The BBC’s Truth about Food programme provided some great information about good nutrition and dispelled a few myths which tend to get in our way when we try to figure out whether our eating habits are good or bad.

The key observation from DJ Andrea Oliver was about the difficulty of finding good information. Unlike fad diets and fad diet shows, the BBC used a wide mix of food scientists and very effective computer-generated animation. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans gave an amazing picture of the fat deposits in the DJ celebrity’s body. The very basic truths about calorie intake versus expenditure came through very clearly. And the myth of the lean person’s fast metabolism was neatly despatched to the poo-collection pot of history (Question: why are there so many prime time diet shows at the moment which concentrate at faecal matter, just when you’re trying to eat your TV dinner?). The fatter person simply eats more: end of story. There was also some fascinating evidence from Denmark about the value of low-fat dairy sources of calcium in helping us excrete dietary fat. Too many of us think of all dairy products as inherently fattening.

The cost of acquiring information, either to generate a healthy exercise regime or a good diet, seems crucial. It takes time, and to put it into practice takes a lot more. The BBC here proved a very reliable source. But there will always be snake-oil salesman with another fad to obscure the basic truths. Like Rome (or the marathon runner) it is not built in a day. Andrea Oliver observed at the end that when she started the programme she was looking for a result. What she realised by the end was that it’s an ongoing process. These two things are very different. We live in a results-driven culture, whether on the football pitch, in business or in our quest for products, diets, weight loss or exercise regimes. Oliver’s weight loss was not dramatic, averaging about 1 pound per week. Over three months she lost 7 kg, or about 14 pounds. On a week-to-week basis, weight fluctuates naturally, meaning that it would actually be hard to observe the trend. So, if you are not committed to the process, the short term results might be disappointing and throw you off course.

The New York Times produced a useful article this week where journalism professor Michael Pollan argues that the whole nutrition industry is the problem and that fundamentally we will be all right if we cook our own food, mostly plants! Interestingly, it was Tyler Cowen, author of economics blog Marginal Revolution, who linked to this piece, except that he rather unhelpfully seemed to suggest that fruit was bad for you. This sort of confusion means you have to invest the time in finding out how and what to cook, and persist with the process long enough, despite any setbacks.

The BBC did a sterling job in making light work of that for most people today.

One of the best websites I’ve come across recently in this context shows exactly what 200 calories of each food looks like. When the internet has to be shut down because it is too big and dangerous for us to cope with, perhaps they could leave that site up.

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I’ve tended to make light of colds in recent years, mocking myself with the comedic idea of “man-flu”. I have an elaborate evolutionary biology-inspired theory of man-flu that I’ll relate at some point in another post. But, after four days of ever-intensifying head cold, I started to wonder whether I did have flu. Some symptoms of muscle ache indicated flu perhaps, but most of the symptoms were confined to above the shoulders.

The last time I felt viral, I resolved that the next time, rather than not exercise at all, I might try a light session (say, 20 minutes on the bike) to see if it would have a positive effect. It is said that such a small amount of exercise is not detrimental, and could have positive benefits. This time there was no way. A week on, even though the symptoms have for the first day today been on balance lighter than the day before, I feel no better than a week ago.

Following the “feed a cold, starve a fever adage”, for which there seems to be some scientific basis, I’ve eaten a lot this week, and experienced some weight gain as a result.

Resting heart rate 51

Weight 73 kg

Mood
Sick with virus (seventh day)

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The Marginal Revolution has a good link to an article about the psychology of procrastination.

The most salient quotation for non-exercisers in this article is this:-

“Fifty per cent of heart attack patients don’t manage to make the lifestyle changes that could save their lives.”

I know what that feels like. It took a major wrench to wake me up and determine I needed to save a few more heart beats for when I might need them much later. The problem is you never know how much time you have.

This fits quite neatly into an area of study that ties the marathon and the concept of delayed gratification together with other ways we tend to favour the short term in the choices we make:-

“Over the years, psychologists have come up with a lot of ideas about what makes people procrastinate. In addition to anxiety and perfectionism, some suggested that procrastinators were self-sabotaging, hostile and rebellious, or depressed.

But for Steel, procrastination can be explained by an insight borrowed from behavioural economics called hyperbolic discounting [my link]. This is the tendency to value near-term rewards more than long-term ones. For instance, some people will choose a payoff of $50 today over $100 tomorrow.”

There’s an old fashioned saying: “A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”. But, as with all such adages, there are times (whether it is saving for our pensions, or keeping fit) when it may be wrong.

Resting heart rate 53

Weight 72 kg

Sick with heavy virus

Mood

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