Image courtesy of Vonslatt on Flickr

Those of us who enjoy SF/F fiction aren’t the only folks on the road to better health. Many of the folks who create the fictional worlds, characters, and events we enjoy also get up from their desks and get moving. We were fortunate enough to catch up with Sci-Fi & Fantasy writers Jay Lake and Elizabeth Bear, both of whom, in addition to putting a lot of mileage on their respective keyboards, put a fair bit of effort towards getting up and away from them, too.

Jay has been churning out a prodigious number of sci-fi and fantasy short stories and novels since the turn of the century, frequently visiting territory in the realm of “new weird” and various flavors of N-punk (steampunk, clockpunk, and the like). Whether or he’s flying solo or collaborating with a handful of co-conspirators, it’s a safe bet that, no matter where you start out from, you won’t be in Kansas anymore by the time he’s done. He enjoys inventing funky worlds and making any excuse for a zeppelin cameo.

Elizabeth takes pretty much every SF/F trope and turns it on its ear in the name of challenging assumptions about the genre, the characters, and the expectations of both. Whether it’s flipping the animal-sidekick motif upside-down, poking around the underside of myths, or delving into the psyches of an ensemble cast, her writing will expose and explore the unexpected.

Both Jay and Elizabeth have been nominated for (and won) numerous awards for their fiction, including the Hugo, Campbell, Phillip K. Dick, and James Tiptree, Jr awards, among others. In short, they both write some very, very good and interesting stuff, in addition to being well worth sitting down with for a pot of tea.

So, without further ado, let’s give them a workout. They shared their thoughts on making time to get healthy, how it affects their work, and a singularly pernicious corn chip.

Unlike simply trying to best yesterday’s high score in Peggle (or beat Mike in yet another game of Lexulous), real life comes with a nearly infinite number of achievements. Thankfully, most of them aren’t as tedious or expensive as farming rep for every last mount, or an ultra-rare pet drop.

Forthwith, an almost certainly incomplete list of achievements that have gotten us out of our computer chairs and away from our desks.

Image courtesy of db*photography

I’d like to lose the 20lbs that stand between me and a size 12, or  even the 50lbs that stand between me and a size “Wow!”.  I know that to do so I need to make calories in less than calories out. But how many calories should I shoot for in general?

I’ve used a number of calculators, with so vastly different results.

Here’s two examples:

The American Cancer Society says I need 2318.

The Mayo Clinic says I need 1550.

What gives? Where can I get a reliable number?

Thanks,
Naomi

Ok.  Wow.  You guys have really decided to stop throwing softballs at us when it comes to these questions, haven’t you?  Next time why not ask us how to perform open heart surgery or something?  Sheesh.

Seriously, though – The reason this is a difficult question is because the first (and most honest) response is “it depends.”  It depends on a lot of things.  It depends on how old you are, how tall you are, how much you weigh currently, how active you are, what your sex is, and what type of calories you’re putting in to your body (a 1200 calorie a day diet consisting of nothing but Snickers bars isn’t very likely to warrant positive results).  With all of those factors in place it is no wonder that you’re having a hard time finding a solid answer to your question.

Image courtesy of stu_spivack

While there are some great resources out there for this question  (Dotti’s Weight Loss Zone, Weight Watchers, Daily Burn, etc) , none of them have a clear answer on one of my favorites: Pho (Vietnamese noodle soup).  While I am elevating ShrinkGeek to the level of the oracle on Delphi, do any of you guys know? Or – how about just a Boolean: Is it healthy, or not? BTW: I’m talking about restaurant Pho, not the crap in the ramen noodle aisle.

I tried to take the easy way out of this question and defer the answer to Jaden Hair, Tampa Bay area food celebrity and author of The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook.  I follow her on Twitter and am constantly assaulted by posts about the amazing Asian recipes she talks about so I figured if anyone would know it was her.  Sure enough, she has a recipe for Pho on her site that sounds absolutely amazing.  Unfortunately for me when I asked her if she had ever figured out the nutrition information for the recipe she replied that she had not, and that we should all follow the advice of her Mother who so wisely said “Just eat!  It good for you!”

Which, I suppose, answers the second part of the question.  So much for this being an easy assignment.

A reader asks:

What’s better — taking my vitamins first thing in the morning, or just before bed?

Your garden-variety multivitamin can be taken pretty much any time you’re going to remember to do so.  If this is when you get out of the shower before work, when you’re brushing your teeth after dinner, or during the first bio break of your nightly raid, it doesn’t matter too much. Humans are creatures of habit, so once you get used to taking your vitamins, you’ll pretty much go on auto-pilot.

If you’re already taking any daily medications, that’s pretty much the perfect time to add one more to your regimen. Hey, we’re not going to ignore the simple, obvious answers around here just because they’re simple and obvious. You want to know the easiest way to do something? Ask the slacker to do it, and they’ll find the easiest way possible.