Allow me to sing the praises of George's P & H, located in Aquaschicola.

In the last 25 years, I've probably called them a dozen times to fix something, and each time they made a service call that day. And each time - except once when they had trouble finding a part for a heater probably installed before the Reagan administration - the problem was fixed before I returned from school that afternoon.How's that for super service?My requests have run the gamut: to stop leaks in a kitchen faucet, a toilet bowl, and a bathtub; to replace two water heaters, one that simply aged and one ruined by nine inches of water in my basement; to somehow drain that basement flood and about a half dozen others, which ultimately led to jackhammering the basement floor and installing a sump pump.I express my pleasure with their work in a health-and-fitness column to prove a point. Many bicyclists who do the training rides I do are quite handy around the house, so every time I sing the praises of George's P & H, someone says, "It would've been cheaper to do it yourself."Usually, I simply shrug my shoulders or nod in agreement, but the earthy Englishman in me wants to reply, "No flipping way."Honestly, it really would not be cheaper for me. I own no tools other than a few screwdrivers, a monkey wrench, and a hammer, so I would've needed to purchase whatever. Worse, I possess no handyman skills, none whatsoever, so each job would've required quite an investment in time, and I value my time far more than money.For me, to DIY is D-U-M-B and definitely not "cheaper."Now put that story aside and consider a current health-and-fitness myth: that it's considerably more expensive to eat healthy foods as compared to convenience foods or other unhealthy options. Here are a few of the headlines culled from a recent Internet search that encourage that misconception."Healthy eating is growing more expensive than unhealthy food." "Eating healthy vs. unhealthy will cost you $550 more per year, study reveals." "Healthy food is expensive. So now what?"In the first of those articles, researchers from the University of Cambridge in England determined that the difference in cost in 2012 between healthy and unhealthy foods was staggering.To decide this, the researchers profiled 94 foods and beverages and applied a technique known as nutrient profiling to ascertain the healthiness or unhealthiness of each item. Ultimately, they determined 1000 calories of healthy food cost three times as much as 1000 calories of unhealthy food.In other words, $12 bought 1000 calories of healthy stuff or 3000 calories of stuff that wasn't that year in England. Similar research like this abounds, so it's easy to understand why the eating-healthy-foods-is-more-expensive misbelief exists.But the researchers in this study used the price of food energy - the cost per calorie - as the measuring stick. Think about that. If you do, the "bad" news that good food "costs more" now makes good sense.Why wouldn't the unhealthy foods, often loaded with inexpensive sugars and fats, contain far more calories and therefore be cheaper per calorie than healthy ones?Perform the same study, using the same foods but employing a different standard of measurement - average portion size - and the healthy foods cost less than the unhealthy ones. At least that's what Andrea Carlson and Elizabeth Frazao concluded when they performed a comprehensive study of federal studies for the U.S. Department of Agriculture in May of 2012.The federal government commissioned this study hoping to dispel the notion that following the federal dietary guidelines for healthy eating is more expensive than eating way the average American eats - poorly. To do so, Carlson and Frazao estimated the cost of nearly 4,500 foods and then applied that to prior government research.They found that "foods low in calories for a given weight appear to have a higher price when the price is measured per calorie" - as the University of Cambridge also found - but "when measured on the basis of edible weight or portion size, grains, vegetables, fruit, and dairy foods are less expensive than most protein foods and foods high in saturated fat, added sugars, and/or sodium."Now let's go back to the problems in my basement that would've cost less if I fixed them myself. That statement is as true - and as obvious - as the one put forth by the University of Cambridge study.But when I use a more important measurement than purely out-of-pocket cost, the work George's P & H does for me is a bargain. The same is true when you buy healthy foods.For you, the "more important measurement" is long-term health - but let's not forget an increase in day-to-day energy.To me, the real bargain is that $2 of steamed broccoli only yields 125 calories while $2 of potato chips can have nearly 1000.I hope you feel the same.Kevin Kolodziejski can be reached at

kolo@ptd.net