mommy blog

I ran across a five page article in the NYT about what may be a parallel universe; a parallel universe that is an exact enantiomer of our own:

der ,,mommy-blog'' welt.

Let me explain.

Carbon is tetravalent, that is to say, the maximum number of bonds the atom can make to other atoms is four. Carbon can also form what are called "multiple bonds", examples are double bonds (H2C=N-H), triple bonds (H-C=C-H), but we will consider good ol' single bonds, like we find in methane, CH4. At this point, just remember the bond count for carbon is four.

When a carbon atom has four single bonds to other atoms, like methane, the shape of the molecule is a tetrahedron, one of the platonic solids.

Let's not get into why, MO theory is boring. But consider this: if the four substituents bound to the central atom are all chemically or structurally distinct, we get a tetrahedron with a special, unique topology. You get what's called a chiral molecule. A chiral molecule is a type of molecule that lacks an internal plane of symmetry and has a non-superposable mirror image, that is to say, it comes in right and left-handed (enantiomeric, see above) forms!

Now here is the mind blowing thing; all life as we know it is chiral! In fact, because all of the natural amino acids (except one) are left-handed chiral, this is a sure signature of life (think proteins)!

In the "mommy blog" universe, however, everything must be different at a very fundamental, mind-blowingly enantiomeric level.

This is from the mother of all mommy blogs, http://www.dooce.com/

One of a few diet tips my trainer shared with me when I started working with her over a year ago was to snack on canned tuna (diet here does not refer to losing weight, but instead to eating healthy), and before you go and make that gagging noise that [husband] Jon does every time I even mention it, just hear me out. Or maybe you can't hear me over Jon's gagging. That's fine. Sometimes he can't hear his geek podcasts because of the sound of my eyes rolling. Today I got home from spin class and headed straight for the cabinet where I keep the tuna. I hadn't even opened the can of tuna and [daughter] Marlo was tugging on my pants while saying, "Up! Up!" This should be interesting, I thought, especially since I was opening up a new exotic mustard I found online. You guys, this combination is awesome, and it gets even more awesome if you add in a whole wheat tortilla, some shredded cabbage and a blow job!

This entry was dated 8 Feb 2011. You wouldn't know that anything, FUCKING ANYTHING ELSE was going on in the world outside of this mommy universe.

And in her ears the little Seashells, the thimble radios tamped tight, and an electronic ocean of sound, of music and talk and music and talking coming in.

-Ray Bradbury

me me me

NYT, Bahrain

“I don’t want a democracy,” said Rayyah Mohammed, 32, an art project director and strong supporter of King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa. “I want a monarchy. I like how things are. I have a job. I have a house. I have free health care.”

And this is the essence. Rayyah has his stuff, and doesn't give a-flying-fuck-at-a-rolling-doughnut about anything or anybody else. This thinking produced pretty lampshades at Belsen. Out of human skin.

Addenda: NYT 18 Feb

The coffins were carried on the roofs of two cars as a man with a loudspeaker led the crowd in its chants from the bed of a pickup truck, alternating between calls to the faithful — “There is no God but God” — with political messages such as “We need constitutional reform for freedom.”
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good luck...

more "uncertainty"...

headline, nyt

U.S. Raises Value of a Life, and Businesses Fear Impact

You too may be a weiner

The following is a "fleshed-out" press release compiled from Reuters, AP, NYT, .gov websites, and my personal experience. It concerns Obama's proposed FY 2012 budget.

please click here before reading

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It puts a five-year spending freeze on non-security discretionary spending, which the White House says would save $400 billion over 10 years and "bring government spending to its lowest level since President Dwight Eisenhower was in power in the 1950s and early 1960s". [ed note: July 1, 1952 US population was 157,552,740;  July 1, 2010 US population was 309,050,816; this means the US population is greater by a factor of 1.962 today than at the start of the Ike & Dick Show. The current rate of change of the US population is ca. +1%/yr]

The freeze would cover the agencies and programs for which Congress allocates specific budgets each year, including air traffic control, farm subsidies, education, nutrition and national parks. [ed note: and Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs, a small, but high impact R&D program in which I was involved. The program funds research into terrifying, fatal, incurable, fairly common diseases]

It proposes spending $671 billion on the U.S. military next year, including $118 billion for the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan. Total spending on national defense in the proposed budget would be $702 billion, a figure that includes spending on nuclear weapons and health care and retirement, down from $721.3 billion in fiscal 2010.

It cuts Community Development Block Grants by $300 million; $2.5 billion from a program, known as LIHEAP, that provides heating assistance to poor people; more than $1 billion in grants to large airports; $950 million for U.S. states' "revolving funds" for water treatment and other infrastructure.

The payoff in budget savings would be small relative to the deficit: The estimated $250 billion [ed note: from AP, $400 billion from Reuters, White House estimates 1.1 trillion] in savings over 10 years would be less than 3 percent of the roughly $9 trillion in additional deficits [ed note: from AP, White House estimates $7.2  trillion additional deficits]  the government is expected to accumulate over that time [ed note: savings is 3-15.3% of additional accumulated deficit, depending upon the numerical data source].

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Get it?

Which side are you on...
      -Florence Reese

Can Bristol Palin save America?

I usually don't quote PopEater (I prefer Hecklerspray's ongoing coverage of Lindsay Lohan's "Boobs Embargo"), but sometimes....
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Bristol Palin, 20, is already plotting her future career in-- you guessed it-- politics! In an interview with E! News, Bristol admits that she'll "probably" run for office sometime "further down the road."

But sources claim Bristol's foray into politics is going to happen a lot sooner than she lets on. "Bristol has a new sense of confidence since she did 'Dancing with the Stars,'" the source said. "She has seen her mother (Sarah Palin's) success and believes Washington should have more regular people like her in office making decisions for the country, rather than the elite that currently run DC."

The abstinence speaker and soon-to-be author "doesn't have a strong political resume" but the source claims "that's what will make her a great congresswoman or even President!" Who knows? Maybe Bristol will be vying for the White House in 2012 instead of Mama Grizzly!

Beavis...he said "Twatter"...heh heh heh...

Frank Rich column, NYT

The live feed from Egypt is riveting. We can’t get enough of revolution video — even if, some nights, Middle West blizzards take precedence over Middle East battles on the networks’ evening news. But more often than not we have little or no context for what we’re watching. That’s the legacy of years of self-censored, superficial, provincial and at times Islamophobic coverage of the Arab world in a large swath of American news media. Even now we’re more likely to hear speculation about how many cents per gallon the day’s events might cost at the pump than to get an intimate look at the demonstrators’ lives.

Perhaps the most revealing window into America’s media-fed isolation from this crisis — small an example as it may seem — is the default assumption that the Egyptian uprising, like every other paroxysm in the region since the Green Revolution in Iran 18 months ago, must be powered by the twin American-born phenomena of Twitter and Facebook. Television news — at once threatened by the power of the Internet and fearful of appearing unhip — can’t get enough of this cliché.

The talking-head invocations of Twitter and Facebook take the form of implicit, simplistic Western chauvinism. How fabulous that two great American digital innovations can rescue the downtrodden, unwashed masses. That is indeed impressive if no one points out that, even in the case of the young and relatively wired populace of Egypt, only some 20 percent of those masses have Internet access.

yeah...eekwal rights an' stuff...huh?

NYT tonight

Barbara Bush, one of the twin daughters of George W. Bush, will endorse same-sex marriage on Tuesday, publicly breaking ranks with a father who, as president, pushed for a constitutional amendment banning such unions.

wikipaedia

click here

She attended Yale University where she was a legacy member of Kappa Alpha Theta sorority (her mother, former First Lady Laura Bush, and her twin sister Jenna are also members of Kappa Alpha Theta). On April 29, 2001, Bush was charged with a Class C misdemeanor for being in the possession of alcohol under the age 21 in Austin. On May 29, 2001, Bush was charged with another misdemeanor — attempting to use a fake ID (with the name Barbara Pierce, her paternal grandmother's maiden name) to purchase alcohol. She pleaded no contest to both misdemeanors.
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Uhhhhhhhh...OK....