As we near the traditional witching hour for New Years resolutions — the third week of the year, when our resolve traditionally begins to dissolve, here come fightin’ words in the form of a survey from “a pioneer in online personality tests.” OK, that description, of Queendom.com, may not inspire the confidence of a Gallup or 538 poll, but the findings are interesting nonetheless. To wit …
Of 230 men and women surveyed regarding their will to lose and get healthy, men gave themselves a score of 65 out of 100, women a 61. Of course, this sounds like a self assessment, in which case the result isn’t surprising.read more
With high temperatures expected to soar into the mid-70s in parts of North Carolina this weekend, you have no excuse for not getting into the wild, be it learning to reconnoiter at the coast, scoping birds in the Piedmont or hiking the Blue Ridge escarpment.read more
Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. To help ease the transition, every Monday we feature a 90 Second Escape — essentially, a 90-second video of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake … anywhere as long as it’s not under a fluorescent bulb.read more
A new year brings new opportunities to be active: go birding with seasoned birders on the Outer Banks or learn the sport of curling. Or, stick to the tried-and-true with a good ol’ winter mountain hike, courtesy the Carolina Mountain Club.
Coast
We adopt a three-day weekend for the purposes of this week’s recommendations in order to alert you to the weekly bird walks held every Friday at the Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge. Pea Island is home to about 400 species of birds, and now is a good time to catch a good mix of year-round residents and migrants down for the winter from Canada and other points north.read more
We’ll spend the first few weeks of 2013 looking at issues of particular relevance to many of you as the new year unfolds. Today, the first working day of the year, we start our Happy, Healthy New Year — heretofore shorthanded to HHNY — segments with what’s likely at the top of most of your lists: losing weight. I originally wrote the following for the Charlotte Observer, where it appeared last month. Click on each section entry for more information.read more
