Calorie Defined

The official definition of calorie is: A measurement of energy- the amount of energy needed to raise 1 gram of water 1 degree Celsius at standard atmospheric pressure. Calories in food are actually measured in kilocalories, so 1,000 actual calories for every 1 Calorie listed on food packages. Europe uses the actual kilocalories or kilojoules.

During the 1880s, Wilbur O. Atwater decided to determine how much energy different types of foods contained. He decided to treat different foods just like coal and burn them to ash in a furnace and measure how much heat (or calories) each one produced. He gave a numerical value to the calories produced by each food. He measured nine calories per gram from high-fat foods, and about four calories per gram from carbohydrates and proteins. We still use this system, to an extent.

During 2003, a US university team of nutritionists tested two slimming diets with the same number of calories on a group of overweight women. One diet was very low-fat and relatively high in carbohydrate. The other was high in fat, but low in carbohydrate. The low-fat dieters lost 3.9kg (almost 9lb), but the high-fat dieters lost more than twice as much weight at 8.5kg (almost 19lb).
The calories are the same, but the body reacts differently when it uses them. Maybe it is time to rethink how we count calories.
Calories listed on food labels are only an approximation. The US FDA allows food manufacturers to look at their ingredients and determine how many grams of fat, carbohydrates, and protein they contain, and then assume that each gram of protein and carbohydrates gives 4 kilocalories, each gram of fat gives 9, etc. Then they subtract 4 kilocalories for every gram of fiber, and that is the official, government sanctioned calorie measurement.
In addition to the above, different bodies deal with Calories differently. Genetic conditions, illnesses, and other factors can cause foods to be metabolized differently by some people vs. others. A 100 Calorie snack for you, might only be an 80 Calorie snack for someone else.

Bottom line, since Calories are an approximation, ingesting a few hundred more or less on any given day is not going to make much difference on your weight.

Happy Friday

If you lust for trivial things, you become trivial. If you lust for happiness, you become happy.

Today I lust for sharing the joy of a Happy Friday!

Happy Canada Day

July 1 is Canada Day. This year, it celebrates Canada’s 150th anniversary of Confederation.

Incidentally, The first Saturday in July is also International Cherry Pit Spitting Day. Past three year winning spits -
2014 Brian Krause Dimondale, MI 80' 8"
2015 Kevin Bartz Niles, MI 48' 8"
2016 Rick Krause Tuba City, AZ 48' 2 1/4"

Brian Krause is also holder of the US record cherry pit spit of 93' 6 1/2", set during 2003.

July 4th

Thomas Jefferson, third President of the United States, died the same day in 1826 as John Adams, second president of the United States, on the 50th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. A few years later, fellow founding father, and fifth President of the United States, James Monroe passed away on July 4th, 1831. Interesting that three of the first five American presidents died on the 4th of July.

Incidentally, The people of France offered the Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World to the people of the United States on July 4th, 1884.

Just Three American Cars Remain

Online car research site Cars.com, ranks the “most-American” cars and trucks and takes into account globalization of the supply chain. It found just three models qualified.
The definition of “Made in America” has been undergoing some changes, especially in the auto industry. Integrated supply chains and efforts to cut costs have made the auto industry’s globalization “irreversible.”
The criteria used: country of engine origin, country of transmission origin, U.S. factory employment relative to the company’s sales footprint, domestic parts content, and assembly location. The percentage of domestic parts that a car needs to be able to qualify is 60 percent.

The three "most-American" cars were Jeep Wrangler, Jeep Cherokee (made by Italian-American carmaker Fiat Chrysler Automobiles in Toledo, Ohio), and Ford Motor Co.’s Chicago-made Taurus.

Simpsons Names

Many of the characters on the Simpsons show were named by Matt Groening and are named after people in his family. He did refuse to name the grandfather after his own grandfather, Abraham, and asked the writers to choose a name. The writers, who had no knowledge of his grandfather's name, chose Abraham. The full name is Abraham Jedediah "Abe" Simpson II, but he is commonly called grampa. His parents were Orville J. Simpson and Yuma Hickman.

O.J. Simpson

No relation to the above. His full name is Orenthal James Simpson. His nickname from football days is The Juice. He is having a parole hearing July 20, 2017 in Nevada, and could be released during October. 2017.

Incidentally, Lawrence Tureaud it the full name of Mr. T.

Tomato Preservation Tips

Keep your tomatoes at room temperature, ideally in a single layer out of direct sunlight. To keep them fresher longer, store them stem side down. If they do not lay flat, peel more of the stem off, until they can lay flat on a counter or plate. Also, it is OK to store in the refrigerator if you will use them within a few days. Last, you do not need to keep them in a brown paper bag, unless there are flies in the area.

Wordology, Pizza Peel

You may think it is odd to peel a pizza, but that is not what this is.

It is the instrument that pizzerias and cooks around the world use to shove a pizza into the oven and to remove it from the oven. Kind of like peeling off the oven floor.

Myth Busted: Never Eat Before Bed

It does not matter what time you eat. What matters is the amount of calories you consume.

It has long been a false belief that if you eat before going to sleep you will not be active enough to burn off those calories. What really matters is the total amount of calories you eat and not the time of day you eat them. If you consume the same amount of calories whether you eat them earlier or later, your body will digest those calories the same.

The reason some suggest an eating schedule is to prevent overeating. For example, if you skip meals you can become over hungry, which might lead to overeating when you finally do eat. The reason late night eating has been associated with weight gain is because it is often a late night snack in addition to a full day's worth of calories. So, eat whenever you like, just do not overeat and you will not gain weight.

Another myth, if you exercise on an empty stomach, you burn fat faster. When you exercise, you burn calories, whether they are from recently consumed food or fat. If you burn fat, then eat, the food is converted into fat again. So, food calories or fat calories, they are the same - more in and you gain weight, more out and you lose weight.

Phone Photos

It is estimated that 1.2 trillion digital photos will be taken this year. Almost 85% of them will be taken by phones, the rest by cameras and tablets. This compares with 200 billion digital photos taken by phones during 2011.

More than 3.5 trillion photos have been taken as of 2012 since Daguerre captured his first picture during 1826. More pictures are taken every two minutes than were taken throughout all of the 1800s. According to Deloitte, 3.5 million photos were shared every minute during 2016.

Happy Friday

Do not hold back. A gusto for life yields an abundance of happiness.

I am always blessed with an abundance of happiness, especially on a Happy Friday!

What's in a Name, Mickey

In the film industry, a ‘mickey’ is a gentle camera move forwards. It is named for Mickey Rooney (a ‘little creep’).

Alcohol Proof

The regulation to proof alcohol was simply to test and verify that the contents of a barrel of liquid was what it was claimed to be began in England during the 16th century to ensure that the King collected the proper amount of taxes on the sale of the product.

The first method involved soaking a gun pellet in the liquid, and then trying to light it on fire; if it burned, it was classified as a proof spirit. However, as alcohol’s flammability is temperature dependent, the higher the temperature, the more vapors the alcohol infused solution will emit and therefore more flammable. Sometimes actual alcohol was passed off as something less and taxed at a lower rate.

Frequently the product would catch fire, and the authorities would know that the spirit was at least 57.15% alcohol by volume (ABV), which at that time was classified as being 100 proof.

As scientific skills improved during the early 19th century, a far more accurate test was developed which measured the liquid’s specific gravity (the ratio of the density of a substance to a reference, in this case distilled water). Distilled water is actually denser than alcohol. In 1816 a test was developed using the fact that at 11°C  (51°F), a 100 degree proof spirit (~57.15% ABV) would weigh 12/13 that of distilled water.

AnIPA with an ABV of 6.9% in the UK would be 12.075 degrees of proof, while a 100% ABV pure alcohol would have a proof of 175 degrees.

In the US, proof is calculated by doubling the ABV. So alcohol with an ABV of 40%, is 80 proof. Nevada, US prohibits the sale of alcohol in excess of 80% ABV (160 proof), and California, US prohibits the sale of anything over 60% ABV (120 proof).

The US has singled out one alcohol in particular for regulation – absinthe ABV (45-75%). It is infused with green anise, fennel, other herbs, and grand wormwood. During the early 1900s, a number of countries banned absinthe, due to a smear campaign conducted by the wine industry and the presumed presence of thujone, a chemical compound that is said to be poisonous in large amounts. It is now known that most absinthe has very little thujone and easily meets all regulatory requirements. Beginning in 2007, absinthe returned to the US as imports from Europe and with domestic producers.