Here I am, about to take a final in operations.  If anyone knows when to use the M/M/s model vs. M/D/1, please let me know in the comments!

However, for those of you who are operationally challenged like myself, here are some articles you might find interesting (about fitness, not operations):

From my local San Jose Mercury News, here’s an interesting article about saving money by growing your own vegetables.  A bit lacking on specifics but still enough here for a few good ideas.  I’m a big fan of this myself and believe that growing a bit of food in your backyard is one of the best things you can do for your health.
@San Jose Mercury News

And while we’re on the topic of saving money and eating healthy, here’s an article from About.com that talks about 5 low calorie budget meals.  The vegetarian chili is my favorite.
@About.com

From the Seattle Post Intelligencer (read it quick because I think they’re one of the papers going out of business) comes an article about different ways to give yourself a break.  While this doesn’t quite fall under the category of exercise, I do believe many of these are great ways to lower stress and that’s a wonderful thing for your body and your soul.
@Seattle PI

And if we’re on the topic of destressing, here’s an article from the Life Spotlight on why getting a hobby is good for your health.  And if you’re thinking about a hobby, you may want to try blogging.  It’s fun to run something like 60 in 3, or even a personal blog.  My little personal blog is right here by the way, if anyone is interested in reading my book reviews, short stories and occasional crazy rant
@Life Spotlight

Spent most of this weekend in Carmel, hence the lateness of this post.  However, it was well worth it.  Taking a day or two to relax every once in a while is an important part of a healthy life.

And with that, here’s are some useful articles!

The Simple Dollar, one of my favorite personal finance blogs, has a post about splurges and habits.  This is very similar to my post last week about sinful indulgence only from a money perspective.  The theme is the same though.  Enjoyment of something is much better when it’s a rare treat rather than an every day habit.
@The Simple Dollar

From Almost Fit we have this comprehensive list of 44 ways to lose weight.  Many of these will be familiar to long time readers of 60 in 3 but the list is still worth while.
@Almost Fit

From one of my favorite personal development blogs, Zen Habits, here are five simple exercise programs for beginners.  I think I may have linked to this one before, but hey, it’s worth a second read
@Zen Habits

And finally, from the New York Times, a post very appropriate to these times about eating well on a downsized budget.  Some very good tips here, especially for those of you who associate healthy eating with expensive supermarkets.
@New York Times

It’s a busy week here in the Gal household.  I have my dad visiting from Israel as well as lots and lots of work.  So let’s get right to business and look at some interesting articles from this week:

From Zen Habits, here are 17 strategies for sticking to a diet.  The first three are 95% of the secret to the success of any diet, but the other 14 are good too.
@Zen Habits

On a similar note, here’s a post from Back In Skinny Jeans with seven ways to keep going even when you feel like giving up.  Good advice here which applies to more than just health.  I know that I’ve had multiple occasions in my life when I’ve thought “why bother?  Just give up!”  Behaviors like these really helped me through.
@Back In Skinny Jeans

From Miz Fit, here’s a video post about avoiding workout plateaus.  Very timely considering that my topic for this Monday will be performance improvements and are they needed?
@Miz Fit

From Mark’s Daily Apple, we have this article about intermittent fasting.  Lots of good information here and very interesting for me since I just went through my own experiment with intermittent fasting.
@Mark’s Daily Apple

And from The Simple Dollar (one of my favorite personal finance blogs) here’s an article about combining health and wealth with nine tactics for making healthy and cheap meals.  Words to live by
@The Simple Dollar

I’m not a big fan of CNN, or of network television news in general, but they occasionally have good fitness related articles.  So this week is all CNN.

First, we have this article about eating healthy on a budget.   The person being interviewed spent a month eating on a foodstamp budget of about $176 a month and still managed to find some healthy choices.  If he can do it on that budget, you can do it on yours!
@CNN

And moving from the healthy to the sexy, we have foods that put you in the mood.  I’m not quite sure that any foods have a significant aphrodisiac impact but I’m willing to experiment with these foods.  Besides, I can tell you with 100% certainty that being healthy and fit does wonders for your sex life.
@CNN

And let’s finish this up with another CNN article, this time dealing with foods that are good and bad for your various cholesterol levels.  Good advice here for those of you interested in maintaining a healthy heart, which should be all of you.
@CNN

Today is the last day of my intermittent fasting experiment.  I have to say that it was a learning experience and I’ll give everyone the full rundown tomorrow on my results.  In the meantime though, I’m trying to think up of my new month long experiment for March.  Right now, I’m thinking of trying a new workout regimen, but we’ll see.

For now, here are some articles I thought you might find interesting:

Stephanie at Back In Skinny Jeans wrote this piece about her 5 minute TV exercise breaks.  I like this idea.  A quick 5 minute break with a few good exercises is a great way to keep active, even while doing sedantary activities like work or TV.
@Back In Skinny Jeans

If more TV stations had articles like this one, I might actually watch TV news again.  In this particular case, the station is ABC 13 from Houston I believe and the article is 11 ways in which people botch their workout.  Excellent primer for what NOT to do when exercising.
@KTRK

And yet another good article from a source I usually dislike, this time from CNN, it’s a great piece about a month of living perfectly.  That is, the author tried to spend one month living the perfect healthy lifestyle.  We may quibble about the specifics, but the experiment was interesting and I might actually do something like this for my own monthly experiment.
@CNN

And let’s finish this off on a lighter note.  From Go Healthy Go Fit we have this article about unnecessary fitness gadgets.  Really, all you need is a good pair of running shoes.
@Go Healthy Go Fit

This isn’t quite fitness related, but it is related to personal improvement so…  My lesson for the day, confidence is everything!  I’m not going to tell you how I learned that but it was in a good way

And now, on to some articles!

Since I’m experimenting with fasting this month, I thought this article detailing some of the research around fasting would be useful.  It’s from the Ledger and provides useful summaries of much of the new research now available which shows the benefits of occasional fasting.
@The LA Times

We had some discussion of superfoods earlier this week and one of the ones I mentioned was eggs.  Eggs have gotten a bad reputation for too long.  Here’s new research which shows why the egg can be safely considered a superfood.
@The Guardian

From the New York Times, an interesting article that shows the benefits of stretching for surgeons.  Hey, if it helps them save lives maybe it can also help you become a bit more limber.
@NY Times

And from the newly launched Fitness Spotlight, a really great article that shows an easy program for losing weight and becoming fit.  If you’re a beginner, this one is a must read.
@Fitness Spotlight

I had the pleasure of trying out a boxing workout the other day.  It was exhausting and also a lot of fun.  Will tell you all about it this week.  However, for today, here are some articles I thought you might find useful:

From Back In Skinny Jeans, here’s Steph’s list of 25 things she did to lose 25 lbs.  I love Steph’s posts, they’re very personal and always full of good advice.
@Back In Skinny Jeans

From the Complete Woman, a list of tips for eating healthy on the go.  And no guys, this doesn’t apply just to women, plenty of good tips in here for us too.
@The Complete Woman

And from SF Gate, an interesting article about the health and fitness of our president.  You may not agree with his policies but his workout routine is a good example to us all.
@SF Gate

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Almost forgot, thank you to Mind Mart for including a 60 in 3 article in their latest carnival of healing.