Mananda Bread

  My own crafted vegan Banana Bread Recipe. 

Enjoy! 

Ingredients:

½ cup granulated sugar

¼ cup brown sugar

 3 bananas, mashed

1/4 cup canola or vegetable oil

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour

1 cup all purpose flour

2 tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

½ ts salt

1 ½ tsp cinnamon

¼ ts nutmeg

¼ ts allspice

2 TBS ground flax seed

½ cup chopped walnuts

Directions:

Mash bananas into a mush. Mix in the white sugar, brown sugar, oil and vanilla. Set aside.

Mix the remaining ingredients together in a separate bowl.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry, mixing just until everything is moist. Do not over mix – some lumps are okay. Batter will be thick.

Pour batter into a bread pan that has been sprayed with a non-stick spray.

Bake in a pre-heated oven at 350 degrees for 50 minutes.

Cool for at least 10-15 minutes before removing from pan.

Eat and enjoy!

Welcome to Blogaholics Anonymous

  Hi, my names Growlbert and I’m a blogaholic.

If, like me, you find it difficult to pry yourself away from your blog for even a moment, then this surely is the blog for you.

I am here to offer my assistance and to assure you that you do not need to face the battle against Blogaholism alone.

Let me be the first to publicly admit that I have a problem: I’m addicted to blogs.

By sharing the effects of a serious blog addiction it is my hope that I can help others to avoid making the same mistakes as I have.

Let me start off by saying that there is a strong chance that you may have a problem if you find yourself reading this at 2 o’clock (or later) in the morning. If this is the case then you likely suffer from some form of blog addiction. This could be blog dependency, blog abuse, or one of the most serious conditions of all: full-blown blogaholism.

Here are some definitions and criteria to help you better determine your status:

Blog Dependency and Abuse

The individual experiences repeated blog-related difficulties. For instance: an inability to control blogging, spending a large amount of time associated with blogging, continued blogging despite physical or psychological consequences, persistent desire or unsuccessful efforts to cut down or control blogging, and finally: withdrawal symptoms.

Blogaholism

Usually this is a two-phase problem.It frequently starts off as problem blogging. This involves the repeated act of blogging, quite often in an attempt to alleviate anxiety of some form.

The second phase is blog addiction. This is when the person is truly addicted to the repeated act of blogging.

Blogaholics may exhibit some or all of the following criteria:

1. Physiological dependence on blogs with evidence of withdrawal symptoms when blogging ability is interrupted. (Ex: Person becomes irate when mundane life tasks take them away from their blog and/or feels like they cannot get through the day without some form of blogging.) 
2. Tolerance to the effects of blogging, prompting the need for more and more blogging in order to achieve the desired effect. (Ex: Creating one blog a day is no longer satisfactory. Now the individual necessitates the creation of multiple blogs, sometimes 5 or more, each day. * Note that 5 or more blogs in one hour may indicate a separate, but related, problem known as binge blogging.)
3. Evidence of blog-associated difficulties such as the inability to concentrate (on anything other than blogs).
4. Continued blogging despite associated disruptions in ‘normal life’. (Ex: Blogging to the extent that your significant other considers leaving (or actually leaves) due to a lack of attention from you.)
5. Impairment in social and occupational functioning. (Ex: Being unable to converse with others about anything that is not blog related.)

If after reading this you feel that you or someone you know may suffer from blogaholism, you should consider taking this questionnaire for further clarity.

(Parts of this blog have been modified from Contemporary Nutrition, chapter 7)

Genetically Challanged

  Figuring out how to lose weight - specifically fat – is confusing. Is there a cure all – some sort of a magic formula – a one-size fits all fix? It’s doubtful.

I know that in a technical sense the idea of losing weight is ‘easy’. Your intake simply needs to be less than your output and that makes complete sense. I don’t have any trouble understanding how that works, but what I do have difficulty with is comprehending the vast world of exercise. I’ve been working out – on and off – for a few years now and I still don’t feel any closer to having any of the answers that I’m looking for. The main problem that I run into is that everyone on the block seems to have a different opinion. Opinions are as varied as people’s personalities, even amongst experts. For example, no one agrees on how often you should work out. I hear everything from 3 days a week to 7 days. Similarly nobody agrees on how long you should work out for. I hear anything from 30 minutes to an hour and a half. And there’s always the person who throws in a clause at the end: “but any amount of time that you spend working out is better than no time at all.” All of this gets confusing for the average person, like myself, who is simply trying to be healthy and lose a little extra chunk in the process.

I suppose that one of the main reasons there is so much variation out there is because of the fact no two bodies that react identically to any given stimulus. We all know (sadly) that what works for one person may not work as well for the next. How then do I find what works for me? What will give me a washboard stomach? I hear that ab exercises alone will not do it because one needs to lose actual fat (which makes sense) before abs can shine through. Yet I’ve been doing cardio (5x week/1 hour at a time) for 2 years (although it has been somewhat on and off, though mostly on) and I have yet to see any real life shattering results. I have lost weight (about 5 pounds) and I can see my abs more than I could before, but there are still those dreaded love handles and a thin layer of fat on my lower abdomen.

What I want is to hear straight from an ab source – someone who actually has abs. And I want this person to be someone who didn’t always have them. I want this person to be someone genetically challenged, like myself, who overcame their bodies chromosomal codes and managed to sculpt a flat stomach. I want to know details, like what this person does as a workout routine and what they eat in any given day. I don’t want a link to some webpage with a bunch of advertising gimmicks and cookie cutter answers. I want truth from an actual living, breathing human being. Hello? Is there anybody out there?

The funny thing is that out of all of the people that I see in the gym in any given week there are only 2 women whose bodies completely impress me. Don’t get me wrong, there are some good looking bodies there, but I’m just saying that there are 2 in particular that have somehow found the magic trick to creating a lean mean muscle machine. They are thin, yet muscular (but not too much muscle), fit and athletic looking. I feel like with the amount of time that I spend in the gym that I should look more like them and less like, well…me. I wonder how they got to where they are now. Was it trial and error? Was it pure luck? Do they need to be in the gym 24/7 to keep up their awesome Gladiator esc bodies? I wish that I knew. Yet even if I did know their personal routines there would be absolutely no guarantee that what they are doing would work as well for me. And that pisses me off.

I’m tired of reading about people who have flat stomachs. I’m tired of other people, who do not have anywhere near a flat stomach, suggesting a book with some exercises that they think will work. I need to hear from an actual legitimate source – if one exists. I’ve thought about going up to one of the 2 Gladiator women in the gym, but I’ve always chickened out. I don’t want to give them the wrong impression. I’m just genuinely curious as to how the hell they do it and what the frick I need to do to see them when I look in the mirror. Of course there is the sad possibility that I may never be able to see them (or something close to them) in the mirror. Some say that genetics play a very large role and that not everyone is capable of having a washboard stomach. But is that truth or is that just the bitterness of someone like me who has never had success with getting the stomach that they want?

I feel like I’ve been trying my whole life to get a flat stomach. Either I’m not trying hard enough (or not doing it right) or my body is incapable. I refuse to give up hope yet though. I will keep trying to attain the ‘perfect image’ and in the meantime perhaps I can learn to love, or at least to accept the body that I have. I’m definitely not there yet.

I Scream for Eye Cream!

  Do I really need to use 3 (or more) different kinds of lotion on my face to stay looking young, or is it just another scam? 

I am still amazed at how many different brands of the same product there are in any given store. It’s a little ridiculous. It makes shopping for the indecisive person, such as myself, incredibly difficult. I stand in an aisle comparing not only prices, but also product ingredients and claims. This can be a very timely procedure and it seems that no matter which product I end up choosing, I always end up with some form of buyers remorse. Somewhere in the back of my mind I’m wondering if that other brand or style of Band-Aids would have been better for me.

Most recently I’ve noticed the many different skin products that there are just for the face alone. For years now I have been in the habit of using an Oil of Olay daily moisturizer with sun block in it. A few weeks ago I was speaking with an older woman (who has wonderful skin) and she gave me the impression that just using a moisturizer once a day is no good. Her routine is to use a special daytime moisturizer and then in addition she applies a completely different evening moisturizer as well as an entirely different eye cream. This conversation sent me to the store where I was amazed to see countless facial products. It was overwhelming. Do I really need 3 different creams to put on my face or is it just a marketing ploy? Do these ‘special eye creams’ really do anything different than any of the other creams or are they all basically the same product with a different outfit on?

I stood in the facial cream aisle for a good 20 minutes debating whether or not I really needed the 20-dollar bottle of eye cream. In the end I didn’t get it. I just couldn’t justify spending that much on a cream that may not even be all that it’s cracked up to be. Instead I got a 7-dollar bottle of Night of Olay and told myself that using 2 moisturizers a day is plenty good and that there’s nothing wrong with using my regular facial moisturizer as an eye cream. Still I wonder though – would using an ‘official’ eye cream make me look younger and reduce wrinkles, or better yet prevent them? For some reason I doubt it, but it’s claims like these that keep those companies feeding their families year after year. The people who make these products probably don’t even use them. They probably just Botox at the slightest appearance of a wrinkle. They can afford it – people like me make sure of it. Yet knowing this doesn’t change the feeling that I have that I may really need that eye cream. That somehow having that cream will make my life better and more complete. In no time I’ll be succumbing to their advertising and buying a bottle of ridiculously over priced eye cream that is probably the same damn face cream I’ve already got just dressed in a different bottle.

Double Chin Dilemma

  If I’m not overweight then why do I have a double chin?

I eat relatively healthy and overall I’m in decent shape. I work out at least 5 times a week at a moderate intensity for an hour at a time. My BMI is low, I weigh 115 (on a ‘good’ day – 120 on a ‘bad’ day) and people often comment on how I’m lucky to be ‘so skinny’. But the truth of the matter is that I’m NOT skinny. Granted I am small-ISH, but I am no model fit to be seen in a bikini. I’m tired of people thinking that because I happen to be smaller than them that I can automatically be grouped into the “skinny” category. The reality is that there are fat skinny people, which is just as bad – if not worse – than being straight out fat. A fat skinny person, like me, appears small due to their frame but this person still has much more fat on their body than is needed. What people don’t seem to realize is that it’s just as difficult for the fat skinny person to be happy with their body as it is for the morbidly obese person to be. We fat skinny people get laughed at if we complain about our bodies because with our clothes on the untrained eye doesn’t see anything to complain about, but believe me if you saw us naked you would understand. I’m tired of not being taken seriously. It may be easier for us to hide our problems, but those problems are still there and they are just as real as anyone else’s.

While it’s true that at a first glance you would surely call me skinny, I can guarantee that if I were to lift up my shirt you would change your mind. Because what you would see there would be the reality of my life: unsightly love handles that spill out of the sides of my jeans and make me want to run and hide. It’s amazing what clothes can do to cover up the sad truth. While I despise my stubborn love handles more than I do Lindsay Lohan, what’s most upsetting of all is the double chin. It’s not an enormous double chin and I doubt that anyone would even consider me to have one, but when the conditions are right (or wrong) I can see it peeking out from under my face. It has to be in the right light and at the right angle, but it’s there. Spotting this on myself has made me obsessed with looking at other peoples chins to see if they too have this problem. Thankfully I have noticed quite a few ‘small’ people suffering from the same phenomenon, including several movie stars. There are certain times when 2 of my favorite actresses – Kirsten Dunst and Katee Sackhoff (Starbuck from Battlestar Galactica) – appear to have a hint of the cursed double chin. It may be terrible, but this makes me feel a little bit better. Now please keep in mind that I’m not talking about full-blown nasty, make you want to vomit double chins. I’m simply talking about small hints of a little bit of loose extra skin.

Now how can it be that these double chins appear in even those who are not overweight by standards? The odd thing is that I notice many seriously obese people who do not have a double chin. Is this just a cruel trick played by genetics? Is there are any hope for us double chins to obtain a face free of extra skin – without subjecting ourselves to the disgusting world of plastic surgery? Do chin exercises really work? I mean seriously – do you personally know anyone who can verify that chin exercises have made a difference for them? I see a lot of baloney on the web claiming that if you do such and such 10 times a day that you’re chin will shrink in size. But for some reason I’m not buying it.

Until I figure out a better solution I’ll continue walking around with not only my gut sucked in, but also with my chin tucked in.

Stair Stepper Madness

  If you’ve tried the stair stepper before and have had bad luck figuring it out – read my story.

It was daunting – the thought of using the stair stepper. I would see the machine every day in the gym, staring at me, calling me. I was terrified-until recently- to even attempt using the machine. It was far more comfortable to stick with the familiar elliptical machine that I’ve been using for over a year now. As I did my usual routine on the elliptical, that stair stepper would pop into my vision from the corner of my eye. It was watching me, sending me telepathic messages to “get on”. Finally, after months of this, I decided to give it a try. I lasted for about 5 minutes, if that. It was an awful experience. I thought that the machine would be fairly easy to use. I mean all you do is step, right? Well…sort of. While it is true that what you are doing is as simple as stepping, there is a rhythm that one needs to get into and it’s not as easy as it looks – at least it wasn’t for me. I definitely did not have the stair stepper rhythm or know how to find it. The steps kept slamming to the ground loudly and being that I had never been on the machine before I had no idea exactly what I was supposed to be doing. There was no indication on the machine as to whether or not the steps were supposed to go all the way down to the ground or not. It was only when I noticed that everyone in the gym was staring at me that I realized what a fool I was making of myself. I must have been doing it wrong, but I didn’t have the slightest idea how to do it right and I was far too embarrassed to ask anyone. That was enough to scare me away from the stair stepper for months. I didn’t want anything to do with it, although it kept calling me over. Most of the time I ignored it, but other times I toyed with the idea of getting on again, however, I was far too afraid of the embarrassment that I imagined would inevitably follow.

I suppose that I’m not the only person who has had such difficulty figuring out how to use a stair stepper. It’s one of the least used pieces of equipment in my gym. While there are always many people on the treadmills and often all of the elliptical machines are occupied, I rarely ever see more that 1 or perhaps 2 people using the stairs. And there is an entire wall of them in the gym!

Months went by without my feet coming anywhere near the stepper. And then it happened. I decided to give it another shot. I don’t know why I wanted to use the machine so badly. Perhaps because it’s something different. Perhaps because I thought that it might give me a better workout. Perhaps because I wanted to prove to myself that I could do it. Whatever the reason, I got on. And again I made a fool of myself. As before the steps kept slamming to the ground. People turned to look at me. My face turned beet red. I wanted to get off of the machine and run as far from the gym as I could, but instead I forced myself to stay on and learn how the heck the thing works. I quickly messed with the settings and finally got situated to a level where I was able to prevent the steps from slapping. It took me a while, about 15 minutes, to really get into the workout and to begin to feel somewhat comfortable. During that first 15 minutes I couldn’t think about anything but how much I wanted to get off of that darn machine. It was uncomfortable and awkward and I felt like everyone was staring at me. I had no idea if I was using the machine correctly. The steps weren’t slapping onto the ground, but it just felt weird. Not too long after 15 minutes and I suddenly felt myself sink into a bit of a groove. It was as if my body had figured out the rhythm of the machine and all of a sudden it just made sense. I got a rush of endorphin and got the feeling that I used to have on the elliptical: this is the machine for me!

I’m writing this blog because from what I’ve found on the internet there doesn’t seem to be any detailed explanations of how to properly use the stair stepper. I feel like there should be more information out there on this neat machine because it can be very intimidating. I’m sure that there are many people who, like me, are too afraid to try it. Or perhaps you’ve tried it and also experienced the steps slamming to the ground causing far more attention than you’d ever want. Perhaps this negative experience has kept you from ever gaining the courage to get back on the steps of doom. Take it from someone who’s been there: TRY AGAIN. I am convinced that the only way that you can learn how to use this machine is to try it until you get it. You have to learn from your mistakes. It will probably be awkward at first, you may hate it and you may want to get off within the first 5 minutes – but trust me that if you can make it past the hard beginning it is well worth it. I’ve been going to the gym for a few years now and for some reason the stair stepper has been the scariest machine for me. It has been the most difficult for me to figure out, but has also been the most rewarding. I find that I get one of the best workouts I could hope for while stepping. It puts me in the ‘zone’, gets my endorphin pumping (literally! It’s such a wonderful feeling!), and makes me break out a sweat – the kind that is needed to burn that fat. This machine works your legs, butt, concentration and balance. I have never been on any machine that requires such concentration! You really need to focus in order to keep your balance – if you are using the machine correctly.

The proper way to use this machine is to keep your feet flat on the steps, stand up straight and step so that you are keeping the step from slapping the bottom as well as preventing it from rising too high. You want your steps to be relatively small. To truly get a full workout you should not be holding on to the rails. If you find that you have to hold on to them in order to stand straight then you need to decrease the level. Faster is not necessarily better. What is best is to challenge yourself to step without holding on while keeping those feet FLAT.  This will work muscles that you don’t normally work out on other machines in the gym and it will improve your balance.

Honestly the best way to learn how to use this machine is to try until you fall into that groove. Give yourself at least 3 separate tries and attempt to stay on for at least 15 minutes – it takes time to find the rhythm, but it’s like riding a bike – once you get it you’ve got it. Don’t be surprised if you can’t stay on for as long as you are able to on other machines – it’s challenging!