“Once in a while it really hits people that they don’t have to experience the world in the way they have been told to.”
-Alan Keightley, as quoted from A Brief Guide to World Domination by Chris Guillebeau

Regular readers of Almost Fit know that I have been mentioning the words World Domination for a few weeks now. Have I gone mad? Do I think that eating real food in moderation will create a position as Potentate of some small nation state? Maybe. But if such a seat were ever offered, I would have to pass - The aspirations that are already on my list are more than enough, and do not include the title of Magistrate. But anything is possible.

For me, Almost Fit is much more than just a hobby - it’s part of a much larger life picture. With Almost Fit, I have two distinct purposes:

1. To improve my health before it’s too late. From my perspective today, losing weight and getting fit is a critical first step in accomplishing my greater goals. Writing Almost Fit inspires me to continue down that path. Writers like Walt Whitman and Thoreau have explained with much greater skill and dimension than I the connections of body, mind, spirit, and the world around us. These are ideas to which I subscribe. For me, my physical state has a very direct impact on how I see myself, how that perception is communicated to others, and my sense of place in the world around me. It affects both my physical ability and my emotional momentum to do the bigger things that I want to do, whether it is to run a marathon, invent something revolutionary, or climb El Cap.
2. To improve the lives of others on a grand scale. I’m one of the many who have spent the majority of my life trying to get or keep my weight under control. This has all sorts of implications, as I mentioned. I have tried everything short of drugs and surgery, with varying degrees of success. Now however, I think I am on to the best solution of all - eating real food in moderation. My hope is that I will be able to help get the word out and impact the lives of others who have struggled with this as I have. And I am doing so, thanks to the Internet, on a global scale.

And this is just phase one.

Inspiring minds want to know

We all have our own aspirations of course - and some of us are still trying to figure out what those are. Whether your goal is to set a lifelong, positive example for your children or to lead a mora of Spartans into battle armed to the teeth - The biggest prerequisites for success in any endeavor are that you must be moved, committed, and determined to accomplish the task. And as important, you have to do the work that is required to get there. For me, getting a handle on my physical state is part of that work.

I am a big believer in finding inspiration in others, which always helps me to get started on the task at hand. For bigger life questions, I look to people who expect more out of life than to pass the time, standing still in a job for 8 hours a day for the best years of their life, until the time is up.

Chris Guillebeau is one such inspiration. Chris’s site is called The Art of Non-Conformity: Unconventional strategies for life, work, and travel. He recently wrote a report for which the timing, for me, could not have been better. He is no guru or prophet; he is simply an excellent writer who is striving to change the world by whispering the unheralded death of mediocrity through a global bullhorn.

With this, I identify.

Chris has published his manifesto which is entitled, A Brief Guide to World Domination (and other important goals): How to Live a Remarkable Life in a Conventional World. The report is spreading like wildfire thanks to a virtual army, myself included, who are enthusiastically fanning the smoke signals of change in a digital age.

Think Global, Act…Global?

“An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”
-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The message of World Domination is simple: Each one of us can live a remarkable life - we just need to choose to do so. Changing the world for the better does not have to be a product of circumstance. If you want to change the world, the most important thing to do, is to start.

But there is a catch.

If you aspire to greatness, you have to think on a bigger scale than you might be accustomed to thinking. In fact, you have to think of your impact for good on a global scale. Thanks to nearly instant, worldwide communication technology, stimulating positive change in global terms has never been more possible. The good news is that accomplishing your goals does not have to be at the expense of a greater good. In other words, you can do great things for the world while you accomplish your own goals. They are not mutually exclusive.

The bad news is, there is a whole system of conventional thinking that will tell you otherwise.

What are your dreams?

To determine our own goals and to live a life that our children and our children’s children will call extraordinary, Chris has distilled the process down to asking two basic questions that those of us who want more out of life have to answer:

#1: What do you really want to get out of life?

#2: What can you offer the world that no one else can?

The questions are simple, but for many the answers may not be. If you are one of the fortunate few who already know your life’s answers, my sincere congratulations. If you are one of the rest of us who are striving to figure this out, don’t panic. You’re not alone. But don’t analyze it too closely. The single greatest mistake that most of us make is not failing in the process; the critical error is never starting in the first place.

For me, the journey is underway. At the time, I didn’t even realize it was starting, but looking back, I’m now approaching month 7 of doing the work (with Almost Fit being the cornerstone), even if I don’t know where precisely my path is leading. I don’t have my final answers yet to questions one and two. But what I do know is they both involve work, trade-offs, and a willingness to sacrifice a degree of comfort for a while in favor of accomplishing truly great things.

The choice is yours - no strings attached

If you are interested in living a life that is remarkable, making changes that will ultimately benefit both yourself and others on a grand scale, and living a life that is uniquely your own, consider reading Chris’s manifesto. It is only 29 pages, it is without charge, and is well worth an afternoon of exercising your rods and cones.

I read it camping on the North Umpqua River.

To be clear, Chris is not selling anything; the manifesto, as I said, is free. There are no MLM schemes behind door number three and there is no commitment required, though I do recommend subscribing to his blog (I do). Operators are not standing by, and there is an unlimited digital quantity to go around, so take your time. This is simply the opportunity to read a thoughtful piece of work that may open your eyes to your own potential, and may spur you on to achievements that you did not think were possible for an army of one.

One last thing…

Chris is a busy guy. In addition to reading the posts on his site, I follow his broadcasts on Twitter. I love the sense of global connectedness I get when I read one of his messages about being lost somewhere in a province that I have no idea how to even pronounce. In fact, in a recent message, he was relieved to be in the familiar comfort of a major airport in Asia.

How many people from this country do you know who would say the same?

Ed. Note: This post took me a while to compose because it is important to me. I hope it sparked your interest. The photos, by the way, are all shots we took in Paris. If you enjoy Almost Fit, please consider subscribing or sharing the posts with your friends. Thanks.

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Ed. Note: This article focuses on the benefits of eating together for families with children. I believe that families come in all shapes and sizes; I just chose families with kids for today’s article. Thanks for reading Almost Fit - I really do appreciate it.

With the pace of life building at an ever increasing rate, for many of us, sharing meals at the dinner table is becoming a lost art. Often times if families eat together at all, it is in the car after having placed an order in front of an illuminated board of “value” options, yelling through a cheap microphone, trying to make it to the next activity only a few minutes late for once.

For a while we were sucked into this vortex of squeezing meals in between the “more important” things (as if meals were not critical to life!). Here’s an example. Read the rest of this entry »

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Ed. Note: If you enjoy this post, please consider having Almost Fit delivered to your inbox. Thanks.

As is our habit, we stopped by the Oregon City Farmer’s Market on Saturday to pick up much of our week’s produce. The Oregon City Farmer’s Market is smaller than many other markets, but we are slowly getting to know the vendors and have found that the size of the market makes it a little easier to recognize familiar faces.

We definitely believe that getting to know where your food comes from, how it’s grown, and supporting the local economy by purchasing from local farmers is a critical value for our family. By both word and example, we hope that these concepts are passed along to our kids who go with us week after week and observe our pleasant conversations with local farmers and vendors.

And nothing is more satisfying than freshly picked berries in berry season here, as our kids know well.

Without further adieu, here are a few photos of this weekend’s spread. And believe me, the food tastes as good as it looks. Read the rest of this entry »

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Ed. Note: This is a reprint (with a few changes) of an article I wrote a while back as a guest post for the guys at GetFitSlowly - Mac and J.D. are some of my principle inspirations for writing about this process, and their site is highly recommended. I’ve had several requests to repost the article here, so I am doing so today. If you enjoy it, please give it a vote via your social networking tool of choice, such as Digg or StumbleUpon. Thanks. Oh, and if you’re new here, welcome to Almost Fit. Please leave a comment and introduce yourself.

When it comes to food, exercise, and our obsession with obesity, the French appear to break all of the rules of Western thought. By and large those who live a traditional French lifestyle eat for pleasure and satisfaction, they often smoke (arguably a stereotype), and they drink regularly. Despite a diet proportionally high in things like saturated fats, the French have remarkably low rates of heart disease and obesity. Welcome to the French Paradox.

On a visit to Paris with my wife and our 7-month old son, I experienced this firsthand. When you walk the streets of Paris, you are tempted with the most sensual culinary delights imaginable: Delicately handmade pastries, beautiful chocolates, freshly baked bread from ovens that have been used for sometimes hundreds of years, full fat, unpasteurized cheeses, and fresh crepes. And that’s just what you can see in the window displays. When you see overweight people in Paris, they are almost never Parisians; in fact, in my experience it was the easiest way to identify my fellow Americans!

Those who practice a traditional French lifestyle seem to break our most commonly accepted dietary notions. They typically:

• Consume 60% more saturated fats than we do in proportion to our overall intake, primarily through dairy. This includes rich cheeses, real butter, whole milk, and yogurt.
• Do not eat low fat products or use or chemically derived sugar substitutes.
• Eat fresh bread daily that is made from refined white flour.
• Regularly consume both lean and fatty meats including pork, duck, beef, chicken, and a few others (someone hide Mr. Ed), as well as fish.
• Drink alcohol with lunch and dinner, and the alcohol is often unregulated. Meaning, where we have a soda fountain, they may have a cask of wine available for refills.
• Smoke cigarettes. As I mentioned earlier, this is a bit of a stereotype since the French typically smoke less than several other European countries, and only a few percentage points more than Americans, on whole. That said, we found in Paris that the smell of cigarette smoke was abundant, yet for some reason we didn’t mind (neither of us are smokers).
• Eat late at night, much later than we do - Often eating heavier foods for supper at around 9 or 10, followed by a dessert course.
• Do not go to the gym or exercise much more than we do (the reasoning being why waste your life in such a way, when you could be enjoying it?).
• Do not obsess about the chemical composition of the foods they eat, and they do not rely on science and industry to tell them what is good or bad. That is what Mother is for.

With all of this dietary rule-breaking, the French simply should be dying off like flies from heart disease. I mean after all, high fat foods? Simple carbohydrates and sugar-filled deserts? Cigarettes and alcohol? No Stairmaster for 3 hours a day? According to our experience, our industrial and governmental science, and our gigantic devotion to every miracle-cure product and approach we can turn our eyes to, their collective hearts should all be congealed, seized up like French-made Peugeot diesel motors full of hardened, varnished sludge.

The truth is that the French typically live 3 years longer than we do, with only an 8.3% rate of heart disease, and a low occurrence of obesity (though sadly this is increasing as Western ways infiltrate French daily life).

So how do they do it?

According to folks like Dr. Will Clower, Michael Pollan, and Mirielle Guiliano (and place me squarely in this camp, by personal experience), it comes down to this: The French simply eat real food in moderation. They eat good food, just less of it (they eat until they’re full, and then they stop). They generally don’t eat the overly-processed, low fat, low carb, hydrogenated chemically substituted well-preserved food-based products that we do. Dr. Clower’s catchphrase: “If it’s not food, don’t eat it.” Michael Pollan? “Eat food. Not Too Much. Mostly plants.”

How to eat rich foods and not gain weight

How can you implement the French approach? What do the French do that allows them to eat what they want, when they want, and still not gain weight?

Here is a list based primarily on the writings of the three authors cited above. Of course, their books provide much more detail on the scientific (and anecdotal) evidence that supports the effectiveness of these ideas, and provide specific techniques on how to implement them. Here’s a sample of the guidance they provide:

• Identify honestly what you eat, think about it, and make changes very slightly and gradually. Remember that you are changing these dietary habits for the span of a lifetime, so they have to be simple, livable adjustments. From Mireille Guiliano, “The answer to weight gain is never dieting.”
• Eat only real food, not processed food alternatives, “faux foods”, or food-like products (particularly high fructose corn syrup).The good news is this means you get to eat butter, bread, and chocolate again.
• Eat for the pleasure of eating, rather than as a means of fuel. Treat your mouth more like a sensory tool and less like a Flux Capacitor.
• Eat at regular times. In France, they maintain a social stigma against between meal snacking. In fact, many of their cars do not have cupholders.
• Eat seasonally, locally, and shop several times a week. And as Michael Pollan says, don’t buy your fuel at the same place you buy it for your car.
• Don’t rely solely on “Nutritionism” to tell you what is good for you; use common sense, and eat real foods. If Great-Grandma wouldn’t recognize it, don’t eat it. This is a simplification here; read In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan for a much deeper explanation of the dangers of relying on science and industry alone to tell us what we should eat.
• Your dietary emphasis should be on green leafy vegetables, or animals who are fed those vegetables.
• Eat fat! Just the right kinds, particularly dairy and naturally occurring fats in plants (think avocados not corn oil). In fact, the lack of fat intake may actually be one of the root causes of many of our health problems like heart disease and diabetes.
• Quantity does not equal quality. Buy the best you can afford, and be willing to spend a little more (although I’ve found that the cost levels out when you’re eating less).
• Train yourself to eat less by enjoying your food more, eating slower, putting less in your mouth per bite, and eating for sensory pleasure. Realize that portion size has grown 3 times what it was 50 years ago!
• Don’t eat mindlessly or be distracted when you’re eating by things like television or the computer.
• Incorporate wine into your diet in moderation.
• Don’t stuff yourself. Learn the often forgotten feeling of fullness with practice and patience. For example, eat half of what you normally would, and wait for half an hour. If you’re starving, you know it wasn’t enough. If you feel physically good, that is the feeling of being full. Practice identifying that feeling, and it becomes second nature with time.
• Try to get all of your nutritional needs met through whole foods rather than supplements whenever possible (there is an ongoing, raging controversy as to whether supplements actually have much benefit out of the context of the whole food from which they were derived. [Update: After reading further, personally I believe that they DO have benefit, but only the right kinds. Industrially produced, synthetic supplements are not only worthless nutrition-wise, they can be dangerous. Whole food multivitamins, on the other hand, are a proven source of nutrition. For the “real” thing, and to gain a better understanding of the issues involved, see Robin’s blog, Whole Food and More.]).
• Learn to cook, and make time to do it. We often say that we don’t have time to cook, but in reality in the last 15 years most of us have somehow made 2-3 hours time for other things like surfing the Internet. It is ultimately a matter of choosing our health as a priority.
• Make ethical choices in what you eat. Develop a relationship with what you put in your body, understand how it affects you, and recognize that your choices impact the environment. This is an interpolation of the French diet in a sense since it is not a conscious concern of theirs, generally, but in a world of genetically modified foods and questionable shortsighted farming practices, it helps you to identify “real food.” The French concept of the Terroir reflects a profound respect for the land that provides the good things in life - it is a principle that helps when trying to make wise choices.
• Don’t view your weight or your choices as a pass/fail situation. View it as a commitment to improving your life over the long haul.

All of these steps, for me, boil down to this: Eating real food in moderation simply works. It may very well be the solution to the French Paradox.

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This is part three of the series, “How I quit eating fast food”. If you enjoy this post, please consider receiving AlmostFit articles in your inbox. Thanks.

In parts one and two of this series, I described how I’ve quit eating fast food using 3 basic steps: Educating myself, Deciding to quit, and Acting on my convictions. In this final part of the series I’m describing the actions I’ve used to successfully break the fast food habit.

20 tactics to kill the fast food habit

1. Start out with a ridiculously simple goal - So simple that you can’t fail. Leo Babauta’s book, Zen To Done, (an excellent book by the way), highlights this concept. If you start out excessively simple, you can build on that success to reach your goals over time. Here’s an example: I first realized that soda, regular or otherwise, is bad for me for one specific reason: in the end, even diet soda simply perpetuated my desire for the stuff. I realized that I could easily give up soda if I wanted to - it never tastes the same at a fast food place anyway, and I always drink too much of it. It was simple and attainable. And the more I did it, the more “power” to change that I felt.

2. Treat the decision to quit fast food as a habit, not a lifelong commitment. The idea is to make it your habit to seek out real food, at the expense of spending time and money on fast food. It doesn’t need to be a lifelong political position. You want healthful choices to become second nature. That way when you do give into that impulse desire, which you likely will at some point in the future, you will not have “failed”. Take it slow, and be proud of your many small accomplishments that will lead to a bigger success of building a healthy habit of eating.

3. Make yourself as publicly accountable as possible. Blog about it. Tell your friends that you are doing it. Use that concept of peer pressure to your advantage by putting pressure on yourself to stick to it. Everyone you know should be shocked if they see you walking out with a weighted paper sack with an ever-expanding grease spot on the bottom where the fries are trying to dig their way to freedom.

4. Don’t buy into the “healthy alternatives” concept that fast food is trying to sell to you. This is basic marketing 101, and is one of the greatest “dupes” since the famous Roman campaign for the healthfulness of lead cups (OK I made that up - but it sounds plausible). The basic idea is to find any way possible to get customers into the store. That is the hardest part. Once customers are in, add-ons are the name of the game. Want that salad? Bundle it with a cheaply sweetened fruit cup and a large diet soda.

“And ya know, since it’s better for you, well, it is going to cost a little more. But that is the price you’ll have to pay for a “healthy” choice. . .”

Sound Fishy? It should. It is malarkey.

Let me put it to you this way: Using basic common sense - If Add-ons and upselling didn’t work, no one would bother to do it.The truth is, IT WORKS. The answer? Don’t enter in the first place.

5. Don’t enter in the first place. This deserves repeating (See the previous tip to understand why). This is hard to do, without question. It may take a while before you can make that a habit, but think of it this way: If you suffered from an addiction to alcohol, does common sense say it’s your best move to buy your groceries at the liquor store? It is common sense, no matter how we try to rationalize it. Believe me - I’ve tried.

6. Reduce your exposure to fast food advertising. This is going to sound crazy, but if you watch less commercial TV, you will be less inclined to eat fast food. Why? Again, common sense. Big Industry pays hundreds of millions of dollars a year trying to find ways of convincing you in a 30-second spot that eating their new sandwich will change your life for good, forever. And their tactics simply work. If you are exposed less, you will be influenced less. Exposed to more - influenced more.

That said, does that mean I have to give up watching Top Chef? I don’t think so. If you want to see who gets voted off the island this week, go for it - but DVR it if you have the option, and then skip the commercials. Of course, if you want to go hardcore, just give up TV altogether. It’s almost guaranteed you will be less influenced if you reduce your exposure.

Want scientific proof? It’s simple: Corporations are all out for one thing: MONEY. If gigantic ad campaigns, which mean repeated exposure, didn’t actually work, do you think they would spend their money on it? Trust THEIR money-making science - they truly do know exactly what they’re doing.

7. Be a cheapskate. Don’t confuse quantity with value, throwing your money away because it is sold to you as a “good deal”. Fast food depends on the idea that you will be foolish enough to believe that a big pile of garbage has more value than a little pile of quality food. Stick with the quality food. Learn to cook. Make enough for leftovers. Lather, rinse, repeat.

One other thing on being cheap as a method of motivation: Remember that when you eat a pile of junk food for $5.00, the one thing you are NOT getting is decent nutrition. Nutritional deficit may be the single greatest cause of all classically Western diseases. So in the end, you’re going to pay for it anyway. And in the mean time, the fast food CEO will be using his $18,000,000 dollar salary to eat excessively well at your expense. Read the rest of this entry »

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This is the second part in the series, “How I quit eating fast food”. If you think it might help others, please consider sharing it via Digg, StumbleUpon, or your favorite social media tools. Thanks. And don’t forget to check out part 3, “20 tactics to kill the fast food habit“.

“Just because it’s toxic doesn’t mean it’s not tasty.” - MastersInTheMaking.com

As I made clear in part 1, I think it’s fair to say that I have an issue or two with my lifelong personified compadre, Fast Food. That’s not to say that it’s my ONLY issue (oh and by the way, speaking of issues, a big “thanks” to the coiners of that ubiquitous ’80s phrase, “global thermonuclear war” for ruining my trust in humanity - Nice work), but in my opinion the fast food hang-up really does have the possibility of killing me in a hurried, greasy fashion.

And if I have one rule in life, it is that when I go, I do not want my mournful passing to be in any way associated with Grease. And thus why I am neither an auto mechanic nor John Travolta.

Further, to prevent a future experience that includes balloon-like medical devices being inserted near my nether-regions in an emergency effort to clear out my brittle arteries, I have quit frequenting fast food restaurants since the beginning of the year.

How am I doing it, considering I seem to get the hankerin’ for Kentucky Fried Chicken every few months as if there is some sort of time-release chicken nugget flavored tablet wedged somewhere in my right parietal cortex?

If you read nothing else, read this

In my opinion, there are very few things in life that you can give up permanently. Does fast food in all of it’s forms fit that category for me for all Eternity? I can’t say - I don’t wear that cologne. But for right now, I have decided to exclude it from my diet altogether (both fast food AND cologne) to allow myself to create the HABIT of eating better.

For me, the only way that I can do this is to say no to fast food completely. Who knows; at some point fast food may become “real food”…But from my vantage point today, I highly doubt it. For now, I’ve decided it doesn’t fit the current picture of my life.

In other words, giving up fast food is a reasonable goal for me, today. Where you draw your own line is, well, your own business.

How to quit eating fast food

There are three parts to this process for me: Educate, Decide, and Act. Read the rest of this entry »

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Editor’s note: This post is this week’s Friday Fit recipe. The idea is to try “real food” recipes that can be prepared on the weekend. Of course, each recipe can also be prepared during the week (that’s when I’m trying it), but with the hectic schedules of most, a recipe might be easier to try on the weekend when work is generally less of a factor. If you enjoy this article, please consider subscribing to my feed. Thanks.

With the school year coming to a close, we had the end of the year picnic last weekend complete with a parachute, hula hoops, and a pot luck lunch spread. In addition to being a great time for the kids, one of the best things about such events is to see the variety in familial food culture. Our instructions were to bring a dish to share, and to bring our own plates, glasses, and utensils, so as to cut down on the waste. It was a great plan, and left very little to clean up.

In our case, we brought sandwiches using some of my freshly made loaves of bread (Can you make artisan bread like this? In only 5 minutes?). Other offerings included Asian noodles, enchiladas, and pizza, all of which quickly disappeared. There were simply too many good things to try, but by the end it was very clear that the quinoa salad in particular was a huge favorite.

Quinoa - the often forgotten grain

In a recent blog post by Lisa over at Iowa Avenue (What is Quinoa?), quinoa was featured as a great alternative to some of the grains most of us are more familiar with. Quinoa is a popular gluten-free alternative for folks that are sensitive to wheat, and has a better nutritional profile than many of the more common grains.

Here’s a quote from Lisa’s article that really got my attention:

“Health bonus: Unlike wheat or rice (which are low in lysine), quinoa contains a balanced set of essential amino acids for humans, making it an unusually complete food. This means it takes less quinoa protein to meet one’s needs than wheat protein. It is a good source of dietary fiber and phosphorus and is high in magnesium and iron. Quinoa is gluten free and considered easy to digest.”

Lisa’s post at Iowa Avenue is an excellent primer on the benefits of quinoa and it’s history. It also includes a great Minestrone recipe. Well worth a visit.

Friday Fit Recipe #10: Gluten-free Summer Quinoa Salad

This recipe is a customized version of the salad we had at the picnic. Thanks to our friends C. and W. for the great recipe - it went particularly well with a salad made with organic greens from our garden, a light vinaigrette, and a roasted free range chicken, which was our dinner last night. It was excellent.

Ingredients

1 cup uncooked red quinoa
2 cups water
2 cups cherry tomatoes, halved
2 avocados, diced
1 cup artichoke hearts
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
2 tablespoons of pine nuts, toasted
2 tablespoons of capers, to taste

Caramelized onions:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 thinly sliced red onion

Basic vinaigrette dressing:
3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons fresh lemon or lime juice, with zest
2 cloves minced garlic
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

Serves 4-6 as a side dish

Preparation

Bring the quinoa and water to boil. When the water boils, reduce the heat to a simmer and cook until the water is absorbed, approximately 10 minutes. When cooked, quinoa has a texture similar to perfectly cooked pasta, or rice. Strain and rinse well under cold water.

While the quinoa is cooking, in a skillet heat olive oil over medium heat and saute the onions until transparent.

Prepare the vinaigrette by combining the ingredients and whisking.

In a large salad bowl, toss all of the ingredients together, including caramelized onions and the vinaigrette.

To Serve

Serve cold or at room temperature. With very little to spoil, this would make an excellent accompaniment on a picnic. Couple this salad with fresh greens, chicken or fish for protein, and your wine of choice, and you have an excellent, healthy meal.

Options

The original recipe did not include the artichoke hearts, but we found that it was a very flavorful addition.

If you enjoyed this article, please consider sharing it through Digg or StumbleUpon, or subscribing to my feed. Thanks.

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“64 oz. soda? Does it come with a chance to win Boardwalk? Well then hit me Brutha!” - Metroknow, 26 lbs heavier

About 6 months ago, I completely quit eating fast food. For me, this was no minor feat. In the first part of this two-part series, I’ll tell you about my relationship (yes, relationship) with fast food. In part two, I’ll tell you exactly how I’m doing it, and how you can too.

I am definitely a card-carrying member of the fast food generation. I don’t know how many times I have made the decision on the size of a combo at McDonald’s based on which of the larger sizes included the most “extra” Monopoly game pieces, which generally led to winning - you guessed it - MORE fast food. I never won that extra-heavy Hummer with the dual 40 gallon fuel tanks.

Why do did I like Fast Food?

Like it or not, here’s the truth: fast food sells - in a BIG way. For me, here’s why:

1. Availability. In many parts of the country, we are simply overrun with fast food and junk food options. In L.A. suburbs, Portland suburbs, and most small towns, when you drive through the business district it looks like this: McDonalds, dry cleaners, cellular phone store, Jack-in-the-Box, stereo store, Starbucks, Taco Bell, KFC, cheap shoe store, Burger King, Wal-Mart, and then McDonalds again.

Repeat that cycle every 4-6 blocks, throw in an Olive Garden, a gas station, and a few 99-cent stores, and you have a drive across America that repeats itself like a Politician stumping from town to town, from sea to plastic-bag-filled shining sea.

Yes, fast food and dry cleaners are everywhere. And I’m not sure which one is more toxic. Someone oughta’ just get it over with and combine dry cleaners and fast food joints. After all, their prices are comparable, which leads me to… Read the rest of this entry »

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Welcome to Almost Fit. If you’ve just arrived from GetFitSlowly, an extra welcome to you as well. Almost Fit is about one thing: Improving health by eating real food in moderation. No low fat this or low carb that, just healthful eating with weight loss being a satisfying side effect. If you enjoy Almost Fit, please consider subscribing. Have a poke around and let me know what you think. Thanks.

Have you ever wondered why it seems that the French can get away with eating everything we’re told not to eat, and still live 3 years longer on average, without exercising more than we do, taking 6 week vacations, and 2 hour lunches?

I’ve written a guest post this morning for the good guys over at GetFitSlowly.com. I mentioned their site briefly yesterday as one of my inspirations for Almost Fit, so it was really exciting when J.D. agreed to post one of my pieces.

If you have a few minutes, check the article out: Food, Drink, and Decadence: How the French Stay Thin.

If you haven’t already, you should also become a regular there if you are at all interested in improving your health. J.D. also writes GetRichSlowly, which is tremendously successful not only because the advice there is so sound, but his well-rendered honesty always shines through. He talks about his successes, failures, interests, and frustrations with great candor. Well worth adding to your RSS feed. Both are in my top 10 daily reads.

Thanks guys!

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