What Your Pee Says About Ye

You are not going to pee your pants. But the nearest toilet is at home, 6 minutes away. In order to make it,you enter a zen-like daydream that would make the Dali Lama himself applaud the majestic, mindful indifference to the bulging in your bladder.

Serene images of meadow larks sipping water from the edge of a murky pond on a late July afternoon occupy your thoughts, whilst you tiptoe among them in an effort to leave them undisturbed.

Serenity comes to a crashing halt when, In this daydream your beloved 3 year old retriever Spanky, urinates boiling hot urine on the rear driver side tire of your 1996 Toyota Camry.

No matter what you do, your thoughts circulate back towards the inevitable:

You've got to pee.

It's one of life's most fascinating challenges -resisting the urge to let go. And lose your hard earned self respect and esteem by giving into the most carnal urge; the last outpost of dignity before crossing into the realm of unabashed shame: drenching yourself in piss.

Frantically reaching home, you pull your car to the front doorstep of your spacious ranch home. Fumbling for the door key, your enemy at this point is time - and any movement that causes you to lose tension in the very muscles holding back a lifetime of future shame.

Once inside you run for your porcelain savior. Mid-way through a 3 minute long evacuation- you notice that your urine is as clear as water.

With my help, we'll decipher the secrets of what your pee says about ye (you). We'll decipher the riddles and mysteries of urine. Specifically when it comes to a marker of your current hydration status - which is the topic of this post (believe it or not).

Clear urine indicates a euhyrated state. In other words - you are in water balance, and the excess urine must be expelled. Unlike a reservoir, the body has no other holding area besides the bladder. What must come out, must come out. Inevitably.

Why you should cancel your Gym membership

If you pay $50 - $60 a month and attend fewer than 4 times a month ( 45 - 50 times a year) - you are better off paying a daily drop in fee. Most drop in fees are $10 - $15. You will save money and avoid long-term contracts; allowing you to "pay as you go". Not to mention avoiding expensive "initiation fees" / " enrollment fees" (which are usually non-refundable) and a gyms way of guaranteeing income for the time one of their membership reps took to sign you up - even if you want to cancel 2 weeks in.

Protein and its calorie burning potential

The body doesn't have a storage area for protein. Unlike excess fat and carbohydrates, which are stored in adipose tissue or liver / muscle glycogen - when you eat large amounts of protein, the body has to expend large amounts of energy to burn it up. In fancy language we call this the thermogenic effect of food, or TEF.

This tends to have a filling effect. You feel full, because your body is busy digesting and breaking down all that protein. The full feeling is your bodies way of saying" let me do my thing. I can't handle anything more right now".

My Beef with the New York Times

The times needs to quote people who know their shit. And this person they quoted sounds like they don't know diddly poo in some regards.

From a recent New York Times article:


“If you work out at an easy intensity, you will burn a higher percentage of fat calories” than if you work out a higher intensity, Carey says, so you should draw down some of the padding you’ve accumulated on the hips or elsewhere — if you don’t replace all of the calories afterward. To help those hoping to reduce their body fat, he published formulas in The Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research last month that detailed the heart rates at which a person could maximize fat burning. “Heart rates of between 105 and 134” beats per minute, Carey said, represent the fat-burning zone. “It’s probably best to work out near the top of that zone,” he says, “so that you burn more calories over all” than at the extremely leisurely lower end."

Let's get something straight - yes, working out at lower intensities, you oxidize (burn) more fatty acids (fat) for fuel. But again - there is no such thing as a "fat burning zone". You are always burning fat. No matter what intensity you're training at. It's just that the contribution of fatty acids changes depending on the intensity. In a simplistic view, the higher the intensity of exercise, the less you rely on fat for fuel. But even that can get dicey - because the more trained you are, the more fat contributes (is oxidized) to fuel exercise!

The quote ends with "It's probably best to work out near the top of that zone", "So that you burn more calories over all". This is a half correct statement. Not because you're burning more fat - but because WORKING HARDER BURNS MORE CALORIES!!!

Energy use during exercise is a continuum. It's not a light switch. Fat on, fat off. Carbs on, Carbs off. It just isn't that simplistic. But the media likes to make it black and white. And since so many are looking for simple, black or white, all or none solutions - this helps perpetuate the cycle. And helps articles like this get written: Articles with some good information, but still missing on really key concepts.

In fairness, the author of the piece does mention that higher exercise intensity relies more on carbohydrate stores (they didn't say glycogen, but that's okay) to fuel high intensity exercise (>85% VO2 Max).

But blah - still got my attention for misleading info.