About Me - Who Am I?

Well here you are at the required “Who Am I” page of every website. The About Me page.

You want to know what qualifies me to write about “ 10 Ways to Protect Your Major Asset”. If you sped through the ether surf and landed here unexpectedly I need to explain that your major asset is your body. You can visit that discussion on the Home Page

Scepticism

Lets’ start with scepticism. Maybe I come by it naturally. Perhaps it’s in my genes - that’s genes not jeans.

Whatever its origin, my sceptical leanings were hardened by my 6 years in the Navy, where as a young officer my critical thinking skills were not always encouraged. Probably my training as a social scientist had already strengthened my natural tendencies to not take information at face value, to challenge opinions – not always great for a military career.

Even as a teenager I always liked to ask the hard questions that can be summarized as “show me the evidence”.

Oh! - you have teenagers, or you remember when you had teenagers, or you have friends who have teenagers, or your “teenagers” now have their own teenagers, or you are a teenager – then you know what I’m talking about.

Here's an example of what happens when your "teenagers" grow up and have their own teenagers - in this case a teenage girl and an almost teenage boy - my grandchildren. (The woman is actually my wife - not my daughter. And she's about my age which gives the lie to my grey beard and shows that the health methods we use, do work.)

It goes beyond teenage rebellion – it is a big part of defining yourself as a distinct individual – questioning everything and seeking evidence.

Honed properly it becomes the base for making informed decisions as you move into adulthood and develop your career – as you pursue life and your personal goals for health, well-being and “wealth”, however you define it.

Opinions are fun – if you’re in a debating society – or if you want to be a typical politician.

But if you want to change a failing policy, or challenge a long-held view you need evidence. While I understood that concept intellectually, I’ve spent my adult life really learning it in the school of hard knocks running a national organization, as Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences and as Dean of Research in an undergraduate university.

Hawaii here we comeOne time I didn’t get enough evidence was in racing my 70’ sailboat from Victoria BC to Maui – 2400 miles. Inadequate research and preparation meant we crossed the line 13th out of 30 boats instead of in the top 3. Lesson learned.

Where's the Beef?

Remember the advertisement first aired in January 1984 – “Where’s the Beef?” That’s what I’m talking about. Whoop’s – maybe that’s a bad analogy since this site is devoted to health - not to fast foods.

But you get the point. People want to see the substance. They don’t just want opinions – they want the evidence. If you’re too young to remember this ad - no problem.

Click Here for "Where's the Beef?" (opens in new window)

Evidence – What to Put in Your Body

If evidence is important in general, it’s absolutely critical when you decide what to put in your body, or what to do with your body.

Vitamins Just Create Expensive Urine

As a sceptic I thought that taking vitamin and mineral supplements was silly and based on folktales. I agreed with 99% - well let’s be cautious and say the vast majority- of western trained doctors. If pushed 5-10 years ago they would say that yes indeed “vitamins just create expensive urine” and “you can get everything you need from your food – save your money”. But my wife said I needed to take nutritional supplements.

You Don’t Always Have to Agree With Your Wife

But it usually helps. However the social scientist in me said - hey if I can show her the evidence that “vitamins just create expensive urine”:

I won’t have to take them

We can save money

I engaged in a lot of research in medical journals and books. To my surprise research proved me, and the vast majority of western trained doctors, wrong. I found there was overwhelming evidence about:

• The need for nutritional supplements

• Their efficacy – a big word meaning they work – in preventing many conditions and degenerative diseases

• Their efficacy in helping to wrestle with certain diseases and conditions

• The need to take the right amount and ratio of different vitamins and mineral supplements

• The need for quality control and high standards in their manufacture.

And that’s what this site is about – evidence about health.

So grab a cup of coffee – no it’s not necessarily bad for you – or your favourite tea, sit ye down and read on.

There are lots of pages and lots of timely, researched, reliable, evidence-based information. You’ll want to come back again and again. So why not bookmark this page right now.

If after a while you appreciate and trust this information feel free to send the URL to your friends and family. Spread the word. Spread the health.

A Note On Humour

What humour you ask? You haven’t noticed any?

Well it is admittedly subtle and dry – understated – no loud guffaws here! Some people, including my wife, tell me it is so dry that it disintegrates into dust and blows away before it hits the page. Ah well, one thwarted career.

I’ve been through a few.

As a kid in elementary school I wanted to be a singer. But by Grade 3 my teachers had concluded that my voice made me more valuable as a stagehand so I was relegated to “Curtain Puller”. Now that’s an important task but hardly the basis of a career as a musical performer.

What about actor? Well at the age of 8 or 9 I did get the lead role as Puck in Down Among the Fairies – an operetta in one act –still available -Google it. Well it was the lead role – yippy! And with my monotone singing voice I was allowed to speak my lines and to mouth the words in the chorus.

So that’s what I did when not otherwise occupied in carrying out stage directions like “somersault from stage left to stage right” in my little green tunic and brown tights (long underwear dyed brown). What a great role – the lead, onstage for the whole production – and I got to somersault everywhere.

This looked like a promising career. We were so good in our three night run that we even got to go on a road trip – to a small rural church – but hey it was a road trip.

Unfortunately the small rural church hall had no indoor “facilities” and diarrhoea, or stage fright, attacked me on this big night – my first road trip. And with all those somersaults – well thank goodness my mother had dyed those tights brown… And so, in embarrassment, ended another promising potential career.

Ultimately I was left with sceptical social scientist. Wow what a choice! While it might help answering “Where’s the Beef” it was not really a career conducive to developing a humorous side. It taught me to be serious about evidence. And I will be, because health is a serious topic.

But I’ll also try to inject some humour here and there – because it is such a serious topic. Maybe some of the humour will even reach the page, and you’ll smile now and then – and prove my wife wrong after all.

Check out 10 Ways to Protect Your Major Asset

Continue to List of Vitamins

Continue to List of Minerals

Go from About Me to Home Page of Secrets about Vitamins

P.S. I love sunsets at sea. Here's one taken during a rare calm day at Triangle Island in the open Pacific Ocean about 50 miles off the coast of BritishColumbia, Canada.Triangle Island I was there helping a friend with a charter of her boat to a BBC film crew taking footage of the large Stellar Sea Lion rookery during the calving season and the subsequent mating rituals. For more on this fascinating place go to my travel Blog.

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