Snow is on the ground. The temps are dropping. Winter has set in true and full in Minnesota, my home state, where the natives try not to let the dreary days of December get them down. One solution: Winter running! Indeed, endorphins are a very good thing this time of year, as is a bit of (fleeting) sunlight during the day in these dim northerly latitudes.
All this is to say that I have been running a lot lately. This includes in temps down to about 10 degrees F so far this year, and at distances that range from four to 10 miles through the ice and snow at a stretch. A litany of products go into play to make wintertime running comfortable and safe. Of that gear, handwear is among the most important.
This winter, I have been testing gloves from a few companies, one of which is Manzella Productions Inc. of Buffalo, N.Y. Now, Buffalo is a place that sees even more snow than Minnesota, so I assume its product designers get some good honest testing in at this time of year. The Hatchback Convertible Running Glove is a testament to some well-thought design.
Near Lincoln, Montana. Photo Courtesy photogramma1on Flickr
A "very secluded" 1.4-acre parcel of land near Lincoln, Montana, that was once owned by Unabomber Ted Kaczynski is on the market, according to the AP. And for just $69,500, you can own this piece of "infamous U.S. history."
John Pistelak Realty of Lincoln has listed the property, which sits on forested land and does not have electricity or running water. The property does not include Kaczynski's cabin, however, (it's on display at the Newseum in Washington, D.C.) and had previously been listed at $154,500.
Kaczynski was captured at the cabin in April 1996 after a nationwide bombing spree between 1978 and 1995. He pleaded guilty in 1998, and is housed in a maximum security prison in Colorado.
Despite -22°F temperatures, a steady band of adventurers has opened the season on Vinson Massif, Antarctica's highest peak and one of the Seven Summits.
Team Latitude, a Norwegian team, was the first to summit this season, according to Explorersweb. Exweb reported that six more teams have completed or are on the way to summiting the mountain.
At 16,067 ft., Vinson is not an extremely technical climb but makes up for it in isolation and exposure to the elements.
A new study finds that people who imagine eating multiple pieces of candy (or multiple bites of any food) eat less of the real thing when given the chance, Science Magazine reports.
Researchers, according to the article, "found that repeated exposure to a particular food—as in taking bite after bite of it—decreases the desire to consume more," thus confirming the widely-held belief that if you worked at Cold Stone for a month, you'd no longer crave sweet cream ice cream. But this study is talking about imagined repeated exposure to a particular food, not actual munching.
In one experiment, 51 undergraduate students imagined performing 33 repetitive motions. The first group imagined eating 30 M&Ms and inserting three quarters into a laundry machine. The second group imagined eating three M&Ms and inserting 30 quarters. Then both groups were allowed to eat however many M&Ms they wanted from a big bowl full of the little chocolate morsels. The first group ate three on average while the other group ate five. (And, presumably, never wanted to wash their clothes again.)
So the next time you crave chocolate cake, imagine yourself eating a Cheesecake Factory-sized slice, bite by bite. That way, when you're faced with a beautiful piece of Black Out cake, you won't eat the whole thing. That's the idea anyway.
