That's Fit

Standing in front of the mirror this morning, just out of the shower, naked -- too much information? -- I coincidentally happened to hear from my living room TV Carson Kressley of Lifetime's' How To Look Good Naked as he spouted off this trick for really looking good naked: moisturize.

A moisturized naked body is a beautiful naked body, said Kressley, who happens to believe -- or so he says -- that any naked body can be beautiful, no matter the size, shape, or physical condition. All it takes is a little mental exercise in feeling good about your body -- and apparently, some good moisturizing too. Kressley, as host of the naked show, also teaches women how to dress in ways that flatter their assets.

I'm all moisturized now. And ready for the Season Two premiere of How to Look Good Naked on Tuesday, July 22 at 10 PM on Lifetime. Hoping to pick up some more great tips.

Aren't we all dying to be told to eat some bread....lots of bread? Unfortunately...I recently dealt with a pretty disgusting reason to chow down on some firm crusted French bread. Ick, ack and yuck! There was a hair stuck in my throat, and I was going nuts! I know........gross! But it was true. Fortunately that's about the grossest thing I've dealt with in a while, so I suppose I should feel pretty lucky? Hmmm.

Anyway. I complained about it to some friends, and they too had experienced the same thing at some point. Very annoying. So I Googled the question and fortunately found an answer. Dr. Khaghn recommended drinking milk to break down the hair (which could take up to three weeks!) Or ... eating some bread which had a good chance of grabbing on to the hair and dragging it down. I chose the latter, and thank goodness it worked. (Now it's probably stuck in my stomach.)

So! If you ever are violated by a hair that won't go away ... find some milk and bread. If you ever want a great excuse to devour some white flour .. chow down on some hair!

My home treadmill has a strategic location -- right smack dab in my kids' playroom so I can work out and watch my boys play at the same time. ER actress Linda Cardellini has a strategic spot for her exercise equipment too.

"I have an elliptical machine at my house that I placed between the kitchen and the couch," Cardellini tells Good Housekeeping in the June 2008 magazine. "So I can't sit there and eat bonbons on the couch -- I've got to get up and work out."

Got a strategy for your workout routine? Feel free to tell all.

Next time you head to the gym, plan to cozy up next to some unfit folks on the weight machines. Chances are you'll work harder and longer if your exercise partners are frumpier than you.

When researchers from the University of California, San Diego, secretly timed women on a weight machine, they found than if a fit woman in tight gym clothes was on the next machine, the exercisers stopped in just under three minutes. But when their neighbor looked unfit and was sporting baggy sweat pants, the women kept going for more than five minutes. Questionnaires the participants later completed revealed the unfit folks didn't make them feel better about themselves, but the hot bods did make them feel worse than when no one was on the next machine.

This news brief, found in the June 2008 issue of Good Housekeeping, has me wondering where I'll place myself next time I hit the gym. How about you?

Divine Caroline's Natalie Josef has a task for you. It's not your usual diet or fitness task, though. No brisk walking, marathon running, or BOSU balancing required. No calorie counting, fat busting, or carb cutting either. Nope. This challenge involves nothing more than your imagination and your wildest dreams.

Here's your assignment, in the form of one simple question: What bad-for-you foods would you turn into good-for-you foods? Pick five. Make them good. And join this chit chat about what you'd choose. Here are my picks:

1. Gooey chocolate brownies
2. Cold Stone Creamery chocolate ice cream with brownies mixed in
3. Outback Steakhouse cheese fries
4. Milk Duds
5. Any chips, any dips

Now, in all seriousness: Check out this AOL Body nutrition site for tips on eating actual good-for-you food.

When I say "good" I mean good for you. When I say cheap, I mean making this recipe will cost you only $6.22. For this price, you'll get six cups of this yummy Avocado Tomatilla Dressing. You'll get a healthy bite to eat too.

Avocado Tomatilla Dressing

Ingredients

Low-fat plain yogurt, 16 ounce, $175
Tomatillos (drained), 28-ounce can, $1.69
Salt, 1/2 teaspoon, $0.05
Avocado, 1 large, $0.89
Fresh Jalapeno (stemmed), 1 large, $0.10
Lime Juice, 1 lime, $0.25
Cilantro (stems removed), 1 bunch, $1.49

Directions

Combine all ingredients and process or blend until smooth. Store in an airtight container until ready to serve.

Nutritional Information (per 1/4 cup)

37 calories, 4 g carbohydrates, 2 g fat, 1 g protein, 63 mg sodium, 38 mg calcium

Meet Carla Birnberg, a self-described writer, babymama, and wife. Also known as "MizFit," this self-starter once owned a boutique personal training studio where she worked with clients from all walks of life and learned that the key to lifelong fitness is a healthy helping of education, motivation, and humor.

Educational, motivational, and humorous this woman is. Now a health and fitness columnist -- see her column in Austin's The Good Life (click on "Fitness" under "Gusto Departments" on the right) -- this cool gal authors her own blog where daily posts feature recipes, tips and trends, viewer mail, freebies, and for the purpose of this post: Monday Facetime. Yep, every Monday, you get to see MizFit via video as she teaches something related to fitness.

Wondering about flax seeds? See what MizFit had to say on February 18 about the nutty treat that is oh so good for you in an Omega-3 kind of way. Want to perfect your crunch technique? MizFit got down on the floor on February 25 and to show you how. On March 3, this spunky girl talked about weight training in preparation for some specific instruction that will begin next Monday.

I recommend you pay MizFit a visit when you get a free moment. I think you'll love what she has to offer. You just might learn a thing or two. Click here to meet my friend.

FitSpirit explores the mind-body connection and the intangible benefits we gain from our efforts to stay physically fit.

Don't strive for perfect. It' a virtual guarantee for failure -- none of us is perfect, you may well know. Doing good, plain old good, is really all we need to feel spunky and nourished. Here are three tips for getting started on your path toward mere goodness.

Don't cut out, just cut back. Slash just 200 calories per day and you'll lose nearly two pounds a month. That's about 20 pounds a year. You can still eat cake -- just limit it, and other treats as well.

Limit sugar and salt. Don't ditch them entirely. Just enjoy a little less. Ketchup, spaghetti sauce, peanut butter, juices, and cereals are all loaded with hidden sugar. And canned chicken noodle soup: 1,780 milligrams of salt per cup. Go with low-sodium minestrone or vegetable and all you'll consume is 290.

Add water. Add water to your beverage line-up and say goodbye to a few regular indulgences, like cans of soda, frothy Frappuccinos, and yes, sinful Margaritas and their accompanying 740 calories. Still OK on occasion, these drinks can severely sideline a healthy lifestyle.

For more where this came from, check out this Oprah magazine article.

Good Morning America co-host Robin Roberts is bald, thanks to breast cancer and chemotherapy. She's done a bang-up job of covering up since she shaved her head in preparation of the big fallout -- her wig is a perfect match for the hair that once sprouted from her scalp -- but she recently decided to bare her shiny scalp. She did it to challenge her comfort zone, she says.

What started as a dare had Roberts braving the catwalk the other day as part of Isaac Mizrahi's runway show, live from New York Fashion Week. All of her friends and fans knew she was doing the show -- they just didn't know she'd do it bald.

"This is who I am," Roberts said about her decision to ditch the wig.

When Roberts was diagnosed with breast cancer last July, the last thing she felt was beautiful. When the folks at Good Morning America dared her to be model, she seized the opportunity. It was a perfect way to push herself outside a certain comfort zone.

To transform herself into a supermodel, Roberts worked with Tyra Banks on walking the runway, Mizrahi on finding the perfect gown, and model Nikki Taylor on photo shoots -- a special layout will appear in an upcoming Redbook magazine.

Check out Roberts here in this video where you'll see a courageous woman make a bold statement as she fights to regain her health. Now that's what I call a model -- a role model.

Rosemary Ellis, Good Housekeeping magazine's Editor in Chief, writes in her January 2008 Editor's letter about this weight loss secret: It's not what you eat and it's not how much you exercise -- it's what you write down about what you eat that matters most in the battle against the bulge.

"Jotting down every bite makes you increasingly aware of what you're eating," writes Ellis. "And when you're more in tune with that, you tend to make smarter choices. The extra weight drops off and is more likely to stay off -- as long as you keep writing."

Why do food diaries work? Because they keep us in the moment and require us to make judgment calls. They make a record of what we're putting in our bodies and that tends to be enough for many to forsake an indulgence.

If losing weight is on your to-do list, consider investing in a notebook and a pen and scribbling down your own bites. See if it makes a difference in how you eat and how you carry your weight. If this technique works for weight management, it might help in other areas of your life too. Maybe an anger journal would help keep your outbursts to a minimum -- instead of shouting at the target of your upset, write instead and calmly approach your subject at a later date. Keep an exercise journal, a happiness journal, a gratitude journal, or a parenting journal. Just keep writing and you're sure to become better at the topics that unfold at your fingertips.

The food sleuths at Good Housekeeping reveal in their October 2007 issue three food items that may appear healthy at first glance but in reality, are really not so good for us.

You might think Sun-Maid's Vanilla Yogurt Raisins are a health food. The raisins are OK. The yogurt is OK. But the white coating mostly consists of sugar and partially hydrogenated palm-kernel oil. A one-ounce box containing about 35 raisins has 120 calories and a pretty hefty dose of saturated fat -- 20 percent of the recommended daily limit, to be exact.

How about some Calbee Snapea Crisps? They're just baked peas. But they're also full of fat. One ounce -- about 22 chips -- packs 150 calories which is the same as regular potato chips. Eat the entire bag and you'll consume 500 calories.

Now get this. There's a lemon lime spritzer out there, made my R.W. Knudsen, that surprisingly contains 170 calories per can. For a seltzer? Yep. It's sweetened with fruit juice concentrates and even has more sugar and 30 more calories than a can of Coca-Cola Classic.

This news certainly inspires me to double check the labels on seemingly healthy food items. It hope it does you too.

When we sleep, our brain "recharges," but it definitely does not take a break from neural activity, according to a report in the newest issue of Science Times.

A test centered around object placement memorization was performed and the results suggested that over a span of 20 minutes, most people taking the test could ace the test, even when taking it a day later.

But, other correlations with the objects (which did not have direct comparisons and placement in the test) becomes hazy in the mind of many test takers. That is, until you sleep on it and re-take the test after some shut-eye. Perhaps the brain commits more of the memorization to memory once it's given time to "rest."

Part of the fun of writing for That's Fit is searching out interesting health and wellness information. Unfortunately, a lot of the stuff we find can be a bit depressing -- it seems like almost everything causes cancer but even that doesn't matter because obesity is going to kill everyone first anyway.

So when I come across something a bit fun, it's nice to be able to share it with readers. For those of you who want some good news, take a look at this short piece that shares why kissing and chocolate are good for you! Apparently chemicals like oxytocin are released when you smooch a loved one and cause a subsequent feeling of calm. The article mentions that German scientists believe people who get a kiss before heading off to work make more money, take fewer sick days and live longer. Not bad for a quick peck on your way out the door.

As for chocolate, did you know that the tasty dark variety can help soothe a cough? Scientists in Britain believe that dark chocolate is more effective than a codeine-based suppressant at keeping a nasty cough at bay. I don't know about all of you but I think it's nice to hear some pleasant health news from time to time!

I love this new news: So-called bad carbohydrates, breads and pastas, are not so bad. I understand this is merely the opinion of one man who did a study -- another study may demonstrate just the opposite -- but in the face of confusing nutrition information, I like to side with the point of view that most suits my desires. And I desire to not worry about carbs. So this is the perspective I'm backing.

University of Virginia professor Glenn Gaesser says eating bad carbs will not make you fat. "It's just nonsense," he says.

Eating sandwiches with white bread isn't going to kill you, says Gaessar. It won't lead to obesity either. It might even help you lose weight.

Are you a cabbage fan? In winter, I sure am. The leafy greens are excellent when slow-cooked (or raw, if that is your thing), and when you add a lot of pepper and even some Italian spice, the result can be quite tasty.

The amount of vitamins and other good-for-health minerals in cabbage make it one of the cheapest food sources I've seen. An entire head of cabbage is generally lower than that junk-food cheeseburger, and offers nutrition that's head and shoulders above most other non-fresh foods.

Some even call cabbage the "tumor's enemy" in relation to its cancer-fighting properties. Personally, I prefer fresh blueberries, but cabbage is a great alternative as well. It may be hard to stomach raw for many of us, but when blended into a smoothie, it's easily palatable.