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1. Blue Zones: Is their secret just walking a lot?
A long 2023 review paper titled The multifaceted benefits of walking for healthy aging: from Blue Zones to molecular mechanisms highlights that maybe the secret to the Blue Zones isn’t some special diet or ancient herb that they’re eating, but simply that their lifestyles are organized such that they walk a lot every day.
“…low-intensity physical exercise, including walking, exerts anti-aging effects and helps prevent age-related diseases, making it a powerful tool for promoting healthy aging. This is exemplified by the lifestyles of individuals in Blue Zones, regions of the world with the highest concentration of centenarians. Walking and other low-intensity physical activities contribute significantly to the longevity of individuals in these regions, with walking being an integral part of their daily lives.”
2. Real men wear kilts (Kilts for healthy balls)
A paper titled 'Real men wear kilts'. The anecdotal evidence that wearing a Scottish kilt has influence on reproductive potential: how much is true? in the Scottish Medical Journal suggests that kilts may in fact serve to increase men’s fertility by keeping the gonads cool. Typical male garments like pants would insulate the crotch and keep it warmer than would a kilt. See my post Quickest way to Lower Testosterone for a breakdown of why heat is so bad for testicle function.
3. Old study on Sunning your balls
A 1939 study titled Influence of Ultraviolet Irradiation upon excretion of sex hormones in the male was looking for answers to the following questions:
They used a small, quartz, mercury lamp that had a spectrum of “52% infrared, 20% luminous and 28% ultraviolet rays.” They exposed different areas of the body (chest, face, back and genitalia) to the light with the rest of the body covered by clothes. “The duration of exposure to the light was 8, 10, 12, 15, 18 and 20 minutes, each succeeding exposure being increased over the preceding one.”
5 irradiations of the chest for 5 consecutive days doubled androsterone output (70IU to 155IU). 8 days without irradiation lowered the androsterone back to baseline. 5 irradiations of the genital area (with other areas covered by clothes) rose the androsterone even further from 70IU to 205IU. It took 10 days for androsterone to go back to baseline.
Androsterone is a weak androgen with about 1/7th the potency of testosterone, so this isn’t that exciting. However, considering androsterone is a metabolite of testosterone, we may guess that UV exposure is raising testosterone.
Now, considering testosterone concentration increases with sun exposure as does vitamin D, this isn’t that surprising. Mercury lamps have been found to increase vitamin D levels. It’s still interesting as it suggests that tanning the balls increases vitamin D levels further than tanning the body. (Per the previous point, don’t roast your balls in the sun for too long.)
4. What if protein powder sucks because it’s powder?
The past two and a half weeks or so I had been putting two scoops of protein powder in about 280grams of Greek Yogurt and ate that after the gym. After a couple days I realized that something about this was making me a bit sluggish compared to if I just ate a normal meal. Perhaps that much dairy doesn’t jive well with me, but I’ve specifically noted in the past that simple shakes of protein powder and milk or water make me noticeably sluggish (even if it’s a good brand - low sugar, not very sweet, not a bunch of crap in it). I didn’t entirely know why this would be the case, but I remembered reading a rodent study a while back on the effect of powdered foods on rodents.
Two different Japanese studies found that indeed, rodents react differently to a solid diet that needs to be chewed compared to a powdered or liquid one that can be gulped down. One of the studies looked at the effect of a solid, powdered or liquid diet on rats. The diets all had the same components, the only difference was the solidity. They concluded that “the group fed with liquid diet gave the highest glucose and insulin levels, while group fed with solid diet demonstrated the least levels, and powdered diet fed group showed intermediate levels thus, suggesting that chewing of the solid diet determined the rate of absorption.”
The other study’s findings were more alarming. The powdered diet somehow disturbed the mice’s sleep, induced more weight gain and even lead to less growth of the cells in the brain (in the hippocampus, specifically).
“PD (mice on the powdered diet) exhibited less cranial bone structure development and a significant weight gain. Furthermore, these PD mice showed reduced number of neurogenesis in the hippocampus. Sleep analysis showed that PD induced attenuated diurnal sleep/wake rhythm, characterized by increased sleep during active period and decreased sleep during rest period. …These results suggest that powder feeding in mice results in a cluster of detrimental symptoms caused by abnormal energy metabolism and anatomical/neurological changes.”
Note that the mice’s entire diet was powdered. I’m not trying to hint that a bit of protein powder here is going to destroy your sleep and brain. Perhaps the solution is to simply not drink your protein shakes by themselves. Have them along with some solid food that requires chewing.
5. Gotta pee? Go make some big decisions
Lately I’ve noticed that my motivation to write decreases immediately after I’ve urinated. The bathroom for the cafe I go is a short walk away, and as I’m heading to it I’ll have various ideas floating in my head ready to be written down when I get back to my seat, but right after I urinate, I almost immediately think that maybe it’s time to pack up my laptop and take a break.
Weirdly enough, a 2011 study from the Association for Psychological Science suggests that the brain works a bit better when you have to pee. From ScienceDaily.com:
In one experiment, participants either drank five cups of water (about 750 milliliters), or took small sips of water from five separate cups. Then, after about 40 minutes -- the amount of time it takes for water to reach the bladder -- the researchers assessed participants' self-control. Participants were asked to make eight choices; each was between receiving a small, but immediate, reward and a larger, but delayed, reward. For example, they could choose to receive either $16 tomorrow or $30 in 35 days.
The researchers found that the people with full bladders were better at holding out for the larger reward later. Other experiments reinforced this link; for example, in one, just thinking about words related to urination triggered the same effect.
"You seem to make better decisions when you have a full bladder," Tuk says.
I've been using protein powder for almost a year now, and I've never experienced these negative effects from it. Some thoughts:
• if you're protein powder has any kind of non-caloric sweeteners in it ('natural' or artificial), it's likely to fuck up your insulin response which can cause drowsiness, among a dozen or so other issues
• if you're taking an excessive amount (more than ~40 g total protein), it's going to make you drowsy as your body reroutes all energy to your gut to digest all that protein
• powdered foods have more surface area, and since digestive enzymes can only access food from the surface, this corresponds to faster digestion, faster absorption, and therefore a stronger insulin response from high-surface area powdered foods. This is what is meant by the quote from the study "chewing of the solid diet determined the rate of absorption": the more you chew, the more surface area your food has, and the faster it is absorbed. It's not that chewing is somehow magic and protects you. Consuming a shake and also chewing something else is not going to change the surface area of the powder. It may, however, slow the absorption if what you're chewing is very slow to digest and calorically empty, like celery or kale.
• This surface area dependent absorption effect is magnified for carbohydrates, which already raise insulin quickly. In the case of the mouse study referenced, their whole diet was powdered, meaning all their carbohydrates were administered as powder, which is basically like injecting glucose directly into the bloodstream; not good.
• To mitigate these effects when taking protein powder, choose an unsweetened brand and consume in moderate amounts so as to not overload your body. Also consume with a high-fiber food.
I use the nuts.com grass-fed protein powder. Just whey, no bullshit. I take 2-3 Tbsp (20-30 g) in one cup of whole milk, and usually eat it with some kind of vegetable and/or a spoonful or two of peanut butter. Never made me drowsy, definitely improved my gains, and also helped me recover from a series of joint and tendon injuries.
You can buy a lamp for a pet lizard that emits UVA and UVB for dirt cheap from Amazon. I wake up with it every morning. Seems to help get me through the overcast winters.
Also, I drink a ton of tea and hold my pee a lot and theres definitely something to that. Plus going into another room resets the brain. Why am I in the kitchen again?