Grugger’s Way

Who Wants to Get Cancer?

What a stupid question.  What we ALL WANT is to Prevent Cancer!  Regardless of the amount of medical research or “advances” in modern medicine, cancer kills more people than EVER!

We hope that we can AVOID CANCER because that seems like a MUCH BETTER BET than curing it.

When it comes to preventing cancer or just maintaining a healthy lifestyle, it should comes as no surprise that the same suggestions and guidelines keep reappearing. Here are a few of those “tips” and you will also feel better too.

Eat vegetables. Try a refreshing leafy green salad with some broccoli, baby carrots, tomatoes, sliced radish, snap pea pods, raw sunflower seeds, zucchini pieces or English cucumber, red, green and yellow pepper slices and snap peas.

Eat more fruit. I think all are good, but some are better for prevention of cancer-blueberries, for one, which contain anthocyanosides, a powerful antioxidant.

Green tea. Studies have shown that the catechins present in green tea are able to slow or prevent the development of cancer in colon, liver, breast, and prostate cells. Iced or hot, regular or diet-all good.

Whole grains contain fiber, antioxidants, and phytoestrogens, all anti-cancer compounds. Check out my recent post about National Whole Grain Month with some important facts.

Don’t Smoke. Smoking cigarettes is the worst thing you can do to your body. It leads to cancer of the throat, tongue, stomach, bladder, lung and even the lips. Have you ever seen a person with half a jaw? Please don’t smoke.

Also increasing the odds that cancer will invade your body: alcohol, red meat and processed meats like ham, sausage and bacon.

What lowers the risk? Eating more fruits and non-starchy vegetables and getting more exercise. (Seems like I’ve heard that before.)

These tips will also help with maintaining a healthy weight. Obesity is a risk factor in six types of cancer.

LIVE LONG AND PROSPER!

Just a fun bit of nonsense for today.  My spouse saw fit to send this to me in an e-mail from work.  She thinks I fit into this “older guy” humor category:

GAMES FOR WHEN WE ARE OLDER
1. Sag, you’re It!
2. Hide and go pee.
3. 20 questions shouted into your good ear.
4. Kick the bucket
5. Red Rover, Red Rover, the nurse says Bend Over.
6. Musical recliners.
7. Simon says something incoherent.
8. Pin the Toupee on the bald guy.

Now WAIT a MINUTE! There are a few things Older Ladies have to deal with too:

SOMETHING FOR THE LADIES:

SIGNS OF MENOPAUSE :
1. You sell your home heating system at a yard sale.
2. You have to write post-it notes with your kids’ names on them.
3. You change your underwear after a sneeze.
4. Going bra-less pulls all the wrinkles out of your face.
WHAT WE ALL HAVE IN COMMON, EVENTUALLY:

OLD IS WHEN:
1. You don’t care where your spouse goes, just as long as you don’t have to go along.
2. Getting a little action means I don’t need fiber today.
3. Getting lucky means you find your car in the parking lot.
4. An all-nighter means not getting up to pee!

GETTING YOUR HEAD OUT OF  YOUR PAST may sound vaguely familiar but only the words have changed.

We really deny outselves the pleasures of the moment, the ability to enjoy the “now” in our lives, when we constantly live in the past.

When we believe that yesterday was better than today, and today is not as bad as tomorrow, we give too much of our attention to what WAS, and drain our energy away from what IS.   We give too much of our power away to the past.  Can you imagine WORRYING about the PAST?  That is so worthless. If we have regrets, so what?  If we wronged someone and that person is still with us, call or write a letter and apologize.  Then get on with it.

I think having a certain degree of anxiety about the future is normal for folks as we age.  God knows, we WISH that our offspring would show at least a little bit of concern about the future as they charge headlong into the World, seemingly without a care.

If we live in our head all the time, we fail to appreciate our other forms of existence.  We need to feel the emotional attachments to the present moment to fully enjoy them.  If the fishing holes that we used to frequent have been obliterated by the changing course of the river, then find new fishing holes that we can enjoy today and let tomorrow take care of itself.

Enjoy the sunset we see tonight and look forward to the sunsets to come.  Hanging on to memories of old sunsets just make us older.

Oh Boy! Over the weekend I saw a promotion on television for “National Stay at Home Week.” As if we didn’t have enough special observances every month anyway.

This is a tongue-in-cheek “National Week” that promotes the beginning of the new Fall Television Season! Wow, for all of us who have been outside enjoying the summer and early autumn weather, with sports and activities of all kinds, the network wants us to realize that it is time to bring this to an END and Stay at Home to watch all the season premiers.

I just wonder if we ought to promote a National “Get Out of the House Week” once the networks begin showing RE-RUNS, which seem to start earlier and earlier each season (discounting last season which excusably was interrupted by the writers’ strike).

Yes, I think that is IT! For all of us who have been chained to our televisions watching endless commercials, tedious and repetitive political ads, graphic violence, mindless humor, and gratuitous sexual innuendo, it is time to pull ourselves away from the television, drag our lazy butts off the couch and enjoy life during National “Get Out of the House Week.”