Entries RSS Comments RSS

Archive for June, 2009

Better Sleep Leads to Healthy Life – Some Sleeping Tips That May Provide you Better Quality of Sleep

Friday, June 26th, 2009


Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise

Are you often tired during the day?

The US studies has shown that around 70% of the citizens do not get the proper rest they need. For this reason, people are suffering poor health, depression and so on. You can get 12 hours of sleep a night. But, if you are constantly awakened, then you are never going to reach the deepest levels of sleep. If you are having difficulties getting to sleep at night, there are a number of things you can do to help you get a good night’s sleep. There are also things you should avoid to enhance your chances of getting a great sleep.

Try to avoid:

Smoking

Studies have shown that those people who smoke a pack a day will have problems falling asleep and when they do it will not be as deep. It also affects the air passages, so you may wake during the night gasping for air.

Thinking, planning, and worrying

It will have your brain whirring. Try to relax your mind to stop thinking, planning and worrying. Try to keep work and money problems outside your bedroom. An argument with your partner or your best friend should be resolved before going to sleep.

Drinking coffee before sleep

It contains caffeine. It can take about six hours to leave your system. Even one cup of coffee in the morning can affect sleep quality hours later. Women tend to metabolize caffeine much slower than men.

Intake of carbohydrate rich, hot, spicy or fried foods before bed

This can upset the digestive system and cause acidity and heartburn, which may be interference in getting a sound sleep. Avoid late night heavy meals. However, a light snack at bedtime may be helpful.

Try the following tips to help you sleep:

Having a warm glass of milk before you go to bed seems to help a lot of people for achieving better sleep. Milk when it is warm releases tryptophan. On the other hand, warm milk also has substances that can keep you awake. Let your own body tell you what it likes about milk.

Have a warm bath to soothe your body.

Keep a regular sleep schedule

Make sure you turn the television and computer off an hour before you going to bed. This gives time to prepare you for sleep.

Relaxing before bedtime, which is the best way to get to sleep, tries a progressive muscle relaxation technique.

Exchange a back and/or foot massage with your partner before bed

Better Sleep Leads To Healthy Life. Things that you do for good health are essential and will directly improve your quality of sleep. Having a regular exercise, eating a healthy diet such as fruits, vegetables may help to improve your quality of sleep.

Create a peaceful sleeping environment. Embrace the darkness. Bright lights and loud noise stimulate your ‘fight or flight’ hormones. This means your body thinks it must be morning. A serene ambience with proper lighting and comfortably cool temperature makes the body ready for sleep. Make your bedroom as comfortable as possible. It is after all, the room for sleeping.

Exercising regularly can help you sleep. But make sure you complete your exercise a few hours before going to bed.

If you find it difficult to sleep at night, try adjusting the room temperature, especially if you feel uncomfortable. Lower the temperature of the bedroom before sleep. Cool temperatures make for better sleep.

Use OCA Water Pillow. It is designed to naturally position the head and neck on the basis of hydrostatic buoyancy to eliminate neck pain and headaches and to improve your sleeping posture for a better night’s sleep. Improve your quality of sleep by reducing neck pain, headaches, and morning pain intensity. The pillow adjusts to the firmness and support necessary for your head and neck by simply adding the desired amount of water. The correct firmness aligns your spine for the best sleeping posture regardless of your sleeping position, reducing undue stress, tension and pressure on your face, neck, muscles, ligaments, vessels, and nerves.

Sweet dreams!



Usph not Interested in Public Health Onboard Cruise Lines

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009


Insider’s story:

During my time onboard ships, I have gathered unique experience, trained by ships’ management on how to evade, deceive and trick USPH personnel, while conducting sanitation inspection onboard. Not very honest, legal or transparent task, but it helped paying my bills. I really had no choice if I wanted to keep my job.

The range of methods I had at my disposal to deceive USPH was huge. Most of those methods are so simple that it makes you wonder just how serious USPH authorities are in their task to scale ships’ sanitation practices on scale of 100. To be honest, those methods strike me as comical. Deep inside, I always knew that USPH never had any serious intentions to push for what every innocent passenger deserves – right for a sickness free cruise. There is just too much politics and too much money involved.

This might be a good time to reveal just few “secrets” to you, but know that they are secrets only to USPH, and to cruise industry – it is common knowledge. The reason why nobody speaks of them is always the same – sailors just want to keep their job and pay the bills. They all know that these cunning East European born practices have been around since the beginning of luxury cruising. Their belief in food safety practices improvement is at the bottom of their priority list, far behind issues like overworking and underpaying.

But let’s start.

80% of all galley equipment is being stored in Accommodation area, far away from seemingly not very interested eyes of USPH inspectors. With inspections being fairly predictable, roughly every 6 months, as the time comes close, galley personnel drags majority of everyday utensils to their cabins and in nearby corridors. What stays in galley pot-wash areas are huge items that occupy space on shelves and give impressions of fullness. How simple, and how ingenious.

It is interesting that inspectors never ask just where are the wide bacon trays on which galley cooks are baking sheets of bacon for breakfast? After the cooks are done with them, they pile them in one heavy metal block, that can be moved around only with the help of trolley. Take it from me, as I had the opportunity to clean them in the beginning of my sea career – you need at least 10 minutes to completely wash, rinse and sanitize just one of them. Now how about 200 of them? And what about all that grease flying all over the pot-wash while cleaning them?

Well, now you understand why is pot-wash always clear as crystal. Lets go further. We’re talking about pot-wash. According to USPH, every pot-wash location should have three cleaners. One for wash, one for rinse and one for sanitizing equipment. Taking in consideration the amount of pots and pans necessary for the cooking operation on a cruise ship with 4000-5000 passengers – it is only reasonable. That is the best way to avoid cross-contamination.

But did you know that in order to ensure that, every cruise ship should employ at least 5 more cleaners.

It will never in the wildest dream happen, unless serious pressure is made on Cruise Lines.

What I have observes throughout my career is that Cruise Line management in general, will rather fire a person with solution to the problem, than spent 50 dollars and solve the problem.

It makes you wonder, looking at the USPH inspectors, while checking chemical lockers in pot-wash areas, are they not interested in nearby work schedule that clearly places only one worker in location for the most of the time?

It goes so far that supervisors are moving cleaners from one pot-wash to another, following the route of inspectors, and suplementing missing cleaner(s) before USPH arrive, in all locations. After all – wearing hats and same uniforms, aren’t all those philipinos looking alike?

Again – how simple and how ingenious.

 



The Rising Trend of Green Living

Monday, June 22nd, 2009


Green living is an attempt to carry out our life in an environmentally friendly and responsible manner

and practices the conservation of resources,recycling, sustainability, green building, alternative energy and other environmental topics.It is also an attempt to minimize the size of our ecological footprints.

All across the globe, green living is now on the rise. In many cities across the world, recycling has taken off and in some cases it has become part of people’s lifestyle. It is also a necessity to many cultures that have limited resources and do not have the funds to buy new items constantly.

In recent years, many eco-friendly cleaning and pesticide products have been developed for use in the home. Instead of chemical-based aerosols, more natural ingredients are used in the cleaning agents and bug-killing aerosols. These are better for you and the environment.

Organic gardening is also gaining popularity. By eliminating the harsh chemicals that are released into the air and soil, they make all living things and the environment healthier.

Many green living enthusiasts have taken to walking and riding bicycles to help save the air from the toxic emission of vehicles. Carpool is also one other way to reduce the traffic. In this way, they help the air become more breathable again.

By using more biodegradable products that can be easily recycled we can help to keep the landfills from growing out of hand with all the trash that we throw out which would not break down or will just contaminate the environment.

Many have turned to cutting down on energy costs by using less energy in their homes. This is much better for the environment. Most energy saving tips is inexpensive and easy for anyone to follow.

Water usage is coming down over the last decade. As more people are aware of global warming, more people will try to save the water supply by using less water in their daily activities.

Some people are even choosing to repair the broken appliances instead of sending them off to the landfill. This not only helps the environment, but also saves people a lot of money in some cases. If it can be easily repaired, why not avoid throwing a perfectly good item away?

The bottom line is – more people are starting to care about the planet. By doing everything they can, the earth will continue to be a wonderful place to live for future generations that will inhabit it.