I always knew that water was important to our health but I never knew these facts.

1. 75% of Americans are chronically dehydrated.

2. In 37% of Americans, the thirst mechanism is so weak that it is often mistaken for hunger.

3. Even MILD dehydration will slow down one’s metabolism as much as 30%.

4. One glass of water will shut down midnight hunger pangs for almost 100% of the dieters studied in a University of Washington study.

5. Lack of water, the #1 trigger of daytime fatigue.

6. Preliminary research indicates that 8-10 glasses of water a day could significantly ease back and joint pain for up to 80% of sufferers.

7. A mere 2% drop in body water can trigger fuzzy short-term memory, trouble with basic math, and difficulty focusing on the computer screen or on a printed page.

8. Drinking 5 glasses of water daily decreases the risk of colon cancer by 45%, plus it can slash the risk of breast cancer by 79%, and one is 50% less likely to develop bladder cancer.

This is interesting. After reading this, you’ll never look at a banana in the same way again.

Bananas contain three natural sugars – sucrose, fructose and glucose combined with fiber. A banana gives an instant, sustained and substantial boost of energy.

Research has proven that just two bananas provide enough energy for a strenuous 90-minute workout. No wonder the banana is the number one fruit with the world’s leading athletes.

But energy isn’t the only way a banana can help us keep fit. It can also help overcome or prevent a substantial number of illnesses and conditions, making it a must to add to our daily diet.

DEPRESSION:
According to a recent survey undertaken by MIND amongst people suffering from depression, many felt much better after eating a banana. This is because bananas contain tryptophan, a type of protein that the body converts into serotonin, known to make you relax, improve your mood and generally make you feel happier.

PMS:
Forget the pills – eat a banana. The vitamin B6 it contains regulates blood glucose levels, which can affect your mood.

ANEMIA:
High in iron, bananas can stimulate the production of hemoglobin in the blood and so helps in cases of anemia.

BLOOD PRESSURE:
This unique tropical fruit is extremely high in potassium yet low in salt, making it perfect to beat blood pressure So much so, the US Food and Drug Administration has just allowed the banana industry to make official claims for the fruit’s ability to reduce the risk of blood pressure and stroke.

BRAIN POWER:
200 students at a Twickenham school (England) were helped through their exams this year by eating bananas at breakfast, break, and lunch in a bid to boost their brain power. Research has shown that the potassium-packed fruit can assist learning by making pupils more alert.

CONSTIPATION:
High in fiber, including bananas in the diet can help restore normal bowel action, helping to overcome the problem without resorting to laxatives.

HEARTBURN:
Bananas have a natural antacid effect in the body, so if you suffer from heartburn, try eating a banana for soothing relief.

MORNING SICKNESS:
Snacking on bananas between meals helps to keep blood sugar levels up and avoid morning sickness.

MOSQUITO BITES:
Before reaching for the insect bite cream, try rubbing the affected area with the inside of a banana skin. Many people find it amazingly successful at reducing swelling and irritation.

NERVES:
Bananas are high in B vitamins that help calm the nervous system..

Overweight and at work? Studies at the Institute of Psychology in Austria found pressure at work leads to gorging on comfort food like chocolate and chips. Looking at 5,000 hospital patients, researchers found the most obese were more likely to be in high-pressure jobs. The report concluded that, to avoid panic-induced food cravings, we need to control our blood sugar levels by snacking on high carbohydrate foods every two hours to keep levels steady.

ULCERS:
The banana is used as the dietary food against intestinal disorders because of its soft texture and smoothness. It is the only raw fruit that can be eaten without distress in over-chroniclercases. It also neutralizes over-acidity and reduces irritation by coating the lining of the stomach.

TEMPERATURE CONTROL:
Many other cultures see bananas as a ‘cooling’ fruit that can lower both the physical and emotional temperature of expectant mothers. In Thailand , for example, pregnant women eat bananas to ensure their baby is born with a cool temperature.

So, a banana really is a natural remedy for many ills. When you compare it to an apple, it has FOUR TIMES the protein, TWICE the carbohydrate, THREE TIMES the phosphorus, five times the vitamin A and iron, and twice the other vitamins and minerals.. It is also rich in potassium and is one of the best value foods around.

Maybe its time to change that well-known phrase so that we say, ‘A BANANA a day keeps the doctor away!’

I still hope we can save Xanga but just in case I am here..

http://jerry474.wordpress.com

I have read countless articles about the lessons handed down by moms to there sons…here is a list that you may find amusing especially if you have an Italian mom. Now that you have become parents you may find yourselves using these very pearls of wisdom.

1. My mother taught me TO APPRECIATE A JOB WELL DONE.
“If you’re going to kill each other, do it outside. I just finished cleaning.”

2. My mother taught me RELIGION.
“You better pray that will come out of the carpet.”

3. My mother taught me about TIME TRAVEL.
“If you don’t straighten up, I’m going to knock you into the middle of next week!”

4. My mother taught me LOGIC.
” Because I said so, that’s why.”

5. My mother taught me MORE LOGIC.
“If you fall out of that swing and break your neck, you’re not going to the store with me.”

6. My mother taught me FORESIGHT.
“Make sure you wear clean underwear,
in case you’re in an accident.”

7. My mother taught me IRONY.
“Keep crying, and I’ll give you something to cry about.”

8. My mother taught me about the science of OSMOSIS.
“Shut your mouth and eat your supper.”

9. My mother taught me about CONTORTIONISM.
“Will you look at that dirt on the back of your neck!”

10. My mother taught me about STAMINA.
“You’ll sit there until all that spinach is gone.”

11. My mother taught me about WEATHER.
“This room of yours looks as if a tornado went through it.”

12. My mother taught me about HYPOCRISY.
“If I told you once, I’ve told you a million times. Don’t exaggerate!”

13. My mother taught me the CIRCLE OF LIFE.
“I brought you into this world, and I can take you out.”

14. My mother taught me about BEHAVIOR MODIFICATION.
“Stop acting like your father!”

15. My mother taught me about ENVY.
“There are millions of less fortunate children in this world who don’t have wonderful parents like you do”

16. My mother taught me about ANTICIPATION.
“Just wait until we get home.”

17. My mother taught me about RECEIVING.
“You are going to get it when you get home!”

18. My mother taught me MED ICAL SCIENCE.
“If you don’t stop crossing your eyes, they are going to get stuck that way.”

19. My mother taught me ESP.
“Put your sweater on; don’t you think
I know when you are cold?”

20. My mother taught me HUMOR.
“When that lawn mower cuts off your toes,
don’t come running to me.”

21. My mother taught me HOW TO BECOME AN ADULT
“If you don’t eat your vegetables, you’ll never grow up.”

22. My mother taught me GENETICS.
“You’re just like your father.”

23. My mother taught me about my ROOTS.
“Shut that door behind you. Do you think
you were born in a barn?”

24. My mother taught me WISDOM .
“When you get to be my age, you’ll
understand.”

25. And my favorite: My mother taught me about JUSTICE.
“One day you’ll have kids, and I hope they turn out just like you.”

A good friend of mine just wrote this on his Facebook page.
If our bodies need exercise, why do we have to force ourselves to do it?

According to a Harvard evolutionary biologist, for much of our history we got all the exercise we needed just by staying alive. The average hunter-gatherer walked or ran 9-15K every day while trying to chase dinner until it dropped dead of exhaustion. In fact, because we used to move so much our bodies are hardwired to take the easy option whenever it’s available (elevator in the gym, anyone?).

Our ancestors didn’t get nearly enough calories to support all that running. That’s why we have an instinctive craving for sugary, fatty foods. So how do we bridge the gap between the ancient and modern lifestyles?

I am still hunting for the best BBQ in the South but I am cruising comfortably in my KIA.

I just saw an interesting story from ABC News and it made me think about the decisions my mother made when she chose to work decades before.

America’s working mothers are now the primary breadwinners in a record 40 percent of households with children — a milestone in the changing face of modern families, up from just 11 percent in 1960.

The findings by the Pew Research Center, released Wednesday, highlight the growing influence of “breadwinner moms” who keep their families afloat financially. While most are headed by single mothers, a growing number are families with married mothers who bring in more income than their husbands.

Demographers say the change is all but irreversible and is likely to bring added attention to child-care policies as well as government safety nets for vulnerable families. Still, the general public is not at all sure that having more working mothers is a good thing.

What do you think?

I just saw a disturbing report. Parents take note.

Kids start watching porn from as early as the age of 6, and begin flirting on the Internet from the age of 8, according to a survey of over 19,000 parents worldwide.

What’s more, kids are accessing instant messaging and computer games at a much younger age than just a few years ago. At the extreme, 3.45% of kids covered in the analysis used Instant Messaging to chat with friends while 2% of computer game addicts were just 5 years old.

The study results were released exclusively to CyberTruth by Bitdefender. The Bucharest-based antivirus vendor correlated results of an online survey of parents with data compiled from its parental control services, such as which sites parents choose to block, and which sites children access regularly.

Almost a quarter of the kids accounted for in the study had at least one social network account at age 12, while 17% were social media users at 10.

Bitdefender found that children lie about their age when creating social network profiles, especially on Facebook, where they are supposed to be least 13.

It is shocking but certainly not surprising. Parents are so proud that their children are computer literate but with that literacy comes a few pitfalls.

With the new movie Gatsby coming out I thought I would go back and look into Fitzgerald’s life a bit more…especially since his wife Zelda is from Montgomery, Alabama. I like this quote as I am a creative soul, “Having once found the intensity of art, nothing else that can happen in life can ever again seem as important as the creative process.”

I was a typical iTunes consumer. Since it was launched 10 years ago I used it often to download songs, but not as much as I used to.

Today however there are so many other options, such as free online radio services Pandora and iHeartRadio, music-listening on YouTube and on-demand services including Spotify and Rhapsody that let you listen to millions of complete songs for a monthly fee.

Now as Apple prepares to mark the 10th anniversary of the iTunes Music Store on Sunday, it sees a radically different music landscape not as predicated on downloads.

Ten years ago, record stores were in full force (although hurting) and music downloading was something young folks did at pirate websites. The introduction of iTunes, where all songs were 99 cents and could be easily transferred to an iPod, made downloading mainstream.

“We thought if consumers had a great, legal way to download music, they would embrace it,” says Apple Senior Vice President Eddy Cue. “Apple was floored, as were the labels, when customers bought over 1 million songs during the first week.”

The iTunes Store launched with 200,000 songs and now has 26 million. Within 10 years, it would become the top retailer of music, selling more music than Wal-Mart, Target and Best Buy. Record store chains Tower and Sam Goody are out of business.

When Apple reported its quarterly financial results this week, it said it sold a record $4.1 billion worth of media on iTunes, but that includes music, movies and TV shows, books and apps. In 10 years, some 25 billion songs have been sold on iTunes. Less clear is how long the music download party will continue.

“There is a major shift to how consumers consume music, and it’s driven by the smartphone,” says Gene Munster, an analyst at Piper Jaffray.

The ubiquitous smartphone — whether it be the iPhone, an Android model, or a recent BlackBerry or Windows phone — has storage for our contacts, a Web browser and the ability to listen to multitudes of songs over the air.

The iTunes store dominated by downloads “is on its last gasp,” says Bob Lefsetz, a former music industry lawyer and blogger at the Lefsetz Letter. “YouTube is where most young people listen to music now.” (More than 1 billion people visit the site each month.)

“When iTunes turns 15 years old, we won’t be talking about downloads, because Apple won’t be selling them,” he says.

Apple until now has resisted expanding beyond downloads, saying consumers wanted to own songs, not “rent” them.

But this year, perhaps as early as June, it is expected to unveil a personalized radio service similar to the popular Pandora (which has 200 million registered users) that would get prominent display on Apple devices.

When the service analysts have called “iRadio” launches, downloads will no longer be as dominant, says Ted Cohen, a former executive with record label EMI who runs the Tag Strategic consulting firm. “People will say, `Why didn’t anyone think of this before?’ Apple wasn’t the first to have music downloads. But when iTunes Store launched, people acted like it hadn’t been done before, because Apple did it so well.”

In a sign of the times, Apple appears to be testing the waters for online streaming. In iTunes now, a preview of country singer Kenny Chesney’s new Life on a Rock album can be listened to in its entirety online — several days before the album is available as a download sale. Earlier this year, Apple streamed new albums from Justin Timberlake and Depeche Mode.

Yet despite the acclaim for music services such as Spotify and Pandora, downloads still dominate how consumers obtain digital music, says Russ Crupnick, an analyst at researcher NPD Group.

According to the worldwide music trade group, the IFPI, some $5.6 billion was spent on digital music in 2012, with downloads accounting for 80%. Revenue from music services grew from 14% in 2011 to 20% in 2012.

Customers of services such as Rhapsody (with over 1 million subscribers) and Spotify (5 million) are in major population centers, NPD’s Crupnick says, and they don’t care as much about owning music. Elsewhere, though, “there are tens of millions of people who still, even if it’s on a phone, still want their iTunes collection,” he adds.

NPD gives Apple a 63% market share for music download sales in the most recent fourth quarter, compared with its closest competitor, Amazon, at 22%. Last year 44 million Americans bought at least one song track or album download, a statistic that has remained stable over the last three years, Crupnick says.

“If downloads were still important, we’d all need more storage,” Lefsetz says. “Apple knows which direction this is going.”