Happy Nirvana

We know that large serving sizes influence dieters to eat more… but what about server sizes?
A study published earlier this year in the Journal of Consumer Psychology reported that restaurant goers order differently, depending on the size of the waiter taking the order.
The study conducted two experiments: one measuring quantity of food eaten, and [...]

Image from my luscious backyard
Fancy exotic bouquets are losing their bloom. Flying in flowers from around the world is expensive in terms of money and the environmental impact. Some florists this summer are starting to use local flowers for their bouquets: as in picked from neighbourhood gardens.
Now florists are turning [...]

A tuberculosis test, called Xpert® MTB/RIF, can successfully identify 98% of all culture-confirmed TB cases, including more than 90% of those with smear-negative disease, a study published in NEJM (New England Journal of Medicine) reveals. The test is highly sensitive for tuberculosis as well as drug resistance to the powerful anti-TB drug rifampicin (RIF) in [...]

Mentally stimulating activities that challenge and engage the brain, such as crossword puzzles, reading, or listening to the radio may help slow down cognitive decline – the gradual deterioration of thinking skills – but may encourage the acceleration of dementia later on during old age, says a report in Neurology, the journal of the American [...]

It’s amazing how many people will share their tips with you once you tell them that you are trying to lose weight. They’ll tell you the latest article they read, what they did last month, or what their friend’s friend is currently doing.
Now although I’m sure all of that advice is well intentioned it may [...]

Image credit: The Journey TV
From this awesome tour of a permaculture allotment, to residents battling to keep their gardens, Britain’s ‘allotment’ culture has featured regularly on TreeHugger. And not without good reason. These small plots of land, rented from local government for an affordable fee, are visible in almost every town and city across the [...]

With the highest teen pregnancy rate in the Western Hemisphere and 25% of teens having had a sexually transmitted infection, we should be paying careful attention to media messages about sexuality and contraception, says a revised policy statement by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) “Sexuality, Contraception, and the Media,” published in the medical journal [...]

Instead of talking with you today about how there is research currently being conducted about how you view your body and how your body responds to and mimics that outlook, I want to share with you a simplified approach to losing weight.
I find that too many people who enter a weight loss program focus on [...]

“Corn falls into the East Nishnabotna River in Montgomery County, Iowa. Severe row crop land erosion is occurring along the river.” Caption/image credit, this and subsquent images:Gannon, Desmoines Register
The dramatic pictures you see in this post speak for themselves: Iowa crop land and even corn falling directly into a river. They symbolize [...]

The research just keeps piling up — more and more scientists are reporting a possible link between type 2 diabetes and Alzheimer’s Disease (and similar conditions).
Earlier this month we discussed a study whereby dementia (such as Alzheimer’s) was found to be more prevalent among people with type 2 diabetes. And a study from the latest [...]