Fit friends may help you lose weight

So, I was reading my latest copy of Men's Health and one of their little tidbits in the margin caught my eye. It referenced a study in the journal Obesity about how hanging out with fit friends may help you lose weight, even if you're not trying to.

Now, I'm pretty sure that hanging out with fit friends is already PHYSICALLY good for me. I run more/farther/faster, bike more/farther/faster, swim more/farther/faster, etc. But it's interesting that even if you aren't trying, there's a subconscious benefit where you try to emulate their behaviors (hopefully the good eating and exercise habits).

Now for a rant

WTF, we have an obesity epidemic and the frikkin journal that, literally, writes the book on the topic charges 32 dollars for a single article! You can get a year's worth of Men's Health (full of good information) for like 10 or 20 bucks. Maybe I'm not the target market for the fancy "journal". Guess I'll stick to my glossy magazine that shows up for nearly free in my mailbox every month.

Then again, I just read a bit of the abstract about the article...here, take a look

Despite significant efforts, obesity continues to be a major public health problem, and there are surprisingly few effective strategies for its prevention and treatment. We now realize that healthy diet and activity patterns are difficult to maintain in the current physical environment. Recently, it was suggested that the social environment also contributes to obesity. Therefore, using network-based interaction models, we simulate how obesity spreads along social networks and predict

blahblahblahblahblah. If the whole article is that long and drawn out maybe i should be happy with the 50 word version they stuck in my Men's Health

Oh yeah, thank's to my future brother in law Rob for the subscription-- great x-mas present bro