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Well Amanda seems to be coming out of Flu territory -- though she still doesn't seem 100%.

I, however, seem to be going into it.

Eating right when you're sick is a challenge because you often don't want to eat anything -- and when you are hungry, you want comfort foods that can't be good for you. Going into our third week there's been more cheating because summoning the will to care for yourself is hard when you can barely summon the will to lift your head before coughing up a lung.

I know a lot of you are under the weather out there -- how are you handling it?

Yeah -- where staying healthy is concerned, this week has been almost a complete wash.

Amanda and I both came down with the flu and spent a lot of time coughing, stuffing ourselves with medication and, more than once, ordering in and not really caring about calories, fat, cholesterol or any of the rest of it.

The urge to comfort food culminated last night when we actually ordered in Chinese. My love for Chinese food is just this side of being a substance abuse problem, and this is the first time since vowing to get healthy that I've had any. We did split one entree (they're more than big enough for it and that's a good way to mitigate the initial bad decision) but I also ordered dumplings. Like Amanda caving to ice cream, this was my low point. And I was too sick to even enjoy it properly.

Neither of us have been to the gym this week, either. But Amanda's on the mend and I should be by next week. We'll be working hard next week to make up for this one.

Attention men and squeamish women: if you will be overly offended by women's health issues, you should probably just surf away now.

You've been warned.

The last few days it's been tough to keep up my healthy lifestyle plans. I'm tired, so I've sat in front of the TV at home instead of going to the gym every night. Worse yet, I've been craving all the stuff I've managed to avoid the last few weeks: sundaes, brownies and chips.

You've probably already guessed the problem. Three little letters...P...M...S!

Normally, I would just pick up a pint of Ben & Jerry's Oatmeal Cookie Chunk and throw the covers over my head until the whole thing was over. But, in the spirit of this endeavor, I decided to explore the causes -- and potential solutions -- to this monthly dilemma that can throw a woman off her best laid dieting plans.

Enter Lynda Brown, a UNCG professor and researcher with a PhD in nutrition.

Jack LaLanne lets his viewers in on the secret to happiness: fresh fruits and vegetables, lean meats and, maybe, a little singing.

Jack had it down thirty years ago -- how did so many of us get so fat and miserable anyway?

I think I've mentioned the book You: The Owner's Manual on the blog a few times now.

It's been a huge bestseller and I recommend it to anyone interested in a clear, concise and often humorous explanation of how our bodies work and simple ways to make them work better.

One of the book's authors, Dr. Mehmet Oz, will be on Discovery Health tonight with two back-to-back shows. The first (9 p.m. ET) based on his book You: Staying Young and the second You: The Owner's Manual (10 p.m. ET).

Dr. Oz has been a regular on Oprah for a while and is always witty and informative. I'll be watching him tonight - you should too.

Michael Pollan, author of In Defense of Food and The Omnivore's Delimma lectured recently as part of the Authors@Google series.

Here's the video. Really good stuff.

Pollan, a professor Science and Environmental Journalism at UC Berkley, has written extensively about everything from the health implications of the ubiquitousness of corn and high fructose corn syrup to the politics of the way we eat.

There's also an audio interview with him from NPR's Science Friday here.

Reader Fred Gregory sends a link to an article about restaurants beginning to print their nutritional information on their menus.

Its title: Would you eat 2,900 calorie cheese fries?

For the record, Outback Steakhouse's Aussie Cheese Fries (the very ones that inspired this blog) have been named Men's Health magazine's #1 Worst Food in America.