As I go through the book of medicine, I've been thinking more and more about my health. I am not terribly unhealthy nor am I very overweight, however my diet is definitely not terrific. I thought I would get some sort of baseline assessment of what my dietary goals should be as it relates to my weight. I weigh about 173 pounds and I'm 6 foot one. I've recently put on about 10 pounds and I'd like to get down to an ideal weight of about 160, a very tone 160. I'm not trying to be a bodybuilder, but I don't desire any excess fat either. I do work in front of a computer for many hours at a time and that lends itself to putting on a little weight around my belly. I do go jogging about four times a week for a couple miles. I went over to MyFitnessPal.com so I could establish a dietary profile. It only took about 60 seconds to complete this profile and get a very baseline assessment of what I might need to do. I wouldn't have to make too many adjustments, but I would need to decrease my calories just a bit. This site all so offers a calorie counter, which I would need as I'm not very good at documenting these types of things on paper nor even understanding what it is I'm documenting. My wife is a lifetime member of Weight Watchers, but that just doesn't work for me. The next step of courses to keep a diet journal or a food diary depending on how you want to look at it. That would definitely not be a problem for me as I journal just about everything that I do. I haven't been terribly concerned about calories since I was in the military. Back then we had to worry about ensuring that we consume enough calories each day when we were in the field.That was about consuming lots of calories as opposed to today where I'm looking to consume the right amount of calories for a more sedentary lifestyle, and if I can eat healthier along the way, then even better.

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

• Arteries and the Purpose of the Spleen
  
  

  Intercostal Arteries.–the intercostal arteries and veins are beautifully illustrated in the chart.  The veins return the blood to the heart.  The large ascending and descending venae cavae are seen in this illustration.

  Meaning of artery.–from the fact that death arteries are empty, the ancients believed in to contain air, whence their name, derived from aer, air, and terco, I keep, which literally means, air ducts.

  The Spleen.– the spleen is a spongy organ, of a living color, oval in figure and situated in the left upper part of the abdomen and immediately behind the stomach.  It’s weight very from four to 10 ounces.  It is largely composed of cells, but it’s function is little understood, though from its position is believed to be in some way useful to the stomach during the process of digestion.

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  We are moving rapidfire through the section and were just about ready to come up on the next section of charts, chart 3.  Shortly after chart 3 we will then hit two of the book of medicine and we will move into anatomy and physiology.

  So sit back, if you’ve got any questions stop by our reception desks and ask her receptionist in the meantime enjoy our translation of the book of medicine.

  As to the known purpose of the spleen today (according to Ask Yahoo! the definitive answer on everything and nothing at all)

  • filtering out foreign organisms that infect your blood
  • removing your old or damaged platelets and red blood cells
  • storing extra blood and releasing it as needed
  • forming some types of white blood cells
• The Olfactory Nerve & The Tongue
  
  

  This week I have uploaded a number of the pictures I’ve been promising for a couple weeks scanned. I will provide an administrative update about that soon after I do it, and I will go back and update hyperlinks in past articles directing to those images readers that find the articles and some date after they’ve been published. For anyone following along in the feed of this website the ordering of articles may get a little jumbled for a day or two as I perform those updates. I apologize for that in advance.  Here is the link for the often reference set of pictures from Chart 1.

  With this article I’m going to move into the next two sections that cover the olfactory nerve and the tongue.

  The Olfactory Nerve – the olfactory nerve is graphically displayed, branches of which are seen passing in all directions over the mucous membrane of the nose. A little to the left of the olfactory nerve is seeing the posterior nares, and immediately below the pharynx and epiglottis, the aesophagus or gullit, the larynx and trachea or wind-pipe.

  The Tongue – the tongue, or organ of taste and instrument of speech, is most accurately represented, the muscular fibers of which are seen running in different but determinant ways, is giving to this important organ variety and regularity of motion and 18 it to assume numerous shapes and forms. The cervical portion of the spinal column is seeing, with the fleshy part of the back of the neck attached. This plate is one that commends itself to our deep in careful study.

  There is not too much that leaps out from this particular section as the text is basically describing a picture. I didn’t spell a suspect is in the way that the book spells the word with an ‘a’ proceeding the ‘e’ of esophagus. There is something about old writing which I have not learned yet that sometimes puts an ‘a’ before and ‘e’. I’ve seen this in words such as, Aegypt v. Egypt and many others. One of these days I will look up the history of the word possibly it’s a Latin derivative of some type or another, I’m not certain today.

• Applying the Test for Lead
  
  

  Applying the Test for Lead. — the sulfide of ammonium may be purchased at a small cost, save for $.25 an ounce, of most dealers and chemicals; and, as its odor is extremely disagreeable, it should be carefully corked until the moment it is used. The experiment should be made upon half a pint of the suspected water; and, if the contamination is supposed to be caused by lead pipes, it is a good plan to test a portion of the liquid which has stood overnight in the conduits. The mode of discriminating the precipitate caused by iron from those due to the dangerous metals, lead and copper, is to let fall a few drop of hydrochloric acid, called also muriatic acid, into the fluid. If the brownish or yellowish brown tent disappears, we may know that innocent iron is the only metallic impurities; whilst if, on the contrary, no change is effected by the addition of the acid, one of the poisonous metals, better copper, is present. No water, however, in which the slightest change is produced by adding the sulfide of ammonium, should be swallowed by man or beast until a rigid investigation by a competent water analyst has proved it to be harmless.

  I somehow doubt that sulfide of ammonium costs that amount today.  Its probably either much more expensive or sold in ridiculous bulks at every grocery store, pharmacy and gas station next to the Phentermine in one of those combination aisles that sells just a little bit of everything, but never the thing you really need.