July 18, 2023 - Ball, Pals, Fast, Dust
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Nuggets of Information: Ball the News That’s Fit to Print
The New York Times announced this week that they are getting rid of their sports desk, and will instead pull content from The Athletic, presumably to focus all their resources on Wordle. Luckily the sports desk at Boo’s N.E.W.S. is here to cover all the action from the fields of play!
The MLB All-Star Game & related activities were a delight to watch. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. won the Home Run Derby, beating Randy Arozarena. Vlad’s dad Vlad Senior won the Derby back in 2007, and they became the first father-son duo to win the Derby. This year’s Home Run Derby featured the highest total amount of home runs in the history of the competition, at 341. The next night the National League won the All-Star Game for the first time since 2012. Go Braves!
The NBA draft occurred, and if you aren’t someone who cares about basketball, you may still want to make the effort to remember the name Victor Wembanyama. They only toss around the designation “generational talent” every 3 or 4 years, so you may want to pay attention to this 7-foot 5-inch Frenchman. The WNBA held their All-Star game this weekend, with Team Stewart, led by Seattle’s Jewell Loyd, defeated Team Wilson 143-126. Loyd, you’ll recall, was drafted 1st in the WNBA draft in 2015, and has been described as a generational talent.
If tennis is more your thing, this year’s Wimbledon was very exciting. In the ladies' final, Czech Marketa Vondrousova beat Tunisia’s Ons Jabeur in straight sets. I really hope this doesn’t embolden those of you who claim that Selima Sfar is the best Tunisian tennis player. Just stop. She was great, but we all know Jabeur is the best. What? Who just said Chiraz Bechri? You have had way too much Boukha! In the men’s final, Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz, 20 years old, beat 36-year-old Novak Djokovic, who has won Wimbledon 7 times before, in five sets. Great match. Many say Alcarez is a generational talent. His defeat of generational talent Djokovic was fun to watch. Not only were Prince William and Princess Kate (and their royalings) there, but Spain’s King Felipe VI also was on hand to cheer on Alcarez. If King Felipe came in still bitter about the Battle of Cadiz, he came away with a sense of redemption.
As men’s golf prepares for The Open in Royal Liverpool Scotland this weekend, Rory McIlroy won the tune up at the Genesis Scottish Open. Ladies golf continues to evaluate Rose Zhang’s status as a generational talent. She won in her LPGA debut at the Mizuho Americas Open, but then missed the cut at the DANA Open.
If that wasn’t enough for you, we also have the Women’s World Cup kicking off on July 20th where the United States is favored to win an unprecedented third consecutive title. Go USA!
Enrichment: Carolina Cottontop
I spent last week in Florida hanging out with my dad. We had a great time. We ate well – takeout from our favorite Italian, BBQ and fresh fish restaurants in addition to cooking we did at home. We watched the MLB All-Star game, Wimbledon and the final season of Ted Lasso, and got lots of work done around the house. The best part for me was just spending time with my dad. Jim Booher has always been my hero, the guy who, through his example, taught me what it meant to be a man/husband/dad.
My dad was born in North Carolina, and as a boy, when polio was sweeping the country, the only activity he could do during his generation’s pandemic shutdown was to go outside and hit hickory nuts with a stick. When he moved to Florida, his group of friends invited him to play baseball, where his hickory-nut eye-hand coordination paired with his blond hair earned him the nickname “Carolina Cottontop.”
While in high school, he met my mom Mary, then went off to college where he held the men’s high-jump record, then married my mom, raised three kids, and became a successful OB/GYN in South Florida. He imparted his love of music to me and my sisters, was active in the church, loved traveling the globe with Mary, and in recent years has taken to feeding the neighborhood birds in our back yard every morning. It is quite a sight to see – ducks, geese, moorhens, cardinals, jays, pigeons – dozens and dozens of birds all coming together to feed at the feet of the Bird Man.
When I was a boy, my dad and I participated in “Indian Guides” - similar to Boy Scouts but with an emphasis on Native American cultures in the Florida area. We were in the Mighty Miccosukee tribe. When I was turning 11, and aging out of Indian Guides, my dad gave me a medal that showed our Miccosukee nicknames (I was “Little Breeze”, and my dad was … wait for it … “Passing Wind”). It also had “Pals Forever” stamped on it. It now hangs along with a framed picture of my dad and me in our house in Florida.
Being home, where I grew up, causes me to be nostalgic and sentimental, but more so since my mom passed away two years ago. It is the same place I remember from my youth, but also it is a different place. It is my home, filled with memories, but emptier without my mom around. I know my dad misses her, as we all do. To live in the home they built, surrounded by reminders of their life together, is both sweet and sad to me.
When I got back to Atlanta, Lisa and a group of our friends were at dinner at a restaurant in our neighborhood, so I walked over from Marta and joined them. Usually when our friends get together, we ask about each other's kids, and take pride in what they are all up to. They all asked how my dad was, and I took pride in telling them about what he is all up to. He drives to Publix almost every day, recites poems he learned in college with ease and recently joined a health club. He pushes himself every day and has several big projects over the next couple months that will keep him very busy.
I feel so grateful for how close we are now – our friendship has really grown over the last two years. We speak every night, and it is truly a highlight of my day. So this week I dedicate this newsletter to a guy who has been a loyal Boo’s N.E.W.S. subscriber from the very first issue. I love you dad! Pals Forever!!
Workshop: Life in the Fast Lane
A key component of my transformation over the last 20 months has been fasting. Across all cultures and religions, fasting plays a role in helping gain mental clarity, removing dead and damaged parts of cells leading to cellular health, and (obviously) weight loss. I started with a common form of intermittent fasting – the 16-8 method. Basically, you have an 8-hour eating window, and a 16-hour fasting window. A big chunk of that fasting window happens when you sleep, so it is fairly easy to stick to the plan. From there, I gradually shrunk my eating window to the point where I ate one meal a day – a 2 hour eating window. I have also tried 7-day fasts twice, 3-day fasts, and Alternate Day fasts. Currently, as I approach my goals, I just don’t eat on Mondays and Thursdays. On the other days, I usually don’t have breakfast, so I end up with a 16-8 type pattern. (I also combine this with regular walking & resistance training, and a low-carb diet, so I’m getting a triple whammy.)
I learned a great deal about fasting from Dr. Jason Fung’s “Complete Guide to Fasting”, along with his YouTube videos. Dr. Fung, a Canadian nephrologist, has helped thousands of patients lose weight and reverse Type 2 diabetes through fasting. If you want to learn more about fasting, and possibly give it a try, check out the Fasting Hub at Focustransform.com and please feel free to reach out to me. I’d love to help you explore this.
Selected Content: All We Are Is Saharan Dust in the Wind
If the Canadian wildfire smoke don’t get you, then the Saharan dust storms will. This is the time of year where giant clouds of dust come across the Atlantic and settle throughout North America. This may not seem like a big deal, but these dust clouds have many fascinating impacts.
When dust settles in the Gulf of Mexico, it serves as a Nutrional turbo-boost to the algae blooms, leading to toxic red tides.
Dust that swings south into Brazil provides nutrients to the Amazonian rainforest. Without those nutrients, there wouldn’t be much of a forest at all.
The area off the west coast of Africa is a breeding ground for hurricanes that make their way across the Atlantic. If the timing works out, and a dust storm drifts into a forming hurricane, the dust shreds the middle of the hurricane, in effect wiping out all the energy from the hurricane, neutralizing it. That is so cool.
I learned all about this from an episode of “Connected” on Netflix. I strongly recommend that series, especially the episode on Dust. Fascinating stuff.