Starling Fitness: Daily writings on Fitness, Diet, and Health

Keira Knightly has been fighting the tabloids. They have been writing articles about her body assuming that she has anorexia and she has even sued a few of them. Then she showed up to the premier of Pirate of the Caribbean in this dress and the rumors sparked again. One can understand why. She looks painfully thin in this dress.

A photograph is just one moment in time

The truth of the matter is, a photograph is just one moment in time. There have been times when I weighed less, but my photographs still made me look fat. There have been times when I weighed more and I looked fantastic. This photo of Keira Knightly is just one moment in time. She happened to be thin at the time and the dress revealed that. Was she thin the previous day? Yeah, but no one posted the photos of her schlepping around in a t-shirt and jeans that she probably wore that day because they weren’t controversial enough.

It’s really the dress, not her body that was so interesting

Because the dress was so revealing, the press jumped on it. If she had worn a different dress, she wouldn’t have received so much attention. Anorexia is a very complicated disease and you cannot tell if someone has it just by their body type, just like you can’t tell whether someone has bingeing problems just because they are fat. In fact, it’s possible to be rather skinny and STILL have trouble with bingeing. Just calling someone anorexic because they are thin is just as discriminatory and hateful as calling someone lazy because they are fat.

I can’t believe in the Thrifty Gene hypothesis. It’s the idea that certain people are predisposed to be fat. It’s the idea that I might eat less than a skinny person and still gain weight. Medical science hasn’t found the thrifty gene yet, but they so believe it to be true that they are scrambling to find it.

I’ve learned a lot about nutrition and healthy eating, but in the end, I have that nagging doubt that the theories could change on a dime. It seems like medical science is never finished figuring out about our bodies and tomorrow they could discover that one simple gene change could make all the difference or they could disprove the idea and throw away everything they have been telling us since I was a kid. There’s no better authority to trust than medical science, but they don’t seem very trustworthy when they can change everything based on a theory.

What’s the point of eating healthy if I have no control?

I can’t believe that it’s all in my genes. I can’t, no matter how much science tells me that genetically some people are more likely to be fat. If I believe it, then I feel like there is no point in my eating healthy and exercising. No matter how much I’m bombarded with the idea, I can’t believe it.

Is that sticking my head in the sand? Maybe. In the end, however, it will be healthier for me to deny belief in the thrifty gene theory because it gives me hope. I don’t want all my hope taken away by medical science. I want to prove them wrong. I want to break free of all the labels that called me fat as a child. I can’t believe in their hypothesis, even if they are able to prove it’s true.

The Philco-Ford Corporation released a movie in 1967 that would show us how our lives would be in 1999. Here is a kitchen scene with a mother, her son and her husband. What will the computer allow the husband to eat?

This video seems strange to me because I remember seeing short clips like this on television and being so excited for the future to arrive. Instead, 1999 came and went. I don’t have a flying car, but I also don’t have a husband who thinks it’s my responsibility to feed him. This conversation between the husband and wife (via TV Phone) is interesting:

Wife: Earl, how about chicken salad?

Husband: Ew…

Cheese omelet?

Cheeseburger with french fries and a nice cold bottle of beer.

I’ll see…

She pulls up this screen on the computer:

It suggests roast beef, green salad and no-cal beer, which is apparently a good enough substitute for Earl.

We’re living in the year 2007 and there are no flying cars and still no calorie-free beer! The future is NOTHING like they told me it would be!

Via: Cynical-C Blog – » What 1999 Will Be Like (A Film from 1967)

Sunday, I filmed another Starling Fitness walking video. I walked past Old Faithful and watched it go off like clockwork. I walked past a boardwalk full of small geyers and springs. I even climbed a mountain and looked over Old Faithful from the top.

The climbing part was hard and a surprising reminder that I need to get working on my endurance. See if you can hear me panting in this snippet from the video:

In the end, I don’t think my panting is that distracting and I’ll probably just leave it in the video. The tourists talking to each other while Old Faithful is showing its best, however, is another story…

Next time you think that you’re not fit enough to tackle a hill or thin enough to go hiking, remember me panting and puffing my way up this hill. If I can do it, you can do it.

If you like this video, it will be ready for purchase in a few months. In the meantime, you can look at what is available right now here:

• Starling Fitness – Fitness, diet, and health weblog » Walking Videos For Sale

Yesterday, Mike and I saw a black bear in Yellowstone and I got a pretty good video of him:

• Starling Travel – Black Bear in Yellowstone

I am out of town AGAIN, this time in Yellowstone Park in Wyoming and Montana. Yesterday, I filmed a new walking video for Starling Fitness going past Old Faithful, a bunch of pretty geysers and springs and up a mountain. I haven’t had a chance to look at the footage, but if it’s good, I’ll make it available to you.

What is your favorite kind of exercise while you’re on vacation?

Do you make sure your hotel has a gym?

Do you have a gym membership that works wherever you travel?

What sorts of activities do you plan? Are they active or sedentary?

I have found that I am willing to walk on the treadmill for days on end just so I can be fit enough to do active things while I’m on vacation. While climbing up the mountain yesterday, I realized that I haven’t been doing nearly enough hill work. I guess it’s time to use that incline setting on the treadmill again once I get home. I think you’ll probably be able to hear me panting up the hill on the video. It might even be bad enough to ruin the footage. Hope not…

I have read diet books with less helpful information about eating than is contained in this simple entry from The Diet Blog:

• The Diet Blog – What Do 300 Calorie Meals Look Like?

If you don’t desire much variety, you could only eat meals that are listed on that entry three times a day and you would definitely lose weight. In fact, if you weigh over 200 pounds, you could add a fourth meal from their list every day and still lose weight.

Me? The thought of only eating what I see on my computer screen makes me want to binge, but there are people who can eat the same thing over and over every day without any problems. If you’re one of those people, here is the most simple and healthy diet you’ll ever encounter.

Via: See what 300- to 400-calorie meals look like – Lifehacker

Remember when I wrote an entry about Greenwashed Food? Companies do little to make their products more healthy aside from the addition of few vitamins, maybe some fiber and a different package. Coca-Cola must have been listening because I have seen this floating around the stores lately.

Just because they added a few vitamins and minerals doesn’t mean it’s any healthier for you. If you enjoy Diet Coke, don’t bother spending the extra money for this. You don’t need a multi-vitamin in your soda when you eat whole foods in healthy portions.

Next time you’re tempted by a fast food advertisement, remember, what they show you isn’t always what you get. This website shows you the difference between what the commercial looks like and the actual food.

• Fast Food: Ads vs. Reality

Each item was purchased, taken home, and photographed immediately. Nothing was tampered with, run over by a car, or anything of the sort. It is an accurate representation in every case. Shiny, neon-orange, liquefied pump-cheese, and all.

Pictured above is the Arby’s Beef ‘n’ Cheddar. Here are the Nutrition Facts for that sandwich from the Arby’s website:

Is the sandwich on the left worth spending 445 calories and 21g of fat? Maybe, if I was craving it. If I was craving it and I got the sandwich on the right, however, I would feel ripped off. Television commercials, magazine ads and billboards make food look really good, but it might not be what you get when you order. Next time you’re craving something, take a look at this website and ask yourself if you’re craving the commercial food or the reality food.

Via: ExtraLife – Scott Johnson’s Comics, Podcasts, Blog, Artwork, Humor and MORE! » Blog Archive » Food ads vs reality

Testimonials are useless. Scientifically, testimonials are not considered valid proof and drugs are required to go through double-blind testing to be accepted. Supplements, however, are unregulated and don’t need to go through testing. They use testimonials all the time to “prove” that their products work.

But why go to all that trouble? Why find an actual person who lost weight with a product when you can just post an unrelated picture of someone who lost weight with a testimonial? Maree Briggs alleges that Metabo-Speed XXX did just that:

• Woman angry as her image used to sell diet pills – 22 Apr 2007 – Crime News – NZ Herald

Maree Briggs, a mother of two, says the photograph was used without her knowledge in an online testimonial for Metabo-Speed XXX, a dietary supplement touted as “the diet pill of the stars” and supposedly endorsed by Oprah Winfrey and Bette Midler.

While not sure how Lab 88 got hold of the photograph, Maree believes it may have been lifted from the website of an Australian-based company she was involved with in the late 1990s.

“It’s not the money, but the principle,” said Maree. “How dare they put my face to something like that. It’s a cock-and-bull story, it’s a lie and it’s conning people.”

Metabo-Speed XXX has removed the photo from their website, but Diet Blog was able to find a cache of it here:

• Metabo-Speed XXX Success Story 2

Next time you’re looking at those before and after pictures, remember, they might not be true. Don’t waste your money on diet pills or any product that promises you a perfect body without diet and exercise.

The buzz around the foodie circles is a new dessert that is supposed to be healthy. It’s called Pinkberry and it’s a frozen yogurt.

Yeah, frozen yogurt. Remember that? It was a fad in the late ’80s and early ’90s. Well, it’s back.

Pinkberry is supposed to be different because it tastes less like ice cream and more like yogurt. And, it’s “healthy.”

When you look at the nutrition facts, it does look really healthy. No fat, only 25 calories, but when you look at the serving size, it’s for 1 oz. You have to go to the menu page to find out how many ounces are served. The photo above is an 8 oz. serving, so your “healthy” dessert just jumped up to 200 calories. That doesn’t even count the fruit added. I give them props about the fruit because they serve only fresh, unsweetened fruit, so that IS healthier than most frozen yogurt shops.

When I checked the nutrition facts for Golden Spoon, however, their 8 oz. serving of fat-free yogurt is 136 calories. The nutrition facts for TCBY’s non-fat frozen yogurt is a little more at 220 calories. What Pinkberry is doing isn’t amazingly low in calories. It’s very similar to the frozen yogurt of years past.

The difference is supposed to be the taste. Kristen at Accidental Hedonist went to Pinkberry with some of her friends and described it here:

• Accidental Hedonist – Pinkberry: how good could it really be?

We all tried to describe what, exactly, the yogurt tastes like. Eun-Duk thought it tasted like Japanese yogurt drinks while I thought of something similar: yogurt-flavored Hi-Chew candy. For lack of a better adjective, it’s very yogurty. It’s much like a slightly sweet, frozen, Greek yogurt, creamy without being fatty, with a very lactic, almost sour, tang. The fruit is extremely fresh, never frozen, and unsweetened.

My second thought: Did I seriously just pay six bucks for this?

In the end, I would rather have a half-cup of REAL ice cream than a full cup of frozen yogurt. With real ice cream, I feel like I am splurging for the same 200 calories. When it comes to dessert, it’s not about hunger or quantity for me. It’s about indulgence.