About: Alan Carpenter

Recent Posts by Alan Carpenter

Eat More Legumes

Eat More Legumes
What are legumes? Legumes include plant species in the Fabaceae (pea) family. A pulse is the edible seed from a legume plant. Pulses include beans (kidney, black, pinto), lentils (of various colors), and peas (chick peas, green peas). What the big deal about legumes? Legumes may lack sex appeal, but they more than make up…
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Live Better on the Camino Podiensis

Live Better on the Camino Podiensis
Around 2012, my wife Betsy and I saw a film, The Way, starring Martin Sheen, about the Camino de Santiago in Spain. We were intrigued about walking for nearly 500 miles through northern Spain in the company of other hikers (pilgrims). Later, we saw two other films about the Camino. We put it on our…
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A Companion Dog Can Enrich Your Life

A Companion Dog Can Enrich Your Life
Dogs as social catalysts In the latter part of the 20th Century, research suggested that dog ownership predicted better health and well-being. In particular, companion dogs seemed to function as social catalysts. In 2000, two British researchers conducted two experiments to clarify whether the social interactions depended on the attributes of the dog or the…
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Psychological Stress and Sleep

Evidence begins to accumulate You might think it obvious that psychological stress would affect your ability to get a good night’s sleep. But it wasn’t that long ago (2004) when researchers at the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit first showed that individuals who had stronger perceptions that psychological stress impaired sleep took longer to fall…
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