The woods, a natural workout

Journal Entry: Weight = 174.8; Coinage = $2.73 from Monday and $.68 from Tuesday; Total bottles = 32; Ground Scores = 15. Monday is always a good day at the car wash. The manager has given his permission for the searches, only ask that I be tidy. One other person also searches and leaves a mess. The manager is a great guy and knows that all finds goes to my battered women's charity. He has asked his boss to also donate.

Feature Entry: For the last two days Ms. MoneyWalker and I are at the "farm." Today, I cleared the trails anticipating Thanksgiving and the arrival of my grandson. The photo (not mine) is of a Tung Oil tree. Our woods are full of them. Years ago, Tung oil was a big cash crop in theses parts. The oil is used as a wood stain and sealer. It is still on the market but synthetics have lessened the demand. Working in the woods provides a natural work out. Still, can't wait to get back to my urban walks and the moneyspots.

Tonight, we are grilling fresh redfish caught my by excellent country neighbor. City life? Country life? tough choice.

MoneyWalker

Photography and Walking

Feature Entry: Photography and Walking

Having Google to help explore the culture of walking provides interesting and unexpected results. Using Advanced Google, I fed in “walking” on the first line and “finding objects” on the exact phrase line. One of the interesting hits produced a photography group that takes walks with their cameras while searching for worthy photographic shots. The moderator has a blog and followers posts their favorite “finds” or photographs on the web, as the one above.

http://blog.webshots.com/?p=927

Journal Entry: Weight = 175.8 lbs. (I’m putting all the left over Halloween candy in the freezer, I have zero resistance to its position on the kitchen cabinet); Saturday’s coinage = $1.75, Sunday’s coinage = $4.66 (wow, I found a new money spot, if I tell you, I will have to kill you.) collectively 154 pennies (1 wheat), 20 nickels, 25 dimes, 4 quarters; Glass bottles = 26; Ground scores = 6 (recycled a perfectly good man’s dress shirt from one of the walks)

MoneyWalker

Go Saints!!!!!

Milestones, Walking, Weight Loss, and Vitamin D

Feature Entry: Milestones, Walking, Weight Loss, and Vitamin D

The MoneyWalker started his blog on January 5th of this year. This week he posted his 150th blog. The purpose of the blog then, and still remains, is to provide science-based encouragement and techniques for those attempting to lose weight or maintain weight loss all through the medium of walking. Since reduced motivation has been repeatedly reported as one of the leading causes of sedentary recidivism, the MoneyWalker has proposed the bizarre but highly effective technique of searching for lost or abandoned money as a method for sustaining the motivation for a daily walking workout.

Today’s post is to lament the fact that Ms. MoneyWalker now insists that we both take a calcium supplement that contains Vitamin D. She knows that I won’t take the horse pill sized supplement without massive doses of reinforcement, both negative and positive. But it is my own fault. I am the one that subscribed to Consumer Reports monthly newsletter “On Health.” After 150 posts, my aging brain finds it increasingly difficult to self-generate feature topics.

She and I both read this month’s headline article, “The ABCs of vitamin D: How much do you really need, and what’s the best way to get it?” They claim that Vitamin D is “shaping up to be the nutrient of the year—if not the decade.” With data from a host of sources, scientists are convinced that vitamin D plays an important role in reducing the risk of osteoporosis, certain cancers, autoimmune infections, and cardiovascular diseases. Moreover, 77 percent of Americans have insufficient amounts, a dramatically new increase.

Why the increase? There are many theories, but being dark-skinned, live in an high latitude area with less sun, being middle-aged, overweight, and/or taking medications are suspected reasons, among others. And then the bad news for the MoneyWalker, not even the sun gained from a daily exercise walk provides enough Vitamin D according to data from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. And not even eating a balanced diet seems to be enough.

While not all experts agree that adults should take Vitamin D supplements, most do, and that is enough for Ms MoneyWalker. “What was that?” “Yes, dear, I took my Os-Cal 600 + D calcium supplement last night and this morning.” “Yes, yes, I am fully aware that it contains 50% of my recommended daily allowance of vitamin D, and that their laboratory uses Dз rather than the less potent D₂.” “Uh huh, I know that it takes effort on your part to place the supplement on my nightstand with a glass of water…” “Yes, I could have at least said Thank You!”

Journal Entry: Recent weigh-in = 174.6 lbs.; Coinage finds last two days = $.69 and $.67 respectively; Total glass bottles retrieved = 10; Ground scores = 6; Best coinage finds = 2 wheats, one each day; and a quarter in one of the USA Newspaper vending machines, always a great feeling to feel the unambiguous feel of a quarter in the coin return slot.

MoneyWalker

P.S. to the Numismatatist, Ms MoneyWalker and I appreciated reading about the role of exercise in your family's remarkable history. Readers of this post will want to read her comments from the second from last previous post.

Giving Shape to Emotional Energy

Journal Entry: Weight the last two days = 175.0; Coinage = $1.75 Monday and $1.15 today; Glass bottles = 29; Ground Scores = 6 (one being a perfectly sound pair of scissors); Best coinage find = two quarters and a dime at a Wendy’s, it had been a long dry spell at Wendy’s.

Feature Entry: Giving Shape to Emotional Energy

Our protagonist Lewis Percy is a good guy, but he worries too much. His creator, Anita Brookner said that he had to guard against “wasting his emotional energy.” She nearly makes energy sound like a commodity that can be bought or sold, saved or squandered. Brookner may be on to something. It seems we are always trying to shape our emotional energy with money and the things it buys including ice cream, chocolate, or a new fashion shirt or blouse.

There can be negative consequences when we attempt to buy our emotional energy. An overspent credit card is one and a bulging waist is line is another. How does Lewis handle his stress and anxiety? He walks! He has a habit of regular walking as a way to pace his living. He walks to the store, the bank, the post office and to his job site. He walks to combat sadness and boredom. He walks when feeling joyful and walks to relieve sorrow. Sometimes he walks for romance with his girl friend and sometimes for male companionship.

We all must deal with the emotional realities of our lives each day. How we chose to live can lead us to waste our emotional energy or accumulate it. Walking leads to the latter, it helps us to pace our living in healthful positive ways. Finding a little money along the way is just a sweet bonus.

MoneyWalker

Exercise as Medicine

Feature Entry:

In Today’s Parade Magazine, a physician observed that has patients seem to follow his prescriptions more faithfully than when he just offered his advice. An actual scientific study asked this very question. In Spain, half of a group of 4000 patients were given general advice to exercise, while the other half got prescriptions to do so. Six months later, those with prescriptions were more active. The results were published in Archives of Internal Medicine. It seems that walking is receiving serious consideration as a “medicine” for many of today’s illnesses.

Journal Entry: Weight = 175.4 lbs (yikes, too much Halloween candy); Coinage = $.44, 29 pennies, 1 nickel, and one dime; Glass bottles retrieved = 8; Ground scores = 9 including a perfectly good umbrella; Best coinage find = three different multiple penny scatters. The weather is beautiful in New Orleans, but the picture of walkers was taken this summer in Vienna, Austria.

MoneyWalker

Eating healthy candy this Halloween

Feature Entry: Eating healthy candy this Halloween

The MoneyWalker loves candy, he loves chocolate, and he love loves figs. So why not leave the Hersheys and the Reese’s in the bag and reach for a bag of Figamajigs. These fat-free fig bars are covered in dark chocolate. They come flavored with almonds, raspberries and mint and were named Healthiest Candy of 2006 by Forbes and given a Healthy Snack Award by Shape in 2007. The nutrition editor of Readers Digest informs us that dried figs are a nutritional powerhouse and pack more health benefits than most dried fruits? They’re full of fiber, calcium, potassium, and iron. Plus, figs are sweet to boot, especially when dipped in chocolate! Look for other great treats for Halloween and other times by checking out their recommendations.


Journal Entry: Current weight = 175.0; Total coinage/paper last four days = $6.89. One find was a crumpled dollar bill; one walked netted four curb quarters; and this morning’s walk yielded an asphalt nickel and a wheat penny. Also, a check for one hundred dollars was submitted to the New Orleans Friendship House, an agency that provides shelter, resources, and spiritual and personal counseling to battered women and their children. Moreover, several articles of clothing have been washed and recycled to needy citizens in the Mid-City area of New Orleans.

Happy Halloween!

MoneyWalker

Interaction Statistics and Weight Loss

Journal Entry: 10/26/09: Coinage = $1.26, 96 pennies (one wheat), 4 nickels, 3 dimes; Glass bottles = 8; Ground scores = 3; Best coinage = 3 asphalt coins (coins hammered away from New Orleans’ asphalt streets). It has turned chilly in New Orleans, a perfect time for a light jacket. The MoneyWalker placed a washed light jacket on a special hook on a street pole with this sign attached, “Washed, please take!” The jacket, a ground score from an earlier walk, had been retrieved from a curb site. It lasted on the pole less than 30 minutes. Someone is walking warming today. Giving back is a good feeling.

Journal Entry: 10/27/09: Weight = 175.2; Coinage = $1.26, 41 pennies, 1 nickel, 3 dimes, 2 quarters; Glass bottles retrieved = 2; Ground Scores = 2; Best coinage find = a fence find consisting of one quarter and two pennies. Tip: I have found that people throw coins away, usually pennies, especially along the fences that separate the drive throughs of fast food franchises from establishments next door. So, when I check drive throughs, I look especially closely next to the fences as well as the areas near the pay windows. This morning the MoneyWalker found a quarter and two pennies along the fence of a Burger King drive through.

Feature Entry: Interactive statistics and weight loss

The MoneyWalkers just returned from a five-day mini vacation to the beaches of Destin, FL with three other couples—great friends. We have been taking this twice yearly trip for several years. We all met years ago at the University of New Orleans’ Faculty Women’s Club. Five of us are professors and all are teachers, three from public schools. Although representing different disciplines, our long friendship is due in part to a respective appreciation of statistics.

At Destin, the women enjoy shopping and the men hang out, take walks, philosophy, and read. Two of us enjoy checking out the thrift stores for used books and brick-a-brac treasures (the MoneyWalker collects small ducks, small boats, and cassette tape recordings). One book from an earlier post was _Perfect Weight_ by Rubin Jordan, 2008 (Siloam Publishing). Chapter 11, “Think for Your Perfect Weight” reminded me of interactive statistics and weight loss.

The chapter featured a testimonial by Carol Green, and executive chef from South Africa. Carol, after years of dieting and sporadic exercise still found herself to be consistently 20 lbs overweigh. She finally found a third step that has brought her back to her perfect weight—to eat while relaxed: “How you receive your food is important. Make every meal an occasion. Pray over your food. Eat calmly. Eat with joy every bite.” It was the interaction of diet, exercise, and stress management that produced the desired result.

She noted while studying to be a chef in Lyon, France that most French citizens eat hearty amounts of eggs, butter, and cream, but weren’t overweight. She noted that “French people ate their meals sitting down. They weren’t in a hurry to eat, preferring stimulating discussion and a leisurely pace with their knife and fork along with a glass of Bordeaux, even in the middle of the afternoon. No matter what they had pressing on their schedules, the French took their time whenever a meal was served.” We Americans can learn from the French. Too often, we eat on the run, wolf down our meals, and fail to appreciate the food or the time to prepare it.

In summary, it is the statistical interaction effect that might be missing from our attempt to lose weight. It is not just exercise and diet that needs our attention, but also stress free eating. Why not eat better food, sitting down, while enjoying stress-free and stimulating conversation.

MoneyWalker