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Calorie Disclosure, Drinkable Veggies, and Cigarettes Suck

Restaurants reveal the numbers, drinking veggies for a slimmer physique, and kicking the bad smoking habit.

Seriously, How Many Calories?
Here at FBG headquarters, we’re big fans of restaurants that let diners in on the calorie counts on menus. Sure, there’s a margin of error depending on the person making the meal, and sure, we sometimes find that a salad has as many cals as a burger, but we love having this information in front of us to help us make difficult dining decisions easier.

Now, under proposed nutrition-labeling legislation, restaurants with 20 or more locations would have to disclose calorie counts on the menu or menu board and have information available upon request, including details such as cholesterol, fat, sodium content and fiber. While this information probably won’t stop folks from ordering a high-cal dish, with this nationwide law at least they’d know where their calorie count stands for the meal.

Mo’ info, mo’ better.

Viva Vegetables!
Although right now I have an unexplainable addiction to grapefruit juice, I go on kicks when V8 juice is my best friend. Looks like that addiction may be good for my waistline. In a new study, it appears that drinking at least one glass of low-sodium vegetable juice daily may help overweight dieters lose more weight. Participants in the study who drank at least 8 ounces of vegetable juice as part of a calorie-controlled heart-healthy diet lost 4 pounds over 12 weeks, while those who followed the same diet but did not drink the veggie juice lost only 1 pound. But even if you’re not trying to lose weight, vegetable juice is a great way to make sure you’re hitting your recommended daily veggie intake. Just watch that sodium!

Keep your diet straight.

Naughty Nicotine
Hard to believe and weird to admit, but this Fit Bottomed Girl used to be a smoker. Cough, cough. Although it’s now been yeeeaars—and it was only a year when I was still a teenager—I still remember how tough it was to quit cold turkey.

I apparently beat incredible odds because reportedly only 2 to 5 percent of those who quit on their own are successful after 12 months. Of that small percentage, it takes an average of three to six attempts to kick the habit. I don’t want to get preachy here or anything, but I’m sure there are some FBGs out there who just need a little push to drop-kick the habit for good. Well, PUSH! Check out some of these quitting tips from the pros for help on your journey to smoke-free lungs. And non-smokers: These tips work very well for any bad habit you’re looking to kick to the curb!

Kick butt to be a Fit Bottomed Girl.

Erin

Photos grabbed from jenny downing, yomi955 and Mykl Roventine at Flickr.

Thorn in My Side, Er, Foot

Meet the Honey Locust*, my friends. This bad boy recently taught me a fitness—and life—lesson. Namely, to slow down, appreciate the small things and don't take your feet for granted.

See, a few weeks ago I went on a benign camping trip. As someone who grew up camping, I was excited for the trip and felt prepared. We had our tent, our s'mores supplies, our beer and our sunscreen (note that we were at a lake only about an hour and 15 minutes from my house and 30 minutes from civilization). Because the park had no hiking trails, I didn't see the need to wear my heavy duty hiking boots. Instead, I wore Crocs (please don't tell the fashion police). This was my first mistake. My second mistake was playing bean-bag toss in a wooded area populated by the pictured tree. I'm sure you can see where this is going...

Without going into the gory details (although, if you're squeamish, you might want to skip the next paragraph), I stepped on a three-inch thorn. It went through my Croc and into the ball of my foot. Ouch. I pulled it out immediately. OUCH. And then my husband tried to get small pieces of the thorn out of my foot as apparently these types of thorns are notorious for leaving behind bark when they're pulled out. OUCH! Then I sanitized it with hand sanitizer, as it's all we had on hand. HOLY MOTHER OF OUCH! Two days later, after realizing that there were still pieces left in my foot, I went—and by "went" I mean "gimped" because I could barely walk—to my doctor who numbed my foot and removed the remaining pieces. Again, I won't go into the icky details, but when I left the doctor, I had a much larger hole in my foot, a prescription for codeine and a bad reputation for cursing like a sailor at the physician's office. Oh, and a much worsened gimp.

For a full 10 days, I probably needed crutches to get around, but I was too proud to use them. So I hobbled to and fro, limiting all of my walking to the necessities. Need to go to the printer? Nope, not going to happen until I also had to pee, ask a coworker a question and refill my water bottle. I became skilled at batching my activities. Doing simple things, such as going to the pharmacy to pick a second antibiotic prescription after your doctor prescribed you one that made you break out into a rash after warning him that it would and then having to wait extra long because he called the prescription into the WRONG PHARMACY, become really tiring and difficult. (For the record, this was not my regular doctor. My regular doctor was on vacation, and from here forward I will forbid her from ever taking a vacation again.)

I also just about went insane from not being able to work out. My regular runs were out of the question, as was anything that put any sort of pressure on my left foot. Because I'm a bit of a cardio junkie, this was a problem. And I got crabby. Very, very crabby.

That is, until I began to see the positives of my predicament. My husband was all of a sudden doing all of the cooking and cleaning without any reminders. I could lie on the couch and watch TV all night and feel good in that I was "recuperating." And, I had a battle wound to show off. (I did earn it after all.) I also started noticing things around me more, like flowers that were blooming today but not yesterday, and a whole new bookshelf at work. (I'm not kidding.) Cut your normal walking speed in half, and you'll see what I mean.

Because of my standing restrictions, I also rekindled my love of weight lifting. Before work, my usual runs were replaced with overhead presses, bicep curls and chest presses. I made sure to burn my muscles to fatigue and didn't rest in between sets to keep my heart rate elevated. I even tried, and liked, a mat Pilates DVD—an exercise phenomenon I've never been sweet on.

Now, weeks later, my foot has healed, and I'm back to running. But something has changed. I'm excited to be on the trail and able to run, but I'm also making time for some Pilates moves to strengthen my core, as some of those exercises really freakin' rock. My "injured" time away has also given me some serious perspective. Namely to slow down, be appreciative and wear the right footwear, especially when within miles of the not-so-sweet Honey Locust. —Jenn

*Note: This tree is not huggable.

Happy 4th of July!

Today we celebrate the birth of the good ol' U.S. of A. And besides running through the sprinkler and noshing on watermelon, we thought we'd take this day of firework greatness to give our brains a workout, too. Below is some great 4th of July party trivia that will amaze your friends, family, neighbors and really anyone you come into contact with. Read on to become the coolest and most knowledgeable chick or dude at the holiday BBQ!

Gobble Gobble. Benjamin Franklin wanted the turkey to be the national animal but was outvoted when John Adams and Thomas Jefferson chose the bald eagle. We love turkey, but are glad Franklin lost this one.

Hot-Diggity, Hot-Doggity. More than an estimated 150 million hot dogs will be eaten today. That's roughly one dog for every two people in the U.S. When you think of it that way: Sick.

Live It. Thirty cities nationwide have "liberty" in their name. Liberty, Missouri, boasts the highest population of all of them. Iowa has more of these places than any other state with Libertyville, New Liberty, North Liberty and West Liberty.

Blow It Up. More than $211 million has been spent on imported fireworks from China.

Here's the Irony. The majority of the nation's flags and patriotic paraphernalia in relation to the 4th of July is produced in China. Nearly $349 million dollars are used each year to import in flags, banners, decorations and emblems.

I Want You! The origin of Uncle Sam probably began in 1812, when Samuel Wilson was a meat packer who provided meat to the U.S. Army. The meat shipments were stamped with the initials "U.S." Someone joked that the initials stood for "Uncle Sam." This joke eventually led to the idea of Uncle Sam symbolizing the United States government.

Late Start. The 4th of July was not declared a national holiday until 1941. Wonder what the hold up was? Fourth of July parties are the best!

Grab a Beer. The U.S. national anthem is actually set to the tune of an old English drinking song called "The Anacreontic Song." Anacreontic was a Greek poet. (I know 'cause I Wikipedia-ed it.)

Enjoy the holiday safely, everyone! And if you feel like singing to express your patriotism instead of spewing trivia, check out this rockin' tune that we promise you'll be singing all day long. —Jenn

Photo grabbed from A Million to One on Flickr.

How Will You Spend the 3rd?


Today may just be July 3, but since the 4th falls on a Saturday this year, the observed day is today. So happy no work day! Today I plan on cleaning the house and getting a long run in before the big holiday barbecues tomorrow, but tell us what you're up to on this 4th of July eve.



Feel free to elaborate about your holiday plans in the comments below! —Jenn

Can't see the poll? Click here.

Photo grabbed from stephen.moore on Flickr.
 

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The Fit Bottomed Girls don't take anything too seriously—including fitness. Here, two regular girls share their trials, tribulations and adventures in staying fit to help you know what's good and what's whack when it comes to working out.
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Low-Cal Noodles: Too Good to Be True?

I love pasta. Like, I would eat it every night if I could. But alas, pasta is high in calories—even the whole-wheat, high-fiber kinds—and I don't do pasta portion-control well. A 1/2-cup serving just isn't enough in my book, no matter how much I try to fill up with a side salad. So, when I first heard about Tofu Shirataki Noodles, I was elated. These noodles are made out of tofu, which is a tad odd I'll admit (and I'm even a regular tofu nut), but one package has only 40 calories, one gram of fa… Continue

Posted on July 2, 2008 at 6:57am — 9 Comments

Fit Bottomed Girls

Work Out "With" Britney Spears



Love her or not, Brit does make some killer workout and dance music that will work its way into your brain and stay there for days. I needed some new workout tunes, and even though Britney released Blackout awhile ago, I’m a little slow on the uptake and just got around to buy… Continue

Posted on June 27, 2008 at 7:20am — 3 Comments

Fit Bottomed Girls

Beware: It's Getting Hot, Hot, Hot

It's getting hot in "herre." And by herre, I mean outside.

I'm always excited for summer after a long Midwest winter. Flip flops, shorts, the pool, the beach, sunlight until 9 p.m., shirtless men running around my neighborhood...the list goes on and on. And I, each year, forgo the gym, slather on my sunscreen and hit the great outdoors for weekly power walks and runs.

I recently started teaching an outdoor bootcamp as well, which has considerably added to my outdoor workout time. The bootcamp… Continue

Posted on June 24, 2008 at 9:41am — 5 Comments

Fit Bottomed Girls

Friday Funny: Kelly Ripa-s Anderson Cooper

When Kelly Ripa first came on the scene, she seemed a little too "perfect"—blonde, perky, tiny, yappy—and I wasn't too sure about her. (I may have been a tad bit jealous, I'll admit.) But, over the years, as she's been Regis' sidekick and held stints on TV and starred in commercials, she's grown on me. She's a mom, and she talks frankly about stress, her kids and her marriage. And although Ms. Ripa didn't start working out until recently (gasp!), she's now a poster child for the awesome things t… Continue

Posted on June 20, 2008 at 11:31am — 4 Comments

Fit Bottomed Girls

Bally's Cats, Beckham's Kids and J-Lo's Threads

Bally Total Fitness gets catty, Beckham kicks it with kids, and J-Lo does workout wear.


Bally Adopts More Pop Icons
To be on point for their upcoming album and music video for "When I Grow Up," the Pussycat Dolls have loosened up their buttons, put on their workout gear and hit the gym. The dolls will join the list of Bally celebrity endorsers, including JT, Kyl

Continue

Posted on June 18, 2008 at 1:25pm — 3 Comments

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At 7:20pm on June 23, 2008, Jen@PatinaEsprit said…
I <3 your blog - great work!!!
At 1:49pm on June 17, 2008, Miguel Pineiro (Wickert) said…
Hey, I added you to my friend list. Keep up the great work! Oh, yeah... Welcome to the family!
At 11:56am on June 17, 2008, Cynthia said…
Hey there!! Your bug in the throat post made me laugh out loud! LOVE it! :)
At 11:05am on June 14, 2008, Lisa Nelson said…
Hi Girls!

I saw "Fit Bottom Girls" in my inbox and thought SPAM! Glad I didn't click delete before reading "Iowa Avenue". Looks like the two of you have a great attitude when it comes to fitness:) ~Lisa
At 11:59am on June 13, 2008, Diana Young, RD, LD/N, CDE said…
Welcome to Iowa Avenue!
At 7:35am on June 13, 2008, Lisa Newton said…
Has "groovy" come back in fashion? I had no idea...................:)

Thanks for the add in facebook.
At 3:28am on June 13, 2008, SpinDiva said…
Welcome FBGs---can I call you that? Look forward to sharing in our "stay healthy" adventure!
At 8:20pm on June 12, 2008, Lisa Newton said…
Wow, I"m impressed. Before I even got a chance to welcome you, you've already commented and posted a blog.

BTW, I just become a fan of fitbottomedgirls on facebook. When you have time, check out Iowa Avenue's page, http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=10631167210

Welcome to Iowa Avenue...............:)
 
 

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