Does anyone know what that grabber device is? I like to use grabbers to pick up chestnuts, but the ones I have are pretty flimsy. This thing looks like a beast in comparison.

Fructose in particular causes liver damage at a much higher rate than other carbohydrates including glucose. It’s not as simple as excess calories.

There are more non-obese diabetics than obese diabetics. Yes, there’s a strong correlation between weight and diabetes, but that has more to do with metabolic disorders causing both weight gain and insulin resistance.

If you’d like to watch a presentation on the topic, this one by Robert Lustig is pretty good. www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDJsxw0uMLM

Avoiding gluten, dairy, or sugar really requires getting proficient at preparing all your meals from scratch. It’s a good skillset to develop, but there’s major hurdles. What are the chances that every single day you’re going to have the time and energy to cook 2 meals from raw ingredients instead of grabbing a box/freezer meal or takeout? It’s not a pure question of whether someone has the willpower to say no to a craving, they have to have the discipline to plan and prepare meals before they are hungry.

Absolute adherence to dietary restrictions is very difficult even when addiction isn’t a major component.

When I did a couple events with habitat for humanity, I met a number of people highly involved in other local charities.

I think volunteering is a good way to meet people who regularly volunteer. That’s the crowd that is likely to know what all is going on in your area. Learning about organizations through volunteers will also give you a good idea for which groups are actually working with their community directly and which ones are more talk and less action.

So I would recommend finding a group to volunteer with to get started, and you can switch to causes that more closely align with your interests once you start making connections. Habitat for humanity, food banks, local environmental cleanup days are all easy to find just about everywhere.