Lesley Burton-Dallas

Here are your REALAGE tips of the week!

Enjoy! Lesley

It's perfect on potatoes, very good on veggies, and divine in salad dressings. And the best news yet? It may help with fat burning. The magic condiment in question: vinegar.

Obese people who took in 1 to 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar daily in a study melted significantly more body fat and belly fat than a group taking a placebo -- despite being on the same diet and exercise plan.

A Sour Path to Skinny
Vinegar may offer a weight loss boost thanks to acetic acid. Seems this sour stuff does double-duty fat-blasting, inhibiting the body's ability to store fat while boosting its ability to burn it. And even though apple cider vinegar was the type used in the recent study, researchers suspect most varieties of the liquid seasoning could have the same get-skinny effects. (Find out what the YOU Docs think about vinegar and weight loss.)

Other Tart Benefits
Vinegar also seemed to help lower bad-for-the-heart triglyceride levels and systolic blood pressure at the end of the 12-week study. That's a Sherpa's load of health benefits for one little flavor maker. So get your daily dose of vinegar with one of these tart-tasting, waist-whittling RealAge recipes:

• When you're craving tart: Give your salad and grilled veggies a refreshing citrus-flavored punch with this Lemon-Balsamic Vinaigrette.
• When you're craving savory: Add a Mediterranean touch to chicken with this Chicken in Garlic-Vinegar Sauce.
• When you're craving sweet: Add a bit of tangy sweetness to dessert with these Balsamic-Spiked Strawberries.

Did You Know?
Apple cider vinegar can make your skin and hair beautiful, too. RealAge author and dermatologist Dr. Amy Wechsler shares how.

RealAge Benefit:

Maintaining a constant desirable weight can make your RealAge 6 years younger.

This Week's Tips from Dr. Oz:

• Choose This Fat-Burning Condiment
• Good Reasons to Get Sweet on Sour Cherries
• Feel Less Achy with This Vitamin

REAL AGE is one of my favorite sources of alternative medicine, healthful ways to eat and live....I thought you might like it if I shared this source with you each week...?

Lot's of interesting links, resources etc...

Let me know how you like it and again, have a great weekend!

BY, REALAGE

Make pancreatic cancer the scariest disease you never got by eating more of this bumpy green veggie: broccoli.

Seems that flavonol-rich diets could reduce your risk of pancreatic cancer by up to 23 percent, according to a recent study. And broccoli's got heaps of the compound.

Fill Up on Flavonols
Flavonols are talented little substances found not only in broccoli but also in lots of other fruits and veggies, like apples, onions, and kale. And these compounds help fight cancer on many fronts. First, they ramp up your body's detox machinery, purging dangerous carcinogens from your system. Next, flavonols help prevent cancer cells from growing and dividing. And as if that weren't enough, flavonols encourage cancer cells to self-destruct, too. (Find out how broccoli helps protect your voice.)

All in the Family
Quercetin is one of the best known flavonols, but there are many others. And together they are part of the bigger flavonoids family, a mighty clan of antioxidants with potent anticancer powers. Pack more cancer-fighting flavonols into your diet with help from these quick and delicious side dishes from EatingWell.

• Broccoli with Caramelized Onions and Pine Nuts -- adds a nutty crunch and sweet onion flavor to broccoli.
• Southern Kale -- can be a main dish, too, with meat added.
• Warm Apple-Cabbage Slaw -- takes just 10 minutes!

Watch this video for tips on chopping onions quickly and easily.

RealAge Benefit: Getting 31 milligrams of flavonoids a day can make your RealAge 3.2 years younger. References Published on 03/11/2010 Flavonols and pancreatic cancer risk: the multiethnic cohort study. Nothlings, U. et al., American Journal of Epidemiology 2007 Oct 15;166(8):924-931.

Additional tips for the week-

• Make Blood Healthier Instantly with This Oil
• Extend Your Life with This Mantra
• Skip This Drink to Help Your Pressure
• Protect Your Pancreas with This Bumpy Green
• What Do-Gooding Does for Your Brain

We hear a lot about the importance of eating organic and eating local, but left out of the conversation are the growing methods of some of our staple foods, and how much forest land has been lost to grow (or raise) products like beef, rice, and palm oil-the latter of which is in more foods than you might realize.

When agricultural land becomes unproductive (usually after about three years), it is often cheaper to clear new land than to fertilize it or replenish nutrients that were drained from the soil. Monocrop agriculture is a major factor in how modern food production has become unsustainable, but coffee and banana production both serve as examples of smooth, successful transitions. They have been drivers of deforestation in the past, but more recently farmers have been using more intercropping and forest cover (ever heard of shade-grown coffee?), which helps to prevent deforestation and preserve biodiversity. This is surely due in no small part to activist campaigns waged in recent years to educate consumers and to generate change in the supply chains.

This is a quick look at common foods contributing the most to deforestation-and as a result, to climate change-around the world.

iStockphoto.com/Thinkstock

Beef

Beef is by far the biggest contributor to deforestation, both because of its direct role in forest clearing as well as the land converted for cattle feed, according to Rhett Butler of Mongabay, a kickass site for environmental reporting around the world. Despite efforts to combat deforestation through illegal logging, the Amazon is actually losing forest cover faster than ever, largely due to the cattle industry, which has been growing in Brazil by an average of 3 million head per year since 1974.

Digital Vision/Thinkstock

Palm oil

Palm oil production is not only one of the greatest drivers of deforestation-destroying, along with old-growth trees, crucial habitat for the endangered orangutan and Sumatran tiger-it is also one of the world's largest sources of greenhouse gases. One of the more widely reported environmental disasters, deforestation for palm oil plantations has led Indonesia to be ranked the third-largest contributor to climate change. And it's hard to avoid: not only will you notice the ubiquity of palm oil once you start looking, in everything from cookies to bread to baby food, it's often disguised on labels as the generic 'vegetable oil.'

Greenpeace / Daniel Beltra

Soy

Covering 11 million hectares of South America, soy is another leading driver of deforestation-not because of some sudden spike in demand by tofu-consuming humans, but because it is used mainly as feed for chickens, cows, and pigs in Europe. Much of the deforestation affiliated with soy is indirect: while soy farmers have done some of the clearing, it's more often that soy is grown on already-cleared land and drives ranchers deeper into the forest.

iStockphoto.com/Thinkstock

Rice

Much of Asia's forest land has been converted to rice paddies, not only leading to the universal effects of deforestation such as habitat loss and threatened biodiversity, but these fields are also the largest source of methane produced from human activity. Rice fields emit between 50 and 100 million tons of methane each year, though that amount could be reduced with changes in farming methods such as draining the fields more often.

Medioimages/Photodisc/Thinkstock

Shrimp

An estimated 38 percent of the world's mangrove deforestation is linked to shrimp production. Commercial shrimp farms have been developed in coastal regions from southeast Asia to Africa and often displace natural low-lying mangrove forest ecosystems, which are generally regarded as not ecologically important, but which actually protect coastal regions from erosion and storm damage, as well as serve as a natural space for spawning and hatchery-directly and adversely affecting the very industry that is taking their place.

Jeffrey Hamilton/Thinkstock

Corn

U.S. subsidies of the ethanol industry have driven corn production through the roof, both in the U.S. and in the Amazon. While that sparked discussions in the U.S. about prices of corn and the ethics of growing food for fuel rather than-well, food, it's also driving deforestation that counteracts any environmental benefits that result from using biofuels instead of fossil fuels.

AP Photo/Andre Penner

Sugarcane

Like corn, sugarcane has expanded rapidly in the last few years for ethanol production. Seen as a more efficient source of biofuel than corn, sugarcane has been pushed hard in Brazil, which has gained a reputation as the first sustainable biofuels economy. How sustainable is it, though, if the world's largest rainforest is destroyed in the process?

Related Posts:
New Google Earth Layer Shows Global Deforestation
What's My Cheeseburger Got to Do with Deforestation and Changing Weather Patterns?
Cattle Pastures in Deforested Amazon Now the Size of Iceland

Some great rules to live by!

Have a great week!

Enjoy!

November 8, 2009 12:00 AM by Mehmet C. Oz, MD, and Michael F. Roizen, MD

The real secret to keeping your body young may be the tips of your shoelaces. Or, really, tiny parts of your body that act like them. Just as those plastic nibs keep your shoelaces from fraying, tiny cellular tips called telomeres protect your DNA from fraying when cells divide. When they're tattered, they're much harder to use. That's what causes cells to stop dividing and growing and replenishing your body -- which means more aging for you.

Telomeres made headlines this fall when three American scientists won the Nobel Prize for discovering them and exploring their role in health and aging. It's prizeworthy stuff: Shortened telomeres contribute to heart disease, diabetes, reduced immunity, and possibly even brittle bones. In people over age 60, those with the shortest DNA tips have been shown to be three times more likely to die from heart disease and eight times more likely to die from an infectious disease than those with longer, "younger" telomeres. Shorter-than-usual telomeres have also been found in many cancers, including those of the pancreas, bone, prostate, bladder, lung, kidney, and head and neck.

One of the most exciting things about telomeres is that your everyday choices can make a big difference in how young they stay. Unhealthy choices can age you by an extra 5, 7, or even 10 years. But YOU have the power to determine whether your telomeres take early retirement or not. In one University of California, San Francisco, study, for example, men who changed their diets, got regular exercise, and calmed their stress with meditation actually increased levels of an enzyme that lengthens telomeres in immune cells. Just what should you tell your telomeres to keep yourself young and healthy?

• Take it down a notch. Your stress, that is. The most stressed-out women have enough telomere shortening to make themselves 10 years older (including wrinkling!); moms of disabled children also tend to have shortened telomeres. So do pessimists! Researchers have shown that meditation coupled with walking and a change in diet -- toward healthy choices only -- lengthens your telomeres. Others are now studying whether mindfulness meditation alone can preserve telomere length. We already know that the technique can help you with the next factor that keeps telomeres young.
  
• Get an attitude. Worrying about pounds, food choices, and calories is associated with shorter telomeres, according to a University of California, San Francisco, study of constant dieters. Step off the diet roller coaster and achieve a consistent lower weight (and longer telomeres) with exercise and a meal plan packed with mindful eating plus healthful vegetables, fruit, whole grains, low-fat dairy, lean protein, and good fats from foods including fish, nuts, and avocados.
  
• Activate yourself. Inactive people have shorter telomeres than active people. The difference is enough to age the sitting-around crowd by an extra decade. Take a walk for at least 30 minutes a day. Physical activity can also help reduce belly fat, another telomere foe.
  
• Say goodbye to tobacco. Smoking two packs a day for 20 years aged participants in one telomere study by an additional 7.4 years. Your telomeres aren't the only reason you need to nix tobacco. Smoking messes with everything from your lungs (of course) to your heart, and even your wrinkles and your sex life -- and everything in between.
  
• Go Mediterranean. That's the meal plan we mentioned above, in the second point -- eat a diet rich in delectable vegetables, fruit, whole grains, and healthy fats. Telomeres, in one study, were longest in those eating the most vitamin C-rich foods, including citrus fruit, strawberries, and red bell peppers; and vitamin E-rich foods, such as whole grains. Add salmon and trout, olive oil, and a cup of tea -- or two or three. Researchers in Hong Kong found the longest telomeres in men who drank three cups of green, or sometimes black, tea a day.

So there's no need to invest in one of the pricey telomere-pampering supplements showing up on the Internet these days -- at least not until more data demonstrate that they do more than transfer money from your wallet. But stay tuned. You may be able to increase the effect of great habits with things that make telomeres grow (such as telomerase). But for now, stress less, exercise more, and go Mediterranean.

Here is a wonderful blog by architect Michael Cobb who journals about his experience using this sustainable green SIP building product of the future. Agriboard.

Agriboard is a structurally insulated panel (SIP) and goes up 8 times faster than conventional methods and saves 80% construction lumber, while being insect and mold resistant, fire rated 2.5 hours and F5 Hurricane- Tornado-Earthquake-Blast proof! :

Studio Ecesis Project Journal by Architect Michael Cobb.

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Panel Installation is Underway

Panel installation is underway. The builders are moving ahead fast. There is only a little more sunshine in the forecast so everybody appreciates the clip. At midday today about 75% of the first floor panels were up after starting work on the panels yesterday. Most panels are being place by crane. Posted by Michael Cobb at 1:54 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Ready to Go.

The mudsills and LSL keys have been applied to the foundation. The Agriboard install should start tomorrow. Total Concepts is the General Contractor and Shook and Waller is the contractor responsible for the Agriboard installation. A big thank you to Steve Pestell, the structural engineer of record, for catching some last minute lumber rating issues and to John Sharp, of Total Concepts, for catching all the electrical issues before the panels went in. Posted by Michael Cobb at 7:45 PM 0 comments

Friday, January 29, 2010

The Diaz Farm Massing Model

The Agriboard panels on the Diaz Farm Residence will look something like this massing model when they are assembled.

The building regulates sunlight intake with a deep eave over the main living space and west facing exterior retractable shades. Coupled with the excellent insulation properties of the Agriboard, it is our hope this building will have superior thermal performance.

In working on this project and others like it, we've found the language of crisp edges to be the most natural expression of a panelized building system. Posted by Michael Cobb at 4:48 PM 0 comments

Friday, January 22, 2010

Waiting for the Rain to Stop

No sooner did the panels make it to the site, than a series of storms hit Sonoma County. In a holding pattern until the weather gives us several days to build. Posted by Michael Cobb at 10:54 PM 0 comments

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Agriboard!

Well after about five years of attempts, Studio Ecesis, has the pleasure of seeing the first Agriboard delivery for the Diaz Residence up in Cloverdale. Agriboard is a product that represents an improvement in SIP panel construction. SIP panels, popular in the Green Building movement, are a highly insulated prefabricated wall, floor or roof panel that is essentially a sandwich of OSB (oriented strand board) and polystyrene. While the product has been successful at improving a home's energy performance, the problems with polystyrene are wide ranging. The manufacturing, the burning and the disposal of this product are all problematic environmentally.

Enter Agriboard. As a byproduct of the wheat and rice harvest, Agriboard manufactures a pressed wheat and rice panel they call a CAF (compressed agricultural fiber) panel. The long and short of the CAF panel is that instead of burning the wheat and rice fields after their harvest, a second crop is afforded by harvesting the stalks for CAF panels. The CAF panel essentially replaces the styrofoam in the SIP panel recipe. The panel for the Diaz Residence is 8" thick and has a R value of 24! This is about twice the R value of a 2x4 wall with batt insulation. The panel's fire rating is 2 1/2 hours and this has allowed us to build closer to the property line than a traditional 2x4 wall assembly would have permitted.

This panel also provides a viable alternative to the present straw-bale quandry in California. Straw-bale, like rammed earth, is an affordable and readily available building material that has been essentially legislated out of existence in the affordable housing market. Isn't affordable housing the place to use these relatively unprocessed low cost materials? To build with straw-bale in California today requires a steel structure to handle seismic issues. The code considers straw-bale too risky a material in and of itself. This steel work is usually too expensive for affordable housing. The place we are far more likely to see rammed earth and straw-bale these days is in higher end homes. By coupling the use of straw with conventional wood construction elements (i.e. OSB) there is a real opportunity with Agriboard to provide a structurally sound building solution here in California that is energy efficient, healthy and renewable.
We are pretty excited about this project. With the approval of an "Application for Alternate Method or Material," the Diaz Residence will be the first Agriboard structure constructed in California. Its 8" thick walls will allow the use of exterior shades in the window pocket. More photos to come. Posted by Michael Cobb at 12:26 PM 0 comments