[In case it needs to be said: I don't agree with every word of everything I link to. --L.]
- Letter from Stephen Fry to a depressed fan (Letters of Note)
- Although they mean well, it’s sometimes quite galling to be reminded how much people love you when you don’t love yourself that much.
I’ve found that it’s of some help to think of one’s moods and feelings about the world as being similar to weather:
Here are some obvious things about the weather:
It’s real.
You can’t change it by wishing it away.
If it’s dark and rainy it really is dark and rainy and you can’t alter it.
It might be dark and rainy for two weeks in a row.BUT
It will be sunny one day.
It isn’t under one’s control as to when the sun comes out, but come out it will.
One day.It really is the same with one’s moods, I think. The wrong approach is to believe that they are illusions. They are real. Depression, anxiety, listlessness – these are as real as the weather – AND EQUALLY NOT UNDER ONE’S CONTROL. Not one’s fault.
BUT
They will pass: they really will.
In the same way that one has to accept the weather, so one has to accept how one feels about life sometimes.
- The HTML5 Readiness Chart Highlights How Well Your Browser Handles the Future [Infographic]
- We’ve said for a while that HTML5 will change the way you use the web, but not all browsers are ready for the big change. This interactive chart highlights which features are still missing in your browser of choice.
[More importantly: chart porn! -L]
- Miso Happy With This Color (Stupid Nail Polish Names)
- It’s nail polish names like these that really make me nostalgic for the good ol’ days. You know, the ones where women were in the kitchen, African-Americans were at the back of the bus, and Asians were in internment camps.
- Progressives Buck Democratic Leaders On Wall Street Reform | TPMDC
- The Wall Street reform bill has no doubt drifted leftward in the past several days. But that doesn’t mean all Senate liberals are happy. Several progressive and populist senators think the bill’s broad approach does not call for the fundamental reforms Wall Street needs. They’ve been pushing far-reaching amendments that would shrink major financial companies, and further limit high-risk trading and though their efforts likely do not have enough votes to pass, they at the very least want to get a fair hearing. And they’re banding together to make sure they get one.
[But the real reason I'm linking to this article is the last paragraph, quoted below. -L]
“I will continue to come and ask consent to be able to offer this amendment,” Dorgan said. “[A]s Governor Schwarzenegger said in a previous life, I’ll be back, and soon.”
- Facebook’s Huge Maze of Privacy Options Mapped Out [Facebook]
- The New York Times does the heavy lifting of actually plotting out Facebook’s headache-inducing privacy options, helping some of us to navigate 50 settings with 170 options, and the rest of us to shake our heads in disbelief.
- Print the Contents of Any Folder in Windows [Windows Tip]
- Need a listing of everything you’ve got in a Windows folder? You could grab screenshots, but that’s a pain when there are lots of files. A quick command line trick gives you an easily printable directory of contents.
- Take Control of Last Minute Job Demands by Guiding Which Job Gets Deferred [Managing The Boss]
- We’ve all been there, you’re busily working on a variety of projects and your boss comes and dumps some rush hour job on your lap. While you can’t always avoid the rush job you can steer it in the right direction.
[Lifehacker always has these tips that strike me as inapplicable to mcjobs. -L]
- IOM Report on Supplement Regulation (NeuroLogica Blog)
- The Institute of Medicine (IOM) is an organization of independent scientists and experts who are tasked with providing, “independent, objective, evidence-based advice to policymakers, health professionals, the private sector, and the public.” In my experience they generally do good work…
They were recently tasked by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to prepare a report on the science behind health claims for food and drugs…. They conclude, basically, that there should be a rigorous standard of evidence for not only drugs but also health claims made for food and supplements as well.
Their key points focus on the fact that many food and supplement claims are based upon basic science research – the use of biomarkers instead of clinical outcomes.
[In other words, much of this crap has not actually been shown to actually contribute to anyone's improved health.
Now, pardon me while I go drink this pomegranate juice.
-L]
…Essentially, companies can claim that any supplement supports a structure or function of the body without the burden of providing any evidence – they just cannot claim that it treats or cures a disease. But this, in practice, is a distinction without a difference. Companies can and do say, for example, that a product “boosts the immune system” and that the immune system fights off cancer, but they cannot say the product treats cancer. They can even have a doctor saying, “I give this product to my cancer patients.” It’s all a pointless game.
…The IOM report is very welcome, but it does not go far enough. The problem really rests squarely in the lap of Congress – they hamstrung the FDA in 1994 at the behest of the supplement industry, and they continue to serve the interests of this industry over the consumer. I also don’t see this issue as being very much on the public’s radar – as the report notes, most people assume health claims for food and supplements are regulated already. The public is further kept nicely distracted from this issue by the frantic propaganda of the pushers of supplements and dubious health products…
- “F” Is For “Fastball Special” – The ABCs Of Wolverine [Concept Art]
- Joe The Barbarian illustrator Sean Gordon Murphy has constructed an alphabet chart perfect for teaching the lil’ amnesiac antiheroes in your brood their ABCs. Remember: without reading, you can’t be the best at what you do!
[Squint. Headscratch.
...Okay.
-L.]
- What It Takes To Be a Justice (Balloon Juice)
- In 48 hours, we have learned of a new list of requirements in order to be a Justice on the Supreme Court. The following is a brief summation (to date- will update as necessary):
1.) Titillating David Brooks…
- Secrecy Loses Again in the U.K. | The Torture Report
- This week Binyam Mohamed moved another step closer to a public reckoning for his ordeal when a British appeals court ruled the government cannot rely on secret evidence to defend itself in a damages suit brought by Mohamed and five other U.K.-based former Guantánamo detainees.
- Infrasound: The Sound Too Awesome for Us to Hear [Mad Science]
- Infrasound is too low-frequency for humans to hear. It has been mistaken for ghosts, has been known to cause nausea and headaches in humans, and is used to monitor the testing of nuclear weapons.
- Sleeping in the Belly of the Beast [Not Scifi]
- In the single greatest sleeping-bag achievement since the Tauntaun Initiative, Patch Together has unleashed the ChumBuddy — a nighttime rig fit to give would-be Quints a pain in the wallet.
[Fuck yeah, it's a shaaaaark. -L.]
The Link(s): Thu, May 13th, 11am by Lee Salazar, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Terms and conditions beyond the scope of this license may be available at leesalazar.com.