PaleoPhil's Journal

[PaleoPhil]

[The above was a joke, BTW, if that wasn't obvious.]

Like Lex, I try to share the bad with the good. I currently have a cold (throat and sinus congestion, aches and malaise, watery eyes, possibly acquired from my co-worker who shares a tiny office who has a bad cold).  I think it's my first clear cold since 2004, in the early days of my going cooked Paleo, and my symptoms appear to be less severe than my co-workers' who I may have acquired it from, but it does add more evidence to dispel banned-member William's bogus notion that people eating nutrient-rich ancestral-type diets cannot get pathogenic infections.

[Dorothy]

I hope you feel better soon!

I actually couldn't tell if it was a brain fart where you got some words mixed up or if you were making a funny. I prefer the funny to the fart. 

[PaleoPhil]

Yeah, it's a funny, but it's an old style of humor like W. C. Fields used to use that I realized that not many use today, and doesn't translate well in writing.

[Dorothy]

It was directed at me, and I liked it, so it worked. 

[PaleoPhil]

I can't remember whether I updated my journal regarding the following or not, so I'll do so now: my left foot is fully recovered now and I no longer get any pain when walking barefoot or in barefoot-style shoes on cement. I injured it when I was doing lots of walking and running in bare feet and barefoot-style shoes on cement and not paying much attention to how gently I was trodding. I kept reinjuring it when I walked more than a few days in a row on cement, so I eventually rested it thoroughly and avoided cement as much as possible and that did the trick. Now I can walk and run on cement with no problems, but I'm trying to be careful to go gently on cement, pay attention to form, and not do excessive ambulation on that hard surface. Blacktop, in contrast, gives me no problems. I wish all sidewalks were made of blacktop instead of cement.

What got me thinking about this was a podcast interview of Paleo diet blogger David Csonka in which he made the same guess that I did in the past--that cement sidewalks may have contributed to the development of cushy footware. Cement, sharp gravel and thorns are the only surfaces/materials I find somewhat problematic to walk on in bare feet. Even broken glass doesn't tend to give me problems. David even talked about a bad incident he had in which he inadvertently ran onto a horrendously thorn-plagued field with a girlfriend he was trying to encourage to run barefoot (ironically) and ended up with badly bloodied feet. The only thing I don't understand is how he ran far enough into the field that he ended up badly bloodied. I would have stopped at the first thorn or two and checked around. I guess they must have been running too fast to stop in time.

[William]

...banned-member William's bogus notion that people eating nutrient-rich ancestral-type diets cannot get pathogenic infections.

Paleoman didn't, and I don't.
Pathogenic refers to living microbes; colds are believed to caused by a virus, which are not living.

Your cold is probably environmental, as I live in a wild forest, minimal environmental pollution/toxins/poisons and use the general purpose antidote

[PaleoPhil]

A pathogen (Greek: pathos, "suffering, passion" and gens (-gen) "producer of") or infectious agent - in colloquial terms, a germ — is a microbe or microorganism such as a virus, bacterium, prion, or fungus that causes disease in its animal or plant host.[1][2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pathogen#cite_note-0

See also:
Virus Pathogenesis
http://www.microbiologybytes.com/virology/VirPath.html

[PaleoPhil]

I discovered a little treasure at my local healthfood market--frozen wild Maine blueberries. Even frozen, they taste fabulous. Far, far superior to those big fat, bland, mushy California blueberries, including organic. I've noticed in the past that wild Maine blueberries give me much less negative health symptoms than most other fruits, so I really put them to the test this time. I ate most of the 17 oz container in a single sitting. The only negative effect was a brief tiny bit of nasal mucus, which I suspect was more due to the cold nature of the frozen berries than the berries themselves. Wild Maine blueberries are excellent proof that not all fruits are the same.

Blessed be the wild Maine blueberry, a little bit of heaven on earth.

[PaleoPhil]

Had some semi-frozen ground (100% grassfed) beef tonight, Nenets style. By chance it was at the perfect state of frozenness--not too much, not too little. Yummy, yummy, yummy, yum! And I felt a nice feeling of well being during and afterward. Blessed be the semi-frozen grassfed beef.

[PaleoPhil]

This is a pretty good approximation of my current staple foods:

Fertile chicken eggs and duck eggs
100% Grassfed ground beef
Fats: Bone Marrow, Suet, lard (all of them grassfed, pastured, free range, or wild and local/regional), and RFCLO
Wild fish: yellowfin tuna, salmon, large fresh sardines, clams, mackerel and other wild fish
100% Grassfed Liver, chicken hearts and other organs
Carrots and Parsnips (edible raw, though occasionally cooked on the 'warm' setting in the crockpot with bones)
Lemons (I squeeze the juice out of them)
Blackberries, wild Maine blueberries
Bone broth, usually made with pastured marrow bones or large fresh wild sardines (including heads)
Really Raw brand fermented raw honey (eating it does wonders for my hair and scalp flakes for some reason, perhaps the antifungal elements)
Raw fermented sauerkraut
Duck breast
Raw high vitamin butter oil (for the vitamin K2, as an experiment)
Water, mineral water, teas (such as Douglas fir spring tip, senna--less harsh for me than cassia fistula--Earl Grey, roasted dandelion, etc.)

My Current Secondary Foods:

Coconut water
Fresh figs (not dried--only tend to be available in the summer), raspberries, "overripe" bananas, and other fruits/berries
Pastured ground bison or pork, pork loin, top round steak, ribeye steak, wild oysters and other meats/fish/organs including occasional wild meats like deer meat, liver or suet
Raw celery and other nonstarchy veggies
Raw aged Spanish sheep milk cheese
Ginger, raw fresh or pickled
Raw or pickled horseradish
Wasabi mustard
Kelp
Sea salt, black pepper, spices
Occasional coffee
Great Lakes unflavored gelatin

[PaleoPhil]

Kale chips

I don't know why several vegans and raw vegans praise kale chips like they were ambrosia. I tried making my own, following their instructions, and wasn't that impressed. So I bought some at my local market today, in case I made them wrong, and was even less impressed. If this is all it takes to impress a vegan, then their diet can't be that good. I'm puzzled. Kale chips are not all that.

[cherimoya_kid]

I'm pretty much unimpressed with dried anything, except seaweeds.

[PaleoPhil]

A friend and good spirit who was a great friend to my best friend left this earth suddenly today while still young enough to participate vigorously in his favorite activity--tennis. He had retired very early and thus was able to do what he loved, and he died while doing it (while taking a break from a tennis match to get a drink of water). He often gave sage advice and today he has taught me to try to refocus on the important things--friends, family and good times. If only I wasn't still a wage slave. God rest ye merry.

[lex_rooker]

Sorry for your loss.  This is the reason that I retired early as well.  So many of my friends didn't even make it to age 55.  One died of lung cancer.  He had smoked for 25 years but quit when he was 40.  He died at 54.  One died of a rare cancer where there are only a few known cases.  He never smoked, drank, or took drugs, but died at 53.  Another dropped dead at 43 while jogging after work.  By all measures he was in great shape.  Another good friend died at 36 from kidney failure.  A virus attacked his kidneys and damaged them beyond repair.  He was on dialysis for 3 years but they never found a match for a transplant and his body finally gave up and he was gone.

We are all on borrowed time and we need to make the most of every minute we have.  This is why I don't spend my time obsessing over diet.  I just make the best dietary choices I can but spend the majority of my time living my life to the fullest doing the things I love to do.

Lex 

[PaleoPhil]

This is why you are one of the great minds on this forum, Lex--you have whittled things down to the crucial essence. Thanks.

[PaleoPhil]

I was sprinting through the woods, having fun leaping over and balancing on logs and such, when I noticed that the fiddleheads (young ferns) are out in force. I bent over to pick one to eat (I find they taste best fresh-picked and raw--they become more bitter after they are picked and allowed to sit around or cooked) and noticed an Indian-looking fellow picking some plants and bagging them. I said hello and asked if he was picking the fiddleheads. It sounded like he said he was picking nuguri and showed me, and it was indeed fiddleheads. He said his people in India eat them. I said I did too and he gave me the thumbs up.

In the Indian subcontinent, it is found in the Himalayan North Eastern states of India. In the Kullu valley in Himachal Pradesh, it is known locally as "lingri" and is famously used to make a pickle "lingri ka achaar". In the Kangra Valley of Himachal it is called 'Lungdu' in the local Kangri Pahari language. In Darjeeling and Sikkim regions, it is called ningro and is well loved as a vegetable side dish, often mixed with local cheese. It is also pickled. In Assam, it is known as 'dhekia xaak'; there it is a popular side dish. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiddlehead_fern

[Lynnzard]

That's funny. You never know who you'll run into out in the woods. I used to run into an elderly lady a lot in Arkansas when I was gathering hickory nuts. She was always after them, too. Close to 80 and still hammering them open like a pro.

[PaleoPhil]

I've heard/read Chris Kresser, Stephan Guyenet, Paul Jaminet, Kurt Harris and others recommend keeping blood glucose spikes below 160 mg/dl, preferably below 140 mg/dl. Heard more about it today in a Livin La Vida Low Carb podcast. Dr. Dwight Lundell said that postprandial blood sugar spikes cause inflammation and that chronically it leads to heart disease. Dr. William Davis said that the most effective weight loss tool is a glucometer. (LLVLC podcast episode 571)

[Dorothy]

Hi Phil - catching up with your journal I'm going to respond to a few things not in sequence of your posting. Hope you don't mind.

I hope you are feeling slowly better after your loss. Truly, every moment we have is a gift.

I've been learning about blueberries as I'd like to grow some and bought a couple of bushes. Blueberries in the wild are actually small plants low to the ground so are harder to harvest. I plan on buying some "low" blueberries on the web if my bush blueberries survive because everyone seems to agree that they taste better. It's actually good that they are harder to harvest or the populations would have already probably been decimated. Also - in case you didn't know it - Costco (at least the one near me) carries massive bags of wild organic blueberries that are small like the ones you bought and are a real bargain. I eat them pretty much every day.

About the blood sugars - I've been thinking about blood sugar and how vital it is lately. Even though my blood sugars stay extremely constant I have learned that even a small change past or above a certain point for me radically affects my energy levels and more importantly the consistency of my energy.

That's great news about your foot! Do you have any links to good information on how to move correctly that I can share with my husband? He has injured his foot mostly through repetitive incorrect contact with the ground I think.

[PaleoPhil]

I hope you are feeling slowly better after your loss. Truly, every moment we have is a gift.

Yeah, I find I recover faster emotionally than I used to since I went Paleo, and I never considered myself excessively soft or sentimental as it was. I seem to be emotionally resilient without being excessively cold (or so I hope). I've been able to cheer up my friend who was hit very hard by this sudden death amongst our close friends, for which she has been very thankful. Raw Paleo seems to be robustifying in many ways.

I definitely recommend small, wild blueberries, preferably ones indigenous to your region.

That's great news about your foot! Do you have any links to good information on how to move correctly that I can share with my husband? He has injured his foot mostly through repetitive incorrect contact with the ground I think.

Cushy shoes with big heels promote incorrect form and weaken the arches and other muscles. Barefoot is best in the long run and it is a growing craze, so there's tons of info on it now. Mark Sisson http://www.marksdailyapple.com/how-to-prepare-for-barefooting/#axzz1t01bXqcL, Barefoot Ted http://www.barefootted.com/index.php?q=/, Chris McDougall http://www.chrismcdougall.com/barefoot.html and others provide a lot of info, including how to transition safely.

In my case, my left foot and leg (and my entire left side) are weaker than my right, so my left foot was more susceptible to injury from lots of walking on cement sidewalks that I was doing. Cement is unnaturally hard and flat. The weakness of the muscles in my left foot and ankle occasionally resulted in striking the ground wrong and one day this happened on a cement sidewalk and I mildly injured my left foot and kept mildly aggravating it by resuming walking on cement sidewalks again too soon. Taking a sufficient break from sidewalks and either taking the bus or walking on grass and dirt as much as possible enabled my left foot to recover and now I can walk on cement sidewalks with no problem.

Your post reminded me that my left ankle and foot also seem stronger than ever and I haven't struck the ground wrong in the months since that last incident. Years ago it was so bad from a gluten-rich diet that my left ankle would sometimes suddenly collapse while I was walking, for no apparent reason. Luckily I was agile enough to never fall, but that could have been a major problem in my elder years, especially if it had continued to progress.

I used to go to chiropractors and they told me that my left side weakness was due to my spinal curvature cutting off much of the nerves to that side. I suspect that weak connective tissues and muscles on that side also contributed (and the reduced nerve signals to that side probably contributed to weaker muscles). It's interesting that my left side strength and joint stability has improved greatly despite still having a curved spine.

[Dorothy]

Thanks Phil. I copied what you wrote here and set it to hubbie.

[Lynnzard]

Yeah, I find I recover faster emotionally than I used to since I went Paleo, and I never considered myself excessively soft or sentimental as it was. I seem to be emotionally resilient without being excessively cold (or so I hope). I've been able to cheer up my friend who was hit very hard by this sudden death amongst our close friends, for which she has been very thankful. Raw Paleo seems to be robustifying in many ways.

It's interesting to see you say this, and I'm glad you're feeling better overall. I'm sorry about your loss. It's good that you're able and willing to be there for your friend. That so often helps in recovery for the self, as well.

I didn't even think about it until I read this, but my emotional responses have shifted, too. My Dad has ongoing, often severe health problems that have taken a real toll on the whole family over the past year. His most recent hospital trip was a few days ago, and while I was still concerned and stayed in close touch with Mom for updates, I wasn't distracted and upset like I have been with the past incidents. I felt calm and as though just taking a wait and see approach was the right way to go. Once he was back home and things were stable, I was as happy as I ever am when he pulls through these things. It was the upset half of it that was markedly different. What do you think makes the difference? Is it the increased raw saturated fat in the diet, or something else?

[PaleoPhil]

Yes, I think that's part of it, and avoiding the modern foods and ingredients that probably screw up the neural system.

[cherimoya_kid]

I'd say having more minerals in the bloodstream, especially magnesium and calcium, makes a big difference in the degree of calm, as well. 

[Dorothy]

I'd say having more minerals in the bloodstream, especially magnesium and calcium, makes a big difference in the degree of calm, as well. 

Cheri - have you done research into the proper ratio of magnesium to calcium for men and women by any chance?