Your Ape Index Affects Climbing and Swimming

Over a bottle of beer, a friend casually mentioned to me, “I have a 2 inch Ape Index.”

“Oh really?” I replied, suspecting a foul innuendo.

“Yeah, dude!”

“That’s, uh… Good for you?”

He then brought out measuring tape and found that I have a 6 inch Ape Index. But what does this mean?

Ape Index

Michael Phelps has an Ape Index of 3 inches. Sonny Liston, a famous boxer, has an Ape Index of 29 centimeters. They both owe their prowess in their respective sports to their Index. But what is an Ape Index, anyway?

Those arms... Those long, long arms!

Well, there’s two ways to look at it:

Ape Index 1, the most widely accepted version, views the Ape Index as a ratio between height (toe to head) and arm span (fingertip to fingertip.) If your arm span is longer than you are tall, you have an Ape Index greater than 1. If you’re a perfect square, your Ape Index is 1. If your arms are short (like a T-Rex) you have an Ape Index of less than 1.

The Vitruvian Man is a perfect square - the "ideal man."

Ape Index 2, the far easier version (especially when drunkenly measuring yourself,) is to subtract your height from your arm span in inches or centimeters.

If you don’t like math, measure yourself (or have a friend measure you for a more accurate reading,) and then plug the numbers into this online Ape Index calculator.

What Does This Mean?

Having longer arms does not mean you're more monkey than your shorter-armed friends. Instead, having longer arms affords you with unique advantages: While rock climbing, a climber with a longer arm span can reach higher, often making difficult courses easier by skipping intermediary steps. Similarly with swimming, a swimmer with longer arms can displace more water per stroke, therefore moving further than those with shorter arms. The Ape Index also helps fighters determine their reach – a crucial measurement for deciding appropriate matchups.

With my freak-ish arms and gigantic feet, I could be an amazing swimmer… in theory. Every human body is different, building muscle and moving energy in slightly different ways. Even though my arm ratio is more beneficial than Michael Phelps’, I might have a harder time than he does in building the appropriate muscle. That's based mostly on genetics. And while I might be able to reach the canned green beans on the top shelf at the supermarket, I’m hardly interested in climbing mountains or getting into a boxing ring.

Natural characteristics are not indicative of natural talent or capability… But it does make for something interesting to measure after a few beers!

Classical Music Lowers Blood Pressure and Relieves Stress

Sorry for my week-long hiatus. My school work was piling up. Now that I’m past midterms, I’m back to blogging. And you know what I could use? Some stress relief. This week, I’m dedicating my blogs to methods for relieving stress.

All Aboard the Coltrane

John Coltrane makes my soul float. That is the simplest way I can put it. Whenever I’m stressed, I throw on some of his smooth saxophone jazz. As I drink in his mellow tones my shoulders sag, my eyes close and I take a deep breath. Coltrane is a musical magician. Don’t believe me? Have this playing while you read on – it makes everything better.

Nice, isn’t it? Anyway, I wondered if jazz actually has a physiological (fancy term for “bodily”) effect on lowering stress. Unfortunately, what few studies I found show that jazz is as effective as silence for treating stress. Fortunately, I found a type of music that supposedly does work.

Stress and Blood Pressure

Have you ever heard the saying, “Settle down before you pop a blood vessel?” Blood pressure has a noted correlation with stress. BAM! Someone just stuck a gun in your face! What’s happening!? Your heart is racing! The stress of having your life threatened has released adrenaline, making your heart beat faster and your blood vessels constrict.

Okay, now focus on the jazz. There is no gun. Relax. It’s okay. Sorry to do that to you.

Imagine you're here. See? Isn't that nice?

As you relax, your heartbeat slows and everything goes back to normal. This is what we call acute or situational stress. But people who work long hours at stressful jobs subject themselves to chronic stress. Rather than worrying about that hypothetical gun (it’s not there, I promise, keep listening to Coltrane,) people in an office worry for weeks at a time about deadlines and mounting assignments. This chronic stress leads to heart disease.

The Power of Classics

I’ve read three different studies about the power of classical music. The first one, conducted at the Institute of Behavioural Sciences in Budapest, Hungary, concludes that students listening to classical music before bed sleep better than those who listen to audiobooks or nothing at all. Although the study didn’t include anyone over the age of 28, you might want to give this a shot – just listen to 45 minutes of relaxing classical music before you fall asleep.

Another study, this time from the University of California, compared several different types of music on their effect on blood pressure. The subjects had to do three minutes of intensive math (yeah, that would stress me out too) and then either listened to classical, jazz, pop or nothing. Jazz and pop music had nearly the same effect on lowering blood pressure as sitting in silence, suggesting there was no effect. But classical music lowered blood pressure on average 80% faster than silence!

Deal with it Yoga - Silence is for chumps! More Mozart, please!

And finally, a study on patients undergoing ophthalmic (eye) surgery found that playing classical music helped to keep patients calmer, lowering heart rate, blood pressure, and respiratory rate, and aiding not only surgery, but recovery. I don’t expect any of my readers to go out and get their eyes cut open any time soon, but if classical music can help keep people calm during that, it has to be pretty good!

Shameless Plug

Take some time out of your day to enjoy some classics. Personally, I prefer Coltrane for my stress. But if you’re looking for some classical music, try looking for Debussy or Mozart on YouTube. And if you’re in the Metro Detroit area, tune into 90.9 FM for classical music during the day and jazz music at night. Nothing makes a drive home from work better than Miles Davis and Dizzy Gillespie.

Apple Seeds Contain Cyanide, But Are Not Poisonous

Apples are kind of a big deal. They symbolize knowledge and sin. They also symbolize health and discord. Personally, I see an apple and wonder two things, “Is it apple-picking season already?” and “Can I put a stick through that and cover it in caramel?”

Hey, this might be a health blog, but I’m still human.

So with happy things to think about like cider, Johnny Appleseed, and tasty treats, why all the negative associations with apples? Well, maybe it’s because…

Apple Seeds Carry a Cyanide Compound

Cyanide, made famous by murder mysteries and spy novels, is a nasty little chemical that keeps oxygen out of blood. A fatal dose of cyanide with turn someone grey and knock them unconscious. From there, the person will slip into a coma and eventually die. The medical definition for this condition is called "hypoxia."

And apples, despite their vitamins and nutrients, carry a compound within every seed called “amygdalin.” This compound breaks down into sugar and hydrogen cyanide – the same deadly chemical used in WWII gas chambers.

Oh the humanity! They're organizing! Save the children!

So apples have the capacity to kill you. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Apple Seeds Can’t Really Hurt You

Just kidding. Don’t be afraid - the dosage of this chemical in a single apple seed is miniscule. What’s more, the chemical can only be accessed if the seed is crushed or destroyed. Seeds have grown to survive the digestive tracts of animals as a way of travelling to find a better place to grow.

Even if you bought a bushel of apples, cored them, crushed the seeds into fine powder and put that into a drink, you still wouldn’t come close to a fatal dose. You would only waste a lot of apples and a lot of time.

 

Now if you used peaches, you’d be getting somewhere… But you didn’t hear that from me.

An apple a day

Keeps the doctor away

I propose we add a second verse to this rhyme:

But eating the core?

Have a coffin in store

I don’t think my addition will catch on in the schoolyard… Ah well.

Mustard: Pain Relief for Arthritis and Burns

Mustard. It’s such an unassuming condiment. It serves Ketchup’s sidekick – a yellow Robin to the tomato-y Batman. And yet, we all know someone who enjoys mustard as though it were crafted by the culinary gods. I had a buddy named Jimmy who drank it from the bottle on a dare. (A dare, I should mention, that he posed on himself.) There’s a regular at the restaurant I work at who uses mustard on his steak.

Personally, I can’t stand it. But, for some reason, this stuff is popular… And did you know mustard can be used as first aid?

A Bit of Mustard for Your Burns

The next time you get a minor burn, dab a little yellow mustard on it. Yep, you don’t even need fancy mustard for today’s trick – just classic yellow. The wound will sting a bit at first, but after a couple seconds you should feel better. Mustard doesn’t speed healing, unfortunately.

Oh, and in case it wasn’t obvious, don’t put mustard on an open wound. Lightly singed skin? Great. Open sore? Not great. Getting some greasy salt into already damaged tissue would be the opposite of pain relief.

"It's not the condiment we want... It's the one we need... The Yellow Knight."

 Mustard Seeds for Arthritis

The true player in the mustard is the seed. Many holistic healers suggest mustard seed pills to treat pains throughout the body, from arthritis to migraines. Or, you can make a plaster out of mustard seed to treat pain in a specific joint (instructions in the link.) The chemicals in mustard seed create heat when they touch the skin, immediately soothing away aches. However, the heat they create at first is pretty intense, so take measures not to burn yourself in the process. Arthritis is bad enough - don’t add chemical burn to your list of problems.

Not a mustard cast. Mustard doesn't work as well as plaster for broken bones.

 Do You Love Mustard?

If you love this curious condiment (more power to you,) check out this link and post your own story!

Soy Acts Like Estrogen and Could Cause Breast Cancer

     When someone mentions “tofu,” the most common association we have is with the word “healthy.” (The second most common association, I’d argue, is “tasteless blob,” and that’s coming from a guy who loves the stuff!) Nevertheless, soy has rivaled meat as a primary protein source because it is cholesterol free and cheaper to produce. But does soy have a dark side as well?

Soy Acts Like Estrogen

     Perusing the internet, I happened across an article on Men’s Health that stated a high-soy diet could wreak havoc on the human body. Men, in particular, become “feminized” from eating too much soy – they lose body hair, become flaccid, and sometimes develop breasts! This is due, states the article, to the chemical “genistein” in soy, which is a phytoestrogen – it acts like human estrogen in our bodies.

Soy can make signs like this very confusing.

     “Whoa!” I thought, “This is serious business! I love tofu and I drink soy milk every morning with my cereal… I’m going to turn into a woman! Ahhh!”

     But then I snooped a little further.

Correction: Soy Acts Like Estrogen… In Rats

     Recent 2009 health studies on Japanese women (who eat much more soy than American women) show no increased rates of breast cancer – another fear associated with phytoestrogen. In fact, genistein is a much weaker type of estrogen than what our body naturally secretes. Think of it like comparing a bottle of O’Douls to a glass of wine – they’re both alcohol, but one is far more potent. In that same year, another study suggested that a soy diet can decrease cholesterol values and even prevent breast cancer! Other studies go further to say it could also prevent prostate cancer in men.

     So why are people freaking out?

     A study conducted on rats, not humans, showed that soy-heavy diets lead to an increased rate of cancer. Taken further, the phytoestrogen changed the rats’ body chemistry to a startling degree. This is important, because we use rats for many cancer studies and we often feed those rats soy-based food. If all these rats are developing cancer from what they eat, then the data from treatment tests could be skewed! Many scientists argue that the effect seen in rats could correlate to humans, because, as mammals, our bodies behave in similar ways. But no link has been scientifically proven, yet.

Eh. He kind of looks like my Uncle Jim, but not by much.

     And as for men developing breasts? That was a single case study as reported by Men's Health. Scientists are leery of case studies because they aren't always indicative of a larger trend. For instance: your neighbor wins the lottery; Are you now more likely to win the lottery? The odds say no, but you'd really, really like to think so! This is the problem with listening to the odd story of the man who started developing female sexual characteristics - you might think it could happen to you when the science indicates otherwise...Like I did.


     Not one of my prouder moments...