Here on LJ, I make a good number of posts which are gloom-&-doom about the future. However, wen dealing with some real Nihilists on FaceBook, I am Mr.Cheerfully Upbeat when commenting to their depressing posts.
Current Music:Spacetime Continuum - Pod - The 4 Quarters Mix (Featuring Jamie Hodge) (Space Station Soma: Tune in,
Marijuana might cause new cell growth in the brain
* 22:00 13 October 2005 by Kurt Kleiner
A synthetic chemical similar to the active ingredient in marijuana makes new cells grow in rat brains. What is more, in rats this cell growth appears to be linked with reducing anxiety and depression. The results suggest that marijuana, or its derivatives, could actually be good for the brain.
In mammals, new nerve cells are constantly being produced in a part of the brain called the hippocampus, which is associated with learning, memory, anxiety and depression. Other recreational drugs, such as alcohol, nicotine and cocaine, have been shown to suppress this new growth. Xia Zhang of the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, and colleagues decided to see what effects a synthetic cannabinoid called HU210 had on rats' brains.
They found that giving rats high doses of HU210 twice a day for 10 days increased the rate of nerve cell formation, or neurogenesis, in the hippocampus by about 40%.
A lovely winter night 8 to 10 inches of snow in the metro area .. 25 MPH winds -25F wind chill, highs in the low double digits F - Stay warm and drive carefully Minnesota friends.
Below from Gulfwaves. Click pic on left to get to videos and pics of creatures living deep deep in the ocean where light does not penetrate. I guess those deep sea critters don't need vitamin D to survive.
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The Census of Marine Life, a decade-long international research project, has inventoried over 17,600 deep-sea species that live where no sunlight seeps through. The findingsare a cry for conservation-based ocean policy, as even deep-sea ecosystems feel human impacts. Robert S. Carney, LSU professor and co-leader of the project's Continental Margin Ecosystems, sums it up well: "Many species live there [the "abyss"]. However, the abyss has long been viewed as a desert. Worse, it was viewed as a wasteland where few to no environmental impacts could be of any concern. 'Mine it, drill it, dispose into it, or fish it - what could possibly be impacted? And, if there is an impact, the abyss is vast and best yet, hidden from sight.' Census of Marine Life deep realm scientists see and are concerned."
Current Music:William Orbit - Pavane Pour Une Infante Defunte (Space Station Soma: Tune in, turn on, space out. Am
Snippetsbelow from Natural News. Click URLs to get to full story.
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Dear NaturalNews readers,
All you fans of raw milk will be a little upset when you read today's story: A small family farm in Missouri has been targeted by a state-run sting operation that now seeks to prosecute two farmers' daughters for selling two gallons of raw milk.
This story really hits home for me, as I grew up just a few miles from where this tyranny is taking place. Read more in my feature story that calls the Missouri AG a tyrant:
Whenever all the weather websites make a huge fucking error, I cannot help but feel the weathermen are all sitting around taking more drugs than Hunter S. Thompson could handle. They just hallucinate their asses off and post their deliriums on their respective websites.
At 6 Am, the websites were predicting many hours of gloom and doom this afternoon and tonight. But when I looked at the radar, I saw no storms approaching. I assumed there was an approaching big-ass storm coming in from the Gulf which was not yet registering on the radar.
Because Tuesday was to be a guilt-free holiday, I stayed up late. When I awoke, there was no rain. And the weather sites no longer talked about gloom and doom. o rain all day since 6 AM. Since I got me a late start, I saw no need to rush out to work.
I go out of my way to check several websites so I can compare them and see which one(s) are full of shit. But when they all are bullshit, my system fails me.
Business is terrible, so I probably did not make much. But at this time, every $20 counts. So I am pissed at the weather people today.
Current Music:Jens Buchert - Algorhythm (Space Station Soma: Tune in, turn on, space out. Ambient and mid-tempo el
Below from Doc Saul at Orthomolecular Medicine News Service. These days, I am using a blend of 2 parts C-salts and 1 part Ascorbic Acid powder. To me, the combo is much nicer than either C-salts of Ascorbic Acid alone.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Orthomolecular Medicine News Service, December 8, 2009
VITAMIN C AND ACIDITY What Form is Best?
(OMNS, December 8, 2009) Vitamin C is commonly taken in large quantities to improve health and prevent asthma, allergies, viral infection, and heart disease [1,2]. It is non-toxic and non-immunogenic, and does not irritate the stomach as drugs like aspirin can. Yet vitamin C (L-ascorbic acid) is acidic. So, a common question is, what are the effects from taking large quantities?
Ascorbic acid is a weak acid (pKa= 4.2) [3], only slightly stronger than vinegar. When dissolved in water, vitamin C is sour but less so than citric acid found in lemons and limes. Can large quantities of a weak acid such as ascorbate cause problems in the body? The answer is, sometimes, in some situations. However, with some simple precautions they can be avoided.
Acid in the Mouth First of all, any acid can etch the surfaces of your teeth. This is the reason the dentist cleans your teeth and warns about plaque, for acid generated by bacteria in the mouth can etch your teeth to cause cavities. Cola soft drinks contain phosphoric acid, actually used by dentists to etch teeth before tooth sealants are applied. Like soft drinks, ascorbic acid will not cause etching of teeth if only briefly present. Often, vitamin C tablets are coated with a tableting ingredient such as magnesium stearate which prevents the ascorbate from dissolving immediately. Swallowing a vitamin C tablet without chewing it prevents its acid from harming tooth enamel.
Chewable Vitamin C Tablets Chewables are popular because they taste sweet and so are good for encouraging children to take their vitamin C [4]. However, some chewable vitamin C tablets can contain sugar and ascorbic acid which, when chewed, is likely to stick in the crevices of your teeth. So, after chewing a vitamin C tablet, a good bit of advice is to rinse with water or brush your teeth. But the best way is to specifically select non-acidic vitamin C chewables, readily available in stores. Read the label to verify that the chewable is made entirely with non-acidic vitamin C.
Stomach Acidity People with sensitive stomachs may report discomfort when large doses of vitamin C are taken at levels to prevent an acute viral infection (1,000-3,000 milligrams or more every 20 minutes) [1, 5]. In this case the ascorbic acid in the stomach can build up enough acidity to cause heartburn or a similar reaction. On the other hand, many people report no problems with acidity even when taking even 20,000 mg in an hour. The acid normally present in the stomach, hydrochloric acid (HCl), is very strong: dozens of times more acidic than vitamin C. When one has swallowed a huge amount of ascorbate, the digestive tract is sucking it up into the bloodstream as fast as it can, but it may still take a while to do so. Some people report that they seem to sense ascorbic acid tablets "sitting" at the bottom of the stomach as they take time to dissolve. It is fairly easy to fix the problem by using buffered ascorbate, or taking ascorbic acid with food or liquids in a meal or snack. When the amount of vitamin C ingested is more than the gut can absorb, the ascorbate attracts water into the intestines creating a laxative effect. This saturation intake is called bowel tolerance. One should reduce the amount (by 20-50%) when this occurs [1].
Acid Balance in the Body Does taking large quantities of an acid, even a weak acid like ascorbate, tip the body's acid balance (pH) causing health problems? No, because the body actively and constantly controls the pH of the bloodstream. The kidneys regulate the acid in the body over a long time period, hours to days, by selectively excreting either acid or basic components in urine. Over a shorter time period, minutes to hours, if the blood is too acid, the autonomic nervous system increases the rate of breathing, thereby removing more carbon dioxide from the blood, reducing its acidity. Some foods can indirectly cause acidity. For example, when more protein is eaten than necessary for maintenance and growth, it is metabolized into acid, which must be removed by the kidneys, generally as uric acid. In this case, calcium and/or magnesium are excreted along with the acid in the urine which can deplete our supplies of calcium and magnesium [6]. However, because ascorbic acid is a weak acid, we can tolerate a lot before it will much affect the body's acidity. Although there have been allegations about vitamin C supposedly causing kidney stones, there is no evidence for this, and its acidity and diuretic tendency actually tends to reduce kidney stones in most people who are prone to them [1,7]. Ascorbic acid dissolves calcium phosphate stones and dissolves struvite stones. Additionally, while vitamin C does increase oxalate excretion, vitamin C simultaneously inhibits the union of calcium and oxalate. [1,2].
Below is a page of links to various presentations on the diagnosis and treatment seminar on Vitamin D deficiency. Unfortunately, the links lead to PDF files which are massive, slow to load, and have ridiculously large type. I guess the pages in the PDF were slides used during the presentation. Lots of very good info, but the format is terrible. In the seminar, the slides were used to illustrate the words of the speakers. In the PDF files, we get just the slides. Material is not easy to follow. And some is incomprehensible. But the PDFs are still worth looking at to try to figure out.
Below that is an e-mail from Grassroots Health talking about the seminar, and giving links to their website.
Addendum: I wrote a critique of the PDF files and sent it to Grassroots Health. I received a quick return e-mail, thus (once again) demonstrating that the wheel which does the squeaking gets the grease!
The videos will be up in ?February.. words, pictures and everything! Carole
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Diagnosis and Treatment of Vitamin D Deficiency Seminar
I did my first 108 sun salutation mala today (which included about 30 Gayatri Mantras as well). I did classical hatha style and my friend did Ashtanga style (she's a strong lady-keener) I was wondering if anyone else had done this mala and what experience/s you had afterwards? My YTT instructor says day 3+ is when the crying starts and 2 weeks later I should hit some intense go-go-go-go energy ;) I'm so curious to see what will happen.
Right now, my hamstrings are sore, I'm quite tired and somewhat irritable.
Sometimes when I am in the midst of writing a rant, I begin to question whether I should mention that particular topic again. I tend to make posts which cover much of the same material I covered in previous posts on that same topic. I make rants on the need for vitamin C, on why one should avoid getting flu shots, on why smoking is not safe, etc.
Yesterday, I made a rant about smoking. Before dawn today I received an e-mail from someone on LJ. I have permission to reprint the e-mail, but am unsure as to whether I have permission to name the person. So I removed the names.
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Hi Alobar, This is XXXXXXXX, wanted to thank you for that post on smoking. that lj put it in the forefront of my mind that i cannot start smoking again like i used to. i had been without a cigarette for over ten years and started up less than two weeks ago.
Will find better ways to deal with life. Your aptly put homage of "fucktard" did it for me because it is the truth.
sincerely XXXX
Current Music:I:cube - Untitled 8 (Space Station Soma: Tune in, turn on, space out. Ambient and mid-tempo electron
Yesterday, there was a post to lj_maintenance, "Currently all notifications are being queued up so they can be processed as soon as the fix is pushed and verified to be working correctly."
They still have not sent me any notifications of comments. So I have been checking for comments on http://www.livejournal.com/tools/recent_comments.bml It's a nuisance to have to check that webpage, but it works.
Current Music:Modulate - Dreams (Space Station Soma: Tune in, turn on, space out. Ambient and mid-tempo electronic
Tattoo Me Or There's A Goddess on My Arm So, the fruit of work with the awesome Molly Crabapple (mollycrabapple.com), Mme. Cyn at Britishink in DC and my arm plus thanks to Srprs and Paradoxosalpha for the Greek, I now have a gorgeous Babalon (0) tattoo. She took about 5 hrs total and I had the color finished today. Also, my camera stopped working so view the fab phone pics and artwork by Molly Crabapple, to whom I owe so many thanks for making this real, and extra special thanks to Mme. Cyn, who did the gorgeous tattooing with flair and soul. When in DC, go to Britishink!
Tonight! Tonight at 10:00 pm ET (7:00 PT), HDnet will premiere, as part of its "InFocus" series, the Enigma documentary Aleister Crowley: The Beast 666.
Villanized during his lifetime as the 'World's Most Evil Man," Aleister Crowley is the most well known and influential occult magician of modern times. Was he a fraud, a madman, a monster or a perhaps a real magus?
It's a great overview of Crowley's life and beliefs, and how these inform the spiritual practices of a modern magician. The show will also be re-run throughout the month; for a list of showtimes, look here.
35 degrees. It was 35°F outside last night. It's 36°F right now (at 7:45 am). There is a freeze watch for California: California's agriculture pretty much goes to hell in a handbasket when temperatures drop below freezing.
The average low temperature for this time of year is 41°F.
When it rains for several days straight, I think of one of the tales in the book by Lord Dunsany I purchased back ~1975, Fifty-One Tales by Baron Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett Dunsany. However, I have no interest in worshiping any deities when it s wet (or not wet). I just like the tale I have placed below. If ever I was care taking a child, I would read Dunsany to him or her at bedtime.
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THE TROUBLE IN LEAFY GREEN STREET
She went to the idol-shop in Moleshill Street, where the old man mumbles, and said: "I want a god to worship when it is wet."
The old man reminded her of the heavy penalties that rightly attach to idolatry and, when he had enumerated all, she answered him as was meet: "Give me a god to worship when it is wet."
And he went to the back places of his shop and sought out and brought her a god. The same was carved of grey stone and wore a propitious look and was named, as the old man mumbled, The God of Rainy Cheerfulness.
Now it may be that long confinement to the house affects adversely the liver, or these things may be of the soul, but certain it is that on a rainy day her spirits so far descended that those cheerful creatures came within sight of the Pit, and, having tried cigarettes to no good end, she bethought her of Moleshill Street and the mumbling man.
He brought the grey idol forth and mumbled of guarantees, although he put nothing on paper, and she paid him there and then his preposterous price and took the idol away.
And on the next wet day that there ever was she prayed to the grey-stone idol that she had bought, the God of Rainy Cheerfulness (who knows with what ceremony or what lack of it?), and so brought down on her in Leafy Green Street, in the preposterous house at the corner, that doom of which all men speak.
Several hours ago, ankh_f_n_khonsu (who was one of the vocal commenters in my original post) made a post on this topic which I highly recommend. Below is the video he posted. Below that is a link to ankh_f_n_khonsu's post.
Over the decades I have noticed a trait of many humans which I find very disturbing. If wolves are spotted charging a village and the wolves will be at peoples' doors in less than an hour, there is all sorts of frantic rushing around preparing for the disaster. But if the wolves won't arrive for 50 or 100 years, villagers leave the preparation and defense to their grandchildren and don't do a damn thing to avert the disaster.
So, in a very real sense, climate change which will take several gfenerations is far more dangerous than an immediate danger of disaster.
The abysmally ignorant right-wing TV commentators make bad matters far worse. Freedom of the Press does NOT (in my not-so-humble opinion) give someone the right to deliberately lie, twist reality, and deliberately mislead the public. If I were in charge of things, the whole slew of them would be off the air in an instant, slapped into jail without bail, and tried for felonies to keep them in prison until hell freezes over. I feel the same way about network executives who permit those dangerous liars to remain on the air. When right wing entertainment is billed as news, we have a very dangerous problem. As the fate of the human race could well be influenced by those right-wing idiot talk show host turkeys and the execs who hire them, it seems to me we are talking about capital crimes ere.
Below nipped from heron61. Great concept. Someday I may have to get me a cellphone. I only wish they had gotten someone who spoke clear un-accented English to speak in the video.
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Google Goggles Google Goggles is a visual search app for Android phones. Instead of using words, take a picture of an object with your camera phone: we attempt to recognize the object, and return relevant search results. Goggles also provides information about businesses near you by displaying their names directly in the camera preview.
Current Music:Liquid Stranger - Rubbermaid Dub (Space Station Soma: Tune in, turn on, space out. Ambient and mid-t
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brianberge's Friends Page
Dear NaturalNews readers, 
Whenever all the weather websites make a huge fucking error, I cannot help but feel the weathermen are all sitting around taking more drugs than Hunter S. Thompson could handle. They just hallucinate their asses off and post their deliriums on their respective websites.
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jubilant
