Is drinking wine paleo?

A lot of crossfitters and paleo eaters ask me if wine is OK?

My answer is usually something like this: As long as humans have picked fruit, and as long as fruit has rotted, alcohol has been paleo.

If you let fruit sit around long enough, its sugars will naturally ferment with native yeasts and turn into alcohol. It's hard to image early cavemen not noticing this and enjoying it.

Most paleo consumers agree that we don't want to eat processed foods or drink. I think this rules out most hard liquor, beers and cocktails. Many have added sugars and harvested grains in them.

If you are looking for the most paleo alcoholic beverage then drink wine. Look for wine made locally.

What you want in a paleo wine

• You want it locally made
• You want to tour the facility and meet the winemaker
• Be sure the wine is fermented completely without residual sugar
• You want it without additives or alterations.

Ok, I admit I'm biased. I live in wine country, enjoy the beverage and publish a travel magazine for San Luis Obispo County that thrives on wineries. In fact, when I retire, I'd love nothing more than to buy a winery in Paso Robles.

Would you like to buy a winery?

Our office landlord and advertising client, Pacifica Commercial Realty, started a new wine division to help people evaluate buying or selling a winery. They publish a comprehensive list of wineries for sale in Paso Robles. I find my self browsing it looking for my dream retirement. Well, maybe one of these days...

Here is an excerpt of the article:

Pacifica Commercial Realty launches new wine properties division

Pacifica Wine Division is headed up by
Steve Meixner and Newlin Hastings.

Blending local commercial real estate expertise with wine industry resources to bring buying a winery from a lifestyle choice to a smart investment.

Ah, the romantic notions of owning a winery: Wandering through vineyards in the early morning light; sipping the fruits of your labor as the gentle laughter of visiting wine lovers, mingled with a classical concerto, floats through the air.

Passion? You may have plenty of that, but if you dream of owning a winery or vineyard, desire eventually takes a backseat to the reality that this is a very competitive business that requires large amounts of hard work, determination and capital. To be successful you need expert resources, good advice and a solid plan.

Enter Pacifica Commercial Realty, the Central Coast’s market leader in commercial real estate.  Pacifica has been in operation in the Paso Robles market for more than 30 years, and has additional offices in Santa Maria and Santa Barbara.  In response to growing demand for its advisory services and transactional experience, the Paso Robles office recently launched its Wine Properties Division to represent buyers and sellers of wineries and vineyards throughout the Central Coast region.

For more information on buying and selling wine properties in the Paso Robles area, visit Pacifica’s Wine Properties Division website, pasowinerealestate.com or call (805) 237-4040.

Is acupuncture Paleo?

Acupuncture is ancient, so it's Paleo right?

OK. That question is a little tongue in cheek, but seriously, I wonder if there is anything to back up the traditional Chinese medicine of acupuncture.

I was recently doing some work on a client's website and reading about the kinds of things the treatment is supposed to help. Our client does acupuncture in San Luis Obispo, CA. Check out these claims and let me know what you think. Here is an excerpt from the Treat Paine Acupuncture site:

Acupuncture is considered an effective frontline treatment for a variety of conditions according to the U.S. National Institute of Health, the British Medical Association, and the World Health Organization.

Painful Conditions:

• Low Back Pain
• Knee Pain
• Carpal Tunnel Syndrome
• Tennis Elbow
• Osteoarthritis
• Rheumatoid Arthritis
• Neck Pain
• Nerve Pinch
• Headaches / Migraines
• Stomach Pain
• Menses Pain
• Sport Injuries

Women's Health:

• Infertility
• Painful and Difficult Pregnancy
• Morning Sickness
• Malposition of Fetus / Breach Birth
• PMS
• Irregular Menses
• Dysmenorrhea
• Endometriosis
• Fibromyalgia

Mental - Emotional Problems:

• Depression
• Anxiety - Palpitations
• Irritability
• Stress
• Low Energy
• Insomnia

Digestive Problems:

• Irritable Bowel Disease
• Dysentery / Diarrhea
• Constipation
• Cramping and Gastric issues

Cancer Treatment:

• Adverse Reactions to Radiation & Chemotherapy
• Nausea and Vomiting
• Fatigue
• Quality of Life
• Anxiety / Depression
• Immune Suppression

Acupuncture Needles:

The needles are about the size of a human hair or 1/12 the size of a typical hospital needle. They are extremely fine and slip easily thru the outer dermal layers without causing pain. The needles are sterile and disposed of after each use.  Nearly all patients notice a calm and enjoyably peaceful feeling post-treatment. 

How It Works:

We know acupuncture has multiple specific effects on human physiology and blood chemistry. Inserted needles result in local and systemic changes.  The brain centers responsible for modulating pain and mood are regulated.  Localized concentrations of the bodies endogenous pain relieving compounds are multiplied. Damaged nerves return to normal levels of intensity and duration when sending signals.   

The Mechanism: 

Systemic:  A Harvard study(1) showed that a signal from an acupuncture needle regulates the limbic center in the brain. Within the limbic center lies the hypothalamus which regulates the endorcrine system. It is hypothesized that acupuncture needling regulates the limbic center which regulates the hypothalamus which regulates the endocrine system and this results in the diverse effects that are observed.

Local:  Acupuncture has been shown to return a damaged nerve to it's proper signal intensity and rate of firing.  It also stimulates an increase in localized concentration of Adenosine which acts as the bodies endogenous pain reliever.  

It Is Not In Your Head:

A recent study at the University College London provides a rational basis that acupuncture effects are not the same as the placebo effect.  This new research showed a region of the brain involved in pain response, the ipsilateral insular was activated during real acupuncture and not during fake needling. Therefore, acupuncture causes measurable physical effects unrelated to a patient's positive or negative expectations and beliefs.   

Are The Needles Sterile?

Absolutely!

Worst triathlon is best day ever

Worst triathlon is best day ever

I learned an important lesson last week: A bad day at a triathlon is better than the best sitting on the couch.

It was at my first triathlon of the year at the 2013 March Triathlon Series hosted by Cal Poly San Luis Obispo at Lake Lopez. The last race I ran was the Wildflower olympic in May of 2012 almost a year ago.

I haven't done much for training for the last several months, unless you count racquetball a few times a week the Paso Robles Kennedy Club Fitness. I've been working over-time at work developing new services for our company Access Local Search.  The little time I have had left I've spent with my children. 

The night before the race, my buddy backed out. At 5 a.m. I was ready to call it off and sleep in. Lake Lopez was in the 50s; swimming in it would be cold difficult. I closed my eyes and reflected on everything I had accomplished in the last couple years: losing 80 pounds; getting in shape and keeping the weight off; changing the way I eat to a pale-style diet. I even qualified for lower life insurance rates now that my health had improved.

Was it all for nothing? Wasn't I mentally tough enough to do it? I started thinking about how far I'd come. I thought about how I want to be in-shape for myself and my family. I mustered the energy and got out of bed and drove down to the race.

If Woody Allen said 80-percent of success in life is showing up, he was 100-percent right. I felt like a million bucks just for showing up and completing the race. As far as speed goes, it was my slowest by far. 

Even though I finished low in the rankings, it was the best day ever. While I was in the race, my mind was in a meditation thinking about everything in life I am grateful for: breathing fresh air, soaking in sunshine, and loving my family. 

Triathlon Stats

Race #21 – Cal Poly’s March Triathlon Series, Lake Lopez

March 24, 2013

Race: Sprint_M_40-44 , ½-mile swim, 12-mile bike ride, 5k run

Time: 1:54:58

Place: 57/69

Swim time: 20:33  

T1 3:21

Bike time: 51:57   

T2 1:46

Run Time: 37:21

Health Insurance Paso Robles – Callie L Fisher Insurance – (805) 238-6593

During late Stone Age there were a significant number of people living into older adulthood

The New York Times reports: Who Lives Longest?


By MAGGIE KOERTH-BAKER

Artwork from the NY Times.

A Swedish baby born in 1800 had a life expectancy of just 32 years. We know this because Sweden was one of the first countries to keep extensive records of births and deaths and, by 1800, had a reliable national system that allowed this morbid statistic to be calculated. That baby’s life may sound nasty, brutish and short, especially for a nation advanced enough to keep such detailed records, but before you imagine 19th-century Swedish teenagers suffering the regret and ennui of midlife crises, consider this: that same year, a 20-year-old Swede could reasonably expect to live another 37 years.

Life expectancy is an average, and it fluctuates with age as the risks we face change throughout our lifetimes. Both those facts make it a frequently misunderstood statistic. High infant-mortality rates depress the figure substantially. This can lead contemporary observers to the false conclusion that most humans died quite young, even in the not-so-distant past. (Were you ever told, as a petulant teenager, that you’d have been considered middle-aged in medieval Europe?)

“ ‘Life expectancy’ is this term that entered public lingo without public understanding of what it really means,” says Andrew Noymer, associate professor of public health and sociology at the University of California, Irvine. Our hypothetical Swedish baby’s 1832 expiration date is, of course, nothing of the sort. It’s a way of expressing, statistically, that lots of babies and small children were dying in 19th-century Sweden. By simply surviving childhood, a young Swede could expect a relatively long life — and if he was lucky, aproper midlife crisis.

But so could Fred Flintstone. In the last decade, scientists have concluded that humans have lived into older adulthood since 30,000 years ago, during the Upper Paleolithic (part of the era more commonly known as the Stone Age). Michael Gurven, a professor of anthropology at U.C. Santa Barbara who has studied modern hunter-gatherer and horticultural tribes, found that people in these societies who survived childhood lived about as long as 19th-century Swedes did — into their 50s and beyond. His work is one clue that suggests Enlightenment Age Europeans could have had the same longevity as our ancestors who painted caves and hunted the woolly mammoth.

Before the Upper Paleolithic, early humans really did die young, most before their 30th birthdays. Then, during the late Stone Age, there was a significant increase in the number of people living into older adulthood. The scientific and technological advances that made the modern era possible are well known to us, but the Upper Paleolithic was also host to a flourishing of early human culture.
Rachel Caspari, a paleoanthropologist at Central Michigan University, studies the life spans of ancient humans, their ancestors and close relatives — together, known as hominins. In 2004, she and a colleague examined teeth from 768 hominin fossils representing three million years of primate evolution.

Looking at wear and other signs of aging in the teeth, Caspari split the fossils into groups of old and young adults, creating rough approximations of ancient demographics. Examing a span from between 100,000 and 30,000 years ago, Caspari found about four old adults for every 10 young adults. But beginning around 30,000 years ago, during the Upper Paleolithic, this reversed: Caspari counted 20 old adults for every 10 young adults.

This demographic shift coincided with an explosion of cultural production: clay figurines; carvings made of bone, wood and stone; cave art and jewelry making; and complex burial practices. According to Caspari, it was longer human life spans that seem to have made this flourishing possible. Having more time on earth allows our species to progress.

Read the full story at The New York Times

Insurance San Luis Obispo – Susan Rodriguez - State Farm Insurance Agent – (805) 783-7050