A full-cut wool kilt is a tricky thing to maintain. It’s wool so it’ll shrink like crazy if you toss it in a washer and dry cleaning ages the wool until it’s a dry brittle shell. Apparently the best thing to do is to carefully wash it in cold water with a mild soap like Woolite. I’ve found a few tid bits about
washing and then pressing your kilt. Sounds like a lot of work, but it might be worth it.
We finally got a gold on Canadian soil! Yay!
Every once in a while, I notice a new photoessay at Life Magazine’s website regarding a momentous event in world history. Unfortunately, I’ve found navigating Life to be cumbersome looking for other photosets (unless they are on the front page).
I’ve tried to capture a few of my favourites here:
Well, flu season is upon us and this year all the worry is on the H1N1 virus that is poised to become a pandemic. There’s lots of information and disinformation out there that makes it quite confusing. If you have questions, read on. Hopefully I can help point you in the right direction.
There is an excellent Flu Shot FAQ on the background for the flu and flu vaccines at Mental Floss, that seems quite sensible and informative. Another excellent but extremely long article helps dispel some of the disinformation spread by idiots about the flu vaccine. For vaccines in general, you can peruse the Toxic Myths about Vaccines. A lot of the fears of vaccines comes from a misunderstanding about a concept that the amount of a substance is important, not simply the presence. I would recommend that anyone that feels worried about thing like toxins in vaccines, in fish, their homes or whatever really should read “The Dose makes the Poison.” It’s weird, people are perfectly happy to buy strong cleansers that are full of very, very, toxic chemicals that off-gas or evaporate into their homes in shocklingly large quantities, but as soon as they learn that there might be traces of mercury in something, they go crazy. I guess that leads into the second problem, is that people in general are horrible risk evaluators. The perception of risk is often not the real level of risk.
From an epidemiological point of view, watching the progress of H1N1 has been fascinating. The prevalence of the H1N1 virus across the world is also well documented. What is remarkable is the relative dominance of H1N1 over that of other seasonal strains.
The cordyceps fungus is about as freaky as mother nature gets. Imagine a parasite that, when it gets inside you, begins to alter your behaviour. It essentially begins controlling your mind. In the case of a cordyceps-infected ant, it forces the ant to climb to a high point, perhaps high atop a lonely branch. There, the ant dies and the fungus bursts from its body, spreading spores in the wind. Soon more insects are infected and forced into the macabre dance of the cordyceps.
