yin yang, save your bacon!

And now the section of the blog name that pertains to "that's what HE said."

Greetings!
In case you didn't catch my opening line there, this is Derek (the husband) speaking. Man, when was the last time I posted here? Yeah, I don't know either. Long story short, it has probably been a long time.

If I could sum up the last couple months of my life in one word, it would be the word "balance." Truthfully, "balance" really only entered my life like 4 days ago, but these four days has permission from myself to speak for the entire two months (or since I last posted). I don't really remember unimportant things past like 4 days anyways, you know, "out of sight, out of mind" type stuff.

Balance entered my life in the form of a board, a balance board. Here is a picture:

I think it is pretty straight forward how it works. Anyways, I have been kind of obsessed with them for a while, after reading many articles about all the physical and mental benefits and all. Here's one.

Basically what it comes down to is that balance is everything to us as humans with motor skills. Anything physical we do relies on our internal balance. Balance boards' primary objective is to improve your internal balance system. Along the way, it improves your coordination, reaction time, and strengthens your core, as well as your lower body joints (primarily ankles and knees) that tend to get injured easily. If you run or walk often, think about how a slight imbalance in your walk or run could have negative long term effects on your joints.

The physical aspect is just that half of it. Balance boards improve the connections between your left and right brain hemispheres while using the board. This is because your entire body is involved in trying to stay balanced on that thing. This improves our short term memory, ability to focus, and attention span.

In fact, some people use balance boards to improve the attention span of autistic children by reading to kids while using the board, or teaching them words. Balance boards have also been known to help kids (and adults) improve their penmanship.

In addition to all the benefits, balance boards are way fun! Look up on youtube balance board tricks and you will find tons of cool stuff. Here is a crazy cool one.

I just realized that this whole blog post makes it sound like I am being paid to write this. Truth is, I don't think I am. But maybe this blog post will be so influential that balance board companies around the world will just start giving me money.

Speaking of promoting things that I am not paid to... One of my best amigos just released an app for iProducts called Save Your Bacon. It's actually quite addicting and challenging. You are a little pig running away from a big scary butcher. There are many obstacles along the way. I wonder if vegetarians would be inherently better at this game...? Anyways, I encourage everyone to buy it and play it. Trey (the developer, and my dear friend) has offered $20 to anyone who can beat the last level while getting a perfect score of 5 bushels of corn (you'll understand once you play it). Now that I have announced that to the world... This is not a guarantee that Trey will actually pay anyone for anything. But you never know.