Musical interlude of the day (take two)

Rudy!

For football fans:
The movie Rudy is not on line, but the real Rudy story is:



and for those of you who don't care about football: Here is the music from the score that is a delight to hear.



correction: A poor quality version can be found on line HERE.
Don't know if the US streaming sites have it (they don't stream to the Philippines).

Sigh. Four more abadoned kitties

I rescued 4 more abandoned kittens from outside our door. Mama probably is a stray who left them in the vacant lot across the street...I found two in the driveway and one in the ditch and another in the flowers who fell into the ditch trying to get away from me.

We don't need cats we have plenty.

The bad news is that we end up losing most of the rescued kittens from illness or to the dogs when they get old enough to wander. We only have one left of the last 3 I rescued.

No, I am not a cat lover, but they are so sweet, even the one that tried to bite me (and I had to use a towel to grab it).

Earthquakes in Oklahoma? and other stuff

We have small earthquakes here in the Philippines all the time, but in Oklahoma?
more HERE

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An increase in cervical cancer? yeah, we docs know all about that, but no one cared to publicize the problem until now, when they are telling you this to encourage you to get a shot to protect yourself.

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A new drug for cystic fibrosis?
alas, not all of them, only the minority with a certain gene mutation: more HERE

Ivacaftor, also known as VX-770, was developed by Vertex Pharmaceuticals with financial support from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. The oral medicine targets the defective protein produced by the gene mutation called G551D that causes CF. Researchers found that patients carrying G551D - approximately four per cent of all CF patients - who were treated with VX-770 showed a 17 per cent relative improvement in lung function that was sustained over the course of 48 weeks.

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The Jatinga Triangle: Where birds go to die.

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Remember this scene?



well, now the Nails on chalkboard noise mystery solved

headsup DaveBarry
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Gift item of the day

a Sharky Tea Infuser by Pablo Matteoda

the bad news? it's
"conceptual", not on sale anywhere I can find.


more interesting tea infusers are shown at Hometone

Andy Rooney, RIP

TV commentator Andy Rooney has passed away.



His family is in our prayers.

Philippine News below the fold

How to stay cool and keep electric bills down?

NasaSpaceBlog has an article on foam insulation for your home.

actually, here in our ceilings we use one inch foam insulation with aluminum to reflect the sun that comes in our sunroof (the sun reflecter part is because we have an aluminum roof with a sunlight so we don't have to use electric lights during the day...we also have an air flow double roof that lets the air flows up and out).

We still use airconditioning in the afternoon for the offices, but usually the house is cool enough with just fans or our evaporative cooler.

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Archbishop Cruz remembers Father Tentorio

Yeah, looks scruffy like the Priests I used to work with in Africa.

more HERE.
Photo from AsiaNews.
Tabang Mindanao is a local church NGO.
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Cojoined twins from the Philippines have successfully been separated at a California hospital.








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Sunday is the Feasts of the Sacrifice, a Muslim festival to celebrate that Abraham was willing to give everything to God, but also that he learned human sacrifice is no longer a part of God's wishes.

It is a "non working" holiday here in the Philippines.

Bit by a duck? The government has a code to bill for that

I used to tell my patients I could either know billing or know medicine, but under the new "reforms" of medicine you have to do it right or not be paid.

So the new codebook coming soon has this:

November 1, 2011 — Physicians have gotten a few laughs from the new and voluminous set of diagnostic codes known as ICD-10, which distinguishes between being struck by a duck (W6162XA) and being bitten by a duck (W6161XA)...

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) decreed the switch to ICD-10 in 2009 as part of implementing the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)...

With ICD-10, physicians will be able to document what ails a patient with far more specificity. ICD-9, for example, has a code for a malignant neoplasm of an arm, but ICD-10 offers 3 options: upper right arm, upper left arm, or unspecified arm.

Finally, a Code for Walking Into a Lamppost

Such multiple choices help explain why the new code set is almost 5 times larger than the old one. However, some may wonder whether the authors of ICD-10 got carried away in covering every base.

ICD-9, for example, recognizes that patients may seek treatment because they were bitten, and gives clinicians a few choices, such as dog, rat, snake, arthropod, unspecified animal, or human.

ICD-10, in contrast, is a veritable zoo of bite codes — horse, cow, cat, pig, shark, dolphin, sea lion, alligator, macaw, parrot, and duck, to name just a few new kinds of jaws. And for each kind of bite, physicians can pick a code for an initial encounter, subsequent encounter, or sequela.

ICD-10 also describes the world of bumps and bruises in excruciating detail, with codes for walking into a wall versus a lamppost versus a piece of furniture. Ever been crushed between a sailboat and another kind of water craft? There's a code for that, too — V9114XA.

Some accident codes, however, defy the imagination, such as the famous V9107XA: burn due to water-skis on fire, initial encounter...

Memories

Older photos of my family in the USA.

From Old Family Photos

From Old Family Photos

From Old Family Photos

The Hobbit is 3D?

The Happy news of the day

Making kids smile.

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Dr. Bill and Kathy Magee, co-founders of “Operation Smile,” a non-profit medical service organization that provides cleft lip and palate repair surgeries to children worldwide, arrived yesterday at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport from Los Angeles, California, USA, on Philippine Airlines flight PR103...

Magee said it was back in 1982 when he and his wife joined a group of American doctors and nurses on a mission to provide free surgery to Filipino children with facial deformities in a small village in Naga, Camarines Sur.

Magee said he and his wife felt very bad when the mission was only able to operate on 40 children out of the 200 who came to the site. He promised to himself he will return to Naga to work on more children.

And return he did. The very next year, Magee and Kathy assembled a new team of surgeons and went back to Naga.

They were surprised to find 500 children waiting for them. The Magees said they were overwhelmed by the number but the team tried their best to do as many operations as they can.

“The operation kept on growing and snowballed, requiring us to come back year after year and bring with us more and more volunteers,” Kathy said.

“We are just too happy that the support from other people keeps pouring in so we can continue provide these surgeries to children in need. It’s so heartwarming to see the smile on the children that we operate on and in a way, give them their lives back,” she said.

more about the organization HERE and HERE

More here (scroll down to story) about how coordination with the AFP, JTOTF-P, the local government and a local charity enabled the NGO to work in the dangerous south to help the kids last Spring.

Photo of the week

The Giant Nebula, NGC 3603

Thousands of sparkling young stars nestled within the giant nebula NGC 3603. This stellar "jewel box" is one of the most massive young star clusters in the Milky Way Galaxy. NGC 3603 is a prominent star-forming region in the Carina spiral arm of the Milky Way, about 20,000 light-years away. This image shows a young star cluster surrounded by a vast region of dust and gas. The image reveals stages in the life cycle of stars. The nebula was first discovered by Sir John Herschel in 1834. The image spans roughly 17 light-years.

Image Credit: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage

Only Yesterday

The UKTelegraph discusses the changes seen by a man born in 1902.

But a better comparison could be found in Fredrick Allen's classic book "Only Yesterday" (on line HERE) which compares the world of 1919 with that of the early 1930's.

One more word about Mr. and Mrs. Smith and we may dismiss them for the night. Not only have they never heard of radio broadcasting; they have never heard of Coue, the Dayton Trial, cross-word puzzles, bathing-beauty contests, John J. Raskob, racketeers, Teapot Dome, Coral Gables, the American Mercury, Sacco and Vanzetti, companionate marriage, brokers' loan statistics, Michael Arlen, the Wall Street explosion, confession magazines, the Hall-Mills case, radio stock, speakeasies, Al Capone, automatic traffic lights, or Charles A. Lindbergh.

and it's narration on the start of the great depression seems to be hauntingly similar to that of today.

At first it seemed as if the Administration would succeed not only in preventing drastic and immediate wage cuts, but in restoring economic health by applying the formula of Doctor Coue. After sinking to a low level at the end of 1929 and throwing something like three million men upon the streets, the industrial indices showed measurable signs of improvement. .... For a time it seemed as if perhaps the hopeful prophets at Washington were right and prosperity was coming once more...

But in April this brief illusion began to sicken and die. Business reaction had set in again. ... The Coue formula was failing; for the economic disease was more than a temporary case of nervous prostration, it was organic and deep- seated.

sigh

The invisible Asian

Developer with shotgun scared off Oakland rioters
This photo in the San Francisco Chronicle bring in mind one story that is not noticed in the press:

Anti Asian bigotry.

photo credit:Beck Diefenbach / Special to The Chronicle

In this case, it is an American with a Japanese name, but one suspects many other Asian storekeepers in Oakland were targeted and resented being asked if they "support" the rioters (what does the white liberal blogger think they would say to one of the protesters: get a bath and go to work? Actually, one of the shopkeepers, an Iranian American, does comment on the odor then apologizes to the blogger and says she supports the movement...and if you believe this, I have a bridge in Brooklyn I want to sell).

I remember a news program on the Korean station on our cable TV here in the Philippines that was a discussion of Anti Asian bigotry in the US, and most of the discussion was about how the cops didn't bother to protect Korean stores from thugs.

Another little noticed story: That Asians, not gays, are the group who report the highest amount of bullying in public schools.

No, it's not PC to see east Asians being bullied, so the article morphs the bullying into Anti Islamic bullying by interviewing only one parent, identified only as a "housewife", yet one who has the same Jordanian name as the a lady listed on this Rutgers University Near Eastern center.

The real victims, of course, are East and South Asians who dare to study hard and succeed.

And stories, such as the 2009 attack on Asian students, one, where 26 Asian students were beaten badly by gangs at a high school where anti Asian violence is common. No, no "racial" motivation behind that attack, says the principal. And a follow up quotes non Asians who run the school as saying things were improving. even though attacks continued.

In contrast, this 2011 story at Asianweek tells their side of the story.

The solution of the authorities? The attackers were transferred to other schools, and they held meetings to instruct Asian students to understand and be sympathetic to "cultural differences"...

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In the Philippines, the "invisible Asian" is the Christian victims of the MILF.
most news stories report victims or villagers fleeing but not identifying their religion or why they flee. So outsiders use the left's mime that it is evil government troops killing innocent Muslim civilians and making innocent Muslims flee.

From StrategyPage.

So far, president Aquino has resisted calls for a major offensive against MILF, but this is becoming more difficult with each MILF renegade group attacking Christians in the south.

Factoid of the day

Otzie the iceman had evidence he had been infected with Lyme disease.





more HERE.




and HERE.

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factoid two: Achilles did not drag Hector's body around the walls of Troy but in front of the walls of Troy, i.e. probably back and forth.

Why is this important? because the newest investigations of the site suggest the lower city was a bit large for him to do this

A good article summarizing this is found

HERE

the main citadel on the hill is red, and the lower city is in yellow...which also was surrounded by walls (pink in photo).


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Musical interlude of the day

For all you Homer fans: Penelope's song



lyrics here.

Just in time for Christmas shopping

the Nieman Marcus Christmas catelogue. or view the 2011 Fantasy Gift video.

everything for the one you love, from a brand new Ferrari ($395,000) to a delux yurt (only $75,000), to your very own "dancing fountain".(Dancing Fountains, $1,000,000.00; page 57; Guest Choreographer package, $500,000;)

and for style tips, check out their blog.


headsup TYWKIWDBI

Ever have one of those days?

Globalization stories below the fold

LINK Link2

It's the Ottoman empire vs the Turkish Empire...

one factoid I learned from these articles: Turkey now is allowing US anti missiles to be placed there, as protection against Iran's missiles.

and a historical note of how some have used Islam to justify violence HERE.
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Thailand's floods are affecting others: not only will you be paying more for your hard drive, but the Honda plant here in the Philippines has had to shut down for lack of parts.

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Solar flares are going to get worse.

There goes the internet.

and an asteroid will do a near miss on Tuesday.

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air pollution nitrogen is fertilizing tropical forests.

but carbon dioxide is going up faster than predicted.

Stuff below the fold

Psychology research fraud.

Who wudda thot? Reminds me of a study on using amphetamines for add in the retarded, who was caught because his data was too clean.

It's hard to measure behavior changes, and in this case, the subtle findings were too clean to believe.

(when I did a study of stopping anti psychotic medicines, only one third of the informants agreed is a patient was "very aggressive", as defined as a severe injury that resulted in ER treatment, so I ended up not publishing the data).

but the real problem is that statistical errors were found in half of psychology papers being published. That should have been caught by the editors.

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Nigerian solar project goes kaput.

Main problem is not that it was solar: The problem is it was a gift from a benevolent government, so when it developed problems, no one in the village wanted to take care of it or fix it. Instead they called the gov't to fix it over and over again.

And the price is probably a lot higher than giving a loan to a local entrepreneur to buy a generator and sell power to those who want it.

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Internet goes kaput.

If you like the great Firewall of China, get a load of the US equivalent to stop P2P sharing.

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you are now free to brush your teeth:

'Exploding' electric toothbrushes recalled