The Paleo Diet - thoughts

One of the things that I've had an interest in since I started college was diets. I wouldn't always follow them, but I loved to read about them. Still do, of course.

It probably stems from my interest in dietetics that I had thought of majoring in, but I was interested a bit too late and I would rather not attend college for 5 years. :|

At any rate, the "Paleo Diet" (or Paleolithic Diet) originates from the idea that the food we consume today is full of chemicals, isn't natural, and contains many, many foods our ancestors never even consumed before the advent of agriculture.

Many sites that speak about the Paleo diet explain that it helps prevent the onset of diseases that plague our society now, such as diabetes and many dental problems.

The reason for this is because 50-60% of our diet today is comprised of carbohydrates, which are usually high in sugar and spike insulin. High spikes in insulin production are the cause of diabetes and high amounts of carbs/sugar allows baceteria in our mouths to have something to live off of, thus causing cavities.

Many foods are restricted in the Paleo diet that we would normally eat large amounts of in the typical American diet:

[ RESTRICTED FOODS ]

potatoes, tubers
salted, fatty, and highly processed meats (such as hotdogs)
legumes (ALL beans, soybean products, sugarsnap peas, peanuts)
condiments (such as ketchups, mustards, all salad dressings)
sodas, fruit juices
all dairy products
all grains (cereals, including barley, wheat, oats, corn, ect.)
grain-like seeds (amaranth)

...seems quite restrictive, right? Well, everything on this list was never consumed by our ancestors.

The diet encourages grass-fed meats of any kind (really, ANY kind. Even stuff like alligator and ostrich)
Any vegetable that's not a tuber/potato of some kind
all fruits (should be raw fruits unless the juices are naturally squeezed with a juicer for seasoning)
raw, unsalted nuts
stuff like avocado or olive oil in small quantities
natural sweeteners like honey

After reading the details, I'm very interested in this diet. Usually the cleaner I eat and the more veggies/meat I consume, the more energetic and healthier I feel/look. On days when I consume little carbs and more fats/protein I'm far less hungry and usually only need to eat twice a day, once in the morning and once at night. So economically, this is a very good diet for me considering how little I eat.

Next time I'll evaluate the "Keto diet" (or the Ketogenic diet) which is probably far more restrictive than this one actually. XD

My First Sound Recording o_O

Song of time by afalcon

Since this is a blog about hobbies, I decided to do a little sound recording of me playing something simple on my bass guitar. The song on there is called the "Song of Time" and I'm pretty sure any Zelda fan will recognize it since it is in both The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask.

In the future, I plan to do original stuff, but as of right now, I'm not promising anything.

To make the sound recording, I used Audacity which is a program that lets you record audio. I then uploaded the track through soundcloud.com (they offer the music player above). I copied the html code given from the website onto here and that's how I was able to post it on this blog.

--cheers--

*spoilers* Umineko Episode 6 - Thoughts so far

"Without love, it cannot be seen."

I've been currently playing Umineko no naku koro ni episode 6 for the past few days. It's a visual novel arguing over whether the murder mystery was performed by humans or by magic.

Pics I've taken of random scenes:





It's been a trollfest so far, more than any of the other episodes (except maybe episode 3, NOTHING will be able to top that).

We start off with Battler becoming master of the game board and taking Beatrice's role (basically, he's on the magic side now, not on the human's side). He is fighting against Bernkastel and her chess piece Erika and making everything seem as if it was done by magic.

From what I've read so far, it's mostly been about the love between Jessica x Kanon, Shanon x George, and Beatrice x Battler. That constituted a rather large chunk of the game with them fighting against each other in a demon's game because only 1 of these groups is allowed to earn true love (because furniture is only half a soul and only 2 full souls can love each other or some shit, I don't know).

The rest of the game seems to be about Erika trolling the fuck out of Battler by saying how she chopped all of his family's heads off while they were still alive and then trying to marry him and saying she's going to defile him. Erika is truly one of pure evil, far more than anyone else in Umineko so far. She only has 1 scene where she feels anything about anyone that isn't how to intellectually rape them. o_O

I'm still reading through the rest of the story so I don't have a full opinion of it yet. Will post a 2nd opinion once I finish it entirely.

Music Day

Wow, I'm a little late on the bandwagon. I'm actually the person who started this blog, but the last to post something XD. Actually, I've been spending a lot of my time trying to get widgets, tools, etc to go along with this blog. Blogging software is weird like that. So convenient, but so hard to find the perfect ones. Okay, so first things first. My name is Abraham and just like Jim and Evie, I go to Ball State University. Some of my interests include (but are not limited to): comic books, manga, photography, music subcultures, simple yet effective designs, AFOL (adult fans of lego), blogging, and random trivia.

I guess I can talk about what I did on Saturday or as I dubbed it, "Music Day." From the moment I got up, I felt that vibe. "Today is going to be all about music." And it was. I went to two concerts today, played DDR, practiced a bit on my bass, and even took a little nap with music playing in the background.

Hm. Let's talk about the concerts because those were definitely the highlights of my day. I saw two of my favorite local bands today: Osteoferocious and Support the Troopz. Go ahead, check them out. How can I describe the concert? I'll just let this pic speak for itself.

(one of the guys from Support the Troopz crowdsurfing)

Also, I went to late night to see a friend's band perform and I have to admit... they kind of suck... :(
but the band that played later, Scales, totally blew me away. Check them out too :D

Angels in America

Saturday, October 2nd. The great word was spoken. Or something like that. Yesterday night was the final showing of Angels in America: Part 1 at Ball State University. This was also the only time I could go see it. This year I'm not REQUIRED to see any productions, but I have never heard/seen this production before and It's pretty famous (Being a theatre student and all I should KNOW more lol).

The play was 3 hours long which killed me. But it was worth it in the end. I really enjoyed this production, great way to start off the year of productions. I now have to get a hold of the 2nd part. I have this annoying thing that if a play is open ended I don't like it >_<>

If you ever get a chance, come and check out a production of it sometime.

Isn't She Beautiful? I told you she was beautiful!

Ugh. It's been a long weekend. Alrighty peeps. Let's start off with I guess Friday night.

Ended up sleeping through my first class (theatre history) and went to Shakespeare afterwards. Minutes after arriving we were informed class was cancelled. My teacher witnessed a purse snatching and had to be questioned so we got out. Pretty nice day right?

Fast forward time >>>>>

(just realized I never explained the play I was in)

Indianapolis I'm driving on fumes thought I was gonna be late, get gas end up clipping one of those damn things in front of the fueling stations so ive got paint on my front. End up being the 2nd one there for a 5:30 call (and i was actually a little late!) I was pissed. Cast didn't start showing till later. Our 6pm showing didn't start till like 6:20-30.

First runthrough - No real mistakes at least that I saw. Nice crowd. During my closet scene as I was jumping out i slammed my chest into the shelf so after the crowd left to the next room I was laying on the ground for a good 5-10 minutes in pain.

Break time wooot. Relaxed talked to some people. Next showing happening.

2nd show went off AMAZING. Two of my friends Jessy Werner and Kay Jessee showed up (this was the press night so I got 2 comp tickets) I scared the SHIT out of both of them :3

We reopen to public next week and will be playing for every Friday and Saturday in Indianapolis at Morris-Butler House at 6:30, 7:30, 8:30, 9:30pm

I'm gonna write another one about the play I saw Saturday - Angels in America- so stay tuned.

Gaining practical strength - for beginners

Hi~~

My first post on this blog, which is about various hobbies.

I have a varied amount of hobbies, but one that's changed my life for the better is exercise + strength training. I was an out of shape blob of fat a mere 3~4 years ago until I discovered how much fun and challenging training yourself in exercise can be.

Today I'm blogging about an image from 4chan's /fit/ board that I recently acquired that really interested me. It's one of the best beginner routines I've seen for gaining practical strength. By practical, I mean not just straight pumping iron and lifting weights with complicated routines, sets, and reps but only having max 3 sets and being all body weight exercises that ANYONE can do at home. And they are all of course awesome-looking exercises (fuck year handstands).

I plan on doing most of these every morning if I have some time or if I'm bored to hopefully build up strength. I mean sure, I can run 5 miles but that just means my heart and lungs are good at their job. Seriously, I can't do more than 5 full push-ups. :(

From the Dark Pages

Good afternoon readers, first blog on this thing. A little background info on moi. I'm a Junior at Ball State University. I'm a Theatrical Studies Major with a French minor. Interesting combo right? I've been involved with theatre my entire life and I enjoy it! My goal is to become a voice actor someday.

Currently I'm involved with a theatre group in downtown Indianapolis who are putting on a show at the Morris-Butler House. The play is called From the Dark Pages and will be running every weekend in October (to the public) starting next weekend. Tonight is our Press Night, so it'll be my first night with a live audience. I'm a little nervous. I'll post up a reaction blog tomorrow/tonight with an explanation of the play as well for you curious readers.

That's all I got now, time to practice lines and drive to the show.