Moving the ol' blog again...

Blogger is being a pain, so I'm moving the blog over to tumblr. New URL is deaeterna.tumblr.com.

Quote of the day...

Confucius - "Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change."

Spring Homeland Security Advisory chart

Another of Allen's lovely RSS/interweb finds...

Spring Homeland Security Advisory chart.
As suggested by Wired’s awesome Threat Level Blog

Breast Cancer: Busting Common Myths

As we work to raise awareness of breast cancer this October, a new telephone survey by the American Cancer Society (ACS) shows that a surprisingly large number of Americans still believe unsubstantiated claims about cancer.

The saddest part of this news is that the least-educated and informed individuals are among those most affected by cancer according to the ACS.

Healthy behavior depends partly on a person's knowledge of which behaviors place them at risk, such as smoking, consuming too much alcohol, or overexposure to UV sunlight.

But research also tells us that people sometimes will focus on unproven risk factors while paying less attention to those that are scientifically proven. As a result, the decisions they make about their health may become distorted.

The survey included 12 inaccurate or unlikely statements about cancer risk, risk factors, and prevention. Here are a few of those myths:

• The risk of dying of cancer in the U.S. is increasing. False - yet nearly 7 in 10 Americans (68 percent) thought this claim was true.
• Living in a polluted city is a greater risk factor for lung cancer than smoking a pack of cigarettes a day. False - but nearly 4 in 10 (39 percent) thought this claim as true.
• Electronic devices like cell phones can cause cancer. False - 3 in 10 thought this was true.
• Personal hygiene products like shampoo, deodorant, and antiperspirants can cause cancer. False - but about 1 in 7 (15 percent) agreed with this one.
• Underwire bras can cause breast cancer. False - 6 in 10 thought this was true.

Most strikingly, the first statement above, that the risk of dying from cancer in the U.S. is increasing, is clearly false - and yet fully 68 percent of the respondents believed it.

In reality, the death rate from cancer has been decreasing since the early 1990s, and the five-year relative survival rate for all cancers combined has been rising steadily over the last 30 years.

And why did so many believe that living in a polluted city is a greater risk for lung cancer than smoking a pack of cigarettes a day? The authors point to studies showing that people who engage in behaviors like smoking or unprotected sun exposure tend to underestimate their own personal risks from these choices, despite their knowing of the risk to the general public.

Here are some other myths, specifically about breast cancer, that I often hear from patients or their family members:

• The risk of breast cancer decreases after a woman reaches age 65. Actually, the risk of breast cancer increases steadily with age. By the time a woman reaches 85, her risk of developing breast cancer is 1 in 7.
• Antiperspirants cause breast cancer. There is no research to substantiate this rumor, which started on college campuses in 1998.
• Most women diagnosed today will have to have a mastectomy as their breast cancer treatment. In fact, less than 20 percent of women diagnosed nowadays actually need mastectomy; over 80 percent are candidates for lumpectomy surgery.
• If you don't have a family history of breast cancer, you won't get it yourself. In truth, only 12 percent of women diagnosed with breast cancer have a family history of the disease.
• Men can't get breast cancer. One percent of individuals diagnosed each year are men.
• Most women who get breast cancer will die of their disease. No! Fifteen percent of women diagnosed will eventually die of the disease, and that figure has been declining for the past 3 years.
• The radiation from mammograms causes breast cancer. Oh, boy, that's a doozie. The amount of radiation received in a mammogram is very small and not a risk factor. In fact, mammograms save many lives by detecting tumors early.Women diagnosed by mammogram with stage 0 or 1 breast cancer have a 98 percent survival rate, thus demonstrating the value of annual mammograms.

If you have been hoodwinked by any of these myths, here's your opportunity to erase them from your mind by getting the facts. If someone you care about is confused about the stats, share this information with them and reduce their anxiety a bit, too.

Who knows? You might inspire someone to do the right thing and get a mammogram. And that someone, of course, could be the person looking back at you in the bathroom mirror.

© 2007 Johns Hopkins University. All Rights Reserved. This article from Johns Hopkins University is provided as a service by Yahoo. All materials are produced independently by Johns Hopkins University, which is solely responsible for its content.

Two-ingredient, diet-friendly recipes

Two-ingredient, guilt-free recipes

HR Check-in...

HR Check-in from merlinmann on Vimeo.

Aqua Globes...

They're like bongs for your plants!

Post Office kicks off free, by-mail gadget recycling

Post Office kicks off free, by-mail gadget recycling

Tue Mar 18, 2008 3:27PM EDT

Got an old camera, cell phone, or MP3 player that you want to toss? Under a new pilot program offered by the U.S. Postal Service, recycling your dead gadgets is as easy as dropping them in the mail.

Computerworld reports that the Post Office's new "Mail Back" program is getting a trial run in 10 U.S. markets, including Chicago, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Washington, D.C. If the pilot program takes off, a nationwide rollout will follow.

So here's the deal: Just bring your old gadgets (handhelds, cell phones, MP3 players, and even inkjet cartridges - no 20" CRTs or dead dot-matrix printers, unfortunately) to one of 1,500 participating post offices, seal them in preprinted, postage-paid envelopes (you can take as many envelopes as you want), and drop them in the mail.

The package goes to Clover Technologies Group, which is partnering with the Post Office in the new recycling program. In a press release, the Post Office promises that Clover will refurbish, resell, or break down the discarded gadgets for recycling, and that nothing will end up in a landfill.

It's a clever idea for those of us with old electronics too outdated to sell on eBay. Indeed, I have an old, 2001-era iPod that's essentially worthless (I priced it over at SecondRotation and got an estimate of exactly $0), and I'd rather drop it in the mail than pay to have it recycled.

Related:
Recycle electronics free by mail [Computerworld]

I'm totally speechless....

http://www.yahoo.com/s/840799

What year do you belong in?

You Belong in 1997

With you anything goes! You're grunge one day, ghetto fabulous the next. It's all good!

What Year Do You Belong In?

Ch-ch-ch-changes...

As I'm sure many of you have noticed I have become increasingly political in my posts of late. I suppose the logical explanation would be that it is a presidential election year, but I think not. The fifth anniversary of the Iraq war and the continued, violent oppression in Tibet have sparked this flurry of posts. I suffer from apathy at times, as many people do. But, in the end, humanitarian causes always bring me back. It is sad to me that these things are political fodder. In truth, they are basic rights each human should extend to every other human on the planet. Isn't not killing other human beings so fundamental? I think so. It is so easy to get caught up in our daily lives and the people who treat us badly that we forget that there are horrible things out there. I spoke with a man today at work who is trying to put together a banquet to benefit African charities and causes. And he was telling me what it was like there. And I thought about how stupid some arguments I have been in recently have been and how petty some of my grudges are. And that is the truth. So, next time you want to bitch because you have to talk to someone who annoys you or your computer won't work the way it's supposed to or the boss is breathing down your neck...think about what it might be like to be in Iraq or Tibet or Africa...and take a deep breath...be grateful...

Tracy

It's the economy, stupid!

America, We Have a Problem

Crock 'o shit

Five years later and they are still spinning...
Bush: U.S. deaths in Iraq 'laid foundations for peace'

Seven simple dinner menus...

http://food.yahoo.com/everyday/dinner/

Quote of the day...

Lily Tomlin - "The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat."

Happy Easter, everyone!

This comes to me by way of my friend Allen's blog...



Happy Easter, boys and girls!

Politics and Race article

What politicians say when they talk about race

Quote of the day...

PJ O'Rourke - "The mystery of government is not how Washington works but how to make it stop."

No Depression to cease publication...

NO DEPRESSION MAGAZINE TO CEASE PUBLISHING AFTER MAY-JUNE ISSUE

No Depression, the bimonthly magazine covering a broad range of American roots music since 1995, will bring to an end its print publication with its 75th issue in May-June 2008.

Plans to expand the publication's website (www.nodepression.net) with additional content will move forward, though it will in no way replace the print edition.

The magazine's March-April issue, currently en route to subscribers and stores, includes the following note from publishers Grant Alden, Peter Blackstock and Kyla Fairchild as its Page 2 "Hello Stranger" column:

Dear Friends:

Barring the intercession of unknown angels, you hold in your hands the next-to-the-last edition of No Depression we will publish. It is difficult even to type those words, so please know that we have not come lightly to this decision.

In the thirteen years since we began plotting and publishing No Depression , we have taken pride not only in the quality of the work we were able to offer our readers, but in the way we insisted upon doing business. We have never inflated our numbers; we have always paid our bills (and, especially, our freelancers) on time. And we have always tried our best to tell the truth.

First things, then: If you have a subscription to ND, please know that we will do our very best to take care of you. We will be negotiating with a handful of magazines who may be interested in fulfulling your subscription. That is the best we can do under the circumstances.

Those circumstances are both complicated and painfully simple. The simple answer is that advertising revenue in this issue is 64% of what it was for our March- April issue just two years ago. We expect that number to continue to decline.

The longer answer involves not simply the well-documented and industrywide reduction in print advertising, but the precipitous fall of the music industry. As a niche publication, ND is well insulated from reductions in, say, GM's print advertising budget; our size meant they weren't going to buy space in our pages, regardless.

On the other hand, because we're a niche title we are dependent upon advertisers who have a specific reason to reach our audience. That is: record labels. We, like many of our friends and competitors, are dependent upon advertising from the community we serve.

That community is, as they say, in transition. In this evolving downloadable world, what a record label is and does is all up to question. What is irrefutable is that their advertising budgets are drastically reduced, for reasons we well understand. It seems clear at this point that whatever businesses evolve to replace (or transform) record labels will have much less need to advertise in print.

The decline of brick and mortar music retail means we have fewer newsstands on which to sell our magazine, and small labels have fewer venues that might embrace and hand-sell their music. Ditto for independent bookstores. Paper manufacturers have consolidated and begun closing mills to cut production; we've been told to expect three price increases in 2008. Last year there was a shift in postal regulations, written by and for big publishers, which shifted costs down to smaller publishers whose economies of scale are unable to take advantage of advanced sorting techniques.

Then there's the economy...

The cumulative toll of those forces makes it increasingly difficult for all small magazines to survive. Whatever the potentials of the web, it cannot be good for our democracy to see independent voices further marginalized. But that's what's happening. The big money on the web is being made, not surprisingly, primarily by big businesses.

ND has never been a big business. It was started with a $2,000 loan from Peter's savings account (the only monetary investment ever provided, or sought by, the magazine). We have five more or less full-time employees, including we three who own the magazine. We have always worked from spare bedrooms and drawn what seemed modest salaries.

What makes this especially painful and particularly frustrating is that our readership has not significantly declined, our newsstand sell-through remains among the best in our portion of the industry, and our passion for and pleasure in the music has in no way diminished. We still have shelves full of first-rate music we'd love to tell you about.

And we have taken great pride in being one of the last bastions of the long-form article, despite the received wisdom throughout publishing that shorter is better. We were particularly gratified to be nominated for our third Utne award last year.

Our cards are now on the table.

Though we will do this at greater length next issue, we should like particularly to thank the advertisers who have stuck with us these many years; the writers, illustrators, and photographers who have worked for far less than they're worth; and our readers: You.
Thank you all. It has been our great joy to serve you.
GRANT ALDEN
PETER BLACKSTOCK
KYLA FAIRCHILD

My kind of March Madness...

March Music Madness

An article on Missouri floods...

Look at the couple posing for the pic in this article...Ugh. Several lakes in our area broke their banks or flooded their spillways including Beaver Lake, NWA's main water source. But, nothing like this!