<0023>

Go O's! ;-)

<1925>

Duh, convergence. I hate it when I figure out that I was totally dumb in solving a problem when I thought I was clever.

Anyway, yesterday I finished the latest Honduras manuscript and emailed it to my boss. Then I played DDR for 1.5 hours, rawk. Then Happy Hour and baseball. Camden Yards is really beautiful, and we were sitting way up behind home plate. Ken and I had wanted to go to karaoke after, since he missed it before. Somehow we got derailed to going towards Brewers, only to have the deraileur bail on us as we drove there. Hrmph. We went anyway, since we were already going, but I can't say I was too happy about it. It was still good chatting and all that.

Today I've been mostly unproductive on anything but exercising and eating a crapload of vegetables for dinner. Now I gotta get some homework done.

<2227>

Storey notes that having a debate over three blogs is probably not that productive. I'd add most readers are probably also only hearing 1/3 of it. Which means my exclusive readers are getting the best deal, so who cares! ::ducks::

Today's MLM exam was kind awful and kinda fun, depending on if I was way off base or not with my answers. It was awful in the sense that each question provoked an initial wtf response. It was fun in the way that those old UNM math exams were fun... it generally took a while to figure out each question, and usually I had to bounce around the exam a lot, but over time I managed to figure stuff out. There's this cool thing where the brain seems to be processing other problems in the background as you work on something else, so when you get back things are clearer. Anyway, when 5pm rolled around, the silence in the room was like we'd all just sat through the most depressing movie ever. A normally composed friend was even teary in that OMG so frustrated kind of way. Not fun.

You know what's fun? Tons of DDR, which I played tonight.

<1104>

Pro seems to think I forgot about drunk drivers or something, and that this somehow negates my argument that if you're going to talk about abusive alcoholics, abuse is a huge part of the issue and it's not a comparison with any kind of even denominator. In fact, drunk drivers have zero to do with this assertion, and furthermore I never said abusers would abuse anyway, I said non-drinking abusers are also bad. And I just get very irritated when I make an effort to sort out issues and still get misrepresented entirely. At least, when referring to my argument, don't put quotation marks around words I didn't write. Frickin A. I just. want. to. compare. things. that. are. comparable! And to disentangle the harms caused to health and the reasons behind the perhaps differential focus on these harms. Is this not what I do for a living? Geez.

I do have to say Frese leaves out the primary purpose of current bar smoking bans, which is employees. I don't feel safe in this economy saying that people have choices where they work and can avoid working in a smokehole 8-10 hours a day. But I more broadly believe people should be protected from as much as harm as possible in their jobs.

Also, I'm quite certain all these comparisons exist out there already in the literature, which I know is less fun than speculating.

<1503>

Pro has very kindly realigned his depiction of my statements. :-)

In other news, ditching school is awesome. I played DDR for half an hour, did some strength exercises, and then remembered that I usually exercise while watching ANTM on Wednesdays. But, I really wanted to play DDR. I can also bike during ANTM.

Just to add another twist to the alcohol/tobacco thing... I think part of the reason tobacco is seen as super evil is the extent to which US corporations drive the global market, using all the nasty tactics in the developming world that they've been slowly having to stop using here. I think the food industry is seen as evil for parallel reasons of having an ill effect globally. Alcohol seems to be produced everywhere and sent everywhere else, so there's not quite the same vitriol towards those companies. But their tactics are just as bad and they've spent a lot of PR power framing alcohol abuse as an individual issue instead of as a broader structural issue.

So, in summary, I think I've been agreeing with Storey all along that alcohol is pretty bad news. I just wanted to get smoking out there as deserving its bad reputation. Don't even get me started on processed food...

<1840>

Back on the alcohol/smoking thread, I'd have to say that victims of abusers who aren't drinking are also probably suffering more than victims of secondhand smoke. Alcohol perhaps makes it worse or more likely, but there's definitely a big Venn diagram to be drawn here with a circle for alcohol and a circle for abuse and a circle for Very Bad, and I think the latter two circles would overlap substantially. Really, the issue is denominator (like always when comparing health indicators). If your rubric is amount of suffering per victim, alcohol is definitely worse, but if your rubric is amount of suffering per unit consumed, it's a different problem and harder to compare because the suffering from alcohol is much more unevenly distributed than the harm from smoking.

There's also an issue of level. At the level of casual use, a person having a drink is pretty unlikely to cause harm to anyone at all. A person smoking is definitely likely to cause at least small harm to others nearby and to t he smoker. At the level of intense use, a heavy drinker is more likely than a heavy smoker to be harmful in some way to others. Either way, it's pretty easy to win the argument that alcohol is worse than tobacco if you're comparing a raging abusive alcoholic with some bar smoke, because it's not a fair comparison.

The harm from smoking to the smoker is probably the bulk of its total ill effects, but public health has focused on its harm to others because of politics in passing anti-smoking legislation. Technically most of the physical harms of alcohol use on others are already illegal; the more psychological harms are not so much, but we have a hard time dealing with psychological harms when it comes to legislation. I think part of that overlaps with the difficulty we have with "private" matters -- this issue comes up with domestic violence all the time, the discomfort people have with intervening in people's home lives, even when there's abuse. I mean, even on the tobacco front... I think it's criminal that people smoke around kids, but no one's agitating for any laws because it just hits this discomfort zone we collectively have about what goes on in the home.

I'm clearly just public health geeking a lot here.

<1950>

There's another article in the NYT today about losers, I mean, fine people whose parents keep sending them money long after they should have their own source of income. The article is far more balanced than my above statement, but, still. I would like to take this moment to thank my parents for spending lots of money on secondary school and college, and then stopping. As few times as I get to feel like an actual adult, I value being able to run my life on funds that I have secured for myself.

There's also an article about how Cornell is so lame that they have to remind everyone they're in the Ivy League just to get any cred. Ha.

<1604>

This paper for Intro to IH is seriously quals-level brutal. I wish I'd had way more time for it, although I would have just filled that time because this paper could fill any time. It has four major sections, with a total of 12 subsections, in ten pages. And it requries a lot of data synthesis. I'm only taking this class pass-fail, so I should really not stress it, but I feel like just getting a decent paper out there is really hard.

I gotta just finish this thing. Then, happy hour, which had better be great.

<2018>

I know the answer to "Why are the good ones taken?" is right there in the question. Because they're good, duh. The real question is, why do I not seem to find myself at the tiny window before they're taken, so that I can take them?

And why do I not own an umbrella? So that I could go walk sulkingly in the rain.

I really wanted to go out tonight, but there was no way to even propose the idea without knowing it wasn't a good one.

<2255>

Pro makes a good point about the ill effects of alcohol vs. tobacco, but the argument is actually more favorable if you don't limit it to physical effects, because the psychosocial effects are one of the greater harms of alcohol. Some issues: 1) tobacco tends to cause harm with a large time lag, whereas most alcohol harms occur in proximity to alcohol use, making them look different at a given moment; 2) the harms of tobacco to others occur at a lower threshhold and more casually -- you have to add a few things to harm people with alcohol use than just using; 3) alcohol has been found to have *some* benefits to health, whereas tobacco has absolutely zero benefits. I think these things contribute to making tobacco appear far worse, even if they contribute equally to global burden of disease.

Full disclosure: I'm drinking wine at the moment. At home: bars are too smoky.

<1357> We had interesting assign reading today, and one article that was the same useless boring stuff. What do we start class with? The boring stuff. Hate. Yesterday in the curriculum meeting I went off on this class, and I only really let out 50% of potential steam, which was probably still a bit much. Hate hate hate.

<0003>

Easter isn't very exciting for non-child heathens on diets. Really if you don't have eggs to find, candy to eat, or risen Jesus to worship, Easter is pretty empty.

Except for the mad crazy church bells going off right now. Hey church, I don't think Jesus rose *right* at midnight. But it's been a while since I browsed through the Gospels.

<1624>

There's like a stray cat party going on out back. The one that normally is around was making racket before, and now there's a new one mewing up a storm.

<2020>

Unsolicited answers #6: "crazy basketball crack" -- I know, I miss it too. April is the cruelest month. The NBA is nothing compared to March Madness.

<1147>

Today I was going to get up at 8 and work! I got up at 8 and peed, then went back to bed for three hours. I am useless.

Unsolicited answers #5: "what does bizcochitos mean to mexicans" -- I can only speak for *New* Mexicans, but "delicious cookie" is the rough translation. They're mostly only around at Christmas, which is kind of a travesty.

<1257>

I have to say, people who consider smoking to be free speech must favor the kind of free speech that involes punching other people repeatedly in the lungs.

<2113>

So, apparently during the first week after spring break, one of the kids who lives two doors down shot himself, and I managed to sleep through a cadre of police cars, fire trucks and ambulances out front. So Roger told me today. I thought maybe it was the 26th, since I wrote on my webpage that the kids were making a huge racket down the street, but I never bothered to look outside (and was in the living room for a while) so maybe I just miscontrued a party as all that mess. But, no, the News-Letter says it was three days later, on a Wednesday night. Disturbing. I must sleep like a rock.

Went to Canton with Roxanne tonight, mostly to freak out about people getting married, damn them. And to bitch about school.

<1644>

Gwen caught herself a man! Go Gwen!

Actually, thefacebook.com told me first.

<2222>

Unsolicited Answers #4: "stereotypes of a naggy wife" -- 1) Always yellin'; 2) Hates sports passionately; 3) Mean look on her face; 4) Completely unreasonable; 5) Possibly ugly; 6) Follows you around as you try to walk away. Aw, screw it... watch Big Love, between three wives, you're bound to see most stereotypical naggy behavior.

<1215>

I decided to try out brussels sprouts today... they are delightful! Their bad rep apparently comes from the sulphur smell that emerges with overcooking. So many veggies get such a bad rep due to overcooking. Anyhoo, if you nuke them with some water for ninety seconds, they are like a leafy version of the broccoli stem... basically sweet, nutty and tasty without that stiff broccoli stem texture.

<1936>

I helped T move again today... I'm so glad I haven't had to move. She decided not to move her big stuff this time, which meant four carloads of pretty easy moving. I escaped after the moving before dinner... I really wanted to go to happy hour. It's amazing how contextual relaxation is. Happy hour is where I feel relaxed no matter what. I ended up talking to people I didn't know, and I didn't care. But the moving crew, I somehow could not feel relaxed around, and socializing felt more effortful than I wanted. I also didn't feel like diddling around until food arrived. I just had dinner when I got home.

I guess I could have attempted to go out tonight... now that it stays light so late, it always feels early.

<2349>

For a while I've been wanting to start a feature answering questions people inadvertantly ask my blog via search. I think I'll call it UNSOLICITED ANSWERS.

UNSOLICITED ANSWERS
#1: For everyone looking for the Old Spice video with the hot sweaty dancing woman, lady, whatever you want to call her, sorry. If you were trying to ask, "Can only women be hot while sweaty?" the answer is no.
#2: "biostats project idea": Logistic regression will never fail you!
#3: Why does my wrist crack?: If you're asking about regular joint popping noises, it's just fluid moving around and air bubbles or some crap. If you're asking why your wrists fracture regularly, you should really be talking to a doctor and not the internet.

UNSOLICITED QUESTION: If I lose two pounds a week, how much of that is in the form of extra poop? Cuz conservation of mass would lead me to think that lost weight has to go somewhere, and poop seems like a pretty good vector. I just decided to ask that, cuz it's not a question we address as a society.

<2303>

Boooo! Netflix sent me West Wing instead of Sopranos! I'm right in the middle of season 4!

Also, I'm really going to beat Michael if he watched Lost last night.

Nothing much going on... term is going fine, although I really need to catch up with all my work. This weekend, I hope. I still have to write TASP reports, but they shouldn't be too onerous. The diet/exercise/sleeping thing is still going pretty well... I've just decided to shove work to the last priority instead of health.

<1635>

I'm declaring a war on the use of the term "war on." WOTUOTTWO, for short. Can we just describe what our problem is instead of labeling other people as militantly against something? Because it seems that they're generally not, and this term is a big red flag.

Tornado watch!