Perspectives Monthly Lifestyle eNewsletter for March, 2019

March, 2019

3-D Printing 2.0

Stop the presses: photons are powering a breakthrough.
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Screen Out the Distractions

Better phone and tablet habits might just promote improved personal finances.

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Planks, Push-Ups, Progress

Bodyweight training can give you a workout without equipment.

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Recipe of the Month
Perfectly Roasted Sunday Chicken
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3-D Printing 2.0

Stop the presses: photons are powering a breakthrough.

Every year seems to bring new advances in 3-D printing capability. Now the technology has taken another major step: the usual method of printing objects, layer by layer, could soon give way to printing whole objects at once, using high-intensity light.  

The central problem with 3-D printing so far: speed, or more accurately, the lack thereof. If you want to print a large object, it can take hours, even days. Researchers at the University of California just created a 3-D printer that printed out a small replica of The Thinker, the great sculpture by Rodin, in only two minutes – a development with startling implications for manufacturing industries. This printer works like a reverse CT scan: it creates a 3-D image from scanned 2-D images of a physical object, and then, light projects the 3-D image into a tube filled with an acrylate synthetic resin (resin is commonly used in 3-D printing). A chemical in the resin absorbs photons, and when the light reaches the target intensity, the resin solidifies. The UC researchers nicknamed their printer “The Replicator,” as it seems like something out of Star Trek. While it can print only small objects, the hope is that the speedier technology will soon be used to output larger ones.1,2

Screen Out the Distractions

Better phone and tablet habits might just promote improved personal finances.

It is so easy to spend an hour a day (or longer) on major social media websites. Is that behavior a net positive? (Pun intended.) What if we spent more screen time using applications that could help us plan to spend and save wisely rather than simply just spending time distracting ourselves?

There are some very convenient apps geared toward the management of personal finances. Taking a look at your household budget daily through one of these many (free) budgeting apps can show you the state of your cash flow, your rate of saving, and your spending, by expense category. Additionally, you can download the apps for your retirement, investment, and bank accounts, and look at them weekly (or at least every once and a while) to see the balances and activity. There are also coupon-finder apps that will do that work for you (based on your preferences and wants) as well as organizer apps to let you create precise shopping lists (so you can refrain from impulse purchases that are not really worth the cost). A few apps have even been designed to lock you out of your favorite apps, so that you can assign more time to other things in your life. Social media is often great and rewarding, but too much phone time and screen time can affect our lives, and possibly even, our finances.3

Planks, Push-Ups, Progress

Bodyweight training can give you a workout without equipment.

Imagine getting a great workout and quality strength training, without touching a machine. Bodyweight training offers such a path, for young and old. As the phrase implies, bodyweight training uses just your bodyweight for resistance.

As the Mayo Clinic notes, bodyweight exercise, done with the right form and technique, can prove just as effective as resistance training done at a gym with free weights or machines. If you get an aerobic workout in the fresh air and find a health club comparatively unappealing, some or all of your muscular training can come instead from bodyweight exercises at home or outside, such as squats, planks, push-ups, step-ups, lunges, and abdominal crunches. Old favorites can be changed up if they get stale, or if you want more of a challenge, a wall push-up or modified push-up can be supplanted with a classic push-up, for example. If you are afraid of shortchanging or over-exerting yourself through bodyweight workouts, talk to a trainer or instructor who can guide you. Remember that it is good to give each muscle group you work a day off, for recovery time.4 

Recipe of the Month

Perfectly Roasted Sunday Chicken

Ingredients:

2 bunches of fresh herbs, such as basil, flat-leaf parsley, marjoram
1 lemon
4 fresh bay leaves or 3 dried bay leaves

1 2- to 4-lb. whole chicken (preferably, free range)
Olive oil

1 stick butter
2 sprigs of fresh rosemary

Directions:

Step 1
Place a roasting tray in the oven, then preheat the oven to 425°F. Chop the herbs, cut the lemon in half, and tear or crumble the bay leaves. Rub the cavity inside the chicken with sea salt. To season the chicken breast, carefully grab the skin at the top of the chicken breasts and gently separate from the meat of the breast. Rub in salt, add pieces of butter, and push in most of the chopped herbs.

Step 2
Insert the lemon halves inside the chicken along with the bay leaf and rosemary sprigs, then return the skin of the chicken breast over the flesh, tuck the wings under, and firmly tie up the legs.

Step 3
Rub oil and butter over the chicken skin, sprinkle on the remaining chopped herbs, and season with salt and pepper, to taste. Put a few small slashes in each thigh to allow the heat to penetrate directly.

Step 4
Take the heated tray from the oven and drizzle with enough oil to coat the pan. Put the chicken into the tray (breast-side down and leaning to one side), then place in the oven and brown skin. Roast for 5 minutes, then lean it to the other side. As an alternative, you can place chicken breasts into a large frying pan or Dutch oven, add oil, and brown before transferring them to the oven. If only browning in the oven, cook for an additional 5 minutes, then place the chicken on its bottom and cook for approximately one more hour until skin is crispy and golden brown and juices run clear.

Recipe adapted from www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/chicken-recipes/my-perfect-roast-chicken