All you should know about fat

One small article on ScienceNews (published online yesterday, Thursday, October 22nd, 2009) summarizes all you should know about fat in the light of recent scientific advances.

First. Women and men tend to carry fat in different parts of their bodies: men inside the abdomen near their organs, women in a concentrated layer directly under their skin (in scientific terminology used in an article, in their butts). When women hit menopause, their fat relocates to their bellies.

Second.  Fat could be healthier or dangerous. Belly fat cells (i.e. men’s) go directly into internal organs like the liver and can inflame the organs. Hormones from subcutaneous fat (common to women) go into the bloodstream, where they do less harm.

Third. Male and female … rats have the same fat distribution patterns as humans and can be used as guinea-pigs in scientific research on fat.

Then. Post-menopausal women and men lack a molecule called estrogen receptor alpha that grabs on to estrogen. The studies of human fat cells suggested that when estrogen binds to ER-alpha, the cell is more able to break down fat. Women have more ER-alpha in their bellies than men do and that keeps fat away from that fat depot (The researchers mentioned fat depot at least twice in a small article. I think, they’ve invented a new scientific term.)

The main conclusion. Even in males, estrogen is important for marking the fat tissue to be relatively healthy.

Your belly is putting you at greater health risk. The fat in the butts (forgive me this scientific term) is healthy.

1940 RETOUCHED POSTCARD,,,,,, by twittey on deviantart

How To …

Some time ago I came across an online knowledge resource called eHow (see an article about eHow in Wikipedia). It attracted my attention with promises to offer instructions on “how to do just about everything“. And it doesn’t seem an overstatement. In a few seconds I learned How to Hammer a Nail (the main idea is to pick a hammer that is appropriate for the job) and How to Hammer a Nail Without Banging Your Fingers (hold the hammer at the end of the handle etc.),  How to Find More Time to Read (I doubt that it is healthy to read during lunch) and How to Read a Book without Falling Asleep (If at all possible, do your reading in the morning…), How to Blow Your Nose (Use paper facial tissues instead of cloth handkerchiefs) and How to blow your nose in the public (Always keep the handkerchief in your pocket) and so on and so on. Most instructions are written by nice people and they are pleasant and amusing to read.

It is noteworthy that such a large database doesn’t ignore nudist subjects. On eHow one can find out, for instance, How to Be a Nudist and How to Become a Nudist (rid yourself of cultural myths about nudity), How to Follow Nudity Laws (know when and where nudity is acceptable and not acceptable where you live) and How to Practice Nudity in Your Home. In order to give an example, I’ll dwell on the latter instruction. The anonymous eHow Contributing Writer recommends (I’ll give a short summary here):

1. Discuss a nudity policy with your family
2. Be sensitive to your neighbors
3. Protect your furniture by setting down a towel before you sit down
4. Avoid cooking or baking while you practice nudity in your home
5. Refrain from practicing nudity in your home when you have guests that might be sensitive or unprepared to deal with it.

Of course, instructions like that might appear self-evident, but it doesn’t mean that they are useless. In any case, usefulness is not necessary in a reading like this. By the way, I like the respect for feelings of other people shown in this instruction.

Hard to make the right choice by MaraB

P.S. Right now I’m thinking about my own addition to the database. It could be something like How to Miss An Opportunity or maybe How to be Bored with Yourself.

East and West

Sometimes I think that almost every contradiction may be viewed as The Conflict Between East and West.

“Seventeen years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the cultural divide between former East Germans and West Germans is being laid bare at beach resorts,” reported Claudia Rach, Bloomberg News two years ago (see also The New York Sun from September 7, 2006).

K. Bacher in his famous “205 Arguments and Observations In Support of Naturism” quotes Lee Baxandall, according whom

“almost every town on East Germany’s coast has an FKK beach, some 90 sites serving 200,000 campers/lodgers annually; more FKK than textile beaches. A GDR poll found 57% of the population approving of nude recreation, 30% had no opinion, and only 13% opposed.”

FKK-Strand am Schwielochsee

Even, if the German Democratic Republic (GDR) was “Unrechtsstaat” (”unjust state”), while now East Germany is “free,” many of its beaches aren’t. The West is blamed for exporting to the East both pornography and beach restrictions.

Nowadays according to the estimations ascribed to the DFK (German naturist federation) as many as two-fifths of beaches previously used by nudists since Germany reunified in 1990 has lost their nudist statuses.

Claudia Rach wrote that

Since communism’s collapse in 1989, Baltic resorts have added new hotels and restaurants, renovated boardwalks and cleaned up water pollution.
That led to a surge in western tourists, with visitors to the Baltic coast jumping to 5.06 million last year from 1.98 million in 1992, according to the statistical office for the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
Property prices in Germany’s Baltic region have risen 25 percent since 1995, more than the national average, according to a study by the GEWOS Institute for Urban, Regional and Housing Research in Hamburg.
“When people with money holiday in freshly renovated resorts, the last thing they want are naked bodies on their doorstep,” said Wolfgang Weinreich, head of the International Naturist Federation.

The reporter quotes Urs Wagner, the German naturist and Berlin retiree, 57, who said, “It’s a really intense feeling of nature that everyone should experience. But who knows for how much longer. We’re a dying breed.”