Uncle Walter's Rants

The Great Super Cell Phone Nightmare

As I am sure you have heard Google has entered the foray with their Nexus One cell phone, which they have dubbed a "superphone".  So far, it is good, but does not seem to be super, and lacks the ability to support At&t's 3G networks.  At the same time Dell, it excited about their cell phone, and Lenovo has theirs in China.  On top of the computer makers drifting into cell phone space you have the traditional cell makers like Nokia, LG, Motorola, Samsung, and more.  Rounding this out is Blackberry, Palm, and Apple who pretty much own the smart (super) phone market.  How can anyone make sense of it?  Well, here is my 23 cents on the topic.

1. If you want a basic phone get a Motorola, Samsung, or Nokia.  Forget the rest.  Those three do basic quite well.  They fancier "smart" phones are a pain.
2. If you need a "super" phone that is smart and can do all sorts of stuff get a Blackberry or iPhone.  Blackberry is everywhere, iPhone has the best app selection.  Palm is nice, but  there is not enough community support and Google is too new, and quite frankly not that super.
3. If you don't know what you want, just figure out what you are going to do with it.  If you want to make call and take a pic now and then, go basic.  If you need e-mail go smart.

Any questions?

Oh, yeah, always be careful of a phone made by company that doesn't make phones.  Only Apple has pulled that off successfully so far.

-Uncle Walter

Thousands stand in line for Man-Bear-Pig Swine SARS Flu Vaccine

So the swine flu vaccine has been distributed and now people are showing up in droves to get the new shots.  People are scared by the news of the H1N1 virus as it spreads and they are trying to head it off.  Then I hear people say how stupid it is because more people die of regular flu every year, and there is no need to get vaccinated.  So what should everyone do?  Should we get vaccinated or not?  Well, here is my 23 cents on the topic.

There is one simple fact, people are going to get the flu, be it the new flu or flu classic.  People will miss work.  What is more scary about this new one is the fact, while we have some natural defense against classic flu, most of us have no core defense against the new flu.  We just don't have the anti-bodies.  Fortunately the mortality rate is pretty low, but the economic impact of the flu has yet to be seen.  If one in five people miss work because of the flu that has a huge impact, especially when children are involved.  And, there is where the real risk is, economic.  So far, we aren't all going to die, and we will not see a resurgence of something like the Spanish Flu, but there will be a real impact.  That's were the vaccine has to come in, especially since there isn't enough to spread around.  High risk groups need to be protected, just like always, but families need to look at it seriously as something they may need.  They have to accept that they won't die from it, but may miss weeks of work.  Depending on how fast it spreads it may mean more time off.  Can the family afford that?  Just looking at the probabilities, that decision has to come down to the individual person and family.  Then you look at those who will be treating the sick.  That's when things get different.  If you will be caring for a multitude of people who may have the flu, then yes, you should get it to protect yourself and your patients.  No I do not think we can force people to get the shot, but we should reassign those who refuse to other, less vulnerable, areas.  

So get the shot or not, you take the risk yourself, just don't put others at risk. If you are sick stay home.

But all that changes if the virus mutates into something more virulent, then you should run for the hills and emerge 28 days later to see what has survived.

-Uncle Walter

Why should I be impressed, just because I am sick???

Ok, so I get sick, just like everyone else.  But I don't get normal things.  So far I have had Encephalitis, Meningitis, Infarcted Omentum, Meckel's Divirtuculm, to name a few.  You see people don't get these things, often and that makes me one of those cases where the doctors are all excited to see me.  They proudly tell me how rare it is to get what I have had, and that I should be impressed.  Do you think I care if I am the only person who may get this that the doctor will ever see?  No I don't.

Ok, I am a rare case, what I get is uncommon, so?  Why does the doctor think I should be impressed?

-Uncle Walter

Oh dear Lord, that is NOT how to get a longer penis!

Yeah, I know this is floating around the internet a lot, but my god what was this guy thinking???  In California a guy in his 50's decided to make his penis longer by using a steel, ring-shaped dumbbell weight fastener around it.  It stayed there for about three days, all the time his penis got blood, but the blood couldn't get back out.  By the time the firefighters got there it was black and swollen to five times normal size.  Even worse, the guy refused treatment!  They ended up sedating him and for two hours worked to cut through one inch of steel to feel his swollen member.  I just don't know what to say.  Read the article yourself at http://www.dailypilot.com/articles/2009/09/22/topstory/dpt-emergency092309.txt

-Uncle Walter

Nobel laureate Norman Borlaug died at age 95 - A Real Superhero

Do you know who Norman Borlaug is?  If you do the odds are you don't live in the US.  Outside the US he is quite popular where he saved millions or perhaps billions of lives by doing something that environmentalist often do not like.  He developed disease resistant crops and was an advocate of doing whatever was necessary to increase the crop production including the use of chemicals.  His efforts changed the world, but went against a commonly held belief that organic and "sustainable" is better.

"There has been great progress, and food is more equitably distributed. But hunger is a commonplace, and famine appears all too often." - Norman Borlaug

He was took a strong stance that the lives of the many who would die without the food was worth the risk of the few who may get sick being exposed to agricultural chemicals.  He traveled the world saving lives in Mexico, India, Africa and many other places.  In those places his efforts are remembered, but here in the world of fast food and easy lunches we do not celebrate his accomplishments as we should.  We are too easily swayed by the concept of organic and "sustainable" agriculture and feel that everyone should do it without realizing something he did back in the 1940s.  Those methods do not produce enough food to support our population, and if we keep growing as we are we will continue to have food shortages.

Borlaug "saved more lives than any man in human history," said WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran.  

In 95 years this one man changed over one billion lives.  Who else can claim that, and yet very few know his name.

-Uncle Walter

I'm not that thirsty, and other strange things since surgery...

For those who may have forgotten, I had major surgery around six weeks ago.  What happened was I had a congential defect called a Meckels Diverticulum with diverticulitis.  This presented itself as acute appendicitis and resulted in emergency surgery.  Basically some parts that are needed in the early stages of babyhood while in the womb should be reabsorbed into the body around five weeks old.  For me it didn't happen so it grew with my body.  About 2% of the population have this.  Often it isn't a problem, and is ignored if detected.  Very few people every have problems with it (1% - 4% depending on the study).  In my case it caused some pretty bad things like internal bleeding, perforated intestine and a boat load of pain.  Sadly I have been living with the problems related to this for years and never even knew it.  Here are some of the stranger things I have noticed:

• I am not as thirsty.  I would often drink about four liters worth of water a day just at work, and a lot more at home.  Now, I just don't have the thirst.  Some web research claims that the thirst of a sign of internal bleeding.
• My back doesn't hurt like it used to.  I had a slipped disk removed back in '97, and there has always been some lingering pain.  So far the pain has vanished.  No idea how, but I am not complaining.
• I am waking up earlier.  About two years ago I got up at 4am every day without problem.  Sometimes I would only get three to five hours of sleep a night and I would be able to function quite well.  In the past two years I haven't been able to get up no matter what I try.  I have been consistently tired and even 8 hours a night hasn't been enough.  Oversleeping was a real problem for me.  Now I find my body changing back to the early wake up on it's own, no need for the alarm.
• Since I was about ten I have had intermittent abdominal pain, that no doctor could identify.  They always said, that there is nothing there that could be causing the pain.  Now the pain is gone.
• Eating has gotten easier without the discomfort afterwords that I had accepted as a part of life.  I had just assumed that it was normal.
• My appetite is much lower.  In fact I have not gained a single pound from the time I was in the hospital.

I suppose the strangest thing is the realization that my life has been impacted for so long, and I just muscled through it.  I probably had some regular internal bleeding, which weakened me.  In fact the past two years have been been a downhill spiral for my productivity and now I know why.  Now to play catch-up, once the surgery has fully healed.

-Uncle Walter