Gym Ninja has to drive past a KFC on route home every night. Invariably, the traffic lights are always on red when she reaches the bend where KFC is located, which is why she is picking on this particular fast food joint today. But of course, it is applicable to ALL fast food joints .
Every evening, as she turns the corner, there, lit up in the KFC strip lighting, is a load of teenagers, or families out for dinner. Yep. At KFC.
'Well, it's chicken, how bad can it be?', Gym Ninja hears you ask. Ok, so maybe not you at the front. You've been a regular reader of the blog so Gym Ninja knows you wouldn't DREAM of eating that stuff. GN is referring to the others.
Oh, you have noooooooo idea! See, assuming that what is on their menu even has similar DNA to chicken (oh and did you know that humans share 35% of their DNA with daffodils? Fact!), it's what is pumped into it, coating it and how it has been cooked that can take an inherently healthy basic protein into a food-shaped time bomb.
OK, so quite possibly GN has her dramatic head on today. Deal with it. It may be a tad dramatic, but it's not far off. Actually, Gym Ninja is in a story telling mood, and shall regale you with a nice little 'metaphor' to help you get your head around why eating processed fast food is a recipe for disaster. (Oooh, 'recipe for disaster'. All the puns are coming out today eh?).
*get your Maxi-Milk chocolate protein drink, warmed in a mug, and sit down and get comfy as the story is about to begin*
You've come into some money. Woohooo! About f*cking time! The kind of money that means you're in an enviable position to build your own house from the ground up. You spend ages with the architect designing the house of your dreams. The ideal place to live. Impressive Bay Windows, a sweeping driveway, acres of landscaped gardens (well, who doesn't like a trimmed bush when given the alternative?), basically no expense spared. This needs to be the most impressive home for miles around. A real head-turner that will withstand all weathers and will look as good decades from now. You hire a team of builders..oooh, let us call them 'Knights Fairy Castles' (did you see what Gym Ninja did with the initials there? KFC). You then bugger off on holiday, as you can afford to, whilst they build the home of your dreams...
You return from your trip and are faced with an impressive sight as you drive down the approach road to your gated home. Wow. Knock out! The house certainly looks spectacular from here. Exciting!
You pull up at the gates, and pootle up the impressive sweeping driveway. You park up and get out of the car. What do you see?
Hmm, now you're closer, you notice that the brilliantly gleaming white walls of the house that you saw down the road are maybe NOT as fantastic close up. There are dry flaking patches of paint. Pfft! Typical! Dodgy patch of paint no doubt. Ooh, and it's peeling in places too. You are distracted by your ankle twisting as you stumble. Goddamit! That driveway has loose cobbles. You get your pen out and start to make notes so you can ask the builders KFC to follow up and sort these things out. You walk to the front door. The Bay Trees have seen better days. They are all dried out. They look half dead in fact. Maybe they haven't had enough water? You get the key and open the door to a loud creaking sound....
You go inside. Inside the house it is really really dull. There doesn't seem to be any natural light radiating through the house. Then you realise that the windows are grimy. Eww. You go from room to room, and find something wrong in each. The kitchen, the heart of any home, is a right mess. Rubbish strewn everywhere, and the boiler is making some odd noises. Sounds like one of the pipes may be partially blocked? You notice what looks like evidence of dry rot. How can that be? This house is newly built! That's it!
Annoyed you pick up the phone and ring KFC the builders and start raging at them. There's NO WAY this house will stand the test of time! It's really tatty and shabby close up. Badly finished. No light streaming through it. Blocked pipes and odd rumbling noises. Creaky doors and dry rot. Peeling flaky patches of paint all over the place. You'd be very surprised if it didn't need a very expensive overhaul in a few years time, with continual repair bills. If it continued to be like that then it's only a matter of time before it would be condemned!
So what went wrong? The house is new. It looked ok from a distance and yet it's blatantly not. Well, here's the thing. The builders, KFC, they used cheap materials to build the house you see. Cheapo bricks that are from reclaimed demolished buildings were used to build the walls, the paint was old and wasn't mixed properly hence the dry patches, and the boiler wasn't new and is all furred up inside. Everything else was imported in a cheap bulk-buy deal so from a distance it appears to be the real deal, yet up close either looks cheap or just isn't up to the job, snapping/breaking very quickly.
Your home is only as good as the materials you build it with. Makes sense eh? So why, WHY would your body be any different? It's constantly rebuilding and repairing itself as it's in use 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year with NO downtime. It uses the food you eat and the fluids you drink to fuel it and to rebuild itself from. if you go shoving fatty chemical-ladened junk down your trap, then what do you think your body is going to look and feel like pretty soon? Yep. You got it! You're asking it to build a new you out of junk. Junk that isn't strong enough to cope with the demands of everyday life. So what will happen? It'll start to get dry patches and peel in places. Things will start creaking and pipes will get furred up with deposits. It's gonna start looking old and tatty before it's time, and things will start to go wrong. You'll have to patch up the damage, until one day, the damage will be SO huge well............yep. Bye bye you!
Home is where the heart is. That's how the saying goes... It's the only place your heart can inhabit. When it breaks down, where does your heart live then? 6 feet under. ..
Cor blimey! Jackanory never had such bad endings did it? But your story doesn't have to have a bad ending. Get with it people. Take care of your true home. The one you live in right this second. Start today. Don't build it with cheap food that is nutritionally barren. Build it out of the good stuff. Fresh fruit and vegetables, Lean proteins and meats. Health fats and dairy. Did it breathe? Did it have a face? Did it grow out of the ground? Good! If it didn't, then is it a healthy derivative of these sources? Cut out all those microwaveable meals. Cut right down on the fast food. Stop shovelling carbs down your throat like they are about to be stolen from you. YOU deserve much more. There are enough things out there that CAN kill us, so don't give those killers a helping hand.
Are your eyes all big now? Worried? Made you think? Good good. Start to make a few changes. Don't go crazy now. A few manageable changes at a time. Cut out that half a mile long's worth of calorific Subway meal that disguises itself as healthy because it has wilted lettuce in it! Stop squirting gallons of ketchup on your meal (it's FULL of sugar!). Don't fall into the trap of thinking things like Lucozade are healthy drinks. They aren't! It's liquid sugar. Think just as much about what you DRINK as what you eat. It all adds up. Make a few changes, and 'feeeeeel' the change in you. See the change in you. Then add a few more. Before you know it, you're rebuilt as nature intended. FABULOUS darhhhling!
