#ALSO remember doing a lot of research NOT using ALL IN nad then going back when 3/4 of the fic was written to watch it

[moonshynecybin]

Can't decide on a specific scene but i'll take anything you have to say about i'll meet judgement by the hounds bc at this point i have re-read it so many times ...

the thing about ill meet judgement by the hounds is that literally no concrete planning went into writing that thing. i was up against a deadline for a grad school assignment i was procrastinating like NOBODY'S BUSINESS had two panic attacks that week (unrelated to school!!) and then flew to bath with my roommate spur of the moment. posted that ch2 late at night zooted on my anxiety meds and and woke up to some LOVELY messages that i read on a bus when i was pulling away from the airport. insane experience. i didnt even want to give it a chapter two right away i was like IM BUSY. and then i wrote it immediately.

BUT to actually talk about the fic. like you asked <3. i actually had this idea that i wanted to follow marc's pov (at that point i had only written vale) and get inside his insane headspace leading up to his arm surgery and then be like. wouldnt it be crazy if vale was there and wanted to reconcile a bit but he was also kind of avoiding SAYING THAT. wouldnt that make marc feel EVEN CRAZIER. marc marquez saw trap simulator. inside you there are two wounds one is valentino rossi and the other is your fucked up arm. anddddd 2022 seemed like the ideal place for a rosquez reunion to me! like. dramaturgically. marc is on the brink. vale has just retired (easy to get a reason for him to have an epiphany regarding marc, made even easier bc marc pov means i never have to explain it in depth !)

and the thing about this fic is that it was supposed to be. A LOT longer. go race by race until his surgery and have them talk a lot more. change a little more gradually. but uh. ive already said my life was insane at that time and i got excited and fucking SENT that badboy. (again. i was lightly tranquilized.) which i think MOSTLY makes it better but the pacing is still little wacky. anyways i do think of the scene i cut where marc talks to alex all the time but i think i also fully deleted it! dont write fic under the influence! i also cut a BIG scene of them at the french GP where vale brings marc a sandwich and makes him eat it. it should also be noted that i was doing SO much journalism research about this period and i found a bunch of WILD quotes from marc that i compiled into a small insane vision board of them to ground my fic in his crazy way of conceptualizing his life. that i apparently also deleted while zen-ed out. so

more stupid behind the scenes under the cut

actual plot summary (my "outline") that i wrote out at the top of my google doc complete with typo:

Thinking about how absolutely distressing it would be for Marc pre surgery or right after if Vale tried to reconcile. Early 2022 before surgery decision and post Vale retirement

Scenes of Vale like. earnestl y talking to him. Marc represses a panic attack every time. race by race?

and here's what i had written for aragon, which is full of lines i just thought of with NO context or structure like this part would NOT take off the ground. you might notice some of them get repurposed later in the fic:

III. French GP, 2022. P6.

Marc’s still not out of the habit of reaching for him, apparently. He looks— God. Marc’s head hurts just looking at him. He could swear he has defenses from this, from how Marc can feel where he is in every room they’re in together. He guesses somewhere in the last few weeks he’s lost them, again. Just another thing he used to be good at.

despite everything, Marc can feel himself relax, with Vale here. The warm heat of him sharing space. He used to feel like this all the time. Vale to his left. His arm, casual and pain free, on his right. Now he's scarred all the way down both sides.

He remembers when he was a kid and he met Vale. How he had winked at Marc and said, I'll look out for you, cradling the toy car that Marc had brought specifically to give to him in his hands. How Marc had turned it over in his brain for years. I'll look out for you.

Marc bargains with himself

Marc does stupid, stupid things when Vale is in his life. He knows this. Going to the ranch is a bad idea. the press alone, if anyone finds out, would feed the paddock journos for years. It would be stupid— risky

Someone needs to tell him not to race. calm him down. Usually, it’s Álex. 

MORE OUTLINE: Vale brings him a sandwich and Marc wants to cry, terrible race. They watch a movie its very Valentino voice lemme take care of you !!! but no talking about their past lmao. maybe arm

Genuinely terrible race. That one stat about alwasy finishing top 5 or crashing. Vale like actually gets him to talk about his arm which gets no where fast (guest alex?) and riding misery begins to reach a tipping point

[izabellaramirez]

Full Name: Izabella Taylor Ramirez

Nicknames: Iz, Izzy, Ramirez 

Age: Thirty-Eight

Date Of Birth: November 17th, 1983

Gender Identification: Cis Female/ She & Her

Sexual Orientation: Heterosexual 

Relationship Status: Separated/It's Complicated

Residential Area: Kitsilano

Home Town: United States Of America (Wilmington, North Carolina)

Places Lived: New York City, New York (Brooklyn, Williamsburg) & Atlanta, Georgia 

Occupation: Content Creator of all things Beauty, Fashion, Wellness, Fitness & LifeStyle along with being a Freelance Photographer 

Positive Traits: Outgoing & Creative

Negative Traits: Emotional & Lonely

Length Of time In Vancouver: Two Years

tw: child death, tw: lukemia mention, tw: depression mention 

On November 17th back in 1983 the Ramirez family was completed. Amanda nad Joseph Ramirez had welcomed their third and final child into this World at 6:30 in the morning, with two older siblings named Joseph and Viviane impatiently waiting for their new sibling. Another beautiful baby girl was born and everyone wasn’t surprised one bit. They decided to name her Izabella Taylor Ramirez, and that was a name you were going to want to remember. The moment she opened up those beautiful brown eyes and starred up at her mother and father, they were hooked and in love and knew that she was going to be something special. They knew that somehow she was going to change the World a little bit and impact a lot of people.

Izabella’s childhood was pretty much perfect. She had two older siblings whom she loved, parents who were her best friends and a dog that she took care of. Living right smack on the the beach in Wilmington, North Carolina it helped that the girl was a fan of salty air and sea hair. She would spend hours when she wasn’t in school in the ocean, swimming until the sun went down. Her parents had taught her however that education was the most important thing, and even though Izabella was labeled as the Wallflower early on throughout her school years, she studied hard and always got straight A’s. She made a good group of friends and never really felt alone while growing up. Izabella was really overall a happy kid. Aside from surfing, her hobbies included volleyball as she was placed on the varsity volleyball team in high school, she was also a fan of reading and writing. Even if Izabella was considered as a wallflower, the girl was a big part of her school and wrote for her schools newspaper and was on the yearbook committee. It probably wasn’t the best clubs to be apart of, but Izzy didn’t care. In her Junior year of high school when you’re supposed to know what you want to do in life, Izzy figured out she really loved writing. Being editor in chief for her high school newspaper really helped with finding that passion. Getting along with her older siblings, it did help that they were supportive when she had told them she wanted to get into photography and create a blog. On her free days when she wasn’t so busy, that’s what the brunette was doing, she was blogging and becoming obsessed with the World within it.

She soon got into fashion, and watched her blog soar with the content she was posting. When Izabella graduated from high school with honor roll and other achievements, she decided to move out of her small town of Wilmington to New York City. She got accepted into FIT, and majored in Fashion Design, and minored in Film and Media. In college, Izzy pretty much kept to herself but again made a good group of friends and kept to her studies. She didn’t party much, but whenever she did people around Campus knew who she was due to her blog.

Never really getting used to the popularity, Izabella realized she was more than just a blogger. She was a content creator, and had decided during her Senior year of college that she wanted to take this job seriously. After researching more about the job she’s found a passion for, Izabella’s followers grew and grew and grew. She would have never expected it to grow this much. Though Izzy was proud of it. Her blog and YouTube channel was a huge success.

When graduating from FIT again with honor roll and those other achievements, Izabella realized she still loved photography. During the time she’d come home, she decided to take it up upon herself to find a job that included photography. It was the summer time throughout her teenage years, where worked at her local Aquarium. Taking up the job again, this time she became a photographer for them. However, after a few years of living back home, Izabella figured it was time to move again but this time she moved to some place she’s never been before to get a fresh start, Atlanta, Georgia. Georgia was somewhere she always saw herself settling down in.

It was a new city, with a new home and new people. She was twenty-five at the time, twenty-five and trying to figure out the rest of her life. Trying to figure out other little side gigs she could take on. Izabella was always a busy bee, she liked that about herself. She liked the hustle. Atlanta was good for that kind of mindset. Still going strong with her blog and youtube channel, it wasn’t until she met the love of her life and that’s when everything changed. At twenty-eight, being successful and loving Atlanta, she was set up on a blind date by her best friend who also happened to be her assistant. Izabella wasn’t looking for love. She never even dated. Sure, she’s dated while she was in high school and college here and there but nothing serious. Though meeting Nicholas Sanchez had changed her life. He was tall, dark and handsome, just her type and Izabella fell in love with him. She fell in love with him the moment she met him. The two dated for a few years, and at thirty-three they got married. It was late in the game but they didn’t care. At thirty-four, they started trying for a baby, but the two were having trouble. Finally after a couple of failed attempts at IVF, they welcomed their miracle baby at thirty-six and named her Violet Grace Sanchez. Things were perfect for them. Izabella, Nicholas and Violet were perfect, happy and healthy. That wasn’t until at nine months that things took a turn. At nine months old, that was when Violet was diagnosed with Leukemia and the doctors had told Nicholas and Izabella that she only had a little bit left to live.

It had devastated & destroyed them. The news about Violet, their miracle baby had devastated Nicholas and Izabella and the two were on thin ice with one another. They fought about it constantly. As time went on when Violet got sick, she just got worse and worse. The doctors tried everything, but unfortunately just right after her first birthday, Violet had sadly passed away. It destroyed Izabella. The loss of her baby girl had destroyed everything in her. It ruined her marriage to the love of her life, Nicholas and the two had decided to separate. They weren’t divorced. They separated. It was time that the two needed. Time apart to figure things out. They were both lost without their daughter. Their beautiful baby girl.

Izabella always loved to travel and always dreamed about starting over in another town, and that’s exactly what she did. Still being a content creator, and now a freelance photographer, it has been a couple of years since Violet’s passing and Izabella made the decision to move to a different Country. Living in Vancouver, Canada for two years now, she’s been working at another Aquarium and continues with her blog. She continued with her Youtube Channel and is active on instagram and twitter, she has gained a lot more followers and is still passionate about what she does.

[lorei-writes]

People I’d Like to Know Better

Aww, I got tagged by @datenoriko . Let’s do this!

Birthday: March 13 ( it’s somewhat awkward sometimes, because I never know what to answer whenever somebody asks me for my age if it’s before my birthday - the most accurate answer would be my actual age, but the more useful one would be to round it up. Either way, I’m almost 20).

Zodiac: Pisces! (And I can’t swim and have been terrified of water since forever).

Last song I listened to: Take This Lonely Heart - Nothing But Thieves

Hobbies:

Okay, stay with me there. Disclaimer: I do not do all of that stuff all at once. I do not know why it is that, but my hobbies have always followed fixated pattern: find something you like and do nothing else in your free time. I do not want to brag here, I’m just really passionate about those things! + I’m babbling way too much.

Math - I absolutely adore math, especially logarithms and trigonometry. There’s nothing more satisfying that finding a solution to a problem, even if it’s “using a cannon to kill a mosquito”, as my tutor says. That being said, I usually studied on my own (the majority of my classmates at high school just oftentimes needed more time than I did. I did have a private tutor - it is a really common thing in my country - but I usually had the general idea of the concept before the class and we’d just solve the tasks I didn’t know how to tackle). Because math is just like that! It makes sense! I feel safe doing math - if I can see enough examples, then I’ll probably be able to come up with a pattern and the solution. However, there’s a single problem with math ^^”” I had a very bad posture and could sit studying well... 6 hours at school + 3-5 at home (+private tutorial depending on the day)?^^””” It wasn’t all math, but it certainly did increase the amount of time I’ve spent like that... A couple of years of that and you know how I injured my spine ^^”” It was really bad, hehe, I could hardly write ^^” The first physician I’ve seen also didn’t diagnose it right, so I had to take a year off to somehow figure it out ^^””

Writing - I LOVE WRITING. I think I’ve started doing it when I was 11? Although it’s probably hardly noticeable, since I had never written stories in English before, haha. I usually write fantasy, because the word building aspect of it is just so enjoyable. Other than that... I am this unfortunate kind of writer that can’t lie ^^” I always have to research everything, otherwise it doesn’t feel right at all! I most probably always am overly optimistic in regards to economic stuff, but yeah, overall I tried to read up. Recently I’ve been EXTRA excited by how different English is when compared to Polish! I hope one day I’ll be able to convey the same raw emotion in both of them. And that I develop muscle memory, so that I don’t make so many typos!

O, and there’s some actual I-have-looked-it-up-stuff in my stories (spoilers): Had it happened in the future, part 2 - I know a person who has lost an eye in a very similar way, Dragon’s Treasure - technically, those are the symptoms of a poisonous hemlock... Poisoning. Gash, it sounds so stupid. Either way, it doesn’t grow in Japan (but it does in China, India, almost the entire Europe), so I put up the “it was exported” hypothesis. Either way, the funny thing in the story is that we still don’t have an antidote for it, so Torakikumaru was literally saved by the fact that he wasn’t hungry after stuffing himself with candy - yes, the konpeito he shared with Nobunaga. The boy just didn’t ingest enough of the plant for it to be lethal. Together? That’s how untreated hypothyroidism looks. I hope to write more stuff including some small details like that ^^” O, yeah, I was also really happy with how the Judgement day turned out! I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’ve referenced the Exodus there ^^” Well, more precisely, Exodus 34:14, per verse. Though I’d say that that what happened before is also kinda important - the golden calf and so on.

Yes, I’ve been on one shots rampage since I’ve started this blog. 

SEWING - I’m self taught seamstress! I make mostly backpack and cute bags, but I can sew some simple clothes just as well ^^ Recently I’ve been doing some easy fixes and mending, but I hope to make a flat lined skirt in near future. Now that I finally have my hand back, I want to WORK. I also do embroidery. 

Crocheting & Loom Knitting - I’m not the best at either of this, but it’s soo calming. I oftentimes crochet when watching something - I actually can do this and still read the subtitles, so I can watch anime!

Languages - it’s low-key embarrassing, but I can only speak Polish and English ^^” I know some very basic French and Japanese as well, but yeah, I hope to learn more about those. Preferably, I’d like to understand written and spoken Japanese without much trouble. Though I like to just listen how others speak about languages just in general - what are the grammar rules, etc. It’s so fascinating!

Biology - I kinda cheated on biology (well, and chemistry) with math, but I still do love it. I especially like reading about the engineering of human body - how it evolved, what are the flaws in the “design”, how it all works. And for some reason, I like the long words. Just the long words. And since I like to know what they mean, people at school assumed that I was smarter than I was - like, nope, dear, I just read about random stuff and get VERY excited when there’s just a single tiny tineey chance I can infodump somebody.

Drawing - I used to draw portraits before my spine injury ^^” I was kinda decent at it, but yeah, well... Spine. Couldn’t hold the pencil. I’ve lost most of my skill now, but I’m slowly coming back  to it. I love coloring things with alcohol markers. They blend just so beautiful. I also paint with acrylic paints aaand want to learn more about watercolors! 

History - Eh, kinda random, but I watch a lot of stuff about how the daily lives of people in the past were - how did they do the laundry, how was the soap made, how did women deal with their periods, how did the underwear look, etc. I’ve read an amazing book on women in Medieval times! 

CATS - everything cats. Literally. From cat related goods, to actual products for cats - litterboxes, cat litter, anything. I like researching cat behaviorism. That’s probably good tho, because I have three lovely little cat ladies ^^

Otome games - I write only for ikesen, but I’m playing ikevam too. I played ikerev, but gash, the game crushes all the time! :C Other than that, I’ve finished Masamune’s route in SLBP and it was enjoyable - it is only that the colour scheme of the interface makes my eyes burn. I do not mean to say that it is ugly or bad, it just hurts me - not in metaphorical sense, it really, literally tires me out and makes the experience unpleasant. I know it’s weird.

Last movie I watched: Oh. Em. The thing is, I do not know ^^” I plan to watch some Ghibli movies on Netflix, but haven’t got around to it just yet ^^” I don’t remember when was the last time I’ve watched a film other than that - I just can’t focus for long enough. Or I get too excited. Long story short - you don’t want to watch a movie with me. You really don’t.

Dream job: Teacher! I would want to teach math. I’ve seen far too many bright minds go dull because the parents couldn’t afford the private tutor and that is just sooo wrong. However, it means getting stuck in a dead end job and becoming the private tutor after the school - teachers are gravely underpaid in my country and frankly, I don’t know if I will be able to afford to become one. 

Meaning behind URL: None. I just like Masamune & keep here all my stuff and the stuff I like. It makes me happy ^^

Tags: @missjudge-me, @fairstival, @nad-zeta , @metroidgirl0234 ! Hope you guys don’t mind ^^” If you don’t like the tag game, feel free to ignore it.

[birdiethebibliophile]

{fic} That Old Sweet Feeling (part 21)

Fandom:  The Adventure Zone:  Commitment Rating:  M Chapter Warnings:  None Relationship:  Nadiya Jones/Mary Word Count:  2,033

Here on AO3. Read the rest: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15 Part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19 Part 20

Tagging @someone-called-f1nch, @voidfishkid, @mellowstarscape, and @jumpboy-rembrandt!

Endgame has started. This chapter and the next are a LOT of plot, and this one’s a long boi, so brace yourselves, gird your loins, all that. 

Chapter Summary:   Grace formulates plans. Remy connects the dots. Jonesy speculates.

__________________

Nadiya was stirred from sleep by a soft knock on the door. She made a noise of discomfort and shoved her face back into the pillow. Through her half-awake haze, she could hear a lot of muffled voices, then, suddenly, the door burst open and she heard a loud, “Rise and shine, Reed Richards!”

Nadiya jolted fully awake and upright, nearly colliding with Mary Sage. “Wh- what’s wrong?” she said, danger senses immediately pinging.

“Nothin’, I just wanted ya to wake up,” Mary Sage said, half-collapsing against Nadiya. “Grace said we can’t have breakfast until everyone’s up and you’re the last one.”

“Oh. Geddoff.” Nadiya pushed half-heartedly at Mary Sage, who straightened up with a pout. She considered going right back to sleep, but she was pretty awake now. Right. They were at Grace’s penthouse-apartment-whatever it was in San Francisco. “Breakfast?”

“Yeah, she and Abbey’re makin’ French toast and Remy’s helping,” Mary Sage explained, sitting down on Nadiya’s bed with a slight bounce. “French toast an’ bacon an’ orange juice an’ shit. I think she has grapefruit, too, Jonesy really likes it?”

Nadiya’s stomach rumbled. “I have to shower first,” she said firmly. “I feel gross. And then I’ll be out.”

“Nad…” Mary Sage whined. “Please, we’re dyin’ of hunger –”

“Shower!” Nadiya insisted.

“Bathroom’s down the hall by Remy’s room,” Mary Sage, flopping backwards on the bed, managing to avoid Nadiya’s legs. “You suck.”

Nadiya stuck her tongue out at Mary Sage, grabbed her bag, and headed down the hallway.

She really had meant to take a quick in-and-out shower, but the minute she stepped under the hot water, she groaned and closed her eyes. It felt like the grime and dust of the past week was washing away down the drain. She wondered if Mary Sage had showered – judging by the state of her hair (not completely and totally knotted and greasy like it had been the previous night), probably.

Now that she was thinking about Mary, she couldn’t stop. Mary Sage had seemed more… herself  just now than she had in days. She’d been grinning widely, her eyes alert and not glazed over, with the spark of mischief that Nadiya recognized from their car chase back before they got to the cabin.

Nadiya wondered uncomfortably how long she’d been paying that much attention to Mary Sage.

Hurriedly, she washed her hair and made sure she got a thorough rinse before shutting the shower off and wrapping her hair in a towel, throwing her pajamas back on since she didn’t have any clean clothes.

She hesitated at the hallway exit, but before she could do anything else, Grace turned around from where she was standing at the counter and smiled. “Nadiya! Good morning! It’s real good to see you.”

“Um, good to see you too, Grace,” Nadiya muttered, sitting down at the table – two tables shoved together, if she wanted to be accurate – with Kardala, Jonesy, and a woman in her early twenties wearing retro aviator glasses who Nadiya identified as Pridmore. Grace winked and turned back to the griddle, where she was flipping what looked to be about fifty pieces of French toast. She had been the head of Humanities, Nadiya recalled; Irene’s boss, a tall, solidly-built nonbinary woman in her early fifties with long, greying brown hair pulled back into a ponytail. Whereas most of the rest of them – including Jonesy – were still wearing pajamas, Grace was wearing beige slacks, closed-toe brown lace-up shoes, and a pink flowered long-sleeved button-up shirt under a beige suit jacket, unbuttoned, that matched her slacks. Nadiya couldn’t remember ever wearing anything that nice except for her grad school interviews.

Grace, she decided, was either going to annoy the shit out of her, or was a genuine badass. Or both. Could definitely be both.

“Okay, we got French toast, bacon, grapefruit, orange juice, coffee…” Grace said, clapping her hands together. “Everybody grab a plate and have at it. Creamer’s in the fridge if you want it.”

For the next few minutes, the kitchen (or what was generally being called a kitchen) was complete chaos as everyone scrambled to get themselves their breakfast, but eventually, it settled down, and Nadiya was sitting a bit disbelievingly with seven other people, at an actual table, with actual food.

“There’s plenty, I grabbed groceries from the place next door this morning,” Grace said, stirring sugar into her coffee, “so feel free to have seconds or thirds or however much you want.”

“Thanks, Grace,” Remy said around a mouthful of bacon and a huge grin.

“I’ll help with the dishes after,” Jonesy added, kissing Grace’s cheek as she sat down.

Huh, Nadiya thought, looking from Grace to Jonesy. I guess they’re together. For some reason, she glanced at Mary Sage, who was eating French toast like her life depended on it, and who also winked at Nadiya when their eyes met. Nadiya quickly turned back to her own breakfast.

“So, you wanted to hear about our trip?” Remy said once he’d finished his first cup of coffee and gotten a refill.

“If you wouldn’t mind,” Jonesy said. “And then we have some stuff to fill you four in on.”

Remy launched into his version of the events, Kardala and Mary Sage occasionally chiming in with corrections. Pridmore was signing a translation to Abbey. Nadiya mostly let them take care of it, focusing on eating as much French toast and drinking as much coffee as she possibly could. It felt like it did when she’d spent days straight in her lab and she’d finally made a breakthrough. She would go home, sleep like the dead for twelve hours, and order from her favorite Thai restaurant whenever she woke up. Spend the day catching up on the news she hadn’t been paying attention to, watch an episode or two of whatever she’d been watching on Netflix recently, and let whoever’d been texting her she was still alive.

“Wow,” Grace said, shaking her head. “Y’all have been through a lot, huh?”

“You could say that,” Nadiya said, finally setting her mug down. “So, do you know what the fuck is going on? Because we may have some background now, but as far as we know, we’re still being hunted down by either the feds or Martine or both.”

“Well, first of all, you don’t have to worry about that here,” Grace said calmly. “I don’t know if Jamie, Addison, and Flanagan told you, but Jonesy and I – mostly Jonesy – had been working on some tech for blocking the bonds, and this whole place, as well as the surrounding block or so, is basically under a catch-all invisibility cloak. Well,” she corrected herself, “the cloak blocks artificial bonds – the kind Martine’s manufacturing with the stimplants and her modified oxytocin. Regular bonds still work fine. I don’t even know if there is a way to block those. We gave Jamie and Addison and Flanagan some prototypes we made – doesn’t block all artificial bonds, but it should block Martine, the hub.”

“Like a server in a computer network,” Remy said.

Jonesy shot him double finger guns. “Exactly,” she said. “Each team had artificial bonds with the other people on their team and with Martine – which is the main problem.”

“See, I don’t think there’s any way Martine’s given up,” Grace said, the friendly smile dropping off her face, replaced with a serious, business-like look that matched her outfit. “She’s a master manipulator, and I’d be shocked if she didn’t have a plan M, much less a plan B.”

“Here.” Jonesy pushed her chair out, going over to the counter and fiddling with a projector, opening a laptop and connecting them. “I made a PowerPoint.”

Irene leaned forwards eagerly, but Nadiya groaned. “How is it possible that literally every one of you is nerdier than I am?” she complained.

“I’m not,” Mary Sage said.

Nadiya considered that. “You have most of the Bible memorized.”

“That’s not nerdy, it’s sensible,” Mary Sage said, poking her fork in Nadiya’s direction.

“Focus, people,” Grace said. The room fell silent again as Jonesy’s projection appeared on the wall. “So, it’s clear Martine’s not working on her own. She’s been seen in the Capitol, for heaven’s sake. My best guess is that she sold her tech – the stimplants, mostly – to the government in return for complete amnesty.”

“What.” Nadiya knocked over her empty glass in standing up. “That’s – that’s my tech, she –”

“I’m just telling you what I suspect, Nadiya,” Grace said calmly. “I can see you’re upset, but I’m going to be real honest with you. You not getting a patent for your work is the least of our problems right now. Please sit down.”

Nadiya dropped back into her chair, a burning sensation behind her eyes. She wanted to yell at Grace that she didn’t understand, didn’t get how academia worked, that was her entire PhD, all her research, she couldn’t just start over and pick something else. Martine had all but destroyed her career.

“The biggest problem,” Grace said quietly, “is that the government is almost certainly underestimating Martine. They’ve given her too much leeway; they don’t get the extent of her plans. I think – yes, Remy?”

Remy was raising his hand, and now lowered it awkwardly. “I might be able to help with some of this,” he explained. “I… my mom used to work with Martine. She left me a message, a bunch of info on their work. What she knew about Martine, what she thought Martine’s plans were. That was a while ago, though, I don’t know how helpful it’ll be.”

“Anything is helpful at this point,” Grace said firmly. “Could you go get that for us?”

Remy nodded, jumping up from the table and darting from the room, returning in less than a minute with his laptop, which he opened. “She said something about Martine building an – an army of supersoldiers,” he said, pulling up the documents.

Grace’s mouth thinned, but she nodded. “That would fit with what I suspect,” she said. “Jonesy?”

Jonesy nodded and clicked to a slide showing a photo of Martine talking with two people in suits. “The man on the right there is the Secretary of Defense,” she said grimly. “And the one on the left is Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.”

“According to my intel – and my reasoning – Martine’s persuaded the Department of Defense that her stimplant tech –”

“My stimplant tech,” Nadiya put in, still fuming.

Grace sighed. “Nadiya’s stimplant tech, then. She’s persuaded them that it can be used as a weapon. Every news network I can find is working overtime to fix the PR disaster that was Richard’s broadcast, painting Martine in the best possible light. That’s got to be at the behest of the Department of Defense – honestly, I don’t know how deep this goes, she was at the White House, she may even have the president on her side. However, there’s no way she’s told them about the modifications she’s made. Which means…”

“Holy shit,” Mary Sage whispered. “It means she could have a literal, entire army with those connections. With the bonds.”

“All connected to her,” Grace said with a nod. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s made a few more modifications since the disaster at the ‘Berg. To… make the recipients easier for her to control.”

Abbey, a middle-aged man with greying reddish hair, tapped on the table, then signed something, which Pridmore translated in her strong Scottish accent: “What was her original plan, then? Couldn’ta been this.”

“Again, this is partly speculation on our part,” Grace said, “but partly info we gathered when we were still working for the Fellowship. I don’t think she ever thought Richard’s plan would work. Hers wasn’t a backup, at least not to her; it was the only real plan. She was just using his as a way to execute hers. She wanted to recruit the best and brightest, bind them to her, and… well. Use them however she needed.”

“Well, that leaves me with a lot of questions, but I think there’s only one that comes to mind immediately,” Irene said in her quiet voice.

“What is it, Irene?”

“Why us?”

[heliosphoenix]

2017 in review!

That’s right folks, as we count down the hours left until the new year, it’s time once again for Helios’ fucking awesome review of the year we just had.

I think it’s safe to say that 2017 was a very...weird year. That’s probably the best was I can describe it. And I’m not just saying that because somehow a reality TV star became the (supposed) leader of the free world, it just seemed like there were a lot of things that happened this year that just made us wonder, as a species, “Just what the heck are we doing?!”

But, like Taylor Swift, I’m not going to act like the year was all gloom and doom (and fuck you Buzzfeed for trying to pretend that’s all it was). Cause even though 2017 was full of things that seemed bad, or even just weird, there were still a lot of good things that happened as well, and we need to remember them. Because I’ll be damned if I’m going to let clickbait distract us from the fact that there were moments where we lit up the darkness.

Here’s some of them:

The Women’s March on January 21st was one of the largest protests ever with 2 million people taking part.

Scientists in China discovered our oldest ancestor yet, a 540 million year old Saccorhytus

The New England Patriots won Super Bowl LI capped by an incredible comeback in the second half, Tom Brady wins his 5th ring and arguably cements his status as the greatest NFL QB of all time.

Adele won best song and best album at the Grammy’s.

A mostly underwater continent called Zealandia was discovered in the South Pacific.

7 planets roughly the size of Earth were discovered around the star Trappist-1, 3 of which could possibly support life.

“Moonlight” upset “La La Land” for Best Picture at the Oscars (literally at the last moment!)

The world’s oldest golf club in Scotland voted to admit women as members for the first time. 

Carrie Lam became the first woman to be elected chief executive of Hong Kong.

The largest Dinosaur footprint ever measured (at 1.7 meters) was found in Western Australia.

Bob Dylan won the Nobel Prize for Literature.

Edward Enninful became the first black man to become editor of Vogue.

France declared mandatory labeling of digitally modified photos of fashion models.

Emmanuel Macron defeated Marie Le Pen in France’s Presidential election.

MTV became the first major awards show to adopt gender-neutral categories.

Apple became the first company to be worth more than $800 billion.

Brazil declared the national emergency as a result of the Zika virus was over. Puerto Rico also declared its own Zika epidemic had ended.

A global ransomware attack was halted after a 22 year old UK blogger stumbled on the kill switch.

Japanese researches reported the birth of mice that were fertilized by freeze-dried sperm stored on the International Space Station.

The Golden State Warriors won the 2017 NBA championship after posting an unprecedented 16-1 record in the postseason.

Facebook reached 2 billion users.

Columbia rebel group FARC disbanded after 52 years.

France announced it will ban petrol and diesel powered cars by 2040. Great Britain soon announced a similar ban.

Tesla produced it’s first mass-market car, the Model 3. Elon Musk is of course the first owner.

Jodie Whittaker became the first female Doctor on Doctor Who.

Despacito became the most streamed song ever.

John McCain cast a decisive vote to strike down an attempted repeal of the Affordable Care Act.

Gene editing in human embryos to eliminate disease causing mutations was successful performed for the first time.

Scientists identified a deficiency in nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) as being a major cause of birth defects and miscarriages.

A 100 year old fruitcake was discovered in Antarctica in a hut used by the expedition of Robert Falcon Scott, and it was almost edible! 

Paris and Los Angeles were announced as the hosts for the 2024 and 2028 Olympic Games.

The Cassiopeia Jellyfish was discovered to be the first brainless animal that can sleep.

The first woman graduated from the US Marine’s Infantry Officer Corps.

The first Ichthyosaur fossil was found in India.

The painting “Salvador Mundi” by Leonardo Da Vinci sold for $450.3 million.

A rainbow in Tapei was recorded lasting nearly 9 hours, the longest ever.

Gay marriage was legalized in Australia.

Doug Jones became the first Democratic Senator from Alabama in 25 years.

The Vatican rediscovered long lost painting by Raphael.

The Asteroid Oumuamua was discovered to be an interstellar object.

Two neutron stars collided and confirmed the existence of Gravity Waves.

SpaceX launched and recovered a reused Falcon 9 rocket for the first time.

How about the movies that came out this year? Spider Man, Guardians of the Galaxy 2, Wonder Woman, Thor: Ragnorok, Star Wars.

The Michigan Basketball Team won the Big Ten Tournament after surviving a plane crash.

THE GREAT AMERICAN ECLIPSE. How can anyone forget that day?

As you can see, there’s a lot that happened this year! A lot of stuff that ranged from interesting to amazing. And even though there people in this world that are still hell bent on convincing us that everything has gone to rack and ruin, we must never forget that there are still a lot of good things that happened this year, and will continue to happen in the year ahead.

Even so, there’s been a lot of talk this year about where we’re going as a culture, a society and a species. There’s people who feel, for a variety of reasons, that we’re heading on the path to destruction, or at the very least have strayed from the path we should be on. And everyone seems to have the same question; “How do we get back on the right track?”

Well, here’s a suggestion for creating the world you want to live in:

Try spending the next year doing the things you want to do and being the person you want to be.

You don’t need to post a hashtag or join a protest to make a difference. Donate to a charity or help a friend in need. Maybe offer to drive someone who’s not feeling well to the doctor, or go clean the yard of one of your elder neighbors. Or just do what you can to promote the values you believe in. Why wait for a day of action or some galvanizing event? You can do this stuff right now.

You don’t need an incendiary tweet to take action, just try to do the right thing every other day.

Instead of trying to focus on how you can get the entire world onto the right path, why not start with just yourself and your immediate friends and family. Become an inspiration for your fellow citizens, lead by example. 

And most of all, never forget to look for the light. It’s hard to light a candle, and much easier to curse the dark instead. But as President Kennedy once said, we do these things “Not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”

Now as always, there’s one more good thing that happened this year, and you are gonna tell me what it is. Because I guarantee you that even if you’ve just had the worst year ever, there was something good that happened. Maybe someone got you a gift you really wanted, or you reconnected with a friend you didn’t even know you were missing, or maybe you finally did something you’ve wanted to do your whole life.

I can tell you that all three of those things happened to me, and that’s why I can look back and say I had a decent year. And I bet that if you give it some thought, you can say the same thing.

Share it below, tell us what awesome thing happened to you this year. And use that positivity to attack the new year with an enthusiasm unknown to mankind!

I hope you all have a wonderful New Year’s Eve, and a fucking awesome 2018.

[top1course]

3 Reasons Your FACEBOOK ADS ARE FAILING

Hey this is Ryan Hildreth and in this video I’m going to show you the three biggest, facebook mistakes, and the reason why your face, facebook ads, profitable, is he liked, now whether you’re an Amazon, i’m seller a Shopify store owner, social media marketer affiliate marketer maybe I’m a personal brand you sell, courses coaching, or services, i’m gonna show you how to make your face, facebook ads, edible so stay tuned, if you’re watching this video and you currently aren’t running face, that’s totally fine I still want you to stay and watch, because I have a lot of training, that will show you in, exactly how, the run Facebook ads this is one of the highest, paid skill sets online soap, if you aren’t running ads, as we speak, you need to be, okay this is, literally one of the highest, income, skillset, you can acquire, okay so if you learn how to run Facebook ads, Businesses will pay you for it either as a, clients, or as an affiliate okay so you can go out and get businesses to pay for it, or, you going to be in, affiliate marketer, for businesses, does help them sell their products, and they give you a commission, and once you cracked, the code, and turn your eyes, into slot machines, you’ll see what I mean okay Facebook ads, are great, when you, cast and then get them profitable, and you’ll be able to you know basically turn them into slot, and the number one mistake, so let’s go ahead and dive into this number one mistake, is not enough, market, research, okay and what do I mean by this now you’re probably thinking Ryan this is super basic, of course, peoplenow Market, research well, i want to ask, do you know your top 10 competitors in your space now if you have a client, Maybe in the Dermatology space or, baylor plastic surgeon do you know there, 10, competitors, well if you don’t, then, you know that’s market research that needs, if you’re selling it a little trinkets on your Shopify store I don’t know, maybe you’re selling wall, do you know your top, competitors, you need to know that, because if you don’t know, your competitors, and what they are, doing, then it’s going to be hard, to build, your, audiences, phantom build your targeting weather like, you know who are you going to Target what are they interested in, you know what, audience is going to resonate with your product well, the number way, the number one way to figure that out, is to know what your competitors are doing, in fact you can go look at their ads, on a site, Call Dad espresso.

And there’s other tools out there, you know with Facebook, and spying tools, can we can go see, your competitors, ads and see what they are, doing you know what is the copy looking like, like what kind of image are they using, who are they targeting who is commenting on their ads, you could find all that out, you can even go on to their Facebook fan page, and figure out a no click the little tab, it says info and ads, and go ahead and look at their ads right then and there, market research, must be done you have to know who you’re at least, your top 10 competitors are, now if you’re in the personal brand space, you know what type of personal brand do you have are you a fitness, influenster, who are the top 10 influencers, that are actually running advertising, Okay that’s another Keith, sing because there are a lot of, competitors out there, start running advertised, and I wouldn’t consider them your competitors, because you don’t, top performing businesses, online are running face, facebook ads, i’m so do your market research, number two, not enough, texting now, this goes back to number one because if you don’t do your market research, it’s going to be hard, to test your ads now if you do, beer Market Research, and you know your top 10, 10 competitors, then you’re going to be able to, create audiences, based off of food at Target right, share an entrepreneurship space, you target, target in me is a channel or anybody Tanner j.fox, buddy Anthony Alphonso Wright, target, specific, specific people in the space, or if you’re doing you know skincare you would Target maybe the, the top 10 competitors, right, nAD geographical location, you have to be testing, Your, it’s okay that means audiences, geographical locations, age ranges, interest behaviors, all that time, stop in once you have, you know I would say, like if you look at this image maybe you’re using, 1 creative, now you’re going to, run that one creative, 2, maybe 10 different headsets, let you know okay, i have this creative, now this creative is running to be, 10 different audience, does which one converts the best for that creative, and then you do that with your next creative maybe the next creative is a video, that bad that video ad might actually resonate differently, with those same exact audiences that you did for the last, estado Caso, you’ll have ten different audiences that you’re targeting, baby spinach, $3 each audience, okay so you’re only spending 30 bucks, pork per campaign per day, and then you do that, her three different, creatives you don’t have to do three, I usually like to do, do two or three, but if you’re only doing one and maybe only, have thirty bucks, tornado spin, then you do it that way but, do you have to test different audiences, and then obviously, make that meet your budget, okay so not enough test, i see this all the time, not retargeting this is the biggest one these are all this is where all the sales are made, if you aren’t retargeting people that have, landed on your website or people that have, landed on your website, and then maybe added the product, two carts, frye, then you’re not doing your job, as a Facebook Advertiser, okay you need to be following up with those people in reminding them, hey, i saw that you landed on the add to cart, what happen, this offer, expires in the neck, 24-hours you don’t give them a deadline, But retarget them so that they remember.

Right humans right, we take out the trash, okay that’s a common household chore that we all have to do we all have to, how to take out the trash, now how many times have you forgotten, take out the trash, probably, a few times, your whole life, so what makes you think that someone is going to remember, to purchase, the product when they land on you, maybe they had the car in there like you know what I’ll do this later, okay, they’re not going to remember to do it unless you, tell them again right just like when you didn’t take out, the trash when you’re a kid, your mom, kept reminding you, everywhere you went, the trash is just like that so you must, do retargeting ads, what’s the people that have landed on your website, auratic art, OK and create, pacific, advertising, for that, audience, okay so those are the three quick, facebook ad fails, now this is exactly why you’re not profitable, either you didn’t do all three of these or maybe one of these help you out, let me know down, turn the comments down below let me know if any of these would help you out, especially the retargeting cuz I see a lot of on, especially, ad Agency owners, not doing this for their clients so hopefully this video help you out, if you want to learn how to get, get paid for Facebook ads right you want to learn how to get businesses, does the pay you 5000 a month, i have a client on autopilot, what strategy, that I’m going to email to you personally, if you take the masterclass down below it, free free to join, there are limited number of, Spots but when you do, register for that live event I’ll be there, i’m also going to email you our client, ensenada pilot, strategy, okay and this is some of our students that you have used Facebook ads, and are using the things that I’ve taught them, that I’m going to show you, masterclass, abdul and clients as you can see Jason Albright, $2,000 a month, call client Nick Peyton’s doing, now over $100,000, annual revenue for his agency, angie Martinez landed 8:30, $100, client, tons of people, landing, clients, just by running Facebook ad, because obviously, lot of business owners out there especially small business owners don’t know how to run, facebook ads, they’re probably watching this video and saying wow this is a lot of, complicated stuff, i need someone to do this for me I’ll pay them a couple thousand., i want to do it so, if you want to learn how to do that there will be a link down below, He like this video give it a thumbs up, subscribe comments, and I will see you in the next, take care.

from WordPress https://top1course.com/3-reasons-your-facebook-ads-are-failing/

[jakehglover]

Eating Early Dinner Aids Weight Loss and Lowers Cancer Risk

By Dr. Mercola

For years, a standard dietary recommendation said to stabilize your blood sugar and insulin levels (thereby optimizing energy and maintaining a healthy weight) has been to eat three square meals a day with small snacks in between. On top of that, health experts (influenced by the food industry) maintained that processed foods fortified with RDA nutrients are just as good as, and maybe even better than, cooking from scratch.

Vegetable oil in lieu of saturated animal fats, low-fat instead of full-fat, and products fortified with iron and other vitamins and minerals are but a few examples. Today, science is clearly pointing out the fallacies of these strategies. In fact, this all-day grazing — especially on processed foods — has been identified as a key driver of obesity and chronic ill health.

The most obvious risk with spreading out your meals to morning, noon and evening is overeating. Other less obvious risks are biological changes that result in metabolic dysfunction and the inability to burn fat.

Remember, our ancient ancestors did not have access to food around the clock, year-round, and from a historical perspective it is beyond obvious your body was designed for intermittent periods of fasting — either daily or seasonally, or both. In fact, modern research reveals a number of beneficial effects take place when you go for periods of time without eating, and the timing of these periods of fasting also appears to have a significant influence on your biology.

For a number of years now I have been strongly advising to avoid eating at least three hours before bed, and now two recent studies highlight the benefits of eating early dinner, or skipping supper altogether. In one, this singular meal time change was found to combat weight gain. In another, it was found to have a significant influence on your cancer risk. There are logical reasons for these effects, which I’ll review here.

Skipping Supper Improves Metabolic Flexibility

The first study1 found that eating a very early dinner, or skipping it entirely, alters the way your body burns fat and carbohydrates, resulting in reduced hunger and improved fat burning. The key timing feature of this early time-restricted feeding (eTRF) regimen is to eat your last meal of the day by midafternoon, and then fast until the next morning.

I actually prefer the term time restricted eating (TRE) and will use it in this article. Lead author Courtney Peterson, Ph.D., from the Pennington Biomedical Research Center told Science Daily:2

“Eating only during a much smaller window of time than people are typically used to may help with weight loss. We found that eating between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m. followed by an 18-hour daily fast kept appetite levels more even throughout the day, in comparison to eating between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m., which is what the median American does."

To investigate the effect of TRE, Peterson and her team followed 11 overweight volunteers for a total of eight days. During the first four days, they ate all of their meals between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m. During the following four days, they ate between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.

The only thing that changed was the timing of the meals; the total calories remained the same throughout. Data on calorie burning, fat burning and appetite revealed that even though the participants ate the same number of calories each day, and burned about the same number of calories, the TRE schedule:

Lowered hunger

Increased fat burning for several hours during the evening

Improved metabolic flexibility, allowing their bodies to more efficiently switch between the burning of carbohydrates and fats

As you may also know, NAD biology is one of my recent passions as I firmly believe it holds the key to radically reducing chronic degenerative disease and optimizing longevity functions. It turns out that NAMPT is the rate limiting enzyme to make NAD in the salvage pathways that convert the approximate 9 grams you use every day and mostly recycle back to its active form.

It turns out this enzyme is under strong circadian control and when you disrupt your circadian cycle by ignoring the time restriction eating windows, you compromise your body’s ability to create NAD, thus radically limiting your body’s ability to repair DNA damage.

Late-Night Eating Boosts Free Radical Damage

The research points to the influence of your circadian rhythm, and how taking advantage of the peaks and lows of this rhythm can help you optimize your metabolism. Many metabolic functions operate at their peak in the morning and early in the day, becoming less efficient as the day draws to a close and your body prepares for rest and sleep.

But there’s actually more to it than that. Avoiding food before bed will also help you optimize your mitochondrial function, and that’s key for all sorts of disease prevention. In simple terms, when you’re sleeping, your body needs the least amount of energy, and if you feed it when energy is not needed, your mitochondria end up creating excessive amounts of damaging free radicals.

So, avoiding late-night eating is a really simple way to prevent cellular damage from occurring — damage that might otherwise impair your mitochondrial functioning, lower your energy level, and ultimately contribute to all sorts of degenerative disease, including cancer.

Eating Early Dinner Lowers Your Cancer Risk

This brings us to the second study,3,4 published in the International Journal of Cancer last month. Here, they investigated “whether timing of meals is associated with breast and prostate cancer risk taking into account lifestyle and chronotype, a characteristic correlating with preference for morning or evening activity.”

To analyze this potential link, they conducted a population‐based case‐control study including 1,800 people with prostate and breast cancer, who were then compared to 2,100 cancer-free controls who also had never worked a night shift. Subjects completed a food frequency questionnaire and answered questions about the timing of their meals, activity levels, sleep habits and chronotype. According to the authors:

“Compared with subjects sleeping immediately after supper, those sleeping two or more hours after supper had a 20 percent reduction in cancer risk for breast and prostate cancer combined … A similar protection was observed in subjects having supper before 9 p.m. compared with supper after 10 p.m. …

Adherence to diurnal eating patterns and specifically a long interval between last meal and sleep are associated with a lower cancer risk, stressing the importance of evaluating timing in studies on diet and cancer.”

Men who ate supper at least two hours before bedtime had a 26 percent lower risk of prostate cancer compared to those who ate dinner closer to bedtime, and women who ate an earlier dinner had a 16 percent lower risk of breast cancer compared to women eating dinner within two hours of going to sleep.

Indeed, as noted by Dr. Ganesh Palapattu, chief of urologic oncology at the University of Michigan Medical School (who was not involved in this study), “Not only are you what you eat. You are how you eat, and it might very well be that you are when you eat.”5

What’s more, “morning larks,” people who have a natural affinity for getting up early in the morning, were at particularly high risk for cancer when eating dinner too close to bedtime, compared to “evening people” who naturally get more energetic later at night.

While study author Manolis Kogevinas, Ph.D., a research professor at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health, told CNN6 that the mechanisms are unclear, this reduction in cancer risk makes sense when you consider the effect late-night eating has on your mitochondria.

Chronic inflammation is a hallmark of cancer, and by feeding your body late at night, the excess free radicals generated in your mitochondria will simply fuel that inflammation. Mitochondrial dysfunction in general has also been shown to be a central problem that allows cancer to occur. To learn more about this, see “The Metabolic Theory of Cancer and the Key to Cancer Prevention and Recovery.”

Why Continuous Feeding Is so Bad for Your Health

In recent years, it’s become increasingly clear that your body simply isn’t designed to run optimally when continuously fed. If you eat throughout the day and never skip a meal, your body adapts to burning sugar as its primary fuel, which downregulates enzymes that utilize and burn stored fat. As a result, you start gaining weight, and efforts at weight loss tend to be ineffective.

To lose body fat, your body must be able to burn fat. Without this metabolic flexibility, the fat stays and no amount of exercise will budge it out of place.

What’s more, many biological repair and rejuvenation processes take place while you’re fasting, and this is another reason why all-day grazing triggers disease. In a nutshell, your body was designed to a) run on fat as its primary fuel, while still having the metabolic flexibility to effectively burn carbs (you need to be able to burn both), and b) cycle through periods of feast and famine.

Today, most people do the complete opposite — their bodies burn primarily carbs, having lost or severely impaired their ability to burn fat, and they eat a lot, every day, year-round. Intermittent fasting is a term that covers an array of different meal timing schedules. As a general rule, it involves cutting calories in whole or in part, either a couple of days a week, every other day, or daily.

The TRE used in the first featured study is but one example of intermittent fasting, and is quite similar to my “peak fasting” regimen, which involves fasting for 16 to 18 hours each day and eating all of your meals within the remaining window of six to eight hours, making sure your last meal is at least three hours before bed.

To make this schedule work, you need to skip either breakfast or dinner, and a strong case can be made for skipping dinner. Remember, as these new studies show it is vital to avoid eating your last meal within three hours of your bedtime. That said, the key point of intermittent fasting is the cycling of feasting (feeding) and famine (fasting), which mimics the eating habits of our ancestors and restores your body to a more natural state that allows a whole host of biochemical benefits to occur.

Weight loss is really just the beginning, but it can be quite radical. A recent Today article7 discusses how Dr. Kevin Gendreau lost 125 pounds in 18 months using intermittent fasting.

Cut Diabetes and Heart Disease Risk Just by Changing Timing of Your Meals

For starters, cycling in and out of fasting is a powerful way to improve your insulin sensitivity and reverse insulin resistance. In 2005, Danish researchers demonstrated that intermittent fasting quickly increases your insulin-mediated glucose uptake rate.8 Eight healthy men in their mid-20s fasted 20 hours every other day for 15 days. At the end of the trial, their insulin had become more efficient at managing blood sugar.

According to the authors, this confirms the theory of “thrifty genes,” which is similar to Dr. Richard Johnson’s finding that metabolic syndrome is actually a healthy adaptive condition that animals undergo to store fat to help them survive periods of famine. The problem is that most all of us are continuously eating and never fasting. As noted by the Danish researchers:

“Insulin resistance is currently a major health problem. This may be because of a marked decrease in daily physical activity during recent decades combined with constant food abundance. This lifestyle collides with our genome, which was most likely selected in the late Paleolithic era (50000 – 10000 B.C.) by criteria that favored survival in an environment characterized by fluctuations between periods of feast and famine.

The theory of thrifty genes states that these fluctuations are required for optimal metabolic function ... This experiment is the first in humans to show that intermittent fasting increases insulin-mediated glucose uptake rates, and the findings are compatible with the thrifty gene concept.”

So, by mimicking the natural fluctuations in food availability with an intermittent fasting schedule, you naturally optimize your metabolic function without actually changing what or how much you eat when you DO eat, keeping in mind the quality of the nutrients you eat, of course.

Studies have also found compelling links between fasting and reduced risk of heart disease.9 One 2012 study10 found those who fasted on a regular basis had a 58 percent lower risk of coronary disease compared to those who never fasted (90 percent of the participants were Mormons who are encouraged to fast one day a month). Regular fasting was also found to be associated with lower glucose levels and lower body mass index overall.

Intermittent Fasting Promotes General Health and Longevity

There's also plenty of research showing that fasting has a beneficial impact on longevity. There are a number of mechanisms contributing to this effect. Normalizing insulin sensitivity is a major one, but fasting also inhibits the mTOR pathway, which plays an important part in driving the aging process when it is excessively activated. The fact that it improves a number of potent disease markers also contributes to fasting's overall beneficial effects on general health.

Interestingly, research11 shows that fasting increases cholesterol — low-density lipoprotein (LDL, often misconstrued as “bad” cholesterol) by an average of 14 percent and high-density lipoprotein (HDL or “good” cholesterol) by 6 percent. Conventional medicine tells us cholesterol should be as low as possible to avoid heart disease, but this is more myth than fact.

The reason cholesterol may go up when fasting is because cholesterol is part of the biochemical chain that allows your body to process fat. Dr. Benjamin D. Horne, director of cardiovascular and genetic epidemiology at the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute, and the study's lead author, explains:

"Fasting causes hunger or stress. In response, the body releases more cholesterol, allowing it to utilize fat as a source of fuel, instead of glucose. This decreases the number of fat cells in the body ... This is important because the fewer fat cells a body has, the less likely it will experience insulin resistance, or diabetes."

Horne also found that fasting triggers a dramatic increase in human growth hormone (HGH) — 1,300 percent in women, and 2,000 percent in men. The only other thing that can compete in terms of dramatically boosting HGH levels is high-intensity interval training. HGH, commonly referred to as "the fitness hormone," plays an important role in maintaining health, fitness and longevity, including promotion of muscle growth and boosting fat loss by revving up your metabolism.

Fasting also upregulates autophagy and mitophagy — natural cleansing processes necessary for optimal cellular renewal and function — and triggers the generation of stem cells. The cyclical abstinence from food followed by refeeding also massively stimulates mitochondrial biosynthesis.

Importantly, most of these rejuvenating and regenerating benefits occur during the refeeding phase, not the fasting phase. The same holds true for nutritional ketosis, which produces the greatest benefits when pulsed (cycling between low net-carb and higher net-carb intakes).

For Optimal Results, Combine Fasting With a Ketogenic Diet

This brings us to another important point: Recent research shows that intermittent fasting is most beneficial when combined with a ketogenic diet. The study12,13 in question examined the effects of intermittent fasting on weight loss and metabolic disease risk parameters in obese volunteers.

Here, the participants were allowed to eat whatever they wanted in any quantity between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m., while fasting for the remaining 16 hours. The outcomes were then compared to a nonintervention control group.

Overall, participants consumed about 350 fewer calories per day and lost just under 3 percent of their body weight after three months. Systolic blood pressure also dropped about 7 mmHg, compared to the historical control group. While this may sound “good enough,” there’s an important detail that needs to be addressed.

While participants did lose weight, other really important metabolic health parameters did not significantly improve, including visceral fat mass, diastolic blood pressure, triglycerides, fasting glucose and fasting insulin.

One of the key benefits of intermittent fasting is normalizing your glucose and insulin levels — along with many other biological metrics, including all of the ones mentioned above — and that simply didn’t happen here. While the authors didn’t offer an explanation, I believe the answer is fairly obvious, based on the evidence.

The participants were not instructed to alter WHAT they ate, and if they were anything like a majority of Americans, a large portion of their diet was likely processed food and probably even fast food. I’ve repeatedly stressed the importance of eating a diet high in healthy fats, moderate in protein with unrestricted amounts of fresh vegetables to optimize overall health on any intermittent fasting program. This study basically shows you what happens when you fail to address your food choices.

In a nutshell, unless you also balance your macronutrient ratios, you might lose weight but you’ll forgo many of the most important health benefits. If you lose weight but don’t move the needle on glucose, insulin and other disease risk parameters, then you’re not impacting your chronic disease risk. So, for optimal health and longevity, I believe it’s really important to combine intermittent fasting with cyclical nutritional ketosis.

Cyclical is the key term here, as once you are metabolically flexible I believe the research is clear you do not want to remain in chronic ketosis as that is counterproductive to long-term health. You must regularly cycle in and out of ketosis, ideally on days when you are doing strength training.

The cyclical ketogenic diet provides many of the same health benefits associated with fasting and intermittent fasting, and when done together, most people will experience significant improvements in their health — including not just weight loss,14 which is more of an inescapable side effect of the metabolic improvements that occur, but also improved insulin sensitivity,15 increased muscle mass, reduced inflammation and oxidative damage,16 reduced risk of cancer and Alzheimer’s,17 and increased longevity.

Why Cycle In and Out of Ketosis?

A ketogenic diet and intermittent fasting both allow your body to shift from sugar- to fat-burning — an important metabolic flexibility that in turn promotes optimal function of all the cells and systems in your body. And, while there’s evidence supporting either of these as stand-alone strategies, it seems clear to me that combining them will produce the best results overall.

As there are caveats with intermittent fasting, such as the importance of eating healthy whole or minimally processed foods when you do eat, there are caveats when it comes to nutritional ketosis as well.

Most people believe continuous keto is the key to success, but mounting evidence suggests this is not the case. This is why the mitochondrial metabolic therapy (MMT) program detailed in my book, “Fat for Fuel,” stresses cyclical ketosis. There are at least two significant reasons for the pulsed approach:

1. Insulin suppresses hepatic glucogenesis, i.e., the production of glucose by your liver. When insulin is chronically suppressed long-term, your liver starts to compensate for the deficit by making more glucose. As a result, your blood sugar can begin to rise even though you’re not eating any carbohydrates.

In this situation, eating carbohydrates will actually lower your blood sugar, as the carbs will activate insulin, which will then suppress your liver’s production of glucose. Long-term chronic suppression of insulin is an unhealthy metabolic state that is easily avoidable by cycling in and out of keto.

2. More importantly, many of the metabolic benefits associated with nutritional ketosis in general actually occur during the refeeding phase. During the fasting phase, clearance of damaged cell and cell content occurs, but the actual rejuvenation process takes place during refeeding.

In other words, cells and tissues are rebuilt and restored to a healthy state once your intake of net carbs increases. (The rejuvenation that occurs during refeeding is also one of the reasons intermittent fasting is so beneficial, as you’re cycling between feast and famine.)

What You Eat, and When, Have a Significant Impact on Your Health

In summary, while eating real food is the foundation for a healthy life, you can significantly leverage the benefits of a healthy whole diet by making small tweaks to your meal timing, macronutrient ratios, and cycling in and out of ketosis once your body regains its ability to burn fat.

Again, fasting and nutritional ketosis provide many of the same benefits, and both work best when implemented in a pulsed fashion. For instructions on how to implement cyclical keto and fasting, see “Why Intermittent Fasting Is More Effective Combined With Ketogenic Diet.”

Together, I believe cyclical keto and intermittent fasting is a near-unbeatable combination capable of really maximizing the health benefits of both. Importantly, when deciding your intermittent fasting schedule, remember to eat your last meal as early in the afternoon as possible, to optimize your metabolism and avoid the side effects of late-night eating, which include increased hunger, inflammation and a heightened cancer risk.

from HealthyLife via Jake Glover on Inoreader http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2018/09/03/eating-early-dinner-or-skipping-supper.aspx

[sherristockman]

Eating Early Dinner Aids Weight Loss and Lowers Cancer Risk Dr. Mercola By Dr. Mercola For years, a standard dietary recommendation said to stabilize your blood sugar and insulin levels (thereby optimizing energy and maintaining a healthy weight) has been to eat three square meals a day with small snacks in between. On top of that, health experts (influenced by the food industry) maintained that processed foods fortified with RDA nutrients are just as good as, and maybe even better than, cooking from scratch. Vegetable oil in lieu of saturated animal fats, low-fat instead of full-fat, and products fortified with iron and other vitamins and minerals are but a few examples. Today, science is clearly pointing out the fallacies of these strategies. In fact, this all-day grazing — especially on processed foods — has been identified as a key driver of obesity and chronic ill health. The most obvious risk with spreading out your meals to morning, noon and evening is overeating. Other less obvious risks are biological changes that result in metabolic dysfunction and the inability to burn fat. Remember, our ancient ancestors did not have access to food around the clock, year-round, and from a historical perspective it is beyond obvious your body was designed for intermittent periods of fasting — either daily or seasonally, or both. In fact, modern research reveals a number of beneficial effects take place when you go for periods of time without eating, and the timing of these periods of fasting also appears to have a significant influence on your biology. For a number of years now I have been strongly advising to avoid eating at least three hours before bed, and now two recent studies highlight the benefits of eating early dinner, or skipping supper altogether. In one, this singular meal time change was found to combat weight gain. In another, it was found to have a significant influence on your cancer risk. There are logical reasons for these effects, which I’ll review here. Skipping Supper Improves Metabolic Flexibility The first study1 found that eating a very early dinner, or skipping it entirely, alters the way your body burns fat and carbohydrates, resulting in reduced hunger and improved fat burning. The key timing feature of this early time-restricted feeding (eTRF) regimen is to eat your last meal of the day by midafternoon, and then fast until the next morning. I actually prefer the term time restricted eating (TRE) and will use it in this article. Lead author Courtney Peterson, Ph.D., from the Pennington Biomedical Research Center told Science Daily:2 “Eating only during a much smaller window of time than people are typically used to may help with weight loss. We found that eating between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m. followed by an 18-hour daily fast kept appetite levels more even throughout the day, in comparison to eating between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m., which is what the median American does." To investigate the effect of TRE, Peterson and her team followed 11 overweight volunteers for a total of eight days. During the first four days, they ate all of their meals between 8 a.m. and 2 p.m. During the following four days, they ate between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. The only thing that changed was the timing of the meals; the total calories remained the same throughout. Data on calorie burning, fat burning and appetite revealed that even though the participants ate the same number of calories each day, and burned about the same number of calories, the TRE schedule: Lowered hunger Increased fat burning for several hours during the evening Improved metabolic flexibility, allowing their bodies to more efficiently switch between the burning of carbohydrates and fats As you may also know, NAD biology is one of my recent passions as I firmly believe it holds the key to radically reducing chronic degenerative disease and optimizing longevity functions. It turns out that NAMPT is the rate limiting enzyme to make NAD in the salvage pathways that convert the approximate 9 grams you use every day and mostly recycle back to its active form. It turns out this enzyme is under strong circadian control and when you disrupt your circadian cycle by ignoring the time restriction eating windows, you compromise your body’s ability to create NAD, thus radically limiting your body’s ability to repair DNA damage. Late-Night Eating Boosts Free Radical Damage The research points to the influence of your circadian rhythm, and how taking advantage of the peaks and lows of this rhythm can help you optimize your metabolism. Many metabolic functions operate at their peak in the morning and early in the day, becoming less efficient as the day draws to a close and your body prepares for rest and sleep. But there’s actually more to it than that. Avoiding food before bed will also help you optimize your mitochondrial function, and that’s key for all sorts of disease prevention. In simple terms, when you’re sleeping, your body needs the least amount of energy, and if you feed it when energy is not needed, your mitochondria end up creating excessive amounts of damaging free radicals. So, avoiding late-night eating is a really simple way to prevent cellular damage from occurring — damage that might otherwise impair your mitochondrial functioning, lower your energy level, and ultimately contribute to all sorts of degenerative disease, including cancer. Eating Early Dinner Lowers Your Cancer Risk This brings us to the second study,3,4 published in the International Journal of Cancer last month. Here, they investigated “whether timing of meals is associated with breast and prostate cancer risk taking into account lifestyle and chronotype, a characteristic correlating with preference for morning or evening activity.” To analyze this potential link, they conducted a population‐based case‐control study including 1,800 people with prostate and breast cancer, who were then compared to 2,100 cancer-free controls who also had never worked a night shift. Subjects completed a food frequency questionnaire and answered questions about the timing of their meals, activity levels, sleep habits and chronotype. According to the authors: “Compared with subjects sleeping immediately after supper, those sleeping two or more hours after supper had a 20 percent reduction in cancer risk for breast and prostate cancer combined … A similar protection was observed in subjects having supper before 9 p.m. compared with supper after 10 p.m. … Adherence to diurnal eating patterns and specifically a long interval between last meal and sleep are associated with a lower cancer risk, stressing the importance of evaluating timing in studies on diet and cancer.” Men who ate supper at least two hours before bedtime had a 26 percent lower risk of prostate cancer compared to those who ate dinner closer to bedtime, and women who ate an earlier dinner had a 16 percent lower risk of breast cancer compared to women eating dinner within two hours of going to sleep. Indeed, as noted by Dr. Ganesh Palapattu, chief of urologic oncology at the University of Michigan Medical School (who was not involved in this study), “Not only are you what you eat. You are how you eat, and it might very well be that you are when you eat.”5 What’s more, “morning larks,” people who have a natural affinity for getting up early in the morning, were at particularly high risk for cancer when eating dinner too close to bedtime, compared to “evening people” who naturally get more energetic later at night. While study author Manolis Kogevinas, Ph.D., a research professor at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health, told CNN6 that the mechanisms are unclear, this reduction in cancer risk makes sense when you consider the effect late-night eating has on your mitochondria. Chronic inflammation is a hallmark of cancer, and by feeding your body late at night, the excess free radicals generated in your mitochondria will simply fuel that inflammation. Mitochondrial dysfunction in general has also been shown to be a central problem that allows cancer to occur. To learn more about this, see “The Metabolic Theory of Cancer and the Key to Cancer Prevention and Recovery.” Why Continuous Feeding Is so Bad for Your Health In recent years, it’s become increasingly clear that your body simply isn’t designed to run optimally when continuously fed. If you eat throughout the day and never skip a meal, your body adapts to burning sugar as its primary fuel, which downregulates enzymes that utilize and burn stored fat. As a result, you start gaining weight, and efforts at weight loss tend to be ineffective. To lose body fat, your body must be able to burn fat. Without this metabolic flexibility, the fat stays and no amount of exercise will budge it out of place. What’s more, many biological repair and rejuvenation processes take place while you’re fasting, and this is another reason why all-day grazing triggers disease. In a nutshell, your body was designed to a) run on fat as its primary fuel, while still having the metabolic flexibility to effectively burn carbs (you need to be able to burn both), and b) cycle through periods of feast and famine. Today, most people do the complete opposite — their bodies burn primarily carbs, having lost or severely impaired their ability to burn fat, and they eat a lot, every day, year-round. Intermittent fasting is a term that covers an array of different meal timing schedules. As a general rule, it involves cutting calories in whole or in part, either a couple of days a week, every other day, or daily. The TRE used in the first featured study is but one example of intermittent fasting, and is quite similar to my “peak fasting” regimen, which involves fasting for 16 to 18 hours each day and eating all of your meals within the remaining window of six to eight hours, making sure your last meal is at least three hours before bed. To make this schedule work, you need to skip either breakfast or dinner, and a strong case can be made for skipping dinner. Remember, as these new studies show it is vital to avoid eating your last meal within three hours of your bedtime. That said, the key point of intermittent fasting is the cycling of feasting (feeding) and famine (fasting), which mimics the eating habits of our ancestors and restores your body to a more natural state that allows a whole host of biochemical benefits to occur. Weight loss is really just the beginning, but it can be quite radical. A recent Today article7 discusses how Dr. Kevin Gendreau lost 125 pounds in 18 months using intermittent fasting. Cut Diabetes and Heart Disease Risk Just by Changing Timing of Your Meals For starters, cycling in and out of fasting is a powerful way to improve your insulin sensitivity and reverse insulin resistance. In 2005, Danish researchers demonstrated that intermittent fasting quickly increases your insulin-mediated glucose uptake rate.8 Eight healthy men in their mid-20s fasted 20 hours every other day for 15 days. At the end of the trial, their insulin had become more efficient at managing blood sugar. According to the authors, this confirms the theory of “thrifty genes,” which is similar to Dr. Richard Johnson’s finding that metabolic syndrome is actually a healthy adaptive condition that animals undergo to store fat to help them survive periods of famine. The problem is that most all of us are continuously eating and never fasting. As noted by the Danish researchers: “Insulin resistance is currently a major health problem. This may be because of a marked decrease in daily physical activity during recent decades combined with constant food abundance. This lifestyle collides with our genome, which was most likely selected in the late Paleolithic era (50000 – 10000 B.C.) by criteria that favored survival in an environment characterized by fluctuations between periods of feast and famine. The theory of thrifty genes states that these fluctuations are required for optimal metabolic function ... This experiment is the first in humans to show that intermittent fasting increases insulin-mediated glucose uptake rates, and the findings are compatible with the thrifty gene concept.” So, by mimicking the natural fluctuations in food availability with an intermittent fasting schedule, you naturally optimize your metabolic function without actually changing what or how much you eat when you DO eat, keeping in mind the quality of the nutrients you eat, of course. Studies have also found compelling links between fasting and reduced risk of heart disease.9 One 2012 study10 found those who fasted on a regular basis had a 58 percent lower risk of coronary disease compared to those who never fasted (90 percent of the participants were Mormons who are encouraged to fast one day a month). Regular fasting was also found to be associated with lower glucose levels and lower body mass index overall. Intermittent Fasting Promotes General Health and Longevity There's also plenty of research showing that fasting has a beneficial impact on longevity. There are a number of mechanisms contributing to this effect. Normalizing insulin sensitivity is a major one, but fasting also inhibits the mTOR pathway, which plays an important part in driving the aging process when it is excessively activated. The fact that it improves a number of potent disease markers also contributes to fasting's overall beneficial effects on general health. Interestingly, research11 shows that fasting increases cholesterol — low-density lipoprotein (LDL, often misconstrued as “bad” cholesterol) by an average of 14 percent and high-density lipoprotein (HDL or “good” cholesterol) by 6 percent. Conventional medicine tells us cholesterol should be as low as possible to avoid heart disease, but this is more myth than fact. The reason cholesterol may go up when fasting is because cholesterol is part of the biochemical chain that allows your body to process fat. Dr. Benjamin D. Horne, director of cardiovascular and genetic epidemiology at the Intermountain Medical Center Heart Institute, and the study's lead author, explains: "Fasting causes hunger or stress. In response, the body releases more cholesterol, allowing it to utilize fat as a source of fuel, instead of glucose. This decreases the number of fat cells in the body ... This is important because the fewer fat cells a body has, the less likely it will experience insulin resistance, or diabetes." Horne also found that fasting triggers a dramatic increase in human growth hormone (HGH) — 1,300 percent in women, and 2,000 percent in men. The only other thing that can compete in terms of dramatically boosting HGH levels is high-intensity interval training. HGH, commonly referred to as "the fitness hormone," plays an important role in maintaining health, fitness and longevity, including promotion of muscle growth and boosting fat loss by revving up your metabolism. Fasting also upregulates autophagy and mitophagy — natural cleansing processes necessary for optimal cellular renewal and function — and triggers the generation of stem cells. The cyclical abstinence from food followed by refeeding also massively stimulates mitochondrial biosynthesis. Importantly, most of these rejuvenating and regenerating benefits occur during the refeeding phase, not the fasting phase. The same holds true for nutritional ketosis, which produces the greatest benefits when pulsed (cycling between low net-carb and higher net-carb intakes). For Optimal Results, Combine Fasting With a Ketogenic Diet This brings us to another important point: Recent research shows that intermittent fasting is most beneficial when combined with a ketogenic diet. The study12,13 in question examined the effects of intermittent fasting on weight loss and metabolic disease risk parameters in obese volunteers. Here, the participants were allowed to eat whatever they wanted in any quantity between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m., while fasting for the remaining 16 hours. The outcomes were then compared to a nonintervention control group. Overall, participants consumed about 350 fewer calories per day and lost just under 3 percent of their body weight after three months. Systolic blood pressure also dropped about 7 mmHg, compared to the historical control group. While this may sound “good enough,” there’s an important detail that needs to be addressed. While participants did lose weight, other really important metabolic health parameters did not significantly improve, including visceral fat mass, diastolic blood pressure, triglycerides, fasting glucose and fasting insulin. One of the key benefits of intermittent fasting is normalizing your glucose and insulin levels — along with many other biological metrics, including all of the ones mentioned above — and that simply didn’t happen here. While the authors didn’t offer an explanation, I believe the answer is fairly obvious, based on the evidence. The participants were not instructed to alter WHAT they ate, and if they were anything like a majority of Americans, a large portion of their diet was likely processed food and probably even fast food. I’ve repeatedly stressed the importance of eating a diet high in healthy fats, moderate in protein with unrestricted amounts of fresh vegetables to optimize overall health on any intermittent fasting program. This study basically shows you what happens when you fail to address your food choices. In a nutshell, unless you also balance your macronutrient ratios, you might lose weight but you’ll forgo many of the most important health benefits. If you lose weight but don’t move the needle on glucose, insulin and other disease risk parameters, then you’re not impacting your chronic disease risk. So, for optimal health and longevity, I believe it’s really important to combine intermittent fasting with cyclical nutritional ketosis. Cyclical is the key term here, as once you are metabolically flexible I believe the research is clear you do not want to remain in chronic ketosis as that is counterproductive to long-term health. You must regularly cycle in and out of ketosis, ideally on days when you are doing strength training. The cyclical ketogenic diet provides many of the same health benefits associated with fasting and intermittent fasting, and when done together, most people will experience significant improvements in their health — including not just weight loss,14 which is more of an inescapable side effect of the metabolic improvements that occur, but also improved insulin sensitivity,15 increased muscle mass, reduced inflammation and oxidative damage,16 reduced risk of cancer and Alzheimer’s,17 and increased longevity. Why Cycle In and Out of Ketosis? A ketogenic diet and intermittent fasting both allow your body to shift from sugar- to fat-burning — an important metabolic flexibility that in turn promotes optimal function of all the cells and systems in your body. And, while there’s evidence supporting either of these as stand-alone strategies, it seems clear to me that combining them will produce the best results overall. As there are caveats with intermittent fasting, such as the importance of eating healthy whole or minimally processed foods when you do eat, there are caveats when it comes to nutritional ketosis as well. Most people believe continuous keto is the key to success, but mounting evidence suggests this is not the case. This is why the mitochondrial metabolic therapy (MMT) program detailed in my book, “Fat for Fuel,” stresses cyclical ketosis. There are at least two significant reasons for the pulsed approach: 1. Insulin suppresses hepatic glucogenesis, i.e., the production of glucose by your liver. When insulin is chronically suppressed long-term, your liver starts to compensate for the deficit by making more glucose. As a result, your blood sugar can begin to rise even though you’re not eating any carbohydrates. In this situation, eating carbohydrates will actually lower your blood sugar, as the carbs will activate insulin, which will then suppress your liver’s production of glucose. Long-term chronic suppression of insulin is an unhealthy metabolic state that is easily avoidable by cycling in and out of keto. 2. More importantly, many of the metabolic benefits associated with nutritional ketosis in general actually occur during the refeeding phase. During the fasting phase, clearance of damaged cell and cell content occurs, but the actual rejuvenation process takes place during refeeding. In other words, cells and tissues are rebuilt and restored to a healthy state once your intake of net carbs increases. (The rejuvenation that occurs during refeeding is also one of the reasons intermittent fasting is so beneficial, as you’re cycling between feast and famine.) What You Eat, and When, Have a Significant Impact on Your Health In summary, while eating real food is the foundation for a healthy life, you can significantly leverage the benefits of a healthy whole diet by making small tweaks to your meal timing, macronutrient ratios, and cycling in and out of ketosis once your body regains its ability to burn fat. Again, fasting and nutritional ketosis provide many of the same benefits, and both work best when implemented in a pulsed fashion. For instructions on how to implement cyclical keto and fasting, see “Why Intermittent Fasting Is More Effective Combined With Ketogenic Diet.” Together, I believe cyclical keto and intermittent fasting is a near-unbeatable combination capable of really maximizing the health benefits of both. Importantly, when deciding your intermittent fasting schedule, remember to eat your last meal as early in the afternoon as possible, to optimize your metabolism and avoid the side effects of late-night eating, which include increased hunger, inflammation and a heightened cancer risk.