have to use the treadmill as well. Moving it around doesn't burn that many calories.

Spot on!  It's the old equation of eating less calories than you exercise: the only diet plan endorsed by the first law of thermodynamics.

I forget the exact figure, but I think it is c.3500 calories less consumed than burnt will cause a weight-loss of one pound.  If you eat 2000 calories in a day but burn 2500 - a pretty painless rate - you lose a pound a week.  Fifty pounds a year with what amounts to light exercise and enough calories to stuff yourself silly with healthy foods.  It's really do-able.

I don't know...ours weighs a couple of hundred pounds easy. It is not a trivial workout to mandhandle that bastard around.

And something you never thought you would hear someone say.

"Yea, but your's is a monster sized one."

Thank god we cut that tree down last week so you will quit peeping in our windows now.

I take that -- 2.5mg a day. It's fucking dirt cheap, though. (Just started a few months ago. My blood pressure has stayed at 130/85 for 10 years. When I was 220, when I was 320, when I was doing heavy exercise three times a week, when I was doing none -- didn't budge an inch.). That shit is great -- I went down to something like 115/70. Hell, it was that high back when I was in high-school and technically "healthy". Weirdest thing? Not a fucking bit of family history of hypertension. Nada. Zilch. (And for the record -- blood sugar, cholestrol, thyroid, heartrate -- all just dandy.)

It'd odd that he finally put me on it (at 31) after I lost 20% of my body-weight (I'm down to 260 now, and have stayed there for about a year. Given I simply don't have time for exercise and did that by changing eating habits two or three years ago, I'm pretty proud of that. Exercise comes after my Master's. Work + Master's Degree == no fucking time). Losing 20% of your weight in two years is far better than most people do.

My 'ideal weight' is supposedly between 150 and 190 -- which is fucking bullshit of the highest order. When I was at my healthiest (post-high school), I was 225 -- I could have lost maybe another 20 pounds. I was doing heavy aerobic exercise three times a week, I had visible ab muscles (that was a shock to me), and it wasn't like I was bulking out for weightlifting. I wasn't doing any weight training. I don't see how I could possibly have lost enough weight to get down to below 190 and be "healthy". I'd be a fucking twig at 150. I was skinny as shit in High School and weighed 180 -- I did middle distance swimming, so it wasn't like I was unathletic.

I don't buy into the BMI indicators -- they're bullshit. A healthy weight for me is about 230, not 190. And hopefully I'll hit it next year.

As for the rest of the medicine list -- is she taking the zoloft because she's depressed she's fat, or were you just listing all medications regardless of whether they're related to obesity? (Even linsporil isn't necessarily related to obesity -- obesity is just a common trigger for hypertension. I had it when I was at my ideal weight, and I have it now.)

(http://www.garnersclassics.com/pics/animal/ladder2.jpg)

(http://www.garnersclassics.com/pics/animal/ladder.jpg)

I work in IT but I can't tell you why your SQL is returning garbage :P

Above I admit the link to type 2 diabetes. I've seen conflicting evidence on the heart disease front. Surely heart failure if one is /really/ obese and partaking in vigorous activity, but that could happen to any sedentary person. The strongest evidence I've seen has pointed to genetic disorders over weight. We don't go pointing at skinny people who develop heart disease and say they need to eat more and exercise less.

I should mention my best friend is truly (non-BMI) obese genetically and is one of the baddest assest workers I've ever met. We've built roofs, done landscaping, moving, food service, a lot of physically demanding stuff. I brought him in when I was managing the walmart docks, he was by far the fastest and hardest worker we had. So anyone who talks about 'fatties' just being lazy and gluttonous can eat my shorts.

And to reiterate on BMI - it's complete nonsense. When I was unloading trucks I weighed 175 at 5'11", which is borderline overweight. I was solid sinewy muscle, so skinny everyone thought I should see a doctor, I ate massive meals and was always eating snacks because my metabolism was ridiculously high. The 'food pyramid' is bought and fucking sold by special interest, as is the CDC and the FDA.

Sorry this is disjointed, it's 15 minutes past quitting time, gotta go.

Nebu, I think part of the problem with that patient's list of prescriptions you mentioned is the overuse of pharmaceutical marketing. The marketing subtly tells people "FIX ALL YOUR PROBLEMS WITH THESE WONDER PILLS!" They don't actually cure much of shit, they string the symptoms along or claim to give you a better chance of not getting something. But really... lipitor? Do we need that shit? Is altering diet not enough to get cholestorl down quickly enough that you have to supplement it with pills? Unless you tell me this person was 400 pounds or on the absolute any-minute verge of a heart attack, why does this person need it? And Ultram? That shit is strong opiate pain mojo. With all those meds? Fuck, I'm surprised the person hasn't had an Elvis death on the toilet.

Yeah, this one weighs about the same. It's old like...mid 90's old.

Again, BMI is aimed at folks with a sedentary lifestyle.  SITTING ON YOUR ASS.. AKA, very little muscle.    It's a cop-out easy-solution way to tell fatasses, hey, jackass, you're too fat.  People with muscle mass enough to be above and beyond the BMI crap should, I would think, have the knowledge of what's appropriate for their size. 

But then, some folks you don't believe that there's an Energy crisis, either. Or that the magic sky person will gift scientists with a way of miraculously creating energy from nothing, to fix it 'just in time!' so why is this surprising.

Many obese people also suffer familial hypercholesterolemia so an HMG CoA reductase inhibitor does do them some good. 

The main reson for the pharmaceutical problem is that people want that shit.  The beta blockers, calcium channel blockers, diuretics, and anticoags all make sense.  Much of the rest is a judgement call.  I'll tell you that hospital administrators want come back business, so giving the patient what they want is one of the severe downfalls in our fucked up healthcare system. 

You don't have to be a genius to realize that obesity is a serious issue in the US and is doing a great deal to drive up healthcare costs.  You can't have a BMI over 35 and consider yourself healthy no matter how long you live.  Just look at the BMI averages per state over the past 20 years.  They correlate quite nicely with heart disease, diabetes, and the newest piece of medical garbage: metabolic syndrome (which I think is a buzzword for more pharmaceutical nonsense).

I agree with you Haemish.  I think people are popping way more pills than they should ... and I train pharmacists and MD's.  Americans are way more focused on short-term fixes than they are preventative medicine.  I advocate a healthy lifestyle and I also walk-the-walk.     

I'm still riding a super hyper fast metabolism at 25 (I could eat nothing but packages of oreos for a week and not rise about 180, I am 5" 10", I hover around 170-175).  This thread reminds me I have to start exercising before it conks out  :-P

There's a large difference in giving fat people a reality check and actively verbally assaulting them.

The reason it's easy to make fun of fat people is because it's a condition stemmed mostly from laziness. People can love to eat and be fine if they move around. Hell, swimmers I knew in college could destroy all-u-can eat places like packs of ravenous locusts. The problem in America is the whole "This is how I am and you're an asshole if you tell me it's wrong" mentality we spoonfeed to kids today, in between spoonfeeding them massive amounts of sugar.

Oh and the whole fatness genetic thing is mostly crap. "Oh my mom and dad were fat, so that's why I'm fat." No, you're fat because your mom and dad overfed you and themselves, and they never led by example for you to get off your ass.

Heh, they usually come with wheels attached. Oddly enough, I find them easier to move around Before being unpacked.


 :-D

I agree with personal responsibility.  Very much so, and not just on this issue (most of the issues I get criticized here for are with regards to feeling people need to be accountable for their own actions).  I think that damn near any activity that inflicts self-harm in this manner is a bad idea.  You have the responsibility to take care of yourself, for your own sake as well as society's sake (loved ones watching you suffer resulting health issues, greater society having to foot the bill, etc).  

But personal responsibility has nothing to do with insults or jokes at their expense.  And at least overweight people aren't intentionally trying to be harmful to someone else by their bad habbits.

You are all ridiculous and can piss right off.  Fatties are jolly.  And snuggly!  Snuggle a fattiy today! 

Dammit.

Just more of them to love!

Btw, I love the numerous directions this thread has taken. It's like a rollercoaster ride of complete nonsense.

A lot of mormons are fat. Utah has the highest per capita consumption of ice cream in the U.S.

That and anti-depressants.




/bringing it full circle

And global warming corresponds to the decrease in the amount of pirates and ninjas.

My trouble with the "poor guy, he has a slow metabolism" or "lucky me, I just have a fast metabolism" is that if James and John do the same amount of exercise, and James can eat 20% more food because of his "fast metabolism", then he should be glowing red with heat.  The energy has to go somewhere, after all.

I would find it easier to buy if he had a "poor metabolism".  That is, if he just wasn't very good at digesting food and extracting te relevant fats and sugars.

While correlation isn't causation, sometimes what appears to be causation really is.  It's easy to bring up the "global warming vs. pirates" canard about correlation vs. causation, but do you honestly think that the BMI average increase is completely unrelated to the increase in diabetes, heart disease and other ailments that are often linked to unhealthy lifestyles?

to the steroids and other crap they've been injecting into meat animals to make them grow leaner/quicker/more profitably?

The shit we are eating now is NOT the shit we were eating 20 years ago. I shudder to fucking think what they've been pumping into the cows in my hamburger to get them to be more profitable crops. Because it isn't just the meat, it's the milk that I drink which also makes the cheese that I eat with the hamburger. I fully expect to grow a third arm out of my taint before it's all said and done.

If there's something you'd like to discuss, I'll be happy to do my best to provide case-based evidence.  If the point you're trying to make is that every study has weaknesses, I can't really argue with that.  It's one of the reasons that it took so long to convince cigarette manufacturers that their product causes cancer or convincing politicians that the planet is suffering from global warming.  

I'd cite processed foods and a more sedentary lifestyle as being a greater contributor.  If you look at portion sizes and ingredient lists on today's foods you'll see more fat, more bad sugars (high fructose corn syrup), and generally higher calories.  Take a look at any fast food menu... people eat less fiber and more crap than they did 50 years ago because it's convenient and tasty to do so.  It's also sad to discover how few people take the time to prepare balanced meals today.  The small time investment can make a huge difference in the quality of calories you take in.  The old addage: "you are what you eat" may not be 100% correct, but it's not a bad generalization.  Even the new "Low fat" fad foods aren't really any better than the old alternatives.  They replace natural fats with highly processed carbs and seldom have fewer calories. 

Take in what you burn and your weight remains the same.  Take in fewer calories than your BMR and you lose weight.  It's pretty simple.  Lifting weights can be for more than just a vanity issue.  One reason I do it is because more muscle mass increases my basal metabolic rate meaning I can enjoy more of the foods that I like without any concern of gaining in BMI.

 

I think the biggest problem is children. We're entering into a generation of kids who have lower life expectancies than their parents.

Childhood Obesity Statistics. (http://www.obesity.org/subs/childhood/prevention.shtml)

Here's the most shocking one to me:

- When asked to describe their weight, 30 percent of students thought of themselves as overweight.
- 12 percent of parents considered their child overweight.

Yeah, ponder where the breakdown is happening there.

One thing we did with our son is teach him to eat right -- but we're running into problems there because he frets about how other kids see him, and because he's got a large frame and most of the kids in his class are the lean types, he feels fat. (The kid isn't packing anything but the smidge of baby-fat any pre-pubescent kid has. He's just built like a brick -- solid frame. Our doctor, who is a real hard-ass about overweight kids, has happily noted that our kid is exactly where he should be). So we're trying to make sure he learns healthy eating habits BUT that it doesn't feed into a negative self-image.

On the bright side, there really is a much better selection of healthy kids food than their used to be, if you look.

Want to know a great weight-loss tip? Buy an electric kettle. Switched my breakfast to oatmeal because it takes about 60 seconds to make, and it's damn good for you. Beats most breakfast options.

OATMEAL IS THE BEST THING IN THE WORLD FOR YOU!  EAT OATMEAL EVERY DAY!

I say that all the time.

Yes, it is a proven fact that eating a healthy breakfast will in fact help you lose weight. The problem is that a lot of people here "Eat Breakfast" and they get a Crossanwich.

My perfect breakfast:

Two eggs (scrambled no butter), small bowl of oatmeal with berries and Splenda, Half-grapefruit with Splenda, Glass of 2% milk, 1/2 Decaf/regular Coffee. If that don't get your morning going, nothing will.

I actually try not to eat breakfast; it tends to put me right back to sleep.

I actually had a problem late in high school where I actually had to avoid lunch when I could, because I would end up crashing during my lab period.

Going back and trying to read notes you tried to write while falling asleep is never fun.

How? I'm genuinely curious. I skip breakfast so wonder if I'm making a mistake.

Theory is if you skip breakfast you're more apt to snack during the rest of the day.  Snacking is the devil.

Skipping breakfast is a mistake of BIBLICAL proportions. It's moroni.

I've heard that skipping breakfast is a crappy idea if you're trying for a good diet, or losing weight.

As for snacks -- if you are a snacker, best thing you can do is find healthy things to snack on.

In addition to the snacks issue, you're shutting down your metabolism for a very extended period.  If the last time you eat is around 8 or 9 at night, then you aren't eating again until noonish (or later for those type-a "Lunch puts me behind schedule!" folks) you're talking 16 hours where your body isn't stoking itself to burn fuel.    Then you also tend to gorge yourself at the few meals you DO have, because you know you won't be eating again for a while.

The idea is smaller meals more frequently, not infrequent large meals.

Sleep is also a good way of helping to lose weight.  Min. 8 hours a day, but I cheat on that quite a lot and only get 6.

Interesting. I don't eat breakfast and often go all the way to 3, 4 or even 5 o'clock before I eat a full meal. Must be why I have this huge boiler.

No. The important word being 'completely'. Obviously you can't lay in bed all day eating fats and sugars and expect to be healthy. I think it's highly over-rated and the real culprit is a complex mix of diet and exercise and especially genetics and environment. Stress, depression, healthcare, social standing, poverty level, stuff like that.
Let's not go there. The question isn't 'is global warming real'? We're coming out of an ice age, what is occuring is inevitable. The question is the impact of man, and whether we should fuck with nature even further to 'fix' the 'problem'. Most of the global warming fear-mongering I've seen comes from a mindset that feels the earth should be a constant state, when it is anything but. The town I live in was buried under a mile of ice at one point, and before that was at the bottom of the sea. Hey, don't buy land in areas that could be submerged, buried by lava, or dried out like the Sahara has been (notice no global panic about the spread of the Sahara).

I do agree with the post after the one I quoted, for the most part :) The food industry is an odd one. We try to keep stuff like high fructose corn syrup completely out of our diet. My girlfriend's mother was a nurse specializing in nutrition (school nurse), so between her knowledge and my love of whole foods, we make a pretty good team. Balanced whole food meals most nights. But realistically, for a lot of people that's a luxury they can't afford.

On breakfast: I like breakfast and ideally I'd eat one every day. But I'm a night owl and barely get up in time for work, so my breakfast is a banana at the desk. Slice of pizza for lunch, then the aforementioned meal for dinner. Rarely snack, but I've gotten back into the habit of having popcorn while I read myself to sleep lately. Not having a sweet tooth does wonders, I only ate lots of snacks when I was unloading trucks for the cheap energy to burn. This is enough to maintain a trim shape with my old exercise routine, since my office moved downstairs (cutting out about 30-40 trips up and down 4 stories worth of stairs daily), I've developed a bit of a Beer Gut. Thinking of moving the office back upstairs :P

Back for a second to the topic of healthy fat people, one thing to consider about genetic body-typing is that going outside your natural body-type is very stressful on the system, which can also lead to illness (I'm very anti-stress, I think that's the root of so many health problems). And the absolute worse thing you can do is yo-yo, which most heavy people I know that try to diet and exercise into a new bodyshape tend to do.

Let's see if I can help.  

1) Breakfast gets your metabolism going after 8h of time off.  That's one of the greatest benefits.  It also replenishes glucose levels after the fast caused during sleep.

2) Eating 6 small meals a day is better than eating 3 large meals, especially when combined with a regular exercise regiment.  Studies have shown that 6 small meals regulate blood glucose leves meaning fewer moments of high/low blood sugar.

3) Never eat within an hour or two of bedtime.

4) Starving yourself will alter normal metabolism.  If your body suspects you're in a phase of low calorie intake it will actually take steps to lower your BMR.  The more successful diets incorporate not only a balance in calorie types, but will also strive to only decrease caloric intake by a small percentage to avoid this from happening.  Most successful diets will produce a weight loss of 1-3 lbs per week for this reason.  

5) Muscle weighs more than fat.  It's far more important to have a healthy BMI than it is to weigh a certain amount.  Every year my doc tells me that I need to lose weight because at 6' and 203 lbs I'm off the chart.  When he realizes that I'm about 8% body fat, he usually corrects his statement.  There is no "correct" weight for a person, only a healthy BMI range.

I think we have a difference in definition going on here.  If you're BMI is high, you stand a greater risk of having many physiologic issues (high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, etc.).  Notice that I highlighted the word "risk".  It's certainly possible for people to live long and healthy lives while maintaining a high BMI, it just defies the odds.  An example would be any of the many smokers that live well into their 80's and beyond.  I'm still waiting for you to come out and state a clear position though.  Are you stating here that obesity is independant of the factors mentioned or are you just making a case that there are exceptions.  We all agree there are exceptions, so that's not really a case that requires strong backing.

Second, I don't think I've done anything to mock or belittle the obese in this or any thread.  If I have, I apologize. I don't think there's anything wrong with my wanting people to treat their bodies better.  It's not like I'm forcing anyone to do what I ask, I'm merely suggesting that a healthy lifestyle carries many documented benefits.  I think I have strong evidence to support that assertion. 

 

My point in this, and I think Sky's is the same as your point 5 above.

You can be healthy and fit and be completely off the BMI chart.  The BMI chart though is what is being used to provide evidence for an obesity epidemic.  The BMI stuff really needs to be cross indexed with body fat % to give any kind of meaning full data and it's just not used that way.

You're correct and I should have been more specific earlier.  Body fat % is a much more accurate indicator than BMI is.  The problem is that caliper tests are woefully inaccurate leaving immersion as the best method for measuring this.  I doubt many non-athletes have even had this test done. 

I'll be opening a new store called "Give your fat to me!" -- it's easy.. we transfer fat from you to me for a nominal cost so that we can both live normal lives.

It has been awhile, but the last time I looked into what made the BMI tick was pure statistics.  They basically take all the deaths and look at their weight and height.  They found that people live longer on average when they weigh less.  That's it.  Nothing more technical than that.

It doesn't take into account your muscle mass, your lifestyle, your race, your life quality.  You could be a 90 year old man weighing 132 lbs. at 6'0" for the last 30 years of your life not able to hardly lift a pencil, but when you die the BMI will state, "See he lived for a long time and he was very light!"

The BMI is very misleading, but as with any public information they keep it dumb because most people just want to be told what to do.  The reasoning behind it is unnecessary to them.  Tell them a goal and they'll fast and exercise towards it without question.

That gets a lot of people into trouble.  Body fat percentage is a much better guide.  Use it if you need to.  To me, it is about life quality.  If you feel that you are missing out on things in life that you wished you could do because of your weight/health, then work on fixing that.  It is about enjoying the life you have while you have it.

I'm not going to starve myself everyday to look like a skeleton and miss out on activities because I'm always busy working out (my brother-in-law is like this now.)  I'm not going to do that just so I can stay in the nursing home an extra 5 years at the end of my life.  Is that really my reward?!  I figure if I keep my body in a shape that pleases myself and my wife and allows me to play with my kids to my fullest, I'm doing well.  If I can keep my bloodwork in the "AOK" range so I don't run into any early life disasters, I'm doing great.

I'd rather live this way to 70 than live like the BMI wants me to so I can reach 80.  I eat modestly and excercise around 8-10 hours a week.  I'm satisfied with that schedule and with my health as it is.

BMI is being used in some public schools (in Arkansas?) to track childhood obesity. In this case I think it's a very effective tool because children don't have a huge range of bone densities and muscle mass like adults do. The main problem with using it as an adult is that most people use the cheat-calculator by just dividing their weight by height and multiply by some number instead of measuring everything you're supposed to, like wrist circumference, forearm length, etc. to account for one's frame. I weigh more than many women my height and dress size but I have a pretty Teutonic build, and will always be heavier than I look. If I stay within my healthy BMI range, I tend to look a bit thinner than others with the same BMI because I have more muscle and thicker bones.

But yeah, body fat % is most effective, it's just more time consuming to take a Vernier caliper to 5 different body parts than to do simple math.


Naw, people just get a gastric band so they don't hafta to get off their fat asses and actually move. And they only even do that when a doctor says "if you don't lose weight you will die".

We'll see what you think when you're 70.  I watched my father die last year from right side heart failure due mostly to a life of smoking, poor diet, and a lack of exercise.  He wasn't content at all with the decisions he had made.  I'm certain that, barring a tragedy, he would have lived at least another 5-10 years had he taken even slightly better care of himself.   

Edit: You sound like you lead a healthy life so I wasn't really directing this at you so much as the statement itself.  I hear the same thing from many people and it's just plain untrue for the majority of them.  It's my opinion that most Americans could do a lot to improve their quality of life just by cutting back a tiny bit and learning to get some exercise at least 3x a week.  Seems like an investment in the future rather than a major lifestyle change. 

The problem is that exercise for its own sake, for some people, can be really, really boring.

It is for me. I hate the gym. Fortunately, I love rock climbing.

What are you saying here? Personal health isn't supposed to be a dance around the Maypole. Cutting a television show out of your day to move off your ass, and eating one less fast food meal a week isn't asking a lot to add another 5 years to your life. Hell, just walk. Doctors are actually having to convince Americans just to use their legs. It's embarrassing.

There's all kinds of activities that get you the required amount of exercise.  If you find ALL of them boring, well then crap, your genes were flawed and needed to be expunged.

Hell, even working out in your yard for an hour or three is more exercise than some folks get in a year.

Hell yeah it is.  That's why I game for one hour while I ride the stationary bike for 16 miles.  Passes the time and I don't feel so bad about grinding since I'm technically multi-tasking and helping my heart\weight out at the same time.

I never imagined you being built like that. Good job, man :).

I'm the same weight as you, but 4" taller. Not sure about body fat %, but I'm working on losing about 10-15 lbs of it. Getting soft around the edges. From there, I'll reshape a bit, but I don't care to get bigger. I'd like to remain skinny, but muscular. Heh, if I had an ultimate goal, it'd be Bruce Lee -- But I don't how the hell he did that.

Maybe I'm a bit of a hedonist, but if there's something that I really don't want to do, and I don't have a compelling reason to do it...chances are that I won't.

Like weightlifting. Yeah, I get that some people get some kind of enjoyment out of it. Bores me to tears, so until I have a reason to do it, I won't. And walk? Walk where, around the block? Pass (and don't you dare say walk to...anywhere; there's nowhere to walk to). I'd rather pass the time by...well, suffice to say I'd rather do absolutely nothing. I'm stubborn like that.

Maybe you guys are different I suppose....I've always been athletic, but never an athlete; organized sports were far too much of a bother to deal with (though to be fair, none of my schools ever had a hockey team, so I guess I'm being a bit disingenuous with that statement).

There's only one reason people go to the gym:

They want to look good naked.

I think it's an admirable reason.

Maintaining yourself should be good enough reason. Your body is a machine, and the only thing you truly own at that. If you don't care to keep it in at least workable shape, then you're worse than a guy who buys an Enzo and uses it as a porta-potty.

No one says you have to be perfect or anything, but just plain fucking movement should be something you should aspire to at the very least. Very few are going to reach the peak of physical fitness (at least I know it's something I fail at). We all have something to work on. But I find it sickening that someone can't even mentally want it. That's just a terrible attitude.


[EDIT] Must. Appeal. To. Strazos'. Inner. Spartan.

Dancing around a Maypole isn't exactly a dance around the Maypole either.  That sort of thing used to be how I got the majority of my aerobic exercise, until I fucked up my knee doing it.   :-P  I've gained about ten pounds since then.  Sucks.

Apathy is easy.

Also:

Incidentally, that time is, hopefully, fast approaching. A few months at the most. But that's beside the point. Point being:


I won't care until given a reason to do so. Sorry.

EDIT: And in a sorry attempt to put this thread back towards the original topic, I could say the exact same thing about religion.

Just the simple fact that you even have a body is reason enough.

Stray, you should know better by now than to get riled up when Straz says silly things.  It's what he does.

No, the one god reason is:

They want to look like they would look good naked.

By the time it's verified or disproved, the hard part is over (fnarr, snurk...).

Funny thing about both: by the time you have 'a reason' it's too late, the damage has been done.

At least with Voltaire's precautionary principle, both of their negative outcomes are easily avoided, at little cost, by keeping on the safe side and taking some care.

Not to be disrespectful or anything but yeah, 70 is about right for me. Honestly, I've seen old men and women, and some, like my grandmother are very healthy and active. Some like my other grandmother are feebly holding on to what little is left to them. I'd rather die suddenly of a heart attack at 70 than be feeble and in pain at 80 and asking God to kill me. (which if he exists, he won't because of my attitude at my current age.)

I basically live by the whole Dennis Leary ideal "Smoking takes ten years off your life. Well it's the ten worst years, isn't it folks? It's the ones at the end! It's the wheelchair, kidney dialysis, adult diaper fucking years. You can have those years! We don't want 'em, alright?"

While he was being a smart ass and talking about cigarettes it is pretty much my view. Now, I'm trying to lose weight and exercise but not so I'll live 10 more years, but so that the years I'm living now will be better.

Well, what I meant was being healthy and having a good quality of life to 70 rather than being really skinny, weak, and on years of bedrest until 80.  If I die at 70 while still healthy and active, I'll be happy with that.

My goal is to be healthy right up to the point I die.  I believe it is entirely possible and an admirable way to exit this world.  Yes, dieing in the hospital like your father did (no disrespect intended,) is not my idea of the best, but I avoid all those things he did too for that reason.

My only vice is drinking beer and I only do that to the level that actually is reported to be healthy.  Very moderate.  I only drink "good" beer or my own homebrew (which can be good.)  So that keeps my consumption to a minimum from cost and slow production (homebrew.)  :-D  

Moderate for me = 1 12 oz. bottle per night on average.

8 to 12 hours a day of intermittent bursts of intense physical activity would be my guess.

You mean the mysterious dying and becoming his own conspiracy theory ?  That's a hell of a goal.

Trouble is, most people don't die of nothing.  You stil get the shitty years of ill-health where you and the world know you're dying.  If your lifestyle is crap then you just get them ten years earlier.  Don't exercise?  Eat crappy food?  Be a lardass?  Sure, but it just means you get late-onset diabetes earlier.  Or you have trouble walking up hills without taking a dozen stops a decade earlier than it would have been otherwise.  And I'll bet by then you're a bit less keen to have God strike you down with a heart-attack tomorrow than you are to have it happen a couple of decades later.

You want exercise? Get a big-ass inside dog, like my Snow Beast. Either you'll live in a shitpiled, pee-infested warren, or you'll get a half-mile worth of walking a day taking the beast out. It's fun for everyone and gets your heart pumping. The heart pumping may be from fear that this monster of a dog will drag you under the wheels of a passing semi, but still, the blood is GOING.

Well, I think a quote from my own post pretty much sums it up:


Which is somewhat what you're talking about anyway. I may just be cynical. Men in my family rarely make it past 65. My dad jokes it's the stress caused by the women in the family that kills them.

Too right.  I got two border collies.  If I ever stop doing several miles a day (and up to 20 or so on weekend days when I can) with them they'll stop being delightful, obedient hounds and become hyper, neurotic bundles of unused energy.

Edit: Riggs, that's true enough and a good motivation: it was more the Leary bit that I thought was thoughtless bravado (on his part).

Another easy way to get exercise without exercising at a gym is stairs. I really want at least a two-story house (the stairs to my room as a kid were basically a ladder), don't take the elevator, get an upstairs office if you can (I've added about 15lbs since I moved down here :( ).

Apparently (from what I can tell), he had an "every other day" weight training routine, and just incorporated cardio-vascular during martials arts training on the other days.

He seemed to be pretty intense about curls and situps though. Heh.



[EDIT] It's that cobra like physique that I find awesome though. Seems like his back and laterals were some of the few areas where he really tried to bulk up. Without them, he'd probably look like any other slim, well toned athelete.

(http://www.mikementzer.com/images/lee2.jpg)

I got tired of looking at the fat one staring back in the mirror at me.  When you can't see your toes easily and the belly button just kinda vanishes one day, you tend to take it seriously.  300lbs and getting winded going up the stairs?  Not for me anymore.  Having my video games at the exercise station just makes it that much more enjoyable.  It's almost like a job at times, but I enjoy the results (none of my old pants fit anymore, went down to a 30" waist from a 38").

Everyone has to find their own motivation.  I had several reasons for doing it, one of which is shared above.  It's up to you to determine whether you want it or not.  No judgement here on whether you should or not.

That Bruce post was my motivation when I was really into working out. I was wicked wiry, couldn't gain muscle mass, so I concentrated on my back (which got a lot of work as I unloaded trucks anyway), for that 'cobra effect'. It was cool.

For me now, it's just a question of finding time. When I was single and not playing guitar, I had plenty of free time to work out. Now it's tough to find time to enjoy my hobbies at all.

Bruce Lee thinks you're all wankers.

I go to the gym for two main reasons.  I'd like to postpone the heart attack for as long as possible, and it gives me a reason to stare into space and evacuate my brain for 30-60 minutes.

I wish I could do that.  When I'm playing rugby or football or the like then time fies: I can easily burn 800+ calories in 80 minutes and never be bored.  I hate the gym: even though I'm burning roughly the same number of calories, it seems hard, because I am so very, very bored.  iPod, television, nothing helps.  When I'm out walking in the mountains, my mind is clear and I can go for an hour without considering how steep the hill is.  Running machines just seem calculated to stop me thinking about anything but when I can do something else.  I envy you.

I second Endie's entire response.

If you have the choice, I recommend getting a part-time job working outdoors doing something physical. I caddy at a golf course 3-4 times a week and basically get paid good money to work out. Carrying two bags for 5 miles does wonders for you phsyique.

A couple years ago I tried to work part-time at my old job unloading trucks at walmart. They wouldn't let me, despite the fact they had to replace my crew with more than twice as many guys. I lol'd. I just wanted to do the first half of the shift where I was in the truck doing the heavy lifting, and skip out when they got to stocking shelves and sorting the backstock.

Ah, well. I'll get more sleep this way.

Man this thread turned around....

Orson Scott Card doesn't/didn't just write religious themed novels. His early short stories (before Ender's) were pretty much all pure horror/sci-fi, and for the record some of the best horror short stories I've ever read.

He's not only what people call "an asshole", but he's also staunchly conservative--he makes all of the conservatively positioned posters here look like hippies with hair down to their ankles and a joint behind their ear.

I had a mormon room-mate my freshman year on college, and the main reason why the religion was/is racist against black people is due to the historical explanation of their "tribe"--the way he described it to me, people of dark skin are descendants of the "13th tribe", which was the one cast out from the holy lands, or something like that, for being sinful. That's the rationale they use. And while it may not be officially sanctioned, I still saw it with him personally at least--he would have fit right at home with any other racists in my personal opinion.

Why does choosing to write stories regarding religious topics, themes, or plots make what were considered good/great/amazing authors suddenly shitty, religion mongering whores? Some of the best fiction ever written was wholly religious in nature--Dante's Inferno, Paradise Lost, or if you want current stuff look at the movie Seven, or the seventh sign.

I don't believe what he believes, and I find many aspects of the mormon religion counter-intuitive or downright elitist, but just because I don't believe in the underlying stories doesn't mean he's a terrible author.

If your world view is so fragile and unsupported that you cannot examine other world views while enjoying a well written story, and compare to your own, then you have much deeper problems, and your anger at what an author chooses to use as his basis for telling a story is a demonstation of the weakness of your ego.

Besides, it's pretty damned arrogant to think that an author is writing his stories for you...

Yeah ?


So tell me your health stance.

I'd only heard of that racial stuff vaguely and in a drunken pub conversation: they only backed off it in the 70's when their charitable status was funded, no?

I wonder how that'll play when the mormon standing for the republican nomination turns up in some of the less Utah-white states?  I mean that: I wonder.. I've no idea from here.

The press probably won't even bring much of it up. People are already weary of Mormons as it is (even moreso than evangelicals), so it's pointless.

Orin Hatch (a Mormon) ran for Pres a couple of times at least. No one got into too much detail about his beliefs.

Hatch was never a serious candidate though.  There will be more scrutiny with Romney.

As for Card, he's an asshole not becasue he is a conservative, but because he says asshole things. He's also a hack who wrote one good book (and maybe two semi-decent ones) and has been living off it since.

When I work out not only do I end up in a better mood but I have more energy and am more productive and awake the rest of the day.

Working out is like beating your head against the wall...it feels so good when you are done!  :evil: