Saturday, March 30, 2024
Friday, March 29, 2024
Thursday, March 28, 2024
Shopping for Groceries in Paradise
I did the grocery shopping today. Even though I do it the easy way, by pickup, still, it's a relief to be done with it.
My formerly favorite associate has been angry at me. Why? Who knows. I was hoping he wouldn't be there, but I figured he would be since he's usually there weekdays. But he carefully avoided me in a weird way. OK. Fine. Clown.
So I got the groceries inside and almost put away. Yay! I bought fish, and I was thinking of having it for dinner today. But wait! Tomorrow is Good Friday. Should I save it for that? Maybe half today and half tomorrow.
As usual I bought dozens of eggs. I usually buy brown, but I also bought 18 white ones because I want to color them for Easter. I bought a pretty wicker Easter basket and I'll hard boil them, color them, and fill the basket with them. I bought Mrs. Billingsley an adorable little lamb stuffed toy, and some flowers. And a Snickers candy bar for each of us.
So that's how I'm celebrating today in Paradise.
Wednesday, March 27, 2024
Tuesday, March 26, 2024
Solar Eclipse
How did I not know? I only found out a couple of weeks ago that a solar eclipse is about to happen on April 8th in the US. It seems funny to me that I have heard cries of doom about this. More than one person has said, "Do you know how many towns named Nineveh will be in the path of the total eclipse? That's a sign of doom!" Well, we'll see. That seems ridiculous to me. Who named all these towns Nineveh anyway?
This is something that's never happened to me before. Yes, there have been solar eclipses, but this is the first time I'll will be in the path of a total solar eclipse. This is the rainiest time of the year, so I supposed the whole thing would happen on a cloudy and rainy day. However, the forecast so far is for a sunny day.
xxx
Monday, March 25, 2024
Sunday, March 24, 2024
Friday, March 22, 2024
New Coffee Mugs
This is my new coffee mug. I bought four. One for me. One for Mrs. Billingsley. Two backups. It's 16 oz, pretty, and it has a fabulous lid.
Thursday, March 21, 2024
Wednesday, March 20, 2024
Amerigas Hostilities
In December I parted ways with Amerigas and found another propane supplier. I bought a tank instead of renting, and the new company put the Amerigas tank out in the yard near the road.
A lot of gas seemed to be leaking from the tank, and I had called Amerigas several times to come and take their tank. Welp, Amerigas had abandoned their ratty old tank on my property.
I called Amerigas at their local number, and once again spoke to someone in India. They said they had no record of me cancelling my account. So they would look into it.
So days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months. I still smelled gas. So yesterday I called Amerigas again. I wanted them to come get their tank. But Amerigas kept putting me on hold and not getting to my call. Then I called their 800 number to report an emergency gas leak. Soon Amerigas people were pulling into the driveway.
The Amerigas man said, "We could fix this problem right away with a match." OK. That's an Amerigas joke. He moved closer to me, and began to tell me what beautiful hair I have. Uh oh. I moved further away. My little puppy Spot showed up to share in the excitement.
I told Mr. Amerigas that I needed the tank removed from my yard, otherwise I would need to sell it. He told me about the monitor I complained about being installed by "a third party." I had heard this before from the Amerigas people. "I saw Amerigas here installing that monitor with my own eyes!" "Really?" He seemed honestly surprised. I don't know what difference that little story made anyway. Mr. Amerigas told me that it would be very unlikely that the tank would be removed soon. He said that an international conglomerate, UGI, had purchased the company, and that they had been under the mistaken belief that natural gas and propane are a monopoly, and they could do any mischief they liked to customers, not realizing that the customer can get another supplier. What!? Now they had many, many propane tanks all over the land awaiting pickup from all the customers that had quit doing business with them. There's no system for picking up the tanks. Neat.
So once again Amerigas is being a clown. At least I spoke to an actual Amerigas person this time.
Monday, March 18, 2024
Saturday, March 16, 2024
Thursday, March 14, 2024
Butchering Engrish
The unthinkable happened yesterday. The coffee kettle absolutely refused to work. What to do? It was an emergency that I had foreseen, and I had another one of a different brand ready for something like this to happen.
There was a lot to do. Take it out of the box. Rinse it out a couple of times. Fill it with water. Set it up and turn it on. Clearly this couldn't happen all at the same time, so I boiled water in a saucepan. Then eventually I checked out this new invention. There were many buttons. The old one had one button that switched itself on automatically when I put the kettle on the base with water in the kettle. You should have seen all the buttons on this kettle! There was a yellow one, a green one, a blue one, a purple one, and a red one. Oh dear. "Is this from China?" I wondered. Mrs. Billingsley looked at the spelling of the brand name on the box. "How do you pronounce that??" she asked. Well, it was a name not to be uttered by profane tongues.
First, I supposed I should rinse it out a couple of times with water. Don't get any funny ideas. Not with gasoline. How do you open the lid? You play around with it for a while. Mystery solved.
I plugged in the base, and adorned it with the kettle and began pressing buttons. Was there an on/off? There were two buttons side by side on the handle, one saying 100%. That sounded good. Right away pretty little red lights twinkled around the base of the kettle. How cute. Before long, but not any sooner than one could boil water in the microwave, the water in the kettle was boiling. If you think you're ready to make coffee now, you're sadly mistaken. The kitchen filled with the weird smell of plastic burning. I looked the kettle over. Had I left a plastic bag over the kettle? Things looked OK. Well, that was it for yesterday.
I floundered around today wondering what to do. Then it occurred to me to read the instructions. And entertaining reading it was. Check the voltage on your outlet to be sure it's the correct voltage it said. How? Stick your finger into the outlet? Call an electrician? We weren't to the "Call an electrician" part yet. It was there though. Later. There were many subjects and predicates missing. The "to be" verb seemed to be unheard of in Chinese, so why translate it? Don't forget, it would have to be conjugated. Then there were odd ways of patching a sentence together upside down and backwards. Plurals at random intervals. After about half an hour of guesswork on what these important safety warnings were about, the question was not yet answered about what all the colored buttons did. However, we weren't to that part yet either. There were the explosions to talk about. Keep this appliance away from explosives. Really? All the bombs in the kitchen have to go? And was I thinking of giving up and trying to heat the kettle on a burner on the stove? Yes. Beware of children near the appliance.
So I'm still perusing the instruction manual.
Today in Paradise
Weather update.
Likely risk of severe weather today. Wind, tornadoes, and hail possible. Large hail and powerful tornadoes. Have a plan and be prepared.
Wednesday, March 13, 2024
Thursday's Weather Forecast
Strong storms. Scattered thunderstorms in the morning, then strong thunderstorms in the afternoon. Damaging winds, large hail, possible tornado.
Evening. Severe thunderstorms likely. Scattered thunderstorms later, then potential for severe thunderstorms overnight.
Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall may reach one inch.
OK. Fine.
Tuesday, March 12, 2024
Fentanyl Facts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ehvIkZCZmzA
About three years ago a friend of mine suggested that I try marijuana for pain relief from rheumatoid arthritis. It seemed like an OK idea. I've tried marijuana a couple of times but just never liked the wooziness. But it seemed like it might be worth a second look and I didn't think of it as especially harmful. And it was easy to get since my friend's husband grew and sold marijuana. So pretty soon I had a nice stash of marijuana, and also a starter kit of papers to roll a joint in.
I attempted to smoke a joint, but I couldn't seem to inhale it because of coughing. Hmmm. It occurred to me to eat a little bit since I had heard of marijuana brownies. So I had gelatin capsules and put some marijuana in one. It was a 500 mg capsule size, and I filled it about half full. I didn't expect much to happen.
In a few minutes I realized I was losing consciousness. This was frightening, but I suspected, correctly, from the level of collapse that I was experiencing that I had only seconds to go before I was out, so I couldn't do anything to rescue myself from whatever was happening, and rushed to lie down in bed. It was 1:00 o'clock pm. I was unconscious for about a day, not waking up for any reason. Mom was here but didn't seem to notice, even though she was still able to get around then and could have checked on me.
The next day I woke up in the late morning. Goodness I felt terrible all day. Later I told my friend that I thought I had an allergy to marijuana because I had had a severe reaction to it. "No, that's not possible. You can't be allergic to marijuana." I was mystified about what had happened, but it sure wasn't going to happen again. I asked her if the marijuana could have been contaminated with anything. I was thinking I might have been poisoned by an insecticide. She was certain that had not happened. At first I had considered throwing the rest of it in the trash, but I was paranoid about this idea for some vague reason. Well, dump it out in the yard? Maybe. Ask for a refund? No, I didn't want to make anyone feel double-crossed on a drug deal, even if it was only weed. Eventually I decided to just return it and not ask for a refund. I told my friend's husband that it had caused me to lose consciousness. He laughed, and said, "Well, it must be good!" Cheesh. Later on I found a small amount of it left that I had misplaced and forgotten. I gave this to another friend that liked to smoke weed. I told her that I had had a bad experience with it when I had put some in a capsule and swallowed it. "Oooh. Well, that's because you should cook it into something like brownies, not eat raw marijuana." Hmmm. Did that explain it? It sounded like a stretch.
Was I done walking on the wrong side of the law? Pretty much. Mom broke her back not long after that, and it was diagnosed as bursitis. Even though she had X-rays that showed a broken back, the local "doctors" as they like to call themselves, didn't feel it was either very painful or more than bursitis. Seeing the amount of pain she was in, I asked her primary care alleged doctor to prescribe pain medication. "You're the one that really wants opioids aren't you?" she asked. I gave her a tongue lashing, but still, there was no attempt at addressing pain. I found myself in a nightmare world for a while of trying to help a screaming woman all day. Finally I started to think of trying to buy Vicodin or Oxycodone from off the internet. This was something I didn't want to do, but it might be the only solution. However, I dropped the idea. It was just too far over the line. "No wonder there are so many heroin addicts," I thought.
What does this have to do with Fentanyl? I was unaware of the Fentanyl crisis until the last few months when I saw some documentaries by a Youtube channel from Texas about the recent huge increase in opioid deaths in the US. The majority of the deaths are caused by accidental overdose from Fentanyl that people have taken usually not even knowing they are taking Fentanyl. This has happened because China has been sending the ingredients for making Fentanyl to cartels in Mexico, and the drug cartels have flooded the market with Fentanyl laced drugs. The cartels make convincing copies of prescription drugs like Percocet and Xanax and people will buy them thinking they are buying the actual drug. In reality, many times the pills are actually made of Fentanyl. Since Fentanyl is 100 times stronger than heroin, the pills are extremely easy to overdose on. I've even heard that these fake pills have sometimes been sold at pharmacies in Mexico. And more recently, the Fentanyl lacing has started being added to marijuana.
And so, when I hear of overdose deaths, and how easy it can be to die this way accidentally, it sends a chill down my spine. There were 112,000 such deaths in the US last year.
This is a picture from the DEA website of authentic (left) and fake (right) Oxycodone. The fake can look very genuine. When I hear of deaths from Fentanyl overdose, I think, "There, but for the grace of God, go I."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S193-xKXJCc
Sunday, March 10, 2024
Dietary Advice of the Experts
Reading articles and watching videos on the thoughts of the experts on nutrition is puzzling.
I'll go ahead and start with the granddaddy of advice on Youtube, David Sinclair of Sinclair Laboratory at Harvard. Wow. Sometimes I think I'm hearing personal opinions more than facts. I'm never 100% certain of the position he espouses. Is he a vegan? No. Maybe a lacto-vegetarian. I find it annoying to listen to him, and wondering why I feel that way. Do I challenge his findings? I'll just say it. YES. Well, who do I think I am? I think I am Helene. But my real problem with him is his egotism and hubris. How so? Just his odd bristle and seeming distain for all things not Sinclair. He likes to brag that he's in his 50s and looks much much younger. Are there any gray hairs?? Wrinkles?? Well, I suppose he is maintaining OK. Except....
What do I know about his thoughts on a healthy diet? It depends on whether you're a fruit fly or a yeast cell. We can extrapolate all we need to know from there. Let's see. Calorie restriction. OK. Methionine restriction. Okaaaaay... Protein restriction. You're starting to lose me. He's got a big supplement stack. Well, maybe. But I'll admit, I have a few issues there. "Look lady," I can imagine him saying, "I have a list as long as your chubby little arm of documented studies." Very impressive. I just have a gnawing concern that the takeaway from the studies is slanted by being a study that his minions at the Sinclair Lab did under his oversight. And? And there is a bias. Cherry picking of studies and results. Yes, I have some doubts. You're telling me you dare to fly in the face of Harvard University? I'm afraid so. As soon as I see that the talking head of a video I've clicked on is David Sinclair, I think, "Uh oh. Here we go."
What say I? I've heard the noise about calorie restriction and methionine restriction and protein restriction before. I'm not sold. What about the blizzards of studies? Well, these are almost exclusively animal studies, and more than half of those on yeast and earthworms. I understand that many of the studies focus on mice and flies, etc, because of the time element. To determine the lifespan of calorie deprived, methionine deprived, protein deprived people would take a study of decades, instead of a couple years. No mention of possible downsides of these restrictions. Muscle wasting, including vital organs. Bone depletion. These leading to a host of other problems, especially those seen in the elderly. Which goes to the question of longevity and whether one spends old age in good health.
To start with, I don't think an ideal human diet is a one size fits all thing. For example, suppose one has kidney problems? In that case a low protein diet would be helpful. Suppose one has epilepsy? A ketogenic diet would probably be beneficial. The same can be said for a number of neurological conditions. How much of the study results for humans argue for calorie restriction, methionine restriction or protein restriction, when in reality the improvements seen with these diets are due to other factors that wind up happening in these diets? Where am I heading with this? I am saying that one big factor has been ignored, which is the level of carbohydrate consumption.
So, what other problems do I have with dietary advice? It all started a long time ago with the cholesterol hype. I would say probably with the motivation of helping drug companies sell statins. If anything, triglyceride levels seem like a better focus, and once again, the main thing causing high triglycerides is high carbohydrate. Eating fat is a problem due to the effect of the carb overload. Without a carb overload, the fats are not detrimental. But what about hypercholesterolemia? In that case I would say there may be hereditary issues.
One of the most nourishing foods was sacrificed on the cholesterol altar, which is eggs. "They're high in cholesterol!" the experts cried. No matter that the cholesterol in eggs is not well absorbed. Ignoring the fact that the bioavailability of egg protein is second only to human breast milk, and nearly twice as high, if not three times as high, as other sources of protein. And inexpensive. Oh, did I say inexpensive? Surely the panic against eggs had nothing to do with herding the masses in the direction of more expensive protein choices?
This brings me to an article I read in Life Extension today. Its conclusions are diametrically opposed to those of Mr. Sinclair. The gist of the article is that most people aren't eating enough protein, especially those that are older. I am completely convinced that this is correct. How much should one be eating? An older person should aim at 1.5 grams of protein per kilogram of weight. They probably are assuming normal weight. Why would I be so convinced of this idea? The studies? Well, just looking around. As people age one of the most obvious and prevalent symptoms of decline is sarcopenia, loss of muscle mass. This results in many of the catastrophes of aging, which is all types of frailty. Not as obvious, but just about as pervasive is bone loss. Also catastrophic. Both of these conditions are in large part the result of inadequate protein consumption and absorption. Of course, one would do well to exercise. I feel this is putting the cart before the horse though. How can one benefit from this exercise without providing the protein needed for it the have the best effect?
And so, trying to partake of the current wisdom of dietary advice leaves one wandering around in a maze of conflicting opinions based on myriads of studies pointing in all different directions.
Saturday, March 9, 2024
Friday, March 8, 2024
Wednesday, March 6, 2024
How is Easter Determined?
https://www.timeanddate.com/calendar/determining-easter-date.html
This year Easter is on March 31s6.
Calculating the Easter Date
Easter is the most important movable feast in Christianity. How is the date determined each year?
An Easter Sunday date in the calendar.
©iStockphoto.com/tomch
How Is Easter Determined?
Easter falls on the first Sunday after the Full Moon date, based on mathematical calculations, that falls on or after March 21. If the Full Moon is on a Sunday, Easter is celebrated on the following Sunday.
Although Easter is liturgically related to the beginning of spring in the Northern Hemisphere (March equinox) and the Full Moon, its date is not based on the actual astronomical date of either event.
- March 21 is the Church's date of the March equinox, regardless of the time zone, while the actual date of the equinox varies between March 19 and March 22, and the date depends on the time zone.
- The date of the Paschal Full Moon, used to determine the date of Easter, is based on mathematical approximations following a 19-year cycle called the Metonic cycle.
Both dates may coincide with the dates of the astronomical events, but in some years, they don't.
Astronomical vs. Ecclesiastical Dates
In years in which the Church's March equinox and Paschal Full Moon dates do not coincide with the astronomical dates of these events, there may be some confusion about the date of Easter. In 2019, for example, the March equinox in the Western Hemisphere happened on Wednesday, March 20, while the first Full Moon in spring was on Thursday, March 21 in many time zones. If the Church followed the timing of these astronomical events, Easter would have been celebrated on March 24, the Sunday after the Full Moon on March 21.
However, the Full Moon date in March specified by the Church's lunar calendar, also called the ecclesiastical Full Moon, was March 20, 2019—one day before the ecclesiastical date of the March equinox, March 21. For that reason, the Easter date 2019 was based on the next ecclesiastical Full Moon, on April 18. This is why Easter Sunday 2019 was on April 21.
Earliest and Latest Easter Dates
According to the Metonic cycle, the Paschal Full Moon falls on a recurring sequence of 19 dates ranging from March 21 to April 18. Since Easter happens on the Sunday following the Paschal Full Moon, it can fall on any date between March 22 and April 25. (Note: this applies only to years 1753-2400).
List of years with earliest and latest Easter dates
Holidays Related to Easter
The dates of many Christian feasts are based on the date of Easter Sunday. For example:
- Mardi Gras / Carnival Tuesday (47 days before Easter)
- Ash Wednesday (46 days before Easter)
- Palm Sunday (1 week before Easter)
- Maundy Thursday (3 days before Easter)
- Good Friday (2 days before Easter)
- Holy Saturday (1 day before Easter)
- Easter Monday (1 day after Easter)
- Ascension Day (39 days after Easter)
- Whit Sunday / Pentecost (49 days after Easter)
- Whit Monday (50 days after Easter)
- Trinity Sunday (56 days after Easter)
- Corpus Christi (60 days after Easter)
Why Is Easter Celebrated in Spring?
According to the Bible, Jesus Christ's death and resurrection occurred at the time of the Jewish Passover, which was celebrated on the first Full Moon following the vernal equinox. This soon led to Christians celebrating Easter on different dates. At the end of the 2nd century, some congregations celebrated Easter on the day of the Passover, while others celebrated it on the following Sunday.
In 325 CE, the Council of Nicaea established that Easter would be held on the first Sunday after the first Full Moon occurring on or after the vernal equinox. (*) From that point forward, the Easter date depended on the ecclesiastical approximation of March 21 for the vernal equinox.
Orthodox Easter
Not all Christians observe Easter according to the Gregorian calendar; most Orthodox Christians still follow the Julian calendar.
Like the Easter date based on the Gregorian calendar, Orthodox Easter falls on a Sunday between March 22 and April 25 in the Julian calendar (years 1753-2400). In the Gregorian calendar, this corresponds to April 3 to May 10.
In some years, Orthodox Easter falls on the same day as western Easter. The next time the two Easter dates coincide will be in 2025 (April 20).
Read more about Orthodox holidays
Proposed Easter Date Reforms
There have been a number of suggested reforms for the Easter date. For example, in 1997, the World Council of Churches proposed a reform of the Easter calculation to replace an equation-based method of calculating Easter with direct astronomical observation.
This would have solved the Easter date difference between churches that observe the Gregorian calendar and those that observe the Julian calendar. The reform was proposed to be implemented in 2001, but it is not yet adopted.
Another example of a proposed reform occurred in the United Kingdom, where theEaster Act 1928 was established to allow the Easter date to be fixed as the first Sunday after the second Saturday in April. However, this law was not implemented, although it remains on the UK Statute Law Database.
Earliest Easter Dates in Years 1753-2400
Latest Easter Dates in Years 1753-2400
(*) The resolution's exact wording is unknown, so the council's precise contribution to the process of determining the date of Easter is disputed. However, according to some historians, contemporary sources (e.g., by Epiphanius of Salamis and Socrates of Constantinople) suggest that the council decided on an Easter date after the spring equinox.
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