Tuesday, February 04, 2014
Wintertime ramblings
I wonder if the mayor of Atlanta believes in global climate change. I've lived through bigger snowstorms in the past but this winter has been very disruptive. Yonkers hasn't been preparing the roads this winter, what's up with that? Couldn't get out on some days so couldn't blog and comment. Well I could but my browser app on my smartphone that I've been using just fine all this time has become erratic and I've had trouble logging in lately and here I thought I was cool with the technology. Maybe it's this vast NSA info-vacuum/umbrella they have covering the world right now that have been giving people's devices problems. Guys just what is it that you're looking for? A bad winter for me, not only the app but the roving dog that killed a neighborhood cat, a mysterious pain that comes and goes in my hip area (bursitis?), Dad tripped inside and pulled a muscle but is doing better and work is weird. Philip Seymour Hoffman -- you know I think the Charlie Sheen/Justin Bieber stuff is all made up hype and PR, make 'em into bad boys but the ones we never suspect are really doing stuff. I never got the whole heroin thing, first off I hate needles and what happens when you run out of places to shoot up? I'm just getting back on track here. Guys can I have my app back?
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Even the library was weird and glitchy right now. I go to sit down in this nice comfy chair and a man comes over and says he was sitting there, that he just got up to get a paper. As far as I'm concerned once you relinquish your chair but I said "whatever" and went away. OK that can happen but within practically the next minute I decided to go to the Men's Room and as I pushed the door in, didn't do it hard but a man just on the inside started acting all dramatic and in pain so I said did I hit you with the door? and he said yeah. I go "the elbow?" "yeah" and so I apologized and he left. Now I'm not usually superstitious but at that point I just decided to leave the building. There's Seinfeld laws of glitches and happenings at work that I just don't understand.
ReplyDeleteWeather: it has been a lot colder out this way as well, wind chills down to minus 30 and uncharacteristic of our low valley. Re, global warming, we need keep in mind the Jainist parable of of the blind men: dang cold here-dang hot there . I hear the Eskimos are telling Atlanta
ReplyDeletejokes this week.
Heroin: lately, they have been adding Fentanyl and giving it a fancy street name; so
ReplyDeleteaddicts are dropping like flies. Fentanyl is strong stuff: Russian swat teams used it
during the Chechen hostage crisis, in gas form-the kidnappers were instantly immobilized and 15% expired. They call that a 'high'? Then, we have the death penalty execution drugs: lawyers claim it is cruel and unusual and I am usually
sympathetic, but a serial murderer with a trail of dead victims is worried about a
lethal injection? Idaho: the legislature is again trying to pass firearms on campus
laws. Again, the academics argue college age kids with big debt, bad grades and
and girl problems walking into lecture with an assault weapon is not an ideal thing.
Which makes me wonder if all the secretaries at NRA headquarters have Glocks in
their purses?
I have been told by someone who has all the experience to know for sure that Fentanyl is as close to heroin as you can get without heroin. I can also tell you from my own experience that I never believed in that 'try it once and you're an addict' thing until they gave me Fentanyl for conscious sedation when I had my hand operated on. The first words out of my mouth were, "I want some more of that." Oh yeah. After my big surgery they put me on a Fentanyl drip and it was like I was being rewarded for all the helliousness of that surgery. Fentanyl is the effing bomb, do you hear me? That shit is AMAZING. Now, all that being said, when I hear about people getting on the dope and dying of overdoses, all I can think of is, imagine how amazingly great of a drug that has got to be that so many people are willing to die for it. Seriously. Addiction is way beyond the capacity of regular people to understand and I am not being arrogant; I am just saying that until you've been an addict you can't understand the compulsion. It isn't rational, it can't be understood rationally or logically. This brings me to ask the question why don't they use Fentanyl for the death penalty? Is it because they don't want you to enjoy it? I mean, you can kill someone with just a few MICROGRAMS (not milligrams) of Fentanyl. Seems to me like that would also be extremely cost effective. Or they could use the drugs they use when they paralyze people to put them on the vent, like rocuronium or back in the day Pavulon or back in the further day curare. That would kill you just as easy too. It's not really that hard to kill someone with drugs, unless maybe they have a history of narcotic use/abuse, and then you have to really up the dose to get what you want.
ReplyDeleteI gained great insight into drug addiction while reading the ebook Lucy in the Sky by Anonymous. OK put aside that there's some creative editing in these Alice-type books but one quote from the diary really sums it up: 11/20 - "I wish I'd never done any of it and it's not because it made me feel so bad. It's because it made me feel so good." Likewise until you read the book Letting Ana Go you won't understand anorexia. Looked at objectively yes it's totally irrational to die this way but until you read the book you won't understand the mentality.
DeleteUh, I should also mention if it isn't already glaringly obvious that I'm on a bit of an up. There's a new "colleague" (I don't wanna be more direct than that) at work and I sorta have one of those little professional type work crushes and from all signs and symptoms it seems like it might be just a little bit mutual. Also I have a student right now and she's a trip, she's BPII (I am BPI) and so we have had us a little prayer meeting and bared our souls about it all and it's nice to finally find someone in person who has an idea of what it is I go through (although the difference in I and II is really pretty big). Anyway so I go around all day at work with a big goobery smile and the heifers are seriously jealous because they have accused me of flirting but honestly, how do you flirt with someone while measuring a wound? I mean, cmon. I hate working with women.
ReplyDeleteMy workplace has been totally boring the last few years at least for me. None of the fun stuff that makes work semi-worthwhile. It just kind of puts you in a catatonic trance.
DeleteBy the way you could also kill people pretty cheaply and quickly with a big hit of IV potassium. I think that might be a bit more painful though and more indirect because I think the mechanism would be to put you into a fatal arrhythmia. I think the Fentanyl is a much better option. Surely a much more enjoyable one.
ReplyDeleteLikewise I've never understood the lack of an option for a condemned prisoner to commit suicide. In fact they go all out to prevent this.
DeleteCold Weather- wind chill -7 when I pushed the garbage cart out to the street this morning. Reminded me of Yakutsk , the Siberian city that averages 38 below in January and once got down to 82 below. Pretty good sized place-
ReplyDelete270,000 hardy urban souls; never built bridges, they plow a lane across the frozen
Lena River and run a ferry when (if) it thaws. Somewhere in my college days I had
a semester of Russian Geography and sat next to Miss Wisconsin and missed out
on the rest of Yakutsk.
My Guru Maharaj goes to Siberia to preach. He told me one time that when he got there, the devotees greeted him (as we always do) with garlands of flowers, and it was so cold that when one of the garlands was accidentally dropped, it shattered.
ReplyDeleteRemember Sarah Palin can see Siberia from her front porch.
DeleteThe last two days have been techno-disasters for my smartphone. Tuesday I couldn't shut off my e-mail account so the phone kept burning through my minutes and I had to shut it off a couple times and finally decided to delete that account for now. So last night I'm getting bored so I go on google and download some kind of antivirus scan for my phone 'cause at this point I kinda would like to know what in heck is going on (it's gotta be NSA at this point probably looking up some extremely libertarian comment posted somewhere) and so I download the link and something called "Hot Downloads" downloads instead and it looked like a porno site so I deleted that but wasted 17 minutes in the process. A fun night but I'm now more willing to go easy on that ObamaCare website. Conservatives act like that site is some sort of cyberanomaly but I'm here to tell you in the online world it may be the norm.
ReplyDeleteSo now we have a Catholic valentine chocolate . What's next, an after mass food fight?
ReplyDeleteIt's beautiful and different BB but what are we supposed to do with it? Are tourists and the faithful to slowly eat different parts? Since we've segued into the subject of food I gained about 10 or so pounds recently and can't seem to shed them even though I'm doing the exact same thing I did before when they melted off. Oh yeah since that statue is made with cocoa Tesh is very big on cocoa for health reasons, antioxidants or something. Just thought I'd let you know.
DeleteGaining weight... I just ordered that rockinbody workout from Beachbody and will let you know how it goes. I'd like to drop about 15 pounds and tone up what's left.
ReplyDelete10 lbs or so? There is the phenomena of winter weight gain, more fat for insulation,
ReplyDeletestoring potential energy for winter chores, etc...but that is usually considered more like 5 lbs. I have been avoiding my basement treadmill, the one I like so much that I named it Karl Rove. I mentioned to the Mrs. that I needed a personal trainer, maybe
Elle MacPherson, The Mrs. suggested a trainer from Sea World where they work with the blubber types.
I wouldn't mind working out in a big pool with Shamu all day.
ReplyDeleteIMO BB it's easier to lose weight when you're very fat than if you're only a little bit fat. Dunno why but everyone knows it's the hardest thing to lose those last few pounds. Then there's what's called stress fat, you keep the weight on when there's stress at work and chronologically I can timeframe my recent inability to lose the weight with the arrival of a manager or two although that could be nothing. Tesh says you have to jog at least 40 miles to lose at least one pound so you see what we're up against?
ReplyDeleteI have to add that I have to question those people and we all know them who have never had weight issues in their entire life. You know the type they're skinny as rails and they've been that way for years. I do have to question that, imo they don't eat enough. Sure they'll have a slice of pizza with friends to seem normal but they probably don't eat much the rest of the day. Most recently I've been researching what's called the Food Lover's Fat Loss program, basically eating the same foods but not starving yourself. The trick is to eat the right combo of fast carbs, slow carbs and proteins. Dunno, doesn't quite seem to kick in for me.
ReplyDeleteMost thin guys I know of are busy, active, on the go and very often skip meals. I quit that lifestyle some years back, although I often skip lunch.
DeleteHave you considered MREs?
"Most recently, MREs have been developed using the Dietary Reference Intake, created by the Institute of Medicine (IOM). The IOM indicated service members (who were classified as highly active men between the ages of 18 and 30) typically burn about 4,200 Calories (kcal) a day, but tended to only consume about 2,400 Calories a day during combat, entering a negative energy balance." MREs are so bad that you achieve a 'negative
energy balance' in a matter of days!
I used to keep MREs in the house for use during emergencies like hurricanes. They come with their own heaters.
ReplyDeletePlus I hear that the Biggest Loser is coming under fire because people are doing dangerous stuff to lose the weight. This girl who just won lost like 150 pounds in 5 months, that's like a pound a day and way too fast by ALL standards. I mean I guess when you put that amount of money out there people are going to do whatever it takes to lose it but I think that they should be setting realistic limits for folks, stressing more the healthy aspect. Most of those contestants put the weight right back on. Meanwhile Jared is still eating Subway and still looking svelte.
ReplyDeleteI've watched the show enough and my reaction was always just how in hell did they lose tons of weight so fast? 150 pounds in 5 months - when I lost all my extra tonnage the first time it took about 9 months: 20 pounds the first three months (can I call them trimesters?), 30 pounds the second three months and 10 pounds the last three months so that equals 60 lbs. in nine months so I went from about 260 down to 200. Now I think those are impressive numbers but I've never posted numbers like Biggest Loser.
DeleteWe note the continuing legend of Dr. House .
ReplyDeleteI wonder how the German Haus feels about Chronic Lyme which most mainstream doctors kind of shirk off leaving you to suffer. So who says television ain't good for anything.
DeleteOne 'House' episode, a guy had all sorts of shifting symptoms (they always do, after all, it's House). Treated him for pulmonary edema,
Deletelow testosterone, considered Guillain-Barre & myasthenia gravis, suspected hyperchondria, started treatment for Lymes and at the end
found transient thyroiditis. All the while, House was chasing a young
Russian woman who was looking for a green card.
I've been wondering since I've watched a few episodes now and then but many times it's like you said, they'll suspect this or that and begin treatments or other medical interventions for this or that but if it's not really this or that as in the end it's not can't those unnecessary interventions harm a person's health in real life? It's like the characters are all having these fun intellectual experiments with the patients ruling this in and that out and they always begin treatments as in RIGHT AWAY based on their newest theories. Dunno, is the show medically responsible?
DeleteDefinitely a showbiz thing (although the medical parts are reviewed by
Deletea physician). The patient invariably worsens throughout the show, and the diagnostics team is under pressure to 1. save the sinking patient and
2. find the root cause. Hence the drama element. I recall one episode
where nothing at all showed up after a zillion high tech tests. Something
the mother mentioned clued House, who did an invasive abdominal probe
against Doc Cuddy's orders and found (as he expected) a splinter from a
popsicle stick had perforated the intestine. Stuff like 'House' and 'Big Bang Theory' hold my attention better than 'Duck Dynasty' and 'Housewives of New Jersey'.
Odd, shortly after the brief discussion about codpieces, I received this in the e-mail:
DeleteWARNING About eBay
If you buy stuff on line, check out the seller carefully. A friend of mine just spent $95, plus tax, on a penis enlarger.
Bastards sent him a magnifying glass.
The only instruction said, "Do not use in sunlight."
I'm always saying be happy with what God gave ya or maybe in the next life.
DeleteI get your point about the more dramatic elements of House. I mean it'd be kinda hard to have a more realistic show about a bunch of old people getting checkups and House running late at 4:30 because they keep asking questions. Where scriptwriting is concerned always go with the tsetse fly or a bug larval colony somewhere in the brain.
DeleteBTW, Z-Man: did you ever get your app fixed?
ReplyDeleteEliot Spitzer should be very interested in that. So now I have the Google Chrome app in addition to the Opera Mini app (annoying navigation screens on bottom) and I still can't log into my account to post comments on the go. Not the end of the world but you have to ask yourself if something's been working fine for a long time and now ain't as opposed to something just not working from the getgo. With this weather in the Northeast it would have come in handy.
DeleteNot familiar with the smaller e-stuff. For sure with the more common search engines some sites leave snippets (besides cookies) that are spamware/wormware stuff, sometimes zipped, that infect the operating systems. Some years back my PC would only bring up a screen that
Deleteannounced the FBI had taken control and that I better send $500 to a
place in Nigeria so they could unlock it. Every once in awhile, I take the unit in for 'deep cleaning' and have them load up all the new protection
ware. I suppose that happens with the various hand held 'puters' as well, but it is cheaper to toss them and get a new one?
I have never seen House.
ReplyDeleteYour Google Chrome app may be the malware pipeline. If you google Google Chrome Infections, you can review 929,000 articles on their problem. (If you can
ReplyDeletebring them up) :)
I think you're right. I think the problem is more widespread though judging from my own experience and has gone on to other browser apps like Firefox and QQ mini and a couple others. Weird stuff comes up, the apps don't act right or run smoothly but I don't think we've heard about it on the news because the techo-companies pride themselves on their security.
DeleteNoticed a world wide poll of 12,000 Catholics:
ReplyDelete"Seventy-eight percent of Catholics across all countries surveyed support the use of contraceptives"
" In the United States, 79 percent of Catholics support using contraception."
"“Right now, the less-developed world is staying true to the old world values, but it’s gradually eroding even there. [Pope Francis] doesn’t want to lose the legitimacy of the more educated people,”
Trying to keep a finger on religious demographics, ya know?
REF
I had a kind of discussion of this nature once with a Jamaican chef. I said, I just threw out there for the mere sake of considering it but I said why don't couples every once in a while do other things besides straight intercourse so as not to risk a pregnancy (use your fertile imagination here). Not every time I said but these other avenues also offer some release and relief and the guy goes "it HAS TO go in the hole, it's going in the hole!" so I said ok and dropped the discussion. Argue with a Jamaican chef.
DeleteYet its the bishops lobbying against contraception. There is a long standing church tradition of telling people what to do merely for the sake of control.
ReplyDeleteI would submit if they're just lobbying against Obama's contraceptive mandate and are just focused on religious freedom they're not really lobbying against contraception per se although I tend to agree with your second statement (e.g. you have to tell us your personal sins in rather explicit detail in the confessional booth otherwise God won't forgive you).
DeleteSo you really need to read this book. The History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages. I think i paid 99 cent for the kindle vesion and it is fascinating, gives so much insight on why the church is how it is.
ReplyDeleteI'd hazard a guess the book has plenty of footnotes. A minor thing but learned recently that ebooks with all those footnotes tend to be appended at one of the very last pages instead of the bottom of the page and unless you have OCD you can't match up anything without going nuts. I don't worry about it though I just read 'em at the end and go okay.
DeleteThey are at the end of each chapter.
ReplyDeleteThat's easy if you have an actual three-dimensional old-fashioned book, you simply keep your other finger slashed in the footnote page and go back and forth but with a tablet not that I'd care too but...oh maybe you know some trick. The one I read the footnotes were literally at the very end.
DeleteFootnotes and bibliographies are useful and proving you didn't make something up. Do Glenn Beck books have footnotes and bibliographies?
DeleteBack in the day, I wrote a small treatise on the thermodynamics of initiating explosives, only 100 pages. All sorts of footnotes, references,
indexes, tables and bibliography. it was promptly classified proprietary,
no one understood it and I still peruse it once in awhile. The old saw:
if you cannot dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bulls**t. I have a few thousand hardcover in my personal library, and thought I would donate them when I'm up arguing with St. Peter, but the thought occurs
libraries don't do 'books' any more.
I remember that link you gave us about that all ebook library somewhere in Texas. Here's why I like tablets AND good old-fashioned books at the same time. I can have a nice bookshelf which impresses the guests and that I'll occasionally thumb through on a cold winter's night. Now I got alot of books, shelves quite full so I'm actually saving on bookspace by downloading ebooks on my tablet. Also I get 'em faster than going to this Barnes & Noble and then the one in the Palisades Mall 'cause the one in Yonkers didn't have what I wanted. I just go to a wifi hotspot and download books to my heart's content. Done, finished, go home and I got my bookshelves and my tablet so I'm good. I'm a mixture of the Old World and the New World, I'm a hybrid who enjoys the best that both have to offer.
DeleteI've been reading up on the new concept of the quantum computer .
ReplyDeleteThe things have the potential of decrypting code that would take a series of present computers centuries in a few seconds. Of course NSA is funding, but so is Microsoft, NASA and others. Some of the DNA-genetics stuff requires some serious number crunching as well. If it works, it may run Moore\'s Law off the chart.
Along those lines, back in the mid 80s, I was working with a NASAcode for explosives and propellant studies. Our Dell gave up, until the IT people plugged in a couple of math coprocessors for us. It took 20 minutes to run a problem: within five
years, with newer PCs, we were running problems in a matter of a few seconds. Moore's Law.
Privacy doesn't stand a chance BB. Wait 'til they create something that can read minds.
DeleteBeen a hard winter out this way: several skiers, snowmobilers killed in avalanches and some falling into "tree wells" along the slopes. Last week, the only two highways to the east, I-80 and US 12, were closed due to avalanches. In Montana, some old
ReplyDeletelady was evicted from her apartment and was found frozen to death behind a grocery store. The younger set still wearing tank tops and shorts out in the zero
degree weather. Strange part of the country...
I was watching Globetrekker once and I think they were in Norway or Scandinavia somewhere but when you're trekking the snow and the ice ya gotta watch out for those damn crevasses!
Delete