Strike that, reverse it

Can One Lose Lactose Intolerance as an Adult?
Is it just me, or is that an annoying sentence?  "Can one regain lacose tolerance", right?

One More Time

Okay, the group over at Facebook is called Narcolepsy Free.
There's another group called Gluten Free PWN.   I think that's a few other people I know.
Anyhow, hopefully someday we will merge peacefully and not have a crazy narco lady catfight...

I actually am trying to get an account.   I did something wrong.  Or I'm an idiot and am missing something obvious.  Or both.
But hopefully I will see you there soon.

The things I do for you people...   

Quote of the Day

"You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you mad."
 -Aldous Huxley

Big Doin's In the Trailer Park

Apparently some of the girls have set up a group over on Facebook called Gluten Free Narcos
Narcolepsy Free.

Go over and join.

The Double Edged Sword

Psychopathic Boldness Tied to U.S. Presidential Success 

"Certain psychopathic traits may be like a double-edged sword," says lead author Scott Lilienfeld, a psychologist at Emory University. "Fearless dominance, for example, may contribute to reckless criminality and violence, or to skillful leadership in the face of a crisis."
In fact, fearless dominance, linked to low social and physical apprehensiveness, appears to correlate with better-rated presidential performance for leadership, persuasiveness, crisis management and Congressional relations, the analysis showed.

 Yes.   When it is good it is very, very good-  and when it is bad it is horrid.

A really good day

Know Hope

Pop Quiz

Mom’s Depression May Lead to Shorter Kids

The study doesn’t prove that mom’s depression causes a child’s short stature, only that the two are associated. And the authors couldn’t confirm the underlying mechanism linking the two factors, but they had some theories: maternal depression can lead to increased stress in kids, for example, and chronically high levels of the stress hormone cortisol have been associated with lower levels of growth hormones in kids. Depressed moms may also have poor feeding practices like spending less time breast feeding.  “Maternal depressive symptoms are associated with insecure attachment in children and with poor parenting behaviors,” the authors write.

 Your mission is to think of a reality based mechanism.

This is Why

Each day 30,000 people around the world attempt suicide.

Happy Suicide Prevention Day Everyone.

Heh

October is Zombie Awareness Month

Get a Hat

Sleepwalk With Me

Mike Birbiglia has a new movie about his REM behavior disorder.  Jeff and I went to see it last night.

This is Seattle, there was a big crowd, the whole theater was filled-  with frakkin zombies.
The ratio of fat red-headed people was out of control.   It was like an oompa-loompa convention.   I lost count before we even left the lobby. 

And then the movie started.
It's a good movie, it is.  He's really cute and funny and it has a ton of my favorite actors and the story is a familiar tale of navigating impulse control problems.    But watching him eat pizza and then literally run in his sleep, well, that made this crazy old lady twitch and cry through the whole thing.

I really didn't want to see the movie, though.  I usually make an effort not to torment myself that way.
It was an intervention.    He was in town for the screening.  I spent the day and made him a Zombie Survival Kit.   Bought some gluten free food and mouth rinse.  Put the dentist book and a letter in there explaining why.   After the show he had a little Q&A session.   I leapt up after that and got to the front in time to give him the bag, but not really speak.

Hopefully he will read it and stop by the website and get better soon.
Stop Sleepwalking with me instead.

It's a disgrace

Health-care system wastes $750 billion a year

Health-care system squanders roughly 30 cents of every medical dollar through unneeded care, byzantine paperwork, fraud and other waste, a new study shows. Deep cuts to the US heath-care system may produce a more efficient, better-quality product.

They waste a whole hell of a lot more than that.   Half of what they do is treating the side effects of the other half of what they do.  The entire Psychology field could disappear and health outcomes would probably improve.

Things that make me twitch

Can You Die From A Nightmare?
Yes, those strep infections will kill you if you let them.

Sleepwalk with Me 
I want him to get better and lose this livelihood.  Does that make me a bad person?

Heh.  September 7    Seattle, WA - Sleepwalk With Me Movie at Harvard Exit - Mike will be at 7:30 and 9:35 PM Screenings! 

ZomBees!

With GPS!

Biologists Tag 'Zombees' to Track Their Flight

After last year's accidental discovery of "zombie"-like bees infected with a fly parasite, SF State researchers are conducting an elaborate experiment to learn more about the plight of the honey bees. The scientists are tagging infected bees with tiny radio trackers, and monitoring the bees' movements in and out of a specially designed hive on top of the Hensill Hall biology building on campus. At the same time, they are monitoring hives on campus and on the roof of the San Francisco Chronicle's offices for further signs of the mysterious parasite and encouraging the public to participate through a new website ZomBeeWatch.org.

Good Point

From Paul Krugman's blog-

I’ve spent most of the day with a parent in the hospital; and my thoughts turned to the GOP platform, which boasts that

Our reform of healthcare will empower millions of seniors to control their personal healthcare decisions.

If you’ve ever been in this situation — and I assume that many readers have — you’ll understand what I mean by saying that empowering seniors to “control their personal healthcare decisions” is very definitely not what you want right then (or what they would want ex ante).

But I guess that IS the point of the exercise...
Mentally challenged customers are the most exploitable.

Ground Zero

I'm telling ya, the UK is the center of the Zombie Vortex...

No city for old men

Glasgow, for all its charms, is sick—and not metaphorically. Glaswegians die younger than other Britons and nobody knows why.
...Even in wealthy neighbourhoods mortality rates are 15% higher than in similar districts of other big cities. In rougher parts the difference is starker. A study by the Glasgow Centre for Population Health found that between 2003 and 2007 there were 4,500 more deaths in the city than might have been expected given the age and poverty of the population.
...What needs explaining is the following: in modern times, up until 1950 Glasgow did not stand out as particularly sickly. But between 1950 and 1980 a gap opened up between it and other big cities in Britain. The difference was mainly explained by a greater number of deaths from cancer and heart disease. Then, starting in about 1980, the gap widened again, though this time the symptoms were different. Glasgow still had too many cancers and heart attacks; but the marked difference from other cities came in deaths from suicide, violence, drug abuse, alcohol and traffic accidents.

In the 50's, antibiotics started being used.  The genetically susceptible people started dying of chronic streptococcal diseases like cancer and heart disease instead of acute Rheumatic Fever.  And then in the 80's, low fat diets started getting recommended.
These results are absolutely what one would expect from an immune compromised and metabolism impaired population.

Neener Neener

This place delivers to my house...

Brain Eating Zombies of the Day

New York City Education Department

Lunch Trays Got Too Lean in City’s Fight Against Fat

Worried that children were losing the war on obesity, New York City began to slim down its school lunch offerings several years ago, replacing fries with baked potato strips and introducing nonfat chocolate milk, whole grain pasta and salad bars, among other tweaks.  In the process, the city also cut calories. So much so, city officials now acknowledge, that it often served children fewer calories than required by the federal government.

Yeah.   Low-fat, calorie-restricted diets.   Guess what that leads to-  Hypoglycemia and deactivation of the frontal cortex.    Excellent education strategy, people.
Thanks for totally freaking me out for the day.  I'll be twitching about all those sick kids you are just making sicker...

Non-fat chocolate milk?   Really?  Which part of that is nutritious?

Now this is fun

Zombie Family Car Stickers

Things I don't want to know

Corn Maize Gluten Causes Antibody Response in Celiac Patients

That explains the taquitos.
Dammit.

It's the Sugar, Stupid

Even ‘High-Normal’ Blood Sugar Tied to Brain Shrinkage

 “These findings suggest that even for people who do not have diabetes, blood sugar levels could have an impact on brain health,” study author Nicolas Cherbuin, of the Australian National University in Canberra. “More research is needed, but these findings may lead us to re-evaluate the concept of normal blood sugar levels and the definition of diabetes.”

Brain Eating Zombie of the Day

Tom Horvath
You're talking, but you're not saying anything.

How should we treat addiction?

The leader of the largest alternative to AA sounds off on why 12 steps shouldn't be the only model for sobriety.

That's a fact.  AA shouldn't be used at all because the "stop drinking and just suffer" model doesn't help.  However an "internal locus of control" means basically nothing and isn't a real solution either.  If this man knew anything about alcoholics he would help those people with their glucose metabolism.  But he admits he doesn't know what alcoholism really is and that he has basically just decided that whatever ideas he pulls out of his ass are an appropriate thing to do anyway.   Hell, he doesn't even have an internally coherent strategy.  He only has a bunch of clients because his "program" is the path of least resistance- an alcoholics' very favorite thing.

See the Pattern

Shattered Genius
Grigori Perelman is one of the greatest mathematicians of our time, a Russian genius who solved the Poincaré Conjecture, which plagued the brightest minds for a century. At the height of his fame, he refused a million-dollar award for his work. Then he disappeared. Our writer hunts him down on the streets of St. Petersburg.

There was time for one final question. I put it to him in English, the single philosophical question that I hoped he would consider. Where does your life go from here?” I said. Perelman stepped closer to me. I saw that one of his upper teeth was dark brown, decayed. “What?” he said, his English skills apparently dormant. Perelman’s face was focused in concentration as I repeated the question, and I thought that he might answer. But when I finished speaking, his face went slack, as before. He understood what I wanted find out, the path of this unusual life. He mumbled, “I don’t know.”

Stalking Sick People and regurgitating the details.   It's a living, I guess.

Yobama

Obama ordering VA to add staff, see suicidal vets within 24 hours

SSDD.

World Class Obsession

Honorary Zombie of the Day.   Even if he is a Vampire.

Count von Count

I'm so glad I don't have compulsive counting...

Brain Eating Zombie of the Day

Bijal Trivedi
 
An extensive article that is behind the New Scientist paywall so I am including my favorite three paragraphs as per the fair use doctrine...

Food for thought: Eat your way to dementia

If McNay and de la Monte are correct, a similar process may lead to Alzheimer's. They think that constantly high levels of insulin, triggered by the fat and sugar content of the western diet, might begin to overwhelm the brain, which can't constantly be on high alert. Either alongside the other changes associated with type 2 diabetes, or separately, the brain may then begin to turn down its insulin signalling, impairing your ability to think and form memories before leading to permanent neural damage. "I believe it starts with insulin resistance," says de la Monte. "If you can avoid brain diabetes you'll be fine. But once it gets going you are going to need to attack on multiple fronts."
-snip-
Of course, animal studies can only tell you so much about a human disease, but an almost Frankensteinian demonstration confirms that the brains of people with Alzheimer's are insulin-resistant. Using brains from cadavers, Steven Arnold at the University of Pennsylvania bathed various tissue samples in insulin to see how they would react. Tissue from people who had not had Alzheimer's seemed to spring back to life, triggering a cascade of chemical reactions suggestive of synaptic activity. In contrast, the neurons of those who had had Alzheimer's barely reacted at all (Journal of Clinical Investigations, vol 122, p 1316). "The insulin signalling is paralysed," says Arnold.
-snip-
It's not yet fully understood exactly why disrupted insulin signalling would lead to the other kinds of brain damage associated with Alzheimer's, such as the build up of plaques, though the emerging research suggests many, possibly interlinked, mechanisms. One line of evidence, for instance, has shown that insulin and beta amyloid are both broken down by the same protein-chomping enzyme. Under normal circumstances that enzyme can successfully deal with both, but if too much insulin is washing around, the enzyme gets overwhelmed by the hormone, and the beta amyloid gets neglected. Instead of being broken down, it accumulates, perhaps building into the toxic plaques that kill brain cells.

It's a really good summary and there's lots of great ideas on how insulin could be causing dementia. (my guess)   Ordinarily I would be dancing and showering a cover article (!) like this with praise.
But the author repeatedly asserts that fatty foods trigger insulin production and even though that idea is now "common knowledge" - it is just not true.   Carbohydrates do.  Sugar. Sugar. Sugar.
One would expect in an article subtitled  "What you eat may be killing your brain" - there would be a minimal attempt to get the facts straight about the effects of food.
The reason we are all crazy sick is a century of sloppy assumptions just like that.