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Disappearing Breasts, Fat Non-Smokers, and Snoring Ravers
- Oh boy, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons has decided that grafting fat from buttock or thigh to breasts is a now an acceptable method of breast enhancement. “I love that it’s just mine, my own fat,” said one recent breast enhancer to the Times. “I didn’t have to put anything foreign in my body.” The technique had been blacklisted as being unreliable, and complicating mammogram testing; but now some doctors champion it as the "natural" solution. Nevermind the problem of "oily cysts" though, get this: If you lose weight, your new, natural breasts disappear: “They decide to run a marathon and their breasts go away,” explained one doctor. Ha!
- It's official, all the health gains America made by quitting smoking, have been offset by our collective weight gain. WebMD reports that while roughly half as many adults smoke today as compared to the 1970s, the number of obese people has spiked. Thirty-four percent of U.S. adults are obese today, compared to 15% in 1980. Nobody's making the point, but isn't it obvious: When you quit smoking, you hit the fridge harder.
- How many times did we have to tell our raver junkie friends that all that Ecstasy couldn't be good with them — that there could be negative long term consequences. They'd just smile, and give us a hug and a glow wand. Well, guess what, the results are in: Ecstacy makes you snore. A recent Johns Hopkins medical school study found that "users of ecstasy had upwards of eight times the risk of apnea or hypoapnea (shallow breathing) episodes while asleep compared with those who did not use the drug."
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Gray Hair is Fated, But Not Loneliness
- Stressed out women of a certain age, please don't panic about your hair. Turns out stress itself has nothing to do with your hair going gray. That's all determined by your genes. This according to a study by Unilever on 200 pairs of identical and non-identical Danish twins....
- Also, loneliness is contagious, reports WebMD. University of Chicago Researchers followed 5,214 people over 30-plus years, tracking their reports of feeling lonely. Get this: In the study, people felt lonely an average of 48 times a year. Also, the researchers found that each new friend made was good for two fewer lonely days a year. Loneliness apparently feeds on itself, with lonely people "pushed to the periphery of their social networks." Hmm. Three words: Group fitness classes....
- Finally, drumroll please, the American Council on Exercise has released its prediction of top fitness trends of 2010. We'll summarize them in twelve words: More technology, and cheaper, faster workouts with better trainers, especially for boomers....
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Girls Who Live Long and Prosper
Women's Health, taking its mission literally, has conveniently ranked women all over the world in terms of their health. We'll summarize (to the tune of California Girls, on this rainy day in NYC): Well, the Japanese babes live longer thanks to soy, miso soup, and green tea. And the Frenchies, with the wine they drink, they have less heart attacks over there. The South Koreans grandmas eat garlicky kimchi and that makes them feel alright. While Italian girls take siestas, and it keeps them strong at night. The Swissies like to walk, and it really shows up in their bods. And for some strange reason, Senegalese women don't get colon cancer.... Right, check it out: We wish we all could live like those foreign girls.
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Ideal Body Types, Hormonal Workouts, and the Pull Up
Recent highlights from the cool girls and boys of the fitness blogosphere. It's mostly a wasteland of diet supplements and hilarious infomercial workouts out there, but the gems are gemlike...
- Skwigg has created a priceless photo gallery showing how her "ideal body type" has evolved over the years. "In the beginning, I wanted to be magazine model skinny. I knew nothing of fitness or muscles or healthy eating; I just wanted to be thin like Cheryl Tiegs...."
- FitnessFixation, with trademark humor, takes on "hormonally appropriate" workouts: "PMS workouts....For me, these are all about lifting weights, usually heavy ones, and doing generally aggressive things like throwing things around and doing stuff that makes satisfying crashing noises..."
- Meanwhile, T-Nation, home of "Unapologetic Muscle Building Elitists," breaks down the pull-up: "Go ahead, scoff. Or cough. Or floss. Or whatever you do when you're pretty sure someone's full of shit. You know that completing a pull-up or a chin-up is as simple as getting your chin over the bar. Except that's not actually what you're supposed to do..."