{"id":559,"date":"2014-12-18T06:59:03","date_gmt":"2014-12-18T14:59:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jocularious.com\/?p=559"},"modified":"2014-12-18T06:59:03","modified_gmt":"2014-12-18T14:59:03","slug":"telomere-timebomb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/?p=559","title":{"rendered":"My Ticking Telomere Timebomb"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"DNA<\/a><\/p>\n

By Jack Edwards<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dr. Oz says that my telomeres are fraying, and he\u2019s very worried about them. This \u201cfraying\u201d is apparently caused by stress. Sadly, now that he has alerted me to my telomere fraying problem, I have discovered a whole new level of stress.<\/p>\n

Let me explain. Every Monday I read a column in my local paper supposedly written by Drs. Mehmet Oz and Michael Roizen. I say \u201csupposedly,\u201d because with Dr. Oz spending all that time in the make-up room at his television show, creatively named \u201cThe Dr. Oz Show\u201d and with Dr. Roizen busy doing real medical work as the chief medical officer at the Cleveland Clinic Wellness Institute, I figure that the column is really written by one of Dr. Roizen\u2019s third year residents, that or one of Dr. Oz\u2019s assistant make-up artists. It takes a lot of time to knock out a weekly column. I should know, and mine doesn\u2019t even involve any research; let me emphasize this \u2013 NO research whatsoever. In fact, all my comments here are based on a single casual reading of this week\u2019s column in which I may have missed the entire point due a mishap of spilling a glop of cereal onto what may have been the most crucial paragraph in the column. On top of that, I was still very sleepy.<\/p>\n

Let me further explain. My usual Monday routine involves reading the morning paper, which as I have said includes Drs. Oz and Roizens’ column, and then committing myself to following their advice for the remainder of my natural life. I hold fast to this new, deeply held commitment until lunch. Then I remind myself that I\u2019ve lived okay so far with my habit of, for example, basing my diet on animal fat and empty junk food calories, and ask myself why I should be listening to medical advice from Dr. Oz\u2019s assistant make-up artist anyway.<\/p>\n

Back to telomeres. Besides being a popular children\u2019s television show, telomeres are the \u201ccaps\u201d on the ends of our DNA. The longer your DNA caps the better. They help you ward off ailments, including heart disease, diabetes and, as I understand it, the danger of becoming a zombie or even a vampire. (I just made up that last part for your amusement \u2013 the part of about becoming a vampire. It really does help from becoming a zombie.) These telomere caps \u201cfray\u201d and get shorter as you age, but, BIG PROBLEM ALERT HERE, stress can accelerate the fraying! Naturally, I figure I\u2019m already down to the nubs.<\/p>\n

For those of you unfamiliar with Drs. Oz and Roizens\u2019 column, they sneakily divide it into two parts. In the first part, they scare the hell out of you telling you that you\u2019re doing everything all wrong (like not eating enough kumquats) and that it\u2019s unlikely you\u2019ll survive the day, and then the second part, which always begins with the word \u201cfortunately.\u201d This column did not disappoint.<\/p>\n

\u201cFortunately\u2026\u201d the column continues, and goes on to list ways to reduce stress. The list includes mediation, deep breathing, time with friends, music and what they refer to as \u201cjust chill.\u201d (Notably absent was the suggestion that people stop reading their column.)
\nThey explain how to do \u201cdeep breathing,\u201d and I have to confess that I was a little disappointed by the description. You\u2019re supposed to breathe in through your nose counting to four, and then out through your mouth slowly counting to eight. Here\u2019s how they describe the big payoff: \u201cYou\u2019ll instantly increase the oxygen level in your blood by up to 3 percent. Not bad!\u201d They actually say, \u201cNot bad!\u201d Three percent? Honestly? It sounds really bad. Terrible, in fact.<\/p>\n

So, after considering my options, I\u2019m going to focus my telomere saving efforts on music and \u201cjust chill.\u201d In fact, I\u2019m going to make them a permanent part of my lifestyle. At least until lunch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jack Edwards Dr. Oz says that my telomeres are fraying, and he\u2019s very worried about them. This \u201cfraying\u201d is apparently caused by stress. Sadly, now that he has alerted me to my telomere fraying problem, I have discovered a whole new level of stress. Let me explain. Every Monday I read a column in […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[414,408,410,411,409,412,18,532,33,34,413,406,407],"class_list":["post-559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-humor","tag-deep-breathing","tag-dna","tag-dr-mehmet-oz","tag-dr-michael-roizen","tag-dr-oz","tag-dr-roizen","tag-funny","tag-humor","tag-laugh","tag-medicine","tag-stress","tag-telomere","tag-telomeres"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=559"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":573,"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559\/revisions\/573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jocularious.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}