....and his partner, Jimmy Bean

So here I sit, typing this monring in Monroe, Louisiana. Not many highlights so far about Monroe, other than the fact that it's near 70 degrees and yesterday on the plane I sat near a guy who was wearing Jack Daniels whiskey pants. It's just what you would imagine - they're sort of sweat pants, except they had the Jack Daniels whiskey logo all over them. Couldn't help but smile.

Here's the link to the Scientology story I wrote about yesterday. A pretty great read, so check it out.

 

Why Knott?

mickknotts
Originally uploaded by rustedrobot.

When someone says "you have a face made for comedy," you can either take it the wrong way or take it like a guy with a sense of humor. I'm sure Don Knotts was told that on many occasions and from what I've been reading in his obituaries something tells me he was humble enough to laugh it off and perhaps even appreciate it. Don Knotts was a kind of like a .280 hitter with 30 doubles - not the focus of the team, but a solid, reliable performer. I'll miss his goofy face and good natured roles. I'm sure his son, Mick Jagger, will miss him greatly. Don't tell me they're not father-and-son.

While I can't find a link for it yet (and I admit to not trying excessively hard), the new issue of Rolling Stone has an excellent feature on Scientology, in which the author appears to try as hard as she can to give it a fair journalistic spin, butthe guess here is that one still comes away just shaking their head in near disbelief at some of the bridges these people are selling. But if they believe it and they're peaceful and strive to do something good, so be it.

Curious thing, though. Midway through the article (which I read as the sun was coming up at about 6am this morning, making it all the more strange), I found myself, for a brief second, identifying with some of the beliefs. For example, I'm not much of a believer in psychiatry and even moreso, I am highly suspicious of the murky waters that are medication and drugs. Of course, I have never really had much of an occasion (see: injury or surgery) to use them so I suspect I'd become a believer real fast should I require them. I think I speak more from the general over-the-counter medicine side of things - I'm of the strong belief that a lot of them don't do a damn bit of good other than to soothe your mind.

That's certainly where the comparisons end in regards to Scientology, my friends. For one thing, I am not signing any contract which binds me to a religion for 1 billion years, which is a requirement of being in the faith. So without spoiling the article, I'll let you seek it out and read even more mind-blowingly ridiculous stuff about the religion. It's safe to say that I can almost guarantee you that the article is more than worth reading.

That said, it's not just Scientology I question, either. I have my issues with a lot of mainstream and minority religions. The supposed origins and core beliefs of Scientology and certain arms of the Mormons may cause a lot of people to try their best Don Knotts face and make fun of it, but the truth is that a lot of the world's most established religions have similarly out-there stories of how the religions were established and what the core foundation of beliefs are. Perhaps Scientology and the Mormons are more ridiculed solely because their launches came here in the modern day, where media gets boiled down to 15 second sound bites and the actions of so very few are blanketed to a collection of so many.

I don't know, frankly. I do know this: the best religion, in my eyes, is to let people believe what they want to believe and not kill people for not sharing their beliefs (unfortunately, history has not been kind at all to my wishes of the latter). It really shouldn't matter if they are worshipping Jesus, Allah or Q-Tips, should it? Dead Heads were as much a religion to me as any other.

On a less serious note, when I bought my guitar, it automatically qualified me for a subscription to Rolling Stone, a magazine I stopped reading sometime in 1991 or thereabouts. While I am still rolling my eyes at 95% of what I see in the magazine, I have to admit I've been pleasantly surprised by some of the political writing and feature stories. I even bought some songs based on a record review in the last issue, something I was convinced wouldn't ever happen again. The artist? A San Francisco-based psychedelic-pop artist named Kelley Stoltz. Good stuff.

 

Do You Believe In Whining? YES!

Stupid, spolied athlete story #3,456:

Mike Modano of the U.S. Men's Olympic Hockey team, after what can only be labeled as a pathetic team performance, steps off the ice after the team was eliminated yesterday and proceeds to do a dead-on impression of a little girl who just lost her dolly. Modano was complaining that the players and their wives had to book their own flights and hotels. Awwwwww, poor Mikey. He also complained about the coaching staff taking a timeout too early in yesterday's game. Rub your eyes, little Mikey. Buck up, little camper. Nobody gives a shit that a collection of slow, old millionaires (many times over) had to - gasp! - book their own flights and hotels. You've lived a pretty charmed life so far, one that less than a half-percent of the whole country can identify with. The rest of us (yeah, that's 99.5%) actually do book our own flights. The people behind USA Hockey are all volunteers, dickhead.

It's another thing entirely that the team which was chosen to go to Torino was questionable from the start. It's beyond me why they didn't choose some fresher, younger skaters for the U.S. instead of guys like Chelios and Keith Tcksdklkfkfchuk, both of whom looked, well, old, on that larger sheet of ice. Most of the team looked old.

A hat tip goes out to Fort Miley out there in S.F. for posting that comment that included this great link. The referred web page is a series of hellaciously good and saucy quotes about yesterday's subject - the making of Fleetwood Mac's "Rumours." Click it and read....those were the days, man.

 

I Know I Could Have Loved You, But You Would Not Let Me

The Mac
Originally uploaded by rustedrobot.

Oh, you know the story. Band forms. Singer and insanely talented guitar player fall in love. Piano player and bass player fall in love and marry. Drummer falls in love with everyone in the band. Singer and guitar player fight and break up. Piano player and bass player divorce. Everyone fights, does drugs and records the best selling album of the 1970's. Everyone sleeps with everyone else in the band, then does more drugs. Drummer makes wierd faces (caused by drugs) and is still in love with the whole band. Singer injects drugs through her rear end. Band more or less falls apart, in a haze of drugs and stupidity brought on by, most likely, immaturity. Happens all the time.

Fleetwood Mac is right up there with Badfinger and Lynyrd Skynyrd in the pantheon of delicious biographies. Sure, none of its members died, but the drama, oh my holy god. Imagine having to work every day, all day, with someone you just divorced (Christine/Bill McVie). Or someone you are absolutely, positively in love with who loves you back, but not enough (Lindsay Buckingham/Stevie Nicks). Throw in that drummer (Fleetwood) who's been in love with Nicks for years, sprinkle in all kinds of recreational drugs and alcohol and you've got "Rumours," as fine a pop/rock album as you'll ever find.

Why mention it? Well, The Mac certainly had their divine moments afterwards, but everything rolled downhill post-Rumours. How could it not?

Last night, though, while tuning into VH1-Classic (yes, I'm still addicted) I saw the video for "Silver Springs," a song written for Rumours, but only released as a B-side to "Go Your Own Way" way back when. The song was recorded live a few years back as part of their reunion tour, which was so about the money, but the music still provided a fairly commanding presence. "Silver Springs," blows my mind a little bit - having it cut off the album gives one a sense of spoils - I can't imagine how many bands would love the privledge of being able to cut a song like that from an album. Huh.

Now, this is one of those cases where the visual gives you a new perspective on things. I had heard "Silver Spring" more than once and thought the song was ok enough, but seeing them perform it live on video gave it a whole new life. The lyrics, written by Nicks (my least favorite member of the Mac, BTW), are so obviously about her now-famous and contentious relationship with Buckingham. Watching them stare at each other and sing this song together, though, was terribly interesting.

It's clear to me that there remain scars in that relationship that will just never heal. Twenty-plus years down the road and you can still get a whiff of it - that is powerful stuff. Now, I'm no dummy - my money says that some of it is showmanship, but there's a level of interplay there that just cannot be denied. Bottom line: it's probably the most powerful Mac song since Rumors and it's a damn good song.

In doing some digging, there's an entire web page, believe it or not, devoted to Nicks' various quotes through the years about the song. You can check it for yourself as there are some real good ones which certainly don't disprove my theory that there's remains some bitterness. But my favorite story about "Silver Springs" is this one, told by Nicks to the BBC in 1991:

"I wrote it for Rumours, and fourteen years ago I walked into the studio and the record was basically done. It was at the Record Plant, and Mick said, 'Stevie, I need you to come outside to the parking lot 'cause I need to talk to you for a minute.' And I knew it was reallv serious 'cause Mick never asks you to go out to the parking lot for anything.

So we walked to the huge Record Plant parking lot and he said, 'I'm taking Silver Springs off the record.' And, of course, my first reaction was, 'Why?' And he said, 'There's a lot of reasons, but because basically it's just too long. And we think that there's another of your songs that's better, so that's what we want to do.' Before I started to get upset about Silver Springs, I said, 'What other song?' And he said, 'A song called I Don't Want To Know.' And I said, 'But I don't want that song on this record.' And he said, 'Well, then don't sing it.'

And then I started to scream bloody murder and probably said every horribly mean thing that you could possibly say to another human being, and walked back in the studio and completely flipped out. I said, 'Well, I'm not gonna sing I Don't Want To Know. I am one-fifth of this band.' And they said. 'Well, if you don't like it, you can either (a) take a hike or (b) you better go out there and sing I Don't Want To Know or you're only gonna have two songs on the record.'

And so, basically, with a gun to my head, I went out and sang I Don't Want To Know. And they put Silver Springs on the back of Go Your Own Way."

Great stuff! "I Don't Want To Know" is also a pretty great song, but Silver Springs has far more emotion. Wrong decision, Mick.


"Silver Springs"
You could be my silver springs
Blue green colors flashin'
I would be your only dream
Your shining autumn, ocean crashing
And did you say she was pretty
And did you say that she loves you
Baby, I don't wanna know

I'll begin not to love you
Turn around, see me runnin'
I'll say I loved you years ago
Tell myself you never loved me, no
And did you say she was pretty
And did you say that she loves you
Baby, I don't wanna know
Oh, no
And can you tell me was it worth it
Really, I don't wanna know

Time casts a spell on you,
but you won't forget me
I know I could have loved you,
but you would not let me

Instrument solo

Time casts a spell on you,
but you won't forget me
I know I could have loved you,
but you would not let me
I'll follow you down til' the sound of my voice will haunt you
You'll never get away from the sound of the woman that loves you
I'll follow you down til' the sound of my voice will haunt you
(Stevie oversings: Was I just a fool?)
You'll never get away from the sound of the woman that loves you
(Stevie oversings: Was I just a fool?)
I'll follow you down til' the sound of my voice will haunt you
(Stevie oversings: Give me just a chance)
You'll never get away from the sound of the woman that loves you
You could be my silver springs
My blue green colors flashin'

 

You Don't Need A Weatherman To Know Which Way The Wind Blows

Amory Lovins, co-founder of the environmental think-tank Rocky Mountain Institute, offers his very compelling thoughts and arguments regarding just how much both Republicans and Democrats are dropping the ball on renewable energy in this great piece from Discovery magazine.

The topics include include energy/electricity, oil, new plastics, hydrogen and wind. KEY: his writing is simple, easy to understand and a very good "starting point" for anyone who's either too overwhelmed by the glut of information out there or just starting to realize how important this is. Even if you're not interested in this stuff, the content in this article is very, very interesting.

 

Ray Bjork

Ray Bjork
Originally uploaded by rustedrobot.

 

You Have A 50% Chance, But There's Only A 10% Chance That Will Happen

Housecleaning the brain....

• Consumers getting tax credits for the purchase of hybrid cars is a good idea, of course, but this morning's New York Times lays out some of the complications around the tax credits, including the fairly amusing part about the consumer essentially having to guess when to buy the car in order to get the full tax credit. Yes, you read that correctly. The full amount of the tax credit ($3,200) will only be available to buyers "during the quarter in which an automaker reaches 60,000 hybrids in cumulative sales." Up to you to figure out when that is. Good luck. I've toyed with the idea of trading in my car for a hybrid, but I've decided I'm in no rush, as I'm close to paying off my car and it's probably advantageous for me to wait a few years when more models are available, the technology is better and the prices come down a little.
  

• I fall into the Olympics trap every time. Whenever the Olympics approach, I always look forward to watching them - then I never do. If I tune in, I end up like a drooling vegetable, staring off into space, bored out of my mind. I'll probably tune into the medal round for hockey, I suppose.

• I'm on a nasty Six Feet Under bender right now. Steph and I watched Season One about a year ago and she wasn't crazy about it, but I loved it and recently Netflixxed Season Two and watched all the episodes in like 10 minutes. That's a new phenomenon, by the way: renting TV series from Netflix and getting so addicted that you just watch as many as possible in the shortest timeframe possible. We need a name for that affliction. Anyway, I'm about to start Season 3, so don't tell me anything. Seriously. Don't.
  

• Those of you who are music fans of all years should really check out Vault Radio, a recently launched streaming radio program featuring many, many live performances from San Francisco's Fillmore. It's basically forty years of recorded shows which were recently found in the basement of the Bill Graham Presents offices, ranging from Elvis Costello in 1978 to Led Zeppelin in 1969 to Springsteen in 1973, The Band, Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix, and many, many others. Really neat stuff.

• I don't recommend sending the Dick Cheney hunting party out for this. Oh, that was really too easy. I need to work harder on jokes.

• I am taking my first official guitar lesson tonight. So far I've been noodling by myself and it seems you can only get so far that way (especially when you have a full-time job). One of my Christmas gifts from Steph was an hour lesson, so tonight I become a student again. On my own, I've managed to get Elliot Smith's "Ballad of Big Nothing" and Neil Young's "Heart of Gold" somewhat down. I'd like to get to the point where I can rattle off a nice Nick Drake song.

• You know what's totally sweet? When you don't realize you have Monday off until like 5 days before it happens. Excellent surprise.
  

 

You're The Queen of the Village Green

The Autumn Defense @ The Lizard Lounge, Cambridge, MA 2-14-06
Originally uploaded by rustedrobot.

 

I Haven't A Clue Why I'm Like This Today

The Autumn Defense
Originally uploaded by rustedrobot.

Tonight Boston gets a very special Valentine's day treat: Wilco offshoots The Autumn Defense are playing in Cambridge. Back in 2004, I saw the band in both Chicago and Boston in the span of about three months and each of the shows completely floored me. It is, in fact, very rare that I'll head into the city on a weeknight anymore just to see a band, but this band is so talented and so insanely good live that I won't miss it, no matter what. Their live shows back in 2004 undoubtedly rank as two of the best shows I've seen - ever.

I also just went back and checked out my blog post from when I saw them last. I was so floored by their show that I wrote it up at 2am - I couldn't wait. In that post, I wrote: " I'm here to tell you that what I saw tonight might have been one of the best live shows I have ever seen in my life."

Anyway, it will be perfect for a Tuesday night - mellow, sweet, catchy songs in a great little club called The Lizard Lounge, made all the better by the presence of my wife, who has decided to join. Happy Valentine's!

By the way, why all the hubbub about The White House waiting 20 hours to release the news of the Cheney shooting? I don't get it. I do, however, already love saying "The Cheney shootings."

 

What Would The NRA Say Today?

Gerald Ford fell down stairs. Jimmy Carter wore a sweater when addressing the nation. Read George Bush Sr's lips. Bill Clinton points his crooked finger and denies extramarital activity. Dick Cheney & company, though, just make it too easy sometimes. There's just too many possible jokes to tell about Cheney's latest adventure yesterday in which he accidentally shot a friend of his while hunting. It certainly could have been much worse of course, but refer to your late night talk show tonight for the easiest of pot shots. My question, which really comes via my wife, is this: what would have happened if Cheney were hunting with Bush and he accidentally shot the president? Steph seems to think that the Secret Service would have shot Cheney on the spot as a reflexive action, per their job training. Interesting to think about.

UPDATE: I knew it wouldn't take long

Oatmeal solution: I've found an interesting addition to my morning oatmeal recently: fresh figs. You can get them almost anywhere and I choose Calamyrna Figs from Trader Joe's. Cut them up and throw them in there and you've got an even more fiberous breakfast. The figs certainly add a touch of sweetness to the whole thing. Combine those with a pinch or two of brown sugar and some flaxseed meal and you've got yourself a nuclear weapon of health for breakfast. At first Steph seemed slightly disturbed by the presence of fig in my oatmeal, but realized shortly thereafter (on her own) that it's not much different than raisins.

 

This Is Why Blogs Are Good

A few weeks ago you may recall my comparisons regarding the nutritional value of the new-to-market Whole Grain Fig Newtons and the legendary regular Fig Newtons and how the nutritional labels indicated no real difference between the two. I had written Nabisco and received a very unsatisfactory, templated response, so I ratcheted up my dialogue and sent another inquiry.

I must hand it to Nabisco - it took them a couple of weeks, but they responded with a detailed, well-written answer to my question, which appears to both address my questions and perhaps even support my theory that the way it is marketed (essentially as a "health food") is a dis-service to consumers. It is, however, interesting to learn a bit about whole grains and I should also remark that my wife was able to provide some color on this for me even before Nabisco's response. She's a smart.....cookie.

Anyway, their response. In full:

Thank you for your recent inquiry.

We are happy to share with you the thinking behind the launch of the 100% Whole Grain Fig Newtons cookie as part of the100% Whole Grain product line from Nabisco.

In line with the USDA's recommendation to make "half of your grains whole" as part of the 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans and MyPyramid, the new Nabisco products made with 100% Whole Grain provide consumers an option to enjoy some of their favorite cookies and crackers as part of an overall balanced diet that aims to meet these new whole grain recommendations. We'd encourage you to visit MyPyramid.gov for more information on the whole grain recommendations.

Whole grains, as well as foods made from them, consist of the entire grain seed, usually called the kernel. When those grains are processed, however, certain key components of the kernel may be removed, resulting in a loss of nutrients such as vitamins, minerals, and dietary fiber. The resulting refined grains are then enriched to add back some of the vitamins and minerals and, in some cases, dietary fiber (as bran) that is lost through the refinement process, before being further processed into foods.

In the case of Fig Newtons cookies, the regular version that you have enjoyed over the years (which we appreciate) does not contain any whole wheat, but is made from enriched wheat flour, as indicated in the product ingredient statement. In contrast, for the 100% Whole Grain variety of Fig Newtons, we replaced 100% of the enriched wheat flour with whole grain wheat flour, again as indicated on the ingredient statement. The resulting product is, therefore, different from regular Fig Newtons cookies, with a very distinctive taste and texture profile that is particular to whole grains.

While the overall nutrition profile of the two products may appear similar, whole grains provide important compounds in addition to vitamins, minerals and dietary fiber, such as phytoestrogen and phenolics, which may provide benefits beyond basic nutrition. And, although the whole grain wheat flour used in 100% Whole Grain Fig Newtons contributes fiber (indeed, the additional fiber in the product as compared to the regular version is coming from the whole grain), the amount delivered does not equate to a "good source" (or 10% of the Daily Value) for the simple reason that the product does not require a level of whole wheat flour (even with 100% replacement) that will in turn provide a good source of fiber given the serving size of the product and the overall product composition (a significant portion of the cookie is fig filling). That said, the product does deliver 8 grams of whole grain per serving, which is generally considered a "good source" of whole grain.

In some cases, whole grain wheat flour does have more total and saturated fat gram for gram than enriched all-purpose flour, as whole grains still contain the portion of the "kernel" that contains fat components. As a result, certain whole grain products may have differences in fat composition relative to their enriched flour counterparts, which may result in a slight increase of saturated and total fat on a per serving basis.

While the 100% Whole Grain Fig Newtons product you purchased may have contained slightly more saturated fat on a per serving basis than the regular Fig Newtons, please know that we recently changed slightly the formulation for the 100% Whole Grain Fig Newtons product, so that it now contains 0 grams of saturated fat per serving. As a result, moving forward, the labeled saturated fat content per serving is the same for both the 100% Whole Grain Fig Newtons and regular Fig Newtons cookies. The updated packaging reflecting the change in saturated fat content should be available in stores soon.

We are pleased that you enjoy our Fig Newtons cookies and hope that you will consider the 100% Whole Grain variety as a delicious snack that can help you meet your whole grain needs.

Christina Fellows
Executive Representative

Perhaps I can take credit for the reduction in saturated fat? Heh. Nevermind.

 

I Like IM

Instant messaging is a phenomenon we couldn't have even imagined fifteen years ago. The internet back then was embryonic to the average consumer, but you could at least get your head around the idea. Of course, we never could have imagined the scope of its impact (I mean - email!) and the robust speed at which it became so prevalent in our lives.

Instant messaging, to me, was the next step after the idea of email. The ability to instantly communicate with someone in real time, well, that's kick ass, both from the personal/convienence side and from the business productivity side. Looking at the latter, it helps to understand that I am largely working at home, nowhere near any of the co-workers whom I need to be speaking with on a regular basis. So as you might imagine, IM is a central application in my professional life and it's used constantly. We have a corporate IM client, but I just use Trillian, which I've spoken about before - and you should also be using for your IM. Now, if only Trillian would make a music player that played all formats! I digress.

IM for personal use, though, now that's an interesting topic. My wife doesn't use IM and has no desire whatsoever to start using it. At first I thought it strange. I mean, everyone uses it these days, right? I thought about how nice it would be to just drop her a line to remind her about something (it's usually the other way around, BTW!), to see how her day was going or to find out where she put the stamps. Little stuff.

Then I began to realize that maybe it's not a bad thing that she doesn't use it. Why? Because when she gets home, that's our time to catch up. Using IM, we probably wouldn't have as much to talk about! I'm certainly not saying that my wife and I have little to discuss, but anyone married knows that sometimes there's just not much going on to speak of. No updates. Not much happened today, etc. So I'm good with it. We'll continue to communicate old school.

 

I Like Food

Chicken Mole w/ Green Beans
Originally uploaded by rustedrobot.

Similar to most humans, I like food. I also like making food. Sometimes I even get into a zone where I'm rattling off recipes every other night instead of just throwing some pasta in a pot or unfreezing some vegetables or whatnot. Tonight's project was a Mole sauce over chicken, rice and green beans. This has been a longtime favorite of ours now for years, clipped out of a Cooking Light issue circa 2001.

For those of you who've never tried it, it's damn good. The sauce is very basic - throw one cup of chopped onions in a pan with some olive oil, then add one teaspoon each of cocoa powder and cinnamon. Next, add a half teaspoon of chili powder, then drizzle some sugar over it (not too much, yo) and top it with about 1/3 of a cup of chicken broth. Heat on medium until it thickens into a sauce, then add the beans and cook for like 3-5 minutes. Top off with some baked chicken and brown rice.

This recipe is painfully easy and really, really delicious. The chocolate adds very subtle sweetness to the meal - do not overdo that part. Give it a try. It takes about 20 minutes.

Moving on, it's time for another installment of "drive traffic to RustedRobot by taking advantage of people who search Google for a certain young Hollywood actress."

Translation: It seems Scarlett Johansen will appear naked on the cover of Vanity Fair this month with one of my old celebrity crushes, Kiera Knightley, who will also appear sans clothing (you can see the cover by clicking the link). Say what you will about Scarlett's acting, but at least she's not turning into a match stick like Kiera has. Yikes.

 

I Like Balls

Meatballs, Cooking
Originally uploaded by rustedrobot.

.....meatballs, that is. You see, I've never even bothered to try and make them, since my mother has a pretty good recipe. In other words, I'm not sure I could ever top it. But once you get past accepting that fact, then there's no reason not to give it a try. It also helps to have the very best cookbook on the planet to help you along: Cook's Illustrated's The New Best Recipe is thee best $22.05 you'll spend for home improvement this month. Trust me on that. And the balls? Everything came out great! I'll have another couple of meals to think about it some more, too. Nice.

So, a little love for us music dorks now. Down there on the right you'll see a new gray content box which tells me (and you) what bands get played the most on my ITunes player. It's telling, because I almost always listen on shuffle, so it's pretty rare I hammer on one artist. Look, I'm not much different than that guy from that book High Fidelity - always making music lists (less so lately, but still...). The company that does this list for me is called Last.fm, and it's a new web service that I believe has a real future.

Not only does it totally dork me out with my own music homepage, charts and all, but it will also match you up with other Last.fm listeners whose charts are most similar to your own, which means - you guessed it - I can source new bands and even listen to them based on what my "neighbors" listen to and there's a good chance I'll like that new music since my neighbors and I both have similar taste. It's like Match.com for music nerds, only we don't have to, like, date. Totally kick-ass service.

Time for a meatball sandwich.

 

Doctor, Doctor, Can't You See I'm Burning, Burning

Very captivating article in the New York Times this morning regarding the faith we have (or don't have) in our doctors and the unsure world of alternative therapy, which is rife with quacks, profit-takers and drugs that simply don't work.

The world of medicine and healthcare seems to get more and more baffling as time goes on. I don't know about you, but I've never been able to connect with any doctor I've ever had. In fact, it would be great if I could even see him or speak to him. In fact, my last physical was performed by his nurse practitioner. The only time I've spoken to him in the last year, he was bumbling and mumbling about a question I asked him and five minutes later when I hung up I realized I was no closer to my question than when we started.

Who can we trust to tell us we're ok or not ok? Last year, you may remember I had a friend, age 35, who abruptly died of a heart attack. He'd gone to the ER a week before and they sent him home, diagnosing acid reflux. Only in post-mortem did they discover that his heart disease had been festering since his early 20s. Why does it take an autopsy table to diagnose that? (I know the answer....it's just inexcusable).

The fact that so many people are heading towards alternative therapies - an even more mysterious and worse - unregulated - field just speaks volumes about the lack of trust in our medical system. Virtually no alternative medicines or treatments have been proven to work, yet according to the Times, 48% of Americans have tried them, which may speak more about the mental aspects of being physically ill (if you believe you'll get better....).

Let's not even start to weave in the complexities of what drives the insurance business or the drug companies, either. Do we trust ourselves more than our doctors now? Do doctors even trust insurers and drug companies? Shit, I do my best to avoid taking ANY medicine these days unless I absolutely have to. Over-the-counter cough medicine seems to make me worse for a couple of days before I start feeling better. About the only thing I take is Advil and on average I take two pills per couple of months. I don't know who to trust or what to believe.

I'll leave it at this, though: The Times points out a woman who had a bad experience with a Hodgkins diagnosis five years back. When it recurred, she balked at the standard treatment and said:

"I had absolutely no scientific reason for choosing this route, none," she said. "I just think there are times in our life when we are asked to make decisions based on our intuition, on our gut instinct, not based on evidence put in front of us, and for me this was one of those moments."

Think about that quote as if you had said it and your life were on the line. Really says a lot.

By the way, her alternative treatment didn't work.

 

Whaaa?

In watching President Bush's State of The Union speech on Tuesday, I found myself somewhat amused at the following quote:

"Tonight I ask you to pass legislation to prohibit the most egregious abuses of medical research: human cloning in all its forms, creating or implanting embryos for experiments, creating human-animal hybrids, and buying, selling, or patenting human embryos."

Now, his opinion on buying/selling/patenting, etc of human embryos is his opinion and he's certainly entitled to it. But what's up with the "human-animal hybrids" part? I wasn't aware of, and certainly have not seen, any half-man, half-dog walking around town. At least not since the movie Spaceballs (John Candy as a "mog"). Is this really a problem out there? Are mad scientists threatening to build human-animal hybrids? That opens up a whole new set of photoshop options for me.

I haven't looked yet to see if I am affected, but apparantly the Boston Globe and the Worcester Telegram perfectly executed a rather large "oopsy" when they wrapped their Sunday newspaper deliveries with paper which contained the credit card numbers of 240,000 of their subscribers. Um, what? Huh? Are you telling us that nobody caught that as the papers were going out that morning? Is there like one dude or something who oversees that stuff? Maybe it was the same security guard that George Costanza once bought a more comfortable chair for and he subsequently fell asleep on the job. Unreal.

Flash poll: I'm looking for ideas. I make a bowl of oatmeal every morning (not instant) and I'm looking for interesting things to add to it. I currently use one or a combination of the following: brown sugar, raisins, cinnamon, flax-meal and/or a dab of maple syrup. I need some fresh infusions - any suggestions?