eveninghawk’s links

I’m in a joint venture tech company’s office this evening catching up on my global news, and stumbled across some neat summaries of what Shanghai is from Michael Rogers:

• The China Puzzle
• China’s Mixed Message
• If You Can’t Beat ‘em…

Sometimes I see the development of new technology, or new fun things to use, and what do I do?

I drool.

Who wouldn’t want an Apple airport express?

My folks have been behind aspartame since forever. This was something that struck me as not necessarily being a good thing. Then, eventually in science class with Mr. Hanlon, we talked about how aspartame acts much like nicotene. You can’t get rid of it, you just build it up in your system.

Well, then my dad became a diabetic, and the landscape of our kitchen went from being an awful lot of aspartame to almost all aspartame. At this point, little alarms went off in my head, but I didn’t much know what to do with it.

Eventually I sent my mom a lot of resources about aspartame and how it is not necessarily a safe substance, not does it necessarily help diabetics as much as everyone thought it did.

All in all, this was all scary but relevant stuff to me, and my folks did listen. For that I’m glad.

Well, today I read about another item on shelves and in products that had my hackles up (because it’s in everything and just seems like a silly way to avoid sugar, if you ask me): fructose. What is fructose? Fructose is something else my dad has to stay away from: fruit sugar. In yet another field of inquiry where science starts to point the finger at our problems, fructose is being seen as a possible factor in obesity.

This sounds a little preachy considering the amount of research, but it does point to the more important issue at hand: it amazes me that as a supposedly intelligent critter running around on this planet, we can’t figure out that moderation is really the way to go. There are no shortcuts to being healthy. You have to eat well, from all the food groups, in moderation, and you have to exercise. There are no shortcuts, and yet, everyone must believe in them because look at the industry in weight loss.

I was reading around my normal haunts today and came across this interesting piece of entertainment news. Apparently vampires are too cold and overdone.

Also, Angelina Jolie in a wereworlf movie. Hrmmmm.

I read an article today about a pickled dragon found in Oxfordshire. I found out about it via boing boing.

All in all, I must say that the most interesting creative ventures come about when folks have altogether too much free time on their hands.

Boing Boing had me chuckling with this little piece on the headaches of speech recognition.

Another good one to read over there is this one on the screwed-upness of Homelands Security.

Someone please explain to me why you would want to be a stowaway on a plane? Climbing up somewhere through the belly of the plane and riding around at below freezing temperatures and lack of comfortable breathing just doesn’t seem to be the way to go to me. Apparently it’s become a popular thing in New York. Heck, even last year here in Shanghai 2 dead French guys fell out of the sky and through a couple of houses on the outskirts of Shanghai from an Air France plane. They apparently didn’t think the plane was going to China, and when the flight turned out to be really long and they were freezing their butts off, they climbed over to the landing gear bay. There, they froze to death. When the landing gear was released, they fell out.

Being a stowaway on a boat is slightly more understandable to me, same with a train. In many cases, you will probably live through the experience, though the consequences may not be so happy. Sneaking into the underbelly of a plane seems like more risk than it’s worth, so I hope whatever was going on in Nigeria and Jamaica was really worth becoming a human popsicle.

Here on World AIDS Day I find myself thinking about nasty diseases. Today my students talked about AIDS, and SARS. As my day is concluding, while thinking of an HIV infected friend and where he is at today, I am also thinking of folks I know living with Hepatitis C.

It’s a little crazy to me to read this Kansas City Star bit on the recent past of the disease. To back things up a bit and look at transmission methods more clearly , check out this bit from the CDC.

Diseases that you are capable of passing on to other people are things that we should all educate ourselves about.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution posted this interesting article on the frustrations of the new Medicare bill. While her approach and phrasing is a little too flamish for my tastes, she makes an excellent point at the end. The bill does not suit the needs of the elderly, rather fits the pharmaceutical companies’ purses. Topping it off, the bill doesn’t address the 17% of people on Medicare who are in a dire situation and need more help.