A job is something all of us have to do to get by. Those at the top tell other people what to do. Everyone else has to obey in order to take care of pesky things like rent and food. Not everyone is cut out for all the positions out there, though most of us try to do our best with the one we have.

Then there are the weird jobs that you’ve never heard of. In fact, you probably wouldn’t know where to begin if you got one of them. Nevertheless, all of them exist and are consistently looking for applicants—if you know where to look. These aren’t run-of-the-mill, nine-to-five affairs. Instead, they require specific sets of skills that you can only obtain once you get them.

10 Professional Sleeper

“I wish I could be paid for sleeping” is something most of us have thought at some point in our lives, mostly right after we have to wake up to go to work. It makes sense, too, as sleeping is amazing. But what if we were to tell you that you could actually get paid to sleep? In some cases, you’ll earn a lot (depending on where you sleep).

A professional sleeper is a serious occupation and provides services that are required in many modern industries. Although it’s not your typical full-time job, you could earn a sizable income if you land the right gigs.

From researchers (who regularly need sleep testers for various experiments) to mattress brands that need sleepers to test their products and artists who require sleeping subjects, professional sleeping could be a lucrative career if you advertise yourself well enough.^[1]

9 Parabolic Expert

When you train to be an astronaut, one of the first things you have to learn is how to maneuver yourself in a gravity-free environment. Although it may not sound like a big deal, you’d be surprised how difficult it is.

Inherently, our bodies are trained to only work in gravity. It takes a long time just to get used to a gravity-free environment, let alone be able to engage in day-to-day functions in it.

The people who impart that training are known as parabolic experts, one of the most coveted and highly skilled occupations in the going-into-space industry. In fact, only nine people in the world are qualified to do it.^[2]

First, they must become excellent at free-falling in an aircraft (aka a vomit comet in casual NASA lingo). This is the only way to simulate a microgravity environment on Earth for training potential astronauts to go on missions. It’s not their job to actually go into space, even though they’re a crucial part of nearly every space mission.

8 Professional Mourner

The death of a loved one can be difficult to deal with, and everyone copes in his own way. Some people mourn for days before getting their lives back to normal. Others shut themselves away until they can be around people again.

Still others take it one step further and get professional mourners to do their grieving. Although it may sound weird to the rest of us, these mourners are dedicated professionals in quite a few parts of the world.^[3]

Professional mourning has been a thing for thousands of years in many regions, including Africa, China, and ancient Egypt. However, China is mostly where it’s still big business.

The job consists of showing up to the funeral and staging a believable session of mourning—complete with physically breaking down and wailing. This may sound alien to the rest of us, but it’s completely normal in Chinese culture. These pros can also earn quite a bit depending on how good they are.

7 White Hat Hackers

With almost everything from traffic to government databases to supply line inventories of big corporations now operating through the Internet, hacking is an increasingly serious threat for almost everyone. This is especially true of hackers in countries where the Internet isn’t regulated much.

As a result, there’s an equally high demand for good hackers who know the basics of getting into networks without being detected. They expose vulnerabilities in high-value targets like government databases.

Known as white hat hackers (as opposed to the regular black hat hackers), these individuals are hired by corporations and governments around the world to do their best to get into the employers’ networks. If you’re really good at it, you may earn a fortune for doing a contract job, with a chance to be hired by your client at the end of it.

The best part?

Absolutely no one will ask how you got those skills in the first place as long as you’ve never used them to do actual harm. To qualify, you simply need to get really good at hacking. Just make sure you don’t practice on live targets, as that is illegal.^[4]

6 Iceberg Movers

Potable drinking water is already on the brink of running out for the whole world. We may not hear much about it because the crisis isn’t as dire in the loudest parts of the world yet.

Many countries are now looking to Earth’s natural ice reserves for help. They are devising plans to haul entire icebergs from the South Pole to their shores to harvest water. The job is given to iceberg moving companies, where you can apply to work if you’re up for it.

Iceberg moving may sound impossible—like mountain relocation or beach stealing. However, many Middle Eastern countries are already grappling with serious water scarcity issues, so they’re willing to give it a shot.^[5]

Some iceberg towing companies are already on their way to get the first icebergs to some of those countries. Middle Eastern governments are also hoping that huge floating icebergs off the shores of their countries may serve as tourist attractions, too.

5 Futurist

Many current jobs have never existed before, including that of a futurist. If it sounds like someone who sits around all day and makes predictions like a fortune-teller, it absolutely is—except that the predictions have to be backed by data.

It is one of the more accessible jobs on this list (though not for scientific fields). In fact, anyone can apply to be a futurist as many New Age firms are starting to see the importance of the position.^[6]

A futurist’s role is to study current data and make reasonable predictions about future trends based on that information. A government may employ a futurist to predict social changes in order to estimate taxes in the future. An advertising firm may try to find out what kind of messaging consumers are likely to respond to 20 years from now.

Depending on your field, a job as a futurist can be as awesome as it sounds or just entail data crunching all day like your old job.

4 Food Stylist

Over the years, food advertising has come a long way. If you’ve ever seen a food ad and thought “wow, that looks good,” it’s not because that’s how it’s supposed to look. Instead, a highly specialized type of professional called a food stylist made the food look good for the camera.

If “food stylist” sounds like a joke, we assure you that it’s absolutely not. You can go to your local employment listings website and find a posting for one of these right now.^[7]

The job is not easy to do, either. Apparently, styling food is an art form that you master after years of persistent practice, which also involves know-how of photography and videography.

If you do get your foot in the door and become a food stylist for a local firm, you may work your way up and someday get to style food for the big brands. Needless to say, that pays quite well.

3 LEGO Master Builder

LEGO bricks transcend age, sex, borders, and race. No matter who you are or what you do, a LEGO set is all you need to push aside everything else and spend the next four hours trying to build something that you’ll give up on anyway. And that’s okay. A big part of the company’s success is being able to engage the inherent builder in all of us, even if we’re not that good at the job.

That doesn’t mean that everyone’s bad at it. We all had that one kid in class who could build intricate structures out of LEGO sets and simply mesmerize us. If you were one of those kids and have always wanted to do this for a living, you can get paid tons of money for it.

Known as LEGO master builders, these guys are employed by the LEGO Group to create those huge structures built of LEGO bricks that occasionally go viral on the Internet. If playing with LEGO pieces has been your dream all along, you could definitely give this a shot. However, you’d have to be really good at it to even stand a chance.^[8]

2 Shark Tank Cleaner

Most people visiting a shark tank (not the TV show) have a great time, maybe have a snack or two, and then return home. However, the curious ones look at the whole setup and think, “I wonder who cleans that?”

There’s no way to keep the artificially created ecosystem healthy without someone actually going into the tank and manually cleaning it. In fact, there are shark tank cleaners tasked with doing exactly that.

The job is dangerous because the sharks are always in the aquarium. You can’t just make an expensive secondary tank to house the animals until the cleaning is done.

However, the cleaning isn’t what makes this a badass job. It’s getting used to being around sharks that are already angry at all humans for keeping them in captivity. The cleaners have to learn shark behavior and be good at diving—as well as knowing when to get out—to even be considered for the role. They spend around 30–40 hours in the tank per week as a part of their job.^[9]

1 Odor Judge

Smell is an important sense, which is apparent by how many products rely on it to make sales. From soaps to deodorants to candles, how a product smells is as much a part of its commercial success as its appearance. So, who is in charge of making sure that things smell the way they should?

You guessed it (presumably from the title of this entry). Odor judges determine the best smell for a particular product. Obviously, they have to go through plenty of bad odors, like those from armpits, to come up with a deodorant to counter the smell.

It may sound like a horrible job, but it’s also a crucial one. They also deal with issues like whether a particular type of seafood is contaminated by a nearby oil spill. Of course, you must have a keen sense of smell to qualify for this job, and it may end up paying quite well if you work at a large organization.^[10]

You can check out Himanshu’s stuff at Cracked and Screen Rant, get in touch with him for writing gigs at [email protected], or just say hello to him on Twitter.

From the moment you’re born you’re on a one way street towards death. No one has avoided it yet, so there’s no reason to be too worried. Realistically, you probably avoid dozens if not hundreds of potential ways to die every day. From car accidents to falls to choking on a chicken bone, you could get done-in at any moment. But worrying about it is hardly the way to live your life.

That said, while we can all do our due diligence to stay safe and breathing, there are several things you may do that are inching you ever closer to having your ticket punched without you even realizing it. 

10. Having An Apple Shaped Body Puts You at Higher Risk of Death

You probably don’t need to be told again that your diet and weight and exercise and all that jazz influences your overall health. Poor diet and poor health are more likely to lead you to an earlier grave. But did you know that your shape also influences this? As in your literal, physical shape.

Some people have what you might call a pear-shaped body, while others are a little more apple-shaped. Does it make a difference? More than you know. Research has shown that an overweight person who is pear-shaped is actually at less risk of death than someone with a “normal” weight who would be considered apple-shaped.

If you carry all your weight at your waistline, your risk of dying from any number of causes is higher than those who carry it on their hips and thighs. Traditionally, people, including doctors, are more focused on BMI. But this research suggests that even those with a good BMI who are thin but not muscular can still be less healthy than someone with a high BMI and more body fat. 

In studies of over 15,000 people, those with higher waist-to-hip ratio who were not overweight were at a greater risk, up to two times, than people considered overweight and obese. Abdominal fat is more linked to type 2 diabetes, some kinds of cancer, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure and even dementia.

9. A Lack of Friends Puts You at a Higher Risk of Death 

Good news for social butterflies, there’s evidence that your friends are helping you live longer. Bad news for various introverts and people who just don’t socialize well, because that means the opposite for you. A lack of friends and overall loneliness puts you at a greater risk of death than many other factors such as obesity, blood pressure and even smoking.

One study concluded that social isolation can have the same effect on your overall health as smoking 15 cigarettes per day. It can shorten your lifespan by as much as 15 years. People who suffer loneliness and isolation have a 50% greater risk of dementia as well as 29% increased risk of heart disease and a 32% increase in stroke risk. Across the board, it’s bad news.

If you’re feeling good about your own social life, then you should know many people aren’t. A third of people over 45 report feeling lonely, which can still happen even if others are around, while a quarter of those over 65 qualify as socially isolated, which means a lack of social connections.

8. Losing a Spouse Increases Your Risk of Death

Keeping in line with how relationships affect your health, losing a spouse can only devastate the partner left behind. Along with the emotional trauma of losing your partner, there’s also a potential physical toll. 

A massive study over over 370,000 elderly couples across nearly a decade showed that when one partner dies, the odds of dying from literally anything will increase for the surviving partner. Cause-specific mortality increases as well for things like cancer, infections and more. 

Other studies have shown that the younger a person is when their spouse dies, the more likely they are to die within the year. This is especially true for men. Men were 70% more likely to die within a year of their spouse dying than similarly aged men who had not lost a partner. Women were 27% more likely to die.

7. More Than 11 Moles On Your Arm Raises Your Skin Cancer Risk

For years now doctors have recommended going to get any suspicious moles on your body checked out in case it’s skin cancer. Most people have several moles already but if you sprout a new one or one grows larger or in an odd shape, it’s a good sign you may need to have it looked at. 

Less well known is that moles, in general, are a sign you may be at risk for skin cancer. Some research has shown that if you have over 11 moles on your right arm, you are now at higher risk for skin cancer. Feel free to take a second to count yours. 

If you got over 11, you may want to keep an eye on them and make sure you’re using sunscreen. Having over 50 moles anywhere on your body is also a risk factor. But if you got up to 100 moles, then the data suggests you’re now at 5 times the normal risk for skin cancer.

6. Couples Without Kids Have Higher Mortality Rates

The number of people in America who are choosing to not have children is growing, with 44% of non-parents between 18 and 49 saying they probably won’t ever have kids. And while it’s a growing and popular sentiment these days, some people may want to think twice as there’s evidence couples without kids don’t live as long.

Women who don’t have kids have shown a fourfold increase in death rates. Yes, there are a number mitigating factors to consider as well, but there’s a noteworthy correlation, nonetheless.  The biggest thing to consider in a Danish study that looked at 21,000 couples seeking IVF was that they could not have children for whatever reason so there could have been a myriad of other health issues at play. 

While the researchers could not assign causation and the numbers were low, just 316 deaths in 11 years, they were still something of a statistical anomaly. 

5. Diet Soda Has Been Linked to Increased Risk of Stroke and Death in Women

The soda industry is massive, raking in $221.6 billion in 2020. For some, the sugar is too much and so they stick to diet soda. It’s not nearly as big as the entire business but diet soft drinks pull in over $4 billion per year. And sure, you’re cutting back on sugar but you may not be doing yourself any favors in the long run.

Artificially sweetened drinks have been linked to increased risk to a variety of health concerns including stroke and coronary disease. The study involved 80,000 postmenopausal women between 50 and 79 over the course of 12 years. The women who had two or more diet drinks a day were at 23% greater risk of stroke, 29% greater risk of coronary heart disease and had an overall risk of death increased by 16%. The risk factors increased further for women who were obese or of African American descent. 

Again, there was no definite cause-and-effect link here but the noteworthy correlation may at least make you want to consider reaching for some water instead of a diet soda next time.

4. Tall, Thin Men Are at Higher Risk of Collapsed Lung

Obviously there’s no “right” body type but society tends to lean towards some being more desirable to most people than others. Being tall and thin, for instance, is typically considered healthy and attractive. But that’s not always true. 

Tall, thin men are at an increased risk of pneumothorax, or collapsed lungs. It happens when air gets between your chest cavity and your lungs and then pushes down on the lung. Men are at highest risk between ages 20 and 40 and if you’re tall but underweight, that increases your risk further. 

One theory is that growth spurts can spur the condition on. You grow taller while not gaining enough weight to keep up with the height and it causes a weakening of the lungs, which can then collapse. About half the patients who come into the Chest Medicine Clinic in Edmonton are tall, thin men.

3. Taller People Are at greater Risk of Cancer

Speaking of the dangers of being tall, your height may play a role in your cancer risk. There are 6 different cancers that seem to have increased risk for those who are taller. A study that followed nearly 1.3 million women over years showed that the relative risk of all cancers increases by 10% for every 10 cm or 4 inches over average height that you are. And that’s just in general.

Specific cancers carry different risks. Based on a 5 cm or 2 inch increase in height over the average you are at a 10% greater risk of kidney cancer, 8% for ovarian cancer, 4% for prostate cancer and 5% for colorectal. Other cancers have similar risks based on height, too.

2. Toxoplasmosis Significantly Increases Your Risk of Traffic Accidents

Toxoplasmosis is one of those things everyone on the internet knows about because plenty of sites have written about all the goofy ways it may mess with your brain. It’s been an internet staple for over 15 years. But the thing is, we keep discovering new ways it may mess with us.

So the original story about this parasite is that it infects mice and rats and makes them lose their fear of cats because it wants to get into the cats to continue its life cycle. So brave little rats get killed by cats and the parasite moves to the cat. Then you, a cat owner, get infected by cleaning your litter box. But what does it do to humans?

Aside from everything the other sites mention, including our own, toxoplasmosis may cause car accidents. It’s estimated that between 30% and 60% of the world population has been infected by toxoplasma gondii and part of the effect it has on humans seems to be slowed reaction times.

Based on comparisons between infected and non-infected individuals, those who have signs of the parasite are at a 2.65 times higher risk of traffic accidents. Those who have been infected longer show a lower risk, however.  Something to consider next time you plan to head out for a drive after cleaning the litter.

1. People Who Didn’t Get the Covid Vaccine Are at Higher Risk of Traffic Accidents

Here’s one that’ll melt your brain for a minute. We all know that the Covid vaccine caused a bit of a divide amongst people. Most of us got it and some people thought it was part of some government and pharmacy company conspiracy to poison the population. Ignore all of that for now. Research has shown that people who didn’t get the vaccine are at a significantly higher risk of traffic accidents.

Researchers looked at over 11.2 million people over a one month period. Of that group, 16% didn’t get vaccinated while the remaining 84% did. There were 6,682 traffic accidents reported among all of them. The unvaccinated group accounted for 25% of all the crashes which translates to a 72% increased relative risk compared to the vaccinated. Even adjusted for diverse variations like age, sex, location, economic status and more the increase is still 48%.

So how does not being vaccinated relate to car crashes? The research can’t draw concrete conclusions but the hypothesis is that there are psychological factors at play that put a person who would be hesitant to get the vaccine at greater risk of accidents. In other words, people who are distrustful of public health recommendations may be more inclined to ignore driving rules and be reckless behind the wheel.

Many lists out there are out to tell you that all the foods you enjoy are secretly terrible, and that you should stop eating them. They will go on at length about the secret fats, or bugs, or other awful processing that makes you never want to eat food again. This is not one of those lists. Instead, we are here to bring you joy by talking about how foods that you may not have thought were healthy at all, or you even thought were just plain bad for you, are much better for you than you ever imagined. Below are 10 foods that you didn’t know are good for you.

10. Eggs Are Not As Bad For Cholesterol As People Think

Eggs are a controversial food in terms of health. They were once thought quite healthy to the point people ate a lot of them, then people started worrying about their cholesterol and stopped eating them nearly as much, sometimes eating only the egg whites. However, more recently, scientists concluded that saturated fat was a much bigger cause for heart disease, and that eggs were not as bad as we had started to think. This is because they had at first believed that eating too much food with high cholesterol was the biggest contributor, but it turns out eating foods high in saturated fat is what is more likely to increase cholesterol levels.

They don’t recommend binging on eggs, but one egg a day for a healthy adult is okay, and three a week is the limit recommended for those who already have heart or other issues. And as long as you eat them in moderation, eggs are a great source of nutrition that are very good for you. If you keep your overall cholesterol intake reasonable throughout the day, you can get away with enjoying the protein and other nutrients packed into a single egg.

9. Chocolate Actually Isn’t Bad For Your Teeth (At Least Compared To Fruity And Acidic Sweets)

Most of the time dentists are known for hating Halloween and all candies involved, but if you ask your dentist what candy you are allowed to eat, the answer may surprise you. Most people would imagine the answer would be “none”, but many dentists believe that chocolate, especially darker chocolate is not only not bad for your teeth, but can actually have positive effects. Eating chocolate in general is less destructive to the enamel than the more hard or sticky candies, and is much easier to wash off from the teeth.

Dark chocolate also tends to have less sugar, which is less destructive as well. It is also low in acidity compared to most non-chocolate candies, which is another plus when worrying about your oral health. Dark chocolate also contains polyphenols that can help fight bad breath, and has flavonoids that some dentists believe is effective at slowing tooth decay. If you are worried about the health of the neighborhood children next Halloween, just pass out something like Hershey’s Special Dark, and you can rest easy knowing that you aren’t contributing to the downfall of their oral health. While the stereotype of the dentist passing out apples and such may have made it into popular culture, it is more than a little silly. A dentist would likely not give out something as sugary, acidic and sweet as an apple that could break a small child’s tooth or harm their teeth – they would be much more likely to just give them dark chocolate, or perhaps gum sweetened with xylitol.

8. Tuna May Be Dangerous, But Canned Salmon Is Good For You

People used to think of tuna as the ultimate cheap, go-to healthy food that you could use for almost anything in a rush, and get a lot of protein and other nutrients, as well as omega 3 fatty acids, in one go. Unfortunately, now people are worried about mercury levels in tuna, and not many people want to risk eating it more than rarely. However, if you want to get the health benefits of the tuna without the mercury risk at a decent price, canned salmon is actually a great option. And even if you can afford it, fresh may not necessarily be the way to go. Larger fish are more likely to have more mercury, and fresher, larger catches could contain higher levels. Canned salmon is generally farmed in conditions where you don’t even have to worry about mercury levels.

On top of not needing to worry about the dangers of mercury as you would with tuna, it is also only a little bit more expensive. It is packed with protein, omega 3 fatty acids, Vitamin D, healthy unsaturated fats and other nutrients that are especially good for you. Some people may not think of canned foods as healthy, but canned salmon is actually a very cheap and convenient way to get the benefits of tuna without the risk. Just be careful of small pieces of bone, as they can sometimes be found in canned salmon.

7. Frozen Vegetables Are Often Better And Safer Than Fresh Produce

Most people would think that eating fresh food is the way to go, and in a way they would be right. If you could regularly go to a farmers market and buy only fresh, in season fruits and vegetables, then that would be the optimal situation. However, for most people, that really isn’t an option – the vast majority of people do most of their shopping at chain supermarkets. When you are buying at a chain supermarket, eating fresh may actually not be as nutritious or as healthy as you think. When you buy fresh produce, it still had to be shipped quite a way across the country, without ever going through any freezing preservation process – this makes it lose freshness and nutrients. There are also many hands that touch it before you do, increasing the chance of diseases like E. coli spreading because of tainted produce.

On the other hand, frozen produce is usually flash frozen right at the source when it is at peak freshness. And unless it is sitting in a freezer for a long time, it tends to keep the nutrients, due to the flash freezing process. You also don’t really have to worry as much about disease, because the extreme temperatures from the freezing destroy bacteria and help prevent any future growth as it remains in a freezer.

6. Capsaicin, Commonly Found In Chilis, Is Good For Naturally Reducing Inflammation

When most people think of hot chili peppers, they think of crazy people on YouTube eating the hottest possible on a dare, and then making the most excruciating faces as they try to come to terms with what they just did. Many people tend to think of very spicy foods as only for flavor, or for people to try to show others how tough they think they are. However, eating chili peppers is actually good for you, and has medical applications. The key is the active compound in chili peppers known as capsaicin. This compound triggers an endorphin rush that causes your brain to block pain receptors.

Medical experts have especially found it useful for treating arthritis pain, and also for helping the itching and inflammation caused by Psoriasis. In general, capsaicin is a very good anti-inflammatory, and is used in more products than people may realize. Sports relief gels like icy hot use the active ingredient in capsaicin to help give you that familiar burning sensation, and then menthol to give you a cooling sensation afterward. Of course, this doesn’t mean you should binge on anything. Eating chili peppers raw can be bad for your stomach, and eating too much of any one thing can easily cause you indigestion.

5. Garlic And Onions Are Good For You, But Lose Effectiveness The More You Cook Them

Onions and garlic are interesting items on this list because a fair number of you probably already consider them to be good for you. However, many of you may also be accidentally destroying all the health benefits of this food before it ever actually reaches your mouth. Both of these foods are very similar to each other, hailing from the allium genus, which includes other onion-type foods such as shallots. Both of these foods have long been hailed in folk medicine as both preventative and curative, and modern science has recently confirmed ways in which they are good for you. The organosulphur compounds, especially those in garlic, are good for preventing heart disease and as cancer prevention. Onions are often used when dealing with colds, and can help balance blood sugars levels – although it is not enough as a substitute for those who need insulin.

However, most of these benefits are completely destroyed with just a little bit of cooking. Putting garlic in a microwave quickly destroys the health benefits in less than a minute, and onion is very similar. Eating them raw is the most beneficial way to get the nutrients from these foods, but many people may find that unpalatable. For those who wish to cook them part-way but still get most of the health benefits, there are methods you can use.

For garlic, it is recommended that you crush it up and let it sit for a while first. Crushing it activates a compound called alliinase that allows the organosulphur compounds to start working, before the heat can prevent them from doing so. However, too much cooking can still finish off anything healthy about them even this way, so it is recommended to add it to your skillet near the end of cooking. For onions, you can bake them in their skins, which will soften them up and mellow out the flavor, while protecting most of the nutrients within. You could also add raw onion slices to a hamburger – a very delicious and easy way to add nutritional benefits to your meal.

4. Red Wine Is Good For You, But Only In Moderation And Eaten With Your Largest Meal

Some people may have heard before that red wine is good for you and scoffed at the idea, but it is sort of true. Now, we say sort of because this doesn’t mean you should just go pounding down a bottle of red every night. However, in moderation red wine can actually provide positive health benefits, as part of an overall healthy diet. A study at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel tracked over 200 research participants over two years, with three separate control groups, in order to find the health benefits of red wine. All test subjects regularly had blood work done for the study and answered survey questions as needed.

All groups were on the Mediterranean diet, but with no calorie restrictions. One group was instructed to drink a glass of water with their meals every night, one group a glass of white wine, and one group a glass of red wine. The only difference between the groups was what they drank something different, and the red wine drinkers had higher levels of good cholesterol after the two year study. It is also of note that both types of wine drinkers reported better quality sleep, while the water drinkers did not – although no one reported any adverse health effects. However, we should emphasize again that drinking a lot of wine is still not good for you. None of these test subjects drank more than one small glass of wine a day, and they drank it slowly with their largest meal.

3. Pizza Is Actually Quite Good For You, It’s Just Made In An Unhealthy Way By Most US Manufacturers

Pizza is one of those foods that we never really think about as being healthy. In America it is mostly junk food, and eaten at incredible rates. Junk food pizza is also very common and popular in the United Kingdom these days, due to the convenience, cheapness, and instant gratification. However, even junk food pizza has a lot of good things about it; it just isn’t made as well as it could be. Tomatoes contain lycopene, which is an excellent antioxidant, and in general has a lot of different nutrients you need at the same time. However, most common pizza is made with refined flour and not whole grains, is very greasy, and isn’t that good for you to have often.

This should not cause you to mistake the food itself as unhealthy, though. If made in a healthy way, especially at home with whole grains, it can be a very nutritious food that can get you and your family all the different food groups they need in one big, artisanal pie. Some experts also suggest eating pizza, especially the heavier junk food varieties, earlier in the day, as it is less likely for your body to be slowing down at midday and converting the unhealthy parts of the pizza to fat. Pizza can be a very healthy and nutritious part of a regular diet, as long as whoever makes it does so in a healthy manner and with the right ingredients.

2. Sports Drinks Are Better Than Water As A Temporary Measure To Prevent Dehydration And Water Intoxication

Water intoxication is something many of you have probably already heard of. If you are an athlete, don’t have air conditioning, or are outside in the summer heat for whatever reason doing anything strenuous or just moving around, you could be at risk of dehydration. Most people counter this by drinking gobs of water, and this puts them in danger of water intoxication. This is when you drink so much water so fast that, as you sweat, the sodium in your blood becomes dangerously depleted. This can lead to seizures and even death if it isn’t caught and dealt with fast enough. Sports drinks may seem like unhealthy sugar water, but they are designed the way they are for a reason. Sports drinks need to have salt, in order to help put back in the sodium you are sweating out, and the sugar makes the taste bearable despite it being basically salt water.

While we aren’t suggesting these are healthy drinks you should be having all the time as you sit around the house, it is actually a better option than water for anyone who is looking to avoid dehydration on a hot day and maintain the proper electrolyte balance in their body. However, experts also caution that you shouldn’t just drink sports drinks and consider everything just fine. They slow down water intoxication, and it happens much slower than just drinking plain water, but it can still happen, as sports drinks do not have enough salt to replace what you’re losing. Experts recommend dealing with this by also keeping salty snacks on hand to make sure your electrolyte levels stay properly balanced.

1. Unless You Have Celiac Disease, Gluten Is Not Only Good For You But An Important Part Of Your Diet

Gluten-free has become the latest trend in the United States, and while this can be good for the tiny amount of people who do have celiac disease, due to the increased availability of products, it may not be so good for all the others who are following a gluten-free lifestyle. Now, we want to be clear that you can eat gluten free and be perfectly healthy – many who have celiac do this on a regular basis. However, not eating gluten means losing out on a lot of sources rich in dietary fiber, which most Americans do not get enough of already. You are also losing out on a lot of vitamin fortified foods when you go gluten-free.

Now, those who have been officially diagnosed with celiac disease tend to be following nutritional instructions from their doctor, and have a careful plan to make sure they still get the fiber and vitamins that they need. This often involves eating less common whole grains that you have to go out of your way to find and cook on your own, and taking certain vitamin capsules on a regular basis. The issue is that most people who are following the diet because it’s trendy and they think it’s the latest health craze, despite not having the disease, usually are not following instructions from a doctor, or doing their due diligence to research and eat the right replacement foods. Instead, they just eat gluten-free substitutes, and fail to get the proper nutrients that they actually need. Experts feel that those who think they have celiac disease, or some kind of lesser issue with it, should see their doctor for an official diagnosis. This way the doctor can monitor their health, and make sure they are getting the right foods – or reassure them that they have no problem with gluten after all.