INTERESTING TIMES

EWG Action Fund's Healthy Home Checklist
(EWG = Environmental Working Group)
ewg.org/healthy-home-tips/checklist
( good checklist for general avoidance of toxins in the home )

A recent study found that during the Great Depression and two recessions, death rates decreased and life expectancy increased. The association between economic downstrends and a "healthier" populace is decreasing. The implications are astounding.
( This inquiry provoked by the 10/16/09 The Week Health & Science page: notes )

It just poured rain. The streets are full of water and petals. The kitten just walked by, meowing. I'm sitting on the floor in the nook by the window. I worked my last security shift of the quarter tonight. It was nice, just hanging out at school with nothing much going on. Good conversations. This is why I like working security. When it's your job to just sit by a door, people may come talk to you. And you have time to talk with them. It's very reaffirming. I feel fairly isolated much of the time. It's not easy to get people to have a substantive conversation about anything. There's so much militancy out there, people are so sure they are right that they don't care to entertain other points of view. They don't want to take the time to develop their own point of view. I am lucky to have intelligent, curious, openminded people in my life.
( braindump )

I'm in my office right now. It's a small room near the door to the apartment, adjacent to a closet which is likely to be our guest bedroom whenever we have a guest. Our new apartment really is at least twice as big as the Crow's Nest. And it is warm. It is the upstairs of a large house, with three of the four corners made into closets. The remaining corner has been made into a kitchen. This office and the main living area are wood paneled. The wood is pleasant and warm. The carpet in the living room is deep green. The bedroom is large. There is a laundry facility in the basement. And best of all, the kitchen has a gas range, and the heat is a gas stove with visible flames and stone for heat retention. There's something wonderful about FIRE in a dark and rainy city. This apartment actually gets and stays warm. That Crow's nest was entirely uninsulated. It was a very chilly place to hang out. We're still in the Brooklyn neighborhood, but we're in a warmer nest, close to the 17 line bus, and on a quieter street. There is no "mom thirty" here, when all the parents arrive to pick up or drop off their babies at the elementary school. We don't miss the desperate moms trying to park, nor the cascades of children on our sidewalk, nor the little man next door who put fish guts in his trash can. So I think the move was worth it. The expenditure is about the same, probably, overall. This rent is $100 more, but utilities and laundry are included.

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Well I guess I hit the wrong button or something. Where do I call home? I am working to call this place home. It is not coming easily. But it may come. Tonight I may discover that I have friends.

I've been practicing at home, in between and around the rest of my life. I don't have a special hour set aside where I have complete peace. Instead I practice while I am making tea, or while Suzanne searches for an image of the great Apache Chief Cochise of the Chiricahua on the internet. I watch the clouds go by out the window. At the moment the clouds are pink and purple and headed south in poofs. I'm all energized from a few basic yoga asanas, some downward dog variations and basic sun salutations. It's amazing how tingly I feel. I felt a few muscles begin to burn when I tried the more challenging variations, and wondered...will I be sore? I seem to make my hamstrings sore almost continuously. My hamstrings shorten when left to their own devices, and need continuous encouragement to grow longer.
( yoga brag )

Yesterday the kitten stayed indoors all day because she was limping and perhaps tired. I was at school, Suzanne stayed home and watched it rain. It rained all day. The first week of school has been stressful, but overall I'm feeling much better than I did last quarter. The main difference is that I have not JUST moved away from my home of 7 years. I am not getting lost in the school building anymore, I know where to go for the things that I need, and I am more realistic about the expectations of me as a student.
( more )

Signed a lease yesterday morning. And about a dozen other papers. One that says I can be fined $250 if I take the batteries out of the smoke detector. Another that says it's my fault if mold grows in the bathroom. I'll be charged $50/hour for any repairs that need to be done. Basically what I have learned is that a renter in this market has no power. And if I did have any power, I just signed it away. I felt violated after going over all the "agreements" I had to sign to get a place to live. And that doesn't even address what I'm paying for another slummy apartment. This is fucked up. But at least I have a home. Suzanne will be here on Friday and probably Friday night will be the first that I spend at the new place. Move the cat on Friday too.
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I came in early today to attend a meeting about research opportunities at Helfgott. Looks like there is a lot going on, and the project that has Zwickey's juices flowing is the attempt to create a new Practice Based Research Network that includes Naturopaths, Chinese Medicine Practitioners and Chiropractors. The idea is to begin to collect data on what kinds of care people are seeking, on the patient's individual stats and then from there to begin to understand success rates of different modalities. There is no such network for CAM practitioners (complementary and alternative medicine) in existence, so the very beginning stages involve surveying practitioners about what docs to enroll, what carrots to use, what data to collect and how. I have always been interested in the design of surveys and tests, so that's the aspect that I may get involved in.
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You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of rain
are moving over the landscapes
over the praries and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese
high in the clear blue air
are heading home again.
Whoever you are
no matter how lonely
the world offers itself to your imagination
calls to you like the wild geese
harsh and exciting
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.