Causes of fatness

I had already read articles showing that, while diet and exercise are most important (in that order), other things also have an effect on weight gain. They include lack of sleep (the next most important), temperature (apparently shivering burns calories), stress and medication/chemicals. But last year's New Scientist that I just borrowed from the library (December 2011, No2844/2845 Australia) had a couple I hadn't heard before.  

One is pollution. Rats had 50% more abdominal fat after 10 weeks of being subjected to polluted air than rats on the same diet living in clean air. It can also "make your cells less sensitive to insulin, increasing your risk of type 2 diabetes." (p64) The link for diabetes has also been shown in humans. Nasty.

More startling is that the common cold virus, or at least one incarnation of it, has a strong link to obesity. Adenovirus-36 (Ad-36) increases both the number of fat cells and their size, and the effect lasts for years. One study claims "children with Ad-36 antibodies weighed an average of 23 kilograms more than children without them." (p63) And another 10 microbes have a fat-increasing effect. One researcher hoped that this means we can do something about obesity.

Maybe I don't have big bones. Maybe I have the fat virus.

Reversing the cycle

My ducted gas heating broke two days ago. I say broke; I got home from grocery shopping to find the house stinking of burned something or other. Plastic? Not sure. Anyway, sniffed around every room, the smell was everywhere. Didn't seem to come from the dishwasher (which sometimes smells nasty if a wood or plastic implement falls onto the heating element and burns) or the dryer - in fact the laundry (which does not have a heating vent) was the only room that didn't smell. I turned off the heat and aired out the house. It is nearly winter here in Canberra, and the temperature dropped to 14 degrees C pretty quickly. Just to make sure, I turned the ducted gas on again for a little while, the smell returned. So off it went again.

I work from home, and spent the afternoon huddled in blankets in front of my computer. At first I could only get a repair man out Wednesday week, 9 days of frozen toes!, but luckily they called back after they had a cancellation and can fit me in today - so only 48 hours. If they can fix it right away, of course.

So, we all had a pretty cold night, but then the next morning I was telling my friend Caroline about the broken ducted gas. 'But you have reverse cycle air conditioning as well don't you?'

'Um, yes, that cools us down in summer.'

Um, duh. Apparently, reverse cycle means it also heats. Mainly only warms the lounge, not the whole house, but at least it's not 14 degrees C in here any more.