And we say we can't do it..

I was searching for good music when I stumbled upon this one. I can't help but post this. 

I was reminded of this passage from Genesis 18:14.

"Is anything too hard for the Lord?"

Also, Philippians 4:13

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."

Food poisoning caused by egg sandwich

I read a news a week ago about 112 young students in Manila being poisoned because of the egg sandwich. As of this time, most of them were already discharged from the hospital where they were confined. The news report goes

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Qoute:

Manila, Philippines - The Health department last Tuesday said that egg sandwich could be the likely cause of the illnesses which downed 112 pupils in Manila's Tondo district last week.

A GMA News report qouted DOH National Epidemiology Center head Erik Tayag as saying that the sandwichs consumed by students from Corazon de Jesus Elementary School could have been contaminated with the Salmonella bacteria usually found in eggs.

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Salmonella (Image Source)

 Yep. I remembered reading that salmonella bacteria found in eggs. According to the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, University of Arizona

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Qoute:

A potential food safety concern with eggs is Salmonella Bacteria. Eggs are perishable and must be handled with care. One can not tell if an egg contains salmonella bacteria just by looking at it because it has been found inside even clean, unbroken eggs. Avoid eating  undercooked eggs or food dishes containing raw eggs and remember thorough cooking kills Salmonella bacteria.

Although the risk of getting sick from salmonella is relatively small, the infection can be very dangerous, especially for the very young, the lederly and those weakened by illness. Do not leave eggs and foods that contain eggs at room temperature for more than two hours, because rapid bacterial growth can occur.

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Here's that report. It's not only in this article that I read about storing raw eggs in the door of the refrigerator as being a bad idea. Eggs must be stored in the carton in the section of the refrigerator where the temperature is coolest to prevent bacterial growth.

Could it be that cyanuric acid was added to milk?

I also looked 'melamine' up in Wikipedia and went to its Toxicity section.

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Qoute:

Melamine by itself is non-toxic in low doses, but when combined with cyanuric acid it can cause fatal kidney stones due to the formation of an insoluble melamine cyanurate.

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I think I had come across that 'cyanuric' thing earlier. I went back to the articles I had read. Ah, yes. It's in the report from the University of Maine Food Science and Human Nutrition Department. 

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Qoute:

He (Brian Perkin) noted that the toxicity may be related to the addition of cyanuric acid or by the addition of a melamine cyanuric acid complex, such as fire retardant.

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According to (A.A. Babayan, A.V.Aleksandryan, "Toxicological characteristics of melamine cyanurate, melamine and cyanuric acid", Zhurnal Eksperimental'noi i Klinicheskoi Meditsiny, Vol.25, 345-9 (1985). Original article in Russian.), melamine cyanurate is considered to be more toxic than either melamine or cyanuric acid alone.

Could it be that melamine is wrongfully accused?

I did a further reading to do justice to this case in my mind. I also read a United Nations Environment Programme report that shows the low toxicity nature of melamine in foods. I am not a chemist and I will not pretend and interpret the data there. However, the Conclusions and Recommendations says

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Quote:

Environment:

The toxicity of the chemical to aquatic organisms is low. PEC/PNEC ratios are below 1 when based on realistic worst case conditions and on monitored concentrations. Therefore, melamine is currently considered of low potential risk and low priority for further work.

Health:

The toxicity of melamine is low. Repeated exposure resulted in urinary bladder stones and other lesions of the urinary tract. Bladder tumours occured only in male rats after prolonged irritation of the epithelium by the bladder stones. Melamine is not genotoxic. The exposure of workers and consumers is low. Therefore, melamine is currently considered of low potential risk and low priority for further work.

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I went to section 4.2.2 of that report that dealt with repeated dose toxicity and it goes,

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Qoute:

Six studies with rats, oral administration of melamine with the feed and dosing periods of 14 days to 3 months are available. Additional studies with mice and also rather old studies with intraperitoneal administration, and rabbits and dogs were also reported. Summarised findings of the different studies are: Depression of body weight gain and elevated water intake were observed at higher doses of   ca. 500 mg.kg-1.d-1. The target organ system is the urinary tract. Melamine has a diuretic effect, it produces urinary bladder stones (urolithiasis), hyperplastic epithelial changes of the urinary bladder and calcerous deposits in the proximal kidney tubules. In mice ulceration as well as hyperplasias of the bladder occurred. Changes in the urinary bladder were noted in the studies depending on the dose and the species used. A GLP 28 days study in rats ( 19 ) to evaluate urolithiasis indicated a dose dependent incidence of urinary bladder calculi and hyperplasia.The rat and especially the male rat is more susceptible than the mouse.

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If this is the case, does it mean that the guilty companies could have added such a large amount of melamine in our milk that it has become toxic?

Why put melamine in milk

How did melamine find its way in infants' milk? This story of sick Chinese infants isn't the first fatal health issue in China. If you can remember about a year ago, United States had a pet food scare when it was found out that dogs and cats' food contained melamine. It was told that this chemical is to be blamed for the death of some and sickness of thousands of pets. The FDA has identified some of the ingredients were made in China (Source).

According to New York Times Beijing, melamine was added to foods to make them appear higher in protein and have more nutritional value. 

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Qoute:

Producers trying to cut costs often dilute milk with water, which lowers the nutrition level. But the addition of melamine, which is high in nitrogen, helps the milk appear to meet nutrition standards by artificially raising its protein count.

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The University of Maine Food Science and Human Nutrition Department's Brian Perkins said that 

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Qoute

“In the late 1970's, Italian researches completed a study that showed that 70 percent of fish and meat meal contained melamine,” Perkins explained. “By 1988 these researchers showed the number of melamine-positive fish and meat meals was reduced to about 5 percent. This indicates that melamine may have been in our animal feeds for some time, but hopefully not in food for human consumption.”

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I am quite confused. If melamine in food is nothing new, then, relatively, it might not be toxic or else, these fatalities could have occured during the last three decades that the tainting is being done. There are a lot of newspapers that identified (directly or indirectly) melamine to be the culprit in these deaths and illness but I have never read any report that actually identified the actual concentration of melamine in any these food products. 

Image from University of Guelph

The electron microscope image above shows crystals of the type found in the urinary tracts of cats affected by pet food contaminants. The report I read in an article from Cornell University, there was no direct link between melamine and what happened to the pets.

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Qoute:

Cornell College of Veterinary Medicine Dean Donald Smith joined a panel of experts at a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) March 30 press conference in Washington, D.C., to announce that both Cornell and the FDA had independently identified a contaminant called melamine in samples of recalled pet food and in suspect wheat gluten used in its manufacture. Melamine is a chemical used in plastics.

During the press conference, which was shown on CNN, Smith displayed photographs of the urinary tract crystals from affected animals that have been seen by clinicians and pathologists in many parts of the country, and he also showed a microscopic image of an affected kidney. However, Smith emphasized, Cornell researchers have not been able to match the known toxic effects of melamine with all of the clinical and pathologic signs observed in affected cats and dogs. He specifically referred to signs of acute damage to the tubules and the characteristic pattern of cellular inflammation that have been seen in affected kidneys.

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The Chinese dairy companies knew for months the melamine contamination

I love milk even if I am lactose intolerant. Lately, I have been hearing about this melamine thing in milk products, another dairy thing and news about this exploded like a bomb. I had just read the report from the Associated Press that the number of sick children in China had already jumped to nearly 53, 000 (May-August records). 

AP Photo

I do not know what melamine is. The report explained it to me:

Melamine, used to make plastics and fertilizer, has been found in infant formula and other milk products from 22 of China's dairy companies. Suppliers trying to cut costs are believed to have added it to watered-down milk because its high nitrogen content masks the resulting protein deficiency.

Li Changjiang, head of the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine since 2001, had resigned a year after he and the government promised to overhaul the system in response to a series of product safety scares. He stepped down when investigators revealed that the Sanlu Group Co., the biggest producer of powdered milk in China, had received complaints regarding the illnesses in babies being blamed on its infant formula as early as December 2007! Months later, tests show that the milk was indeed tainted with the industrial chemical melamine which causes kidney stones and can lead to kidney failure. The report also read

Even then, Sanlu delayed ordering a product recall until Sept. 11, after the close of the Beijing Summer Olympics and in the face of rising concern from New Zealand partner Fonterra, which owns a 43 percent share in Sanlu.

Note that Sanlu received complaints since December 2007 but it won an industry award in January and featured on state TV last fall as a domestic company with tight quality controls!

According to The Huffington Post, there are at least 3 children who have died and more than 1,300 are in hospitals dozens of them are suffering from acute kidney failure.

Where can I get those good fats?

I find it not surprising that fruits are excellent sources of good fats. There are other foods the article Fats and Cholesterol: Out with the Bad, In with the Good has enumerated but I am looking for something that I could easily get my hands on. I settled with fish. Fishes high in omega-3 fats have become a charmer because of its good taste. I don't know why omega-3 is so essential until I read another of their article Omega-3 Fats: An Essential Contribution that says my body cannot make them and so I have to get them from food. According to that (latter) article, omega-3 fats are needed by  my cell membranes and influence the function of those membrane's cell receptors. They actually provide the starting point for creating hormones that regulate blood clotting, contraction and relaxation of the artery walls and inflammation. I can now see how they help reduce the risk of heart diseases and strokes, cancer and so on. Salmon is a good source of omega-3 fats. 

Click here for the image source.

They even posted a recipe for that. See here.  I sometimes love fresh fishes like salmon and tuna cooked in vinegar. Well, I don't really cook it because there is no heat involved. Just soaked in vinegar with onions and ginger then I let it stay in the refrigerator for hours. But sometimes I love to fry fish. So another question sprouted in my mind. Will omega-3 fats be destroyed if I fry the fish? Fortunately, Harvard University's School of Public Health is very kind they had another article Ask the Expert: Omega-3 Fatty Acids which gives a direct answer to my question. Dr. Frank Sacks said, "Not if the oil is fresh. In fact, even in frying oil that is used for days, you can still find ALA (alpha-linoleic acid, one major type of omega-3 fatty acids) in it. Hmmm..I'm craving for fish :).

Where can I get those bad fats?

I find fatty foods delicious but eversince I had read about cholesterol clogging heart veins, I feel guilty everytime I would eat something especially if I tasted something oily in it. It was a good thing that the Harvard University's School of Public Health has given a very good list of both good and bad fats sources. The 'Bad Fats' category in their e-article surprised me when I read that saturated fats are considered bad because my body can make all the saturated fat I need. Sources of saturated fats are meat, seafood, and whole-milk dairy products like cheese, ice cream and milk. It's hard for me to avoid this because most of the basic needs for cooking like vegetable oils, though it is mainly unsaturated fats, still contains saturated fats. Since I cannot avoid this, the best way that I can do is to keep my daily intake of these bad fats as low as possible. Another bad fats, the trans fats, are created by heating liquid vegetable oils in the presence of hydrogen gas (hydrogenation). Most trans fats come from commercially baked goods (like bread?), margarines, snack foods and processed foods and other fried foods served in restaurants and fast foods. Oh, it includes the delicious french fries :(. 

Click here for the image source.

According to that article entitled Fats and Cholesterol, Out with the Bad, In with the Good, trans fats are worse than saturated fats, and so the risk of having diabetes, heart disease, stroke and other fatal conditions is much greater. Visit their site for more details on bad fats.

What's the difference between fats and cholesterol?

When I read about eggs having significant amount of cholesterol relative to daily dietary cholesterol intake, I asked myself what is cholesterol? Can I use the terms 'fats' and 'cholesterol' interchangeably? I am used to eating cheeseburgers and fries (which I find so greasy) because they are 'fast foods', able to keep up with my time. So I got so concerned on this one. I tried searching for a reliable site which could explain to me what cholesterol is. And here's what I found. According to the KidsHealth site of Nemours Foundation, cholesterol is a waxy substance created by the liver and found in certain foods. Cholesterol is actually helping my body to make vitamin D and some hormones, build cell walls and produce bile salts needed to help digest fat! This is my first time to read a thing known to be bad as cholesterol doing me good. So the body produces just enough cholesterol to do these functions even if I don't take foods with cholesterol.

I searched again for academic sites that can help me in this. According to Harvard University School of Public Health, it is not the amount of fat I eat that causes certain fatal disease(s) but the type of fat I eat. This brought me back to that saturated and trans-fats I mentioned in my previous post. These two are actually bad fats, meaning they increase the risk of getting such diseases as atherosclerosis or hardening of the arteries because cholesterol is deposited on the walls of arteries and forms a hard substance called plaque. Now over time this plaque narrows the arteries. That will cause complications that eventually lead to having a heart attack or a stroke (grabbed that one from KidsHealth). On the other hand, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats are good fats which are fats that lower the chances of getting diseases.

This image is from ABC Health and Wellbeing site.

So where's the connection between fats and cholesterol? I went back to that Harvard University's article and it said that the biggest thing that could influence the cholesterol level in my blood is the mix of fats in my diet and not the amount of cholesterol I take. Their recommendation is to substitute good fats for bad fats. Also, avoid trans fats. Those are the keys to a healthy diet!

What really is the truth about eggs?

Click here for the image source

I got so baffled by this 'egg' thing. All the while I thought eating lots of eggs can do you good. I have a friend undergoing body building whose trainor adviced him to take 7 eggs a day to help him build muscles. So I tried googling for 'truth about eggs'  from university sites and one article hit the nail right on the head. I come across a pdf version of the August 2004 issue of NOAHNET Wellness (Nutrition for Older Adults' Health) from The University of Georgia, Athens.  It directly answered my question 'What is the truth about eggs?' I learned that eggs are excellent sources of B vitamins, iron, protein and other nutrients. Egg yolks are very high cholesterol! Well, eggs are not the only source of cholesterol. There are foods without cholesterol that can increase our blood cholesterol like those with saturated and trans-fats. The American Heart Association recommends a daily dietary cholesterol intake to 300mg. Here's the big blow: one large egg has approximately 213mg of cholesterol! This means that if I eat an egg in a day, I must skip meats in other meals and go for a vegan dish. This way, I could keep my intake of cholesterol in a day well below 300mg. I can also constrain myself to 3 to 4 eggs per week. 

Are eggs good food gone bad?

I love the face of Ashley Judd. She emits that radiance and freshness everytime she smiles and her eyes get chinky -- that's what I like most! So I tried searching for an image that really shows those eyes. Here I found one.

Click here for the image source

One thing that interested me is the heading that says, "The 5'7'' actress owes her youthful glow to a dairy-free diet and morning meditation." The word dairy reminds me of only butter. So should I avoid butter? I tried googling for "bad effects of dairy". The first three scholarly article abstracts that I saw all mentioned eggs and their harmful effects if taken excessively. All mentioned cholesterol. I tried searching for the cholesterol content of eggs. According to the study done by the University of Michigan Integrative Medicine, unlike what you see in most dairy products packages or commercials, there is no established daily serving recommendation for eggs. The reason behind is the controversy eggs has gone through because of high cholesterol content of the yolk. But recent studies imply that dietary cholesterol has less effect on blood levels of cholesterol compared to intake of saturated or hydrogenated fat. Eggs are good sources of nutrients and can be considered a healthy choice if eaten appropriately. See the UMIM site for more academic details on eggs.

How do I convince my friend to drink water

Instead of giving her the good points of drinking water, I plan to tell her the negative sides of not doing it. What is thirst? According to [Rolls and Rolls, 1982, Thirst, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge], thirst is a subjective sensation that is aroused by lack of water, and usually people experiencing it report a dry feeling in the mouth and find that water tastes pleasant. That 'dry feeling in the mouth' is already an indicator of the body that it is dehydrated. They even stated that, "there is no doubt that salivary flow correlates well with the need for water." Deborah Boardly said, "waiting to drink until you're parched is a big mistake because that means your blood level is so low you are now drawing water from your salivary glands which in turn cues thirst." Therefore, we should not wait till we are thirsty before we drink water. One good way to pamper your body from the inside is to drink a glass of water with every meal and then take cups between meals. We can also bring water bottle whenever we go out so that in trips, they will always come in handy.

Why my friend (and some people) don't drink water

I can consume 1 glass to 1 liter per meal, depending on the food. If the food is spicy, my water intake is higher than normal. On the average, I consume 2 glasses of water per meal. That's how I love drinking water.

Not so with my close friend. She takes only half glass per meal, worst, she sometimes go lower than that. When I asked her why she drinks (water) so little, she curtly replied, "That's all I can take." I was trying to get her to my side cause I know water is beneficial to her. But she won't. I wonder why is it that some people are too resistive to drink. So I did a little study so that somehow I could convince my friends to do their bodies a favor and drink lots of water. Here's what I found according to study done by the New York and the iNternational Bottled Water Association.

Excuses why people don't drink water:

(1) not enough time (27%)

(2) don't feel thirsty (11%)

(3) don't like the taste of water (8%)

(4) forget to drink it (7%)

A researcher by the name of Barbra Levine suspects that they are really concerned about being able to go to bathroom (yes folks, just like in the movie Pursuit of Happiness).

Don't wait until you are thirsty. I found out the body is already dehydrated when it alarms thirst.

The Best Time of the Day to Exfoliate

Here, I am not referring to using chemicals to exfoliate my face. I mean exfoliating during bath. There are times when I can't really get rid of pimples. So I just let it be and let it dry. This takes sometime but no matter how I respect its growth on my face it will still leave a scar eventually turning into a dark mark. So how do I speed up the disappearance of these blemishes? There is nothing magical here that I have a scar today and the next day it's gone. No. One thing I noticed is that it takes much time for a pimple scar to disappear. Sometimes a year or more. So I just try to cut it down. One thing I do is scrub my face with a wash towel during bath. There's nothing special about the wash towel I am using. Below is the kind of wash towel I am using (that's white, just seemed discolored due to reflections).

What I do is I put soap (I use a liquid milk soap) on my face and then the rest of my skin. After that I will scrub my face with the wash towel. It is better when I do this at the end of the bath. That time, much loose skin is taken off compared to doing it at the first moment I wet my face. I do this only once a day. The skin needs some time to rejuvenate so I must be kind with it. I avoid scrubing it too much to the point that I feel pain. To do that is crazy. I exfoliate to clean my skin, not to open it to more dirts.. It feels sooo good after that natural exfoliation!

This is your new cube

DUE TO COST CUTTING, THIS IS YOUR NEW CUBE

EFFECTIVE SEPTEMBER 1, 2008  

NEW OFFICE POLICY

Dress Code:
1) You are advised to come to work dressed according to your salary.
2) If we see you wearing Prada shoes and carrying a Gucci bag, we will assume you are doing well financially and therefore do not need a raise.
3) If you dress poorly, you need to learn to manage your money better, so that you may buy nicer clothes, and therefore you do not need a raise.
4) If you dress just right, you are right where you need to be and therefore you do not need a raise.

Sick Days:
We will no longer accept a doctor's statement as proof of sickness. If you are able to go to the doctor, you are able to come to work.

Bereavement Leave:
This is no excuse for missing work. There is nothing you can do for dead friends, relatives or co-workers. Every effort should be made to have non-employees attend the funeral arrangements in your place. In rare cases where employee involvement is necessary, the funeral should be scheduled in the late afternoon. We will be glad to allow you to work through your lunch hour and subsequently leave one hour early.
 
Bathroom Breaks:
Entirely too much time is being spent in the toilet. There is now a strict three-minute time limit in the stalls.. At the end of three minutes, an alarm will sound, the toilet paper roll will retract, the stall door will open, and a picture will be taken. After your second offense, your picture will be posted on the company bulletin board under the 'Chronic Offenders' category. Anyone caught smiling in the picture will be sectioned under the company's mental health policy.

Lunch Break:
* Skinny people get 30 minutes for lunch, as they need to eat more, so that they can look healthy.
* Normal size people get 15 minutes for lunch to get a balanced meal to maintain their average figure.
* Chubby people get 5 minutes for lunch, because that's all the time needed to drink a Slim-Fast.

Thank you for your loyalty to our company. We are here to provide a positive employment experience. Therefore, all questions, comments, concerns, complaints,
frustrations, irritations, aggravations, insinuations, allegations, accusations, contemplations, consternation and input should be directed elsewhere.

The Management

What I didn't know about bottled waters

I almost spilled my water out of my nose after reading (a) and (b).

I had resorted to drinking bottled waters whenever I go outside the house mainly due to their companies' extensive publicity of purity by showing super clean and cool glaciers and ultra-clean mountain springs. I cannot imagine myself drinking tap water. I feel like I'm drinking from the toilet. Why will I not think that way? How clean are the pipes that the tap water goes through? How long have they been there? What if the pipe has a leak? Aaaaah!

But do you know that the bottled water sold in the United States is not necessarily cleaner and safer than most tap waters? That is according to the 4-year study made by NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council). That is already in the US. How much in countries whose efforts in testing and purity standards of bottled waters are lesser (like mine)?

Here are some comparison points between tap water and bottled water according to Community Water Company of Green Valley.

But I am more concerned with the 'cleanness' of tap water and so prefer bottled water. But the following study findings by the NRDC shocked the water out of me (esp. a and b):

1. Approximately ¼ of bottled water are actually bottled tap water.

2. FDA rules permit bottlers to label their products as “spring water” when actually it was just pumped out from a well and may be treated with chemicals.

3. The actual source of of water in bottled waters is not always clearly stated. And so in 1995, the FDA issued rules on labeling to prevent deceptive claims; however, this did not solve the problem. Here are some intriguing labels NRDC had noted:

(a) “Spring Water” -- actually taken from an industrial parking lot beside a hazardous waste site

(b) Alasika™ -- "Alaska Premium Glacier Drinking Water: Pure Glacier Water from the Last Unpolluted Frontier, Bacteria Free" -- Apparently came from a public water supply. Since after the FDA intervened, this label has been changed.

(c) Vals Water -- "Known to Generations in France for its Purity and Agreeable Contributuon to Health...Reputed to Help Restore Energy, Vitality, and Combat Fatigue" -- The International Bottled Water Association voluntary code prohibits health claims, but some bottlers still make such claims.

Here is another thing. According to Minnesota Department of Health, tap water may seem to look or taste differently but it doesn't mean that it's unsafe. Actually, the most fatal contaminants are those that we cannot see, smell or taste.

Another concern is the fluoride found in tap water. Flouride helps strengthen our teeth and prevent tooth decay. Most purified bottled waters have no fluoride because of the reverse osmosis or distallation which can remove fluoride so I need to inform my dentist if I'm mainly using bottled water.

So my dear friends, instead of buying bottled waters, why not just purify at home. There are a lot of companies that sell reliable filtration systems. Key is in maintaining it well because negligence in this part can cause the bacteria or other contaminants grow in those filters. If I'm going out, I take my empty bottle, rinse it completely and fill it with my 'home purified' tap water. Sometimes I taste the chlorine thing so I just let my bottle stay in the refirgerator for 8 hours, at least, and hola! The chlorine taste vanishes.

(Click here for the image source)

Sources:

1. Tap Water vs Bottled Water, Community Water Company of Green Valley 

2. Bottled Water: Pure Drink or Pure Hype?, Natural Resources Defense Council 

3. Bottled Water: Better than the Tap?, U.S. Food and Drug Aministration 

Drink Lots of Water!

I had just read an article by Tracy Spangler, a Nutrition Outreach Instructor in Greenbrier County entitled Are We Wilting? It talked about the benefits of drinking water and I agree with her that we cannot survive without water. Long before carrying a bottled water became a trend, I am already taking that 'n-glasses' of  a water a day. I am not meticulous in counting the glasses I drink water from ok but so far it really has done me sooo good. Actually when I was reviewing for the board exam I always make sure that I always have water by my side. 

Click here for image source

Hydration with water is important for the functionality of our organs. Especially if you're a physically active person. 60% of our bodies is composed of water. Water is necessary to regulate our body temperatures, waste elimination and secretion, digestion and our blood is 80% made up of water. Our body loses approximately 10 cups or more each day, depending on the weather and the activities we do. We therefore need to replenish what we lose.

It doesn't take a doctor to say that even if you take lots of antioxidants, if you do not drink the necessary amounts of water, you will indeed look older than your age.

Will eating tomatoes give me that pretty rosy cheeks?

Let me make this clear: the rosy cheeks I am referring to is not the one caused by rosacea which is a condition characterized by flushing and redness that it seems facial rashes and a good ground for developing pimples. The rosy cheeks I am talking about is that rosy glow that some women try to achieve by putting make-ups on their cheeks.

There are a number of people asking me what facial soap I use. Perhaps there's something in it that they like because they won't bother asking if they're not intrigued by something that looks good. I'm not boasting ok I know my face is not a cut above the rest. I sometimes have pimples. I have a guess that it is because of the rosy cheeks (I come up with this because one girl from the office asked me if I am using pond's). Well, it's not always rosy you know. But it will always exude everytime the weather is hot. I am not using any special soap or what. But I always have a tomato in my breakfast. And everytime I have it in my breakfast, my face is better than a breakfast without. Tomatoes are known to give good skin but could it be that tomatoes are the ones giving that rosy glow? 

Image source : en.wikivisual.com/index.php/Tomato

I searched for hours trying to know if this is true. Haven't found any, unfortunately. Tomatoes however have lycopene which is also an antioxidant that helps prevent heart disease and some cancer. Also, according to wikipedia,

Lycopene may be the most powerful carotenoid quencher of singlet oxygen^[14], being 100 times more efficient in test tube studies of singlet-oxygen quenching action than vitamin E, which in turn has 125 times the quenching action of glutathione (water soluble)^{[citation needed]}. Singlet oxygen produced during exposure to ultravioletlight is a primary cause of skin aging.^[15]

Skin aging again. 

According to lycopene.org,

In the body, lycopene is deposited in the liver, lungs, prostate gland, colon and skin. Its concentration in body tissues tends to be higher than all other carotenoids.

That's why we must be careful that we don't eat tomatoes excessively. Though it is non-toxic, it may cause skin and liver discoloration. Btw, carotenoids are also antioxidants. 

How Vitamin E Can Retard Aging (in simple terms)

Whenever I would see a commercials of vitamin E, be it lotion or shampoo or supplement or anything that has this vitamin in it, I hear all the time testimonies of celebs or just plain beautiful people that it will make them look young and beautiful. Really? It will make me look young and beautiful? With the advent of human desire to be good looking while staying young, this really sells. This got me into studying it whether it really backs up what it claims to be.

I do not know anything about vitamin E except that it is an antioxidant.

What is an antioxidant? 

When I asked a chemist friend of mine what is oxidation, he gave me a very simple illustration. If you cut an apple and you just leave it out in the open for about 5 mins, you will notice that the surface where you cut it had gone a bit brownish in color due to its exposure to oxygen. This is oxidation. To counter this effect, we need antioxidants. Vitamin E is one of them. I had never read any educated article on this vitamin without me reading the word 'free radicals'. These are what vitamin E is trying to protect us against.

What are free radicals?

If you listened to your highschool chemistry teacher, you will know what I am talking about. According to wikipedia, 

...radicals (often referred to as free radicals) are atoms, molecules or ions with unpaired electrons on an otherwise open shell configuration. These unpaired electrons are usually highly reactive, so radicals are likely to take part in chemical reactions.

These unpaired electrons are unstable and easily detached from their mother atom and combine with other atoms. According to the Office of Dietary Supplements of NIH, free radicals can damage potentially by-products of of energy and cells and may add to the development of heart disease and cancer. This is where vitamin E comes in. It is able to limit the production of free radicals and might help prevent or delay the development of such chronic diseases. It can also boost the immune function, repair DNA and other metabolic process. See the NIH-ODS site for more details on vitamin E.

So where does 'reversing' the signs of aging come in?

According to the free radical theory of aging, the organisms age because cells accumulate free radical damage over time. Melanin is an example of a free radical but it is not chemically reactive. However, we will have a problem with free radicals which are biologically reactive. We have biological structures and the damage that free radicals can do to us is closely linked with oxidative damage. This is the same as the apple analogy or the rust formation in iron -- all due to exposure to oxygen. Here is where antioxidants like vitamin E come to the rescue. They can prevent or retard free radicals from oxidizing our sensitive biological make up therefore slowing down the aging process or disease formations.

With the pollution and heat that we have to go through wherever we are, I think we need this. Click here for foods that provide vitamin E. 

Teach Yourself Bee Gees

Work can sometimes be very boring. Thanks to Stevie Riks I sometimes get hysterical..no..exaggerated. But I find his videos soooooooooooo hilarious  even if I had seen it several times.. Really.

Here's one.. because I'm fond of the Bee Gees.

He also runs his own website. Check it out for more laughter!

Health is wealth.

I am a software/hardware programmer and this work can be very addicting. I am enjoying life until the time I noticed my health is deteriorating. I was a player of the Arnis varsity team when I was in college and believe me, this sports is very physical. When I graduated, I totally stopped my training. Worst, I did not get involved with any physical workouts. Now, I am 29 years old and beginning to see the effects of working with the computer for hours and neglecting your health. So I decided to note all my endeavors to be healthy. Why? Because health is wealth.