I went in search of an exercise equivalent for “fast easy recipes” and came up with a good find.   The Daily Fitness Solution provides 20 minute workouts that don’t require a gym or equipment.  It’s written by Reinhard Engels, who works in bioinformatics visualization at MIT.  So, as you might expect, his program is logical, simple and without hype.

The workout program is more than reasonable, with rest days built in (which could be swapped with a workout day if you are on call)  No matter how busy you are, you can probably find 20 minutes!

I also liked his approach to weight loss – the  The No “S” diet:

The No S Diet, also known as the “Grandma Diet,” the “Why Didn’t I Think of that Diet,” and the “No $ Diet” is a program of systematic moderation I invented for myself that I imagine might work for similarly minded people.

No funny science or calorie accounting involved, just a few simple and mnemonic tricks for giving your willpower the upper hand.

There are just three rules and one exception:

• No Snacks
• No Sweets
• No Seconds

Except (sometimes) on days that start with “S”

That’s it.

How could something this simple possibly work? Precisely because it’s simple — or rather, following the Einsteinian dictum, “as simple as possible, but not simpler.”