The Fat-Appetitie Paradox

Conventional wisdom tells us that obese people are fat because they just don't have the will power to avoid overeating. They eat because they are hungry and desire food and thus get fat. At least that's what we're suppose to believe.

Gary Taubes in his book "Good Calories, Bad Calories" submits that what REALLY is at work within obese people is hormonal hijacking. Essentially, he makes the point that people who are obese get that way because hormones in the body drive it to become fat (in similar fashion as hormones in a child's body drives it to grow) and thus the person is filled with hunger and begins seeking calorie as well as feels lethargic and seeks to rest. It's his own hormones that are manipulating him.

I think that this idea makes a lot of sense and is very compelling. I'll have to do some more lookin' into it though before I settle my own views on the subject. It is pretty controversial after all.

They Really Didn't Eat Less In Years Gone Bye

Conventional imagery foisted upon us from multiple sources has convinced us that a couple hundred years ago our ancestors lived in a nearly-starved state working the ground as peasant farmers. Never mind the fact that if this was true and the nation was comprised of a subsistence population we would never have had the level of success that is clear historical fact.

Consider some of the anthropological texts which speak to the type of diet enjoyed by our American and British Ancestors.

Eric Ross wrote of the late 19th century British Diet, "Breakfast consisted of fish, poultry, or game, if in season; sausages, and one meat of some sort, such as mutton cutlets, or filets of beef; omelets, and eggs served in a variety of ways; bread of both kinds, white and brown, and fancy bread of as many kinds as can conveniently be served; two or three kinds of jam, orange marmalade, and fruits when in season; and on the side table, cold meats such as ham, tongue, cold game, or game pie, galantines, and in winter a round of spiced beef."

This was a description of the common fare at a country home. Doesn't sound like the British were hard up for food, does it? They didn't live on a starvation diet in order to remain thin...but they did. But how about in America?

According to Historian Hillel Schwartz, large meals were commonplace as well: "The 75-cent special at Fred Harvey restaurants in the late 1870s included tomato puree, stuffed whitefish with potatoes, a choice of mutton or beef or pork or turkey, chicken turnovers, shrimp salad, rice pudding and apple pie, cheese with crackers, and coffee."

Maybe that was the diet of the rich though, right? Hardly. Here's what Schwartz recalls of the upper-class diet: "When life insurance medical directors sat down to their banquet in 1895, they had clams, cream soup, kingfish with new potatoes, filet mignon with string beans, sweetbreads and green peas, squabs and asparagus, petits fours, cheese with coffee, and liqueurs to follow..."

Wow. People were living it up in the 1800's, huh? Maybe not in earlier times though. Well....maybe that's not true Schwartz finishes up by saying that this food was enjoyed "in two or more courses and thirty to sixty minutes shorter than formal dinners of the previous era, and their portions were smaller."

Looks like we might be wrong in thinking that our forefathers were starved wraiths and that our problem in getting so fat as a nation is that we eat too much during each sitting.

Don't Stare At Another Man's Ass

One thing that I consistently notice at LA Fitness is the simple lack of gym etiquette. I'm not even talking about your run-of-the-mill leaving plates on the bench press bar. I'm talking about OBVIOUSLY weird behavior.

For example, some free weight areas such as the one found at LA Fitness Missouri City TX are a bit cramped. Smith machines and power racks are practically on top of one another. This provides for some very close quarters when busting out reps in either of these areas.

The crazy thing is, I remember seeing one guy finish his set on the smith machine and then sit down as if he were tired on a nearby bench. I dunno why this guy was tired as he had hardly any weight on the bar for doing smith machine quarter squats, but he just sat down as if he were spent.

He then proceeded to STARE at the ass of guy that was doing real squats in the squat rack!

I'm not talking about just staring off into space in the general direction but both-eyes-oogling stare! This is very creepy to say the least and it goes double in a room full of annoying mirrors. The if the guy doing the squats saw that he was getting eye-ball boned he might have lost his concentration and failed a rep or something.

Guys...keep your eyes to yourself in the gym! Do NOT stare at other men!

Why I Don't Crossfit

If you are at all involved in keeping yourself healthy via a rigorous fitness routine, then you probably already know about the cult known as Crossfit that has taken the country by storm over the course of the last 10 years.

Yes, I did say cult. It has all the characteristics of a religious side-show group with it's own initiation rituals, culture, sacred dogmas, pilgrimage (the Crossfit Games), and even a little bit of self-mutilation thrown in for fun.

Crossfitters follow a pattern of very high intensity interval training. The training is so hard that there have been over 200 cases of rhabdomyolosis among members of various Crossfit affiliate gyms worldwide. This is a potentially life-threatening condition where the cells of the muscles don't just tear, but actually burst in the course of exercise and spill their interior contents into the blood. All of this material is filtered out by the kidneys (not the liver) and and overload of this stuff can lead to kidney failure! Can you see why I tended to shy away from this?

Furthermore, Crossfit really is pretty much comprised of zealots. People who think that their way is the ONLY way to get healthy and fit. In fact, they feel that if you look up the word "Fitness" in the dictionary it will tell you that the definition of being fit is simply being a dedicated Crossfitter. What a joke.

The group is even led by a crazy zealot who pursues a dictatorial leadership pattern which emphasizes censorship and groupthink. An article known as the Crossfit White Papers choronicles some of the more obvious acts of dominations that this guy, Greg Glassman, has participated in over the years.

I will give it to these guys though, they are NOT unhealthy or out of shape. Compare that to what you find when you walk into the Long Beach CA LA Fitness and you'd certainly want to have the body of a Crossfit junkie instead of the fat suit worn by most there who are afflicted with #fuckarounditis.

Customer Service Trumps All....Even At LA Fitness

They say that you can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig. In the same way, you can build a new LA Fitness gym with all the bells and whistles and if you run it according to the same crappy models of customer service and professionalisim as at your other crappy locations, you’re going to get the same type of end result.

This is exactly what we see with the new Harbor City CA LA Fitness. Seriously. The place is new and has a lot to offer, right? Nobody can question that when you’ve got a good weight area, full batch of machines, bunch of cardio equipement, pool, basket ball courts, etc. All of that is fine and dandy.

But so what? So the money was invested and the club has potential. Potential success is different from success because…well…it’s only ‘potential’, right? It’s the human element that makes any business succeed or fail and the human element at this gym has failed again and again right out of the gate.

Consider the recent story recounted by Maria. This is a girl that lives right next door to this LA Fitness and decided to stop in and give it a try. All she wanted was a one-week pass to see if she really like the place. It’s not like anyone is just going to go to a gym for one week to scam the place. Seriously, lazy people are not motivated.

So did the LA Fitness people give her a chance to preview the facility before she signed up? Of course not. Why would they? All they care about is money and they (still) believe that high-pressure sales tactics are going to be the best way to get that money out of people. Talk about a shake-down.

The bottom like is that it doesn’t matter how nice you dress a place up. It can even be brand new as we see in the case of this particular LA Fitness location. All of that investment of time and money to get a place up and running goes down the pooper if you have bad customer service.

The Best LA Fitness in the San Diego Area!

The Encinitas CA LA Fitness is one of the best gyms in San Diego County and this is coming from a guy who’s been going to various gyms for a while.  People here actually know how to play racquet ball which means that the courts can become very, very aggressive.  I’d even go so far as to say they have an addictive aspect to them.  I like team sports a lot more than mindless fitness drills so this gym gets even MORE brownie points with me because the competition is always very intense nd there are 2 nearly full sized courts to keep the play going strong for hours.  I’ve seen more than one well-known college player on the boards here and it makes you want to push that much harder to show what you’ve got. 

Men will appreciate the fact that the women that come here are really good looking North Country San Diego types who like to keep in shape.  You can pretty much tell that they are showing off that hot body when they mount the stairmaster machines.  Not a problem with me!  The only people I have a problem with here are the strange old guys.  Seriously weird.  They dress in ways that shouldn’t even be allowed anymore and I’ve seen more than one drooling on himself while working out on a stationary bike.  I feel kinda bad though when I think like that.  At least they are there trying to stay in shape instead of just deciding to check out and die like a lot of older people do. 

One major downside to working out at this LA Fitness is the fact that the big wigs at headquarters have not replaced the machines in ages and they’re really beginning to show their wear.  Usually it’s not an issue, but enough stuff is broken down to notice during peak hours.  At least the people are nice and will let you work in with them if things are crazy busy. I’ve noticed that the staff is very nice and the personal trainers seem to enjoy their job and are working consistently instead of sitting around doing nothing…which would imply that nobody likes them or want their services.
I’d also like to see a little more enforced discipline coming from the staff…like enforcing proper street attire and making people use a towel to wipe the sweat off the machines.  They also shouldn’t allow the second basketball court to be taken up by HS volleyball most of the year.  I know it’s a pain to put up and take down but that court sits unused a lot when others could take advantage of it if the net was put up and taken down at the proper time.  Also, be sure to avoid the locker room at all costs.  They are not well maintained and it’s likely that you’ll come across stuff in there that will make your skin crawl and force you to choke back a little bit of puke.  Also, there’s a pool here but I’d never go in it. I have doubts about how well the water is maintained in light of how the locker rooms are kept up.