The Artist

          Last week, I saw The Artist with my girlfriend.  My mom and sister both raved about it to me and told me we absolutely had to see it.  I didn't know much about it, but I vaguely thought it might be the silent film.  On the way in we found out that not only was it a silent film, but it was also filmed in black and white.  I immediately assumed that anyone who liked it was being pretentious (now you know that neither my mom nor sister read my blog) and that it would be bad.

          And I was wrong.  This movie was very good.  My girlfriend and I both loved it, and we both went in there thinking that the silent film thing would be dumb.  We joked that we both wanted to dislike and came out as complete converts.   The story is great, and the silent film aspect adds a nice layer.  I felt like it caused the audience to be more engaged, as you had to make a little bit more of an effort to understand what was going on.  It was also just a nice change of pace, and some of the more dramatic moments came out really well with the actors "mugging" their emotions to us.

Week's Reflections - 2/4/2012

          As I recently posted, I have been getting killed with work lately.  Hopefully that will be changing soon, and I am planning to post a couple of interesting articles in the near future.  I also have a few interviews coming up, and I'll be sure to post about them.

1.) The Grey

          I thought this was a very disappointing movie.  I saw it with my girlfriend and a friend, and halfway through the movie we were bored and joking about how bad some parts of it were.  The cruddy wolf sound effects, the BS philosophy, the way so many "situations" were obvious plot devices....  It just wasn't a good movie.  I was pretty surprised to find that the greater public seems to have received it pretty well.  Who knows?  Maybe I'm wrong on this one.  Let me know what you think?

          I will say that I liked the ending.  From what I understand, people found it to be very disappointing, but I actually thought  it fit the movie and succeeded in making partial redemption for some of the more boring parts.

Week's Reflections - 1/28/12

          Apologies for getting to this so late today!  It has been a bit of a hectic week.  As always, please let me know if you come across anything interesting you want to let me know about; I would really appreciate it.

Plus it has a nice color.

1.) Curcumin vs LDL Receptors

          This is an interesting little study that I came across recently, despite the fact that it's been sitting around for over three years.  It deals with the compound curcumin, which is found in the wonder spice, turmeric.  In case you missed the boat, turmeric takes a shotgun approach to health in the human body by somehow positively impacting virtually everything.

          This study was designed to further analyze the observed anti-atherosclerotic effects of curcumin.  They found that it increases LDL receptor expression by some molecular pathway that's a little beyond my current paygrade.  LDL receptors pick up LDL cholesterol (the "bad" kind) and help get them pulled into a cell via endocytosis.  Sounds good to me.  Besides, it's a pretty tasty spice.

Week's Reflections - 1/21/2012

          As always, please post in the comments if you have anything interesting you want to recommend for me and others to read/watch/whatever!

Your brain on Alzheimer's.

1.) Diet and Alzheimer's - When the Sugar Hits Your Brain

          This was an interesting article that talks about the effect of Advanced Glycation End Products (AGEs) on our brains.  The author presents a fascinating study from Neurology that presents a very strong correlation between endogenous AGEs and a person's mental decline.  Personally I think AGEs somewhat frightening and are a really interesting topic that I am eager to start educating myself about.

          This article is well worth a read if you're at all interested in AGEs, Alzheimer's, nutrition, or mental decline.

Week's Reflections - 1/14/2012

          Sorry for the lower posting volume this week.  It's just due to the vacation.  I'll be back on form next week.  I hope you are all well, and as always, if you have any thoughts or recommendations, please let me know!


1.) Playoffs Continue

          I have officially predicted the Saints to win it all.  I think Drew Brees, besides being the coolest professional athlete, is playing at a ridiculous level right now.  Their offense is almost machine like at this point.

The Saints are playing the Niners at 4:30, so we'll see if my prediction holds up.  Anyway, I'm enjoying the playoffs, and I hope you are too.

Week's Reflections - 1/7/12

          The first week of the new year is in the books!  I am excited to celebrate by heading on vacation next week.  Don't worry, I'll still post a few updates.


1.) New Track Your Plaque Article

          I like this article, because it's a very succinct and to the point summation of the reasoning behind the Track Your Plaque low carb diet.  Dr. Davis briefly describes the phenomena he sees with a low carb vs a low fat diet, through the lens of a cardiologist mainly concerned with heart disease.  His article is backed by many years of clinical experience managing the diet and heart health of his patients.  At the end, he also suggests that avoiding wheat in particular can also cause people to benefit in several non-heart related ways.  He doesn't break any new ground here, but I appreciate it for being short and concise and easy to understand with or without medical training.

Week's Reflections - 12/17/11

Here are a couple things I read and watched this week that might be worth taking a look at.  Enjoy, and as always, let me know if you have any suggestions!


- I, Caveman  

           Curiosity released the two episode "I, Caveman" a while back.  These episodes have come through the paleo community with some fanfare, because one of the participants was Robb Wolf, a big paleo writer I mentioned in this post.  I just got around to watching it this week, and I thought it was pretty cool.  I have to be honest, I probably wouldn't have found it to be worth watching or too terribly interesting had it not been for Wolf's participation.

Week's Reflections - 12/10/11

          I'm trying to pound out a thoughtful (and hopefully interesting) post every day, but I want to start a Saturday column that's much more light hearted, fun, and easier to write... because weekends are supposed to be fun!

           So on Saturdays, I'm going to make a post about any interesting things I have done/seen/read/whatever over the past week and would recommend to others.  Hopefully as this blog gains some steam and gets some followers, we can turn this into a fun back and forth in the comments section, and you guys can fire back with some things to go do/see/read/whatever.

          Since this is the first, and I have had a hectic week with travel, I am probably going to throw in a few things that didn't come up in the last week.  In the future, I'll keep things more current.