Home Alone

Today I dropped Shirley off at the airport for her 5 day visit to the Bay area. Get ready Michael, Judge Judy 24 hours a day.

Yesterday Gov. Schwarzenegger declared California in a state of emergency because of the severity of their drought. Forecast for Shirley's visit, rain everyday. They should pay her for visiting.

Free at last!! Five wild and crazy days on my own. Let's see, where's the block of cheese? Big plans, going to the dump with Eric and Landry this morning. ... and then ... well I'll figure it out.

Hayden Lunch

I had the pleasure of another lunch with Hayden. She brought both Jill and Tylir along this time. Once again she managed to get the attention of most the tables around us ... or it could have been Tylir. The good news is that Tylir found his lost again wallet ... but only after he had Jill search the house several times and asked her to cancel all of the credit cards. It turned up in the trunk of his car. I don't know why Jill put it there.

Tylir is anxious for Hayden to get a little older so she can side with him. He thinks Jill and I pick on him. When asked if anyone ever sided with him, he responded "no." So Tylir, guess what Hayden is going to do. Good thing you have a thick skin.

AstraZeneca Seroquel Studies Buried

The London-based company faces about 9,000 lawsuits (15,000 patients) claiming it failed to properly warn users that Seroquel can cause diabetes and other health problems for this FDA approved drug. According to an AstraZeneca official, "The drugmaker failed to publicize results of at least three clinical trials of Seroquel and engaged in “cherry picking” of data." ... "AstraZeneca has studied Seroquel extensively and shared all relevant and required data with the FDA -- both before and after the agency approved it as safe and effective.” I wonder how we would react if bin Laden had a way to give 15,000 people diabetes?

Choking

No, I'm not talking about something caught in the throat or what I often want to do to Judge Judy. I'm referring to blowing it under pressure. A recent study (probably paid for with our tax dollars) showed that skilled golfers do better when asked to putt quickly than when told to take their time. Novices miss regardless. A person can get better at handling pressure by putting themselves in pressure situations. You also need to admit to yourself that you have a choking problem ... which means you are normal. Are putting (short golf shot) and putting (placing an article somewhere) really spelled the same?? don't you love English.

Talk to the Box

A year ago the economy looked bad. Unfortunately, I didn’t know what bad really looked like. Now the economy looks bad …. And I really hope I know what bad looks like. It’s hard to look at Washington for solutions. The Republicans are hoping it gets worse enough that we start thinking the Democrats got us here. The Democrats are thrilled it’s bad enough that it is “spending time again”; the coffers are wide open for all their causes. Boy do we need some Obama magic.

I wish I felt that I know the answer but it is way too complicated. The government running banks doesn’t sound good, but bankers running banks sound even worse. Giving everybody health care and unemployment insurance feels good but it doesn’t feel like a solution. Tax cuts for all helps me but I really think tax cuts for businesses are really the only ones that have an impact. I’m afraid there is only one place to turn for answers; Shirley, go ask that little box that talks to you.

Terrorism is #3

A previous rant in this blog discussed how terrorism has fallen behind the economy the top threat to Americans. In reality, both of these are behind the environment. Dan Nocera of MIT points out in a recent publication that we “are a world out of balance. We seek immortality at the individual level and are oblivious to the health of our humanity at a global level.” Our R&D spending for health is 30 times what we spend for energy science.

One of the minor problems we face per James Anderson of Harvard is that that the current level of CO2 in our atmosphere now ensures sufficient heating to melt the Arctic summer ice cap within the next decade. The ice in the Arctic Ocean acts as a heat shield for our planet by preventing the flow of warm ocean currents to the furthest reaches of the northern hemisphere. ... Much of the world’s industrial centers and population are situated near coastline, which will be submerged under the water accompanying the 7 meter (~25 feet) rise in ocean levels with the collapse of the Greenland ice cap. … not to mention that Europe will be a lot colder. The Europeans and others will probably just move over here. Maybe we do need that military.

Polygamy

Shirley (aka JudgeJudy) and I were watching an episode of Numb3rs last night about a man with 73 wives. Part of the focus was on concerns about the inbreeding that seems to occur in the polygamy community. I would think the male gene that wanted multiple wives would be a much greater concern. What are they thinking? Multiple honey-do lists? Knick-knack purchasing contests? One that likes to go to a lot of symphonies, another a lot of plays, another art fairs and yet another that loves the museum circuit? And they need to eat, each with a different fine dining experience they prefer. Shirley said I couldn’t handle it. Once again she was right.