1. Have a maximum BMI < 25.
2. Engage in daily moderate and weekly vigorous physical activity.
3. Gain no more than 11 lbs. since age 18.
4. Eat 5 or more servings of fruit and vegetables daily.
5. Consume > 400g. of complex carbohydrates daily.
6. Limit alcohol intake to < 14g./day.
7. Limit red meat consumption to < 80g./day.
8. Limit daily consumption of fat < 30% of total caloric intake.
9. Limit use of sodium to < 2,400 mg/day.

Doctors are always working to preserve our health and cooks to destroy it, but the latter are the more often successful.
     - Denis Diderot (1713-84) French philosopher and writer

Give me health and a day, and I will make the pomp of emperors ridiculous.
     - Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82) poet and essayist

To avoid sickness, eat less, to prolong life, worry less.
     - Chu Hui Weng, Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine, 4:985,1928

RETIREMENT

As I wandered on the Trinity Trails
Abutting the river and verdant dales,
I had time to mentally pause, gently think
About the past that to now did link.

When I could not meet my patients' wills
I thought I should leave my surgical skills.

But something else must duplicate the loss
Or my brain would vegetate, as with moss.

"Do I miss it?" Many so inquire.

The negative denotes no lack of fire,
Rather two score plus years of joy,
A career earned, owned, caressed-not a ploy.

I'm mightily striving to fill the lack
So my mind's satiety will again come back.

A new calling is certainly needed
To replace that, formerly ceded.

What endeavor would satisfy my desires,
A mental stimulant, not one that tires?

Would it be golf, tennis, card games- a greeter?

No, my psyche's taste required something sweeter.

So I chose to pursue the world of words,
Organized and concise, not like curds.

Poetry, essays, stories, other prose,
Verily brought my gap to a close.

     - The above poem was composed while I was
        walking a segment of the Trinity Trails in Fort Worth, Texas.