WOW!, Just WOW

I just finished listening to Obama's speech. It was incredible and I know that I will remember this speech for the rest of my life.

I already have a sense that tomorrow things will be better, and the day after that will be better again.

I think this must have been something like what it was to watch one of JFK's historic speeches. I am too young to remember him, let alone Roosevelt.

If any of you are old enough, please tell how it compares.

Google Health - Check it out

Things continue to improve with Thing2. However, we continue to have significant health challenges to manage.

Yesterday I explored Google Health for the first time.

All I can say is Wow! If it had been available when all this started, maybe things wouldn't have gone so far before we realized what was going on.

If you take any medications, you should check it out. Building-up an easy-to-access health record could save you if your health status changes and you need to analyze what has changed.

I also found that it's fairly easy to create a daily medication schedule/log in Google Calendar. My only warning is that there are some bugs in the WYSIWYG functionality in the print module.

Pending Listening

This post is my running list of podcasts and other on-line items that I intend to list to.

• Invisible Handwriting: A podcaster's blog: Show Notes for Episode 80, Liaquat Ahamed "Lords of Finance"

Invisible Handwriting - Podcasts from the presses at Harvard, MIT, UC

Invisible Handwriting: A podcaster's blog bills itself as:

The blog for Heron & Crane Productions. Information about The Invisible Hand Podcast and the podcasts for the following University Presses: Yale, Harvard, M.I.T., California and Chicago, as well as general thoughts.

This looks like an excellent blog for someone like me, who loves to read.

Katie Couric at The Daily Beast

Katie Talks Katie - The Daily Beast
The summary reads:

The CBS News anchor talks candidly about facing off with Sarah Palin, being lied to by Alex Rodriguez, how she landed Sully, why George W. Bush is smarter than you think—and of course that new haircut.

Katie Couric is one of our top newscasters, and therefore an interview with her has significant import. The summary made me wonder, will we ever get to the point that comments on womens' appearance will be considered as uninteresting and non-newsworthy as similar commentary on men's appearance?

Update: Now that I've read the interview, I feel a little better about the summary. Here's the relevant part:

As the first sole woman anchor, what’s that experience been like? Have you felt that unique role in anything you’ve been doing?

Sometimes. I think sometimes in the way people analyze what I do. Making note of the color of my khaki pants or things that I think are—

Hair is very big, isn’t it?

Yeah, I got a haircut, which obviously created an international incident, and you know I think you’re just probably scrutinized a lot more closely. And other than that, I haven’t experienced anything major being the first woman. I think obviously I bring my own sensibilities to the broadcast, but so do Charlie and Brian, so I don’t think that’s necessarily gender-specific.

It used to be that women sort of couldn’t stay in television beyond a certain age. That’s completely different now, isn’t it?

I hope so.

-------------------

On a side note: The Daily Beast looks like a great site, I don't know why I've never heard of it before. Do any of you read it? Do you like it?

Thing2's ongoing progress

At her lowest, Thing2 weighed 98 pounds, plus or minus a few ounces. She is 5' 5" tall and a normal weight for her is 135. At 115 she is very skinny. At 98 pounds she has no fat. Her BMI is 13, and it's not because she has a lot of lean muscle, it's because she has no fat left. None. No butt, no nothing.
She is now about 101.5 pounds. On Monday we realized that we should research the proper protocol for someone who is this skinny beginning to eat normally.

I found that this process is called 'refeeding'. Unfortunately, there are some serious risks mentioned in the web articles, and now Thing2 is freaking-out about it.
I'm almost sorry I looked. But it was probably important to know that carbohydrates can cause blood chemistry imbalances, and that a high-fat diet is most helpful. So that's what we're doing.

I called her doctor today to ask if he would do a full blood panel to make sure that the refeeding process is going OK, and that her blood chemistry is in the normal range. Unfortunately, he never called back.

News Analysis that doesn't make me crazy

Over at Firedoglake Prof. James K. Galbraith's post What is to be Done? Next Steps for Economic Recovery is a good start.
His analysis of the stimulus package

We have a bill. In the most likely case, it will slow the collapse but not stop or reverse it. And it will come into effect alongside a bank rescue plan that stands very little chance of reviving the credit markets. So we have one part of a recovery plan that is helpful but probably insufficient, and another part that most likely will not work at all. The prospects for an early exit from the slump are therefore not encouraging, just yet.

His straight-to-the-heart-of-it comments on the moderate senator's actions are refreshing in their clarity and sensibility.

It is difficult to know what the so-called moderate Senators were thinking. Do they have special insight into this crisis? Do they have their own forecasters, with deep understanding and good track records in these matters? Do they have their own models? Do they have, in other words, any ground for believing that less than $800 billion, spread over two years, will be enough to bring the economy back? If so, they weren't saying so, so far as I could tell.

He has some cogent and simple recommendations for next steps which make a lot of sense.