Posts by Stephen Judd
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Heh, since I'm a make it up as you go kind of cook, there's no telling whether I can reproduce past successes :D
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Oh gawd, when my late mother had breast cancer she hated that positive thinking stuff with its implication that victims weren't thinking right. And now we know, thanks to Science (TM), it doesn't make any difference.
I understand that in the social psychology there is this type of cognitive bias called the just world fallacy, whereby people rationalise random injustice away and try to find reasons why it must be fair. I tend to think this is one thing that supports the positive thinking in illness.
And clearly we need a PAS cook-off at some point....
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I think the maximum oxalate menu would be something like wilted spinach salad, main of palusami (taro leaves have mega oxalic acid) with cassava chips, and rhubarb crumble for dessert...
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We are all so confused about consciousness and free will and agency and being a "big bowl of neurotransmitters and jelly" (again, another phrase I intend to steal and pass off as mine). Pain is real. Pain is chemicals. Pain is in your head, like thoughts. And thoughts are chemicals. Hence thoughts are real. But not in a way that we like to think about because then we would have to deal with an unpleasant thesis (chemicals and electricity and determinism) and antithesis (randomness perturbs the chaos of chemicals and electric potential) or synthesis* (all things considered there isn't a lot of room for my personal agency).**
We like to think we're in charge of our thoughts. And if we're in charge of our thoughts, other people must be in charge of their thoughts. And so if other people think they feel pain, without visible cause, and they're in charge of their thoughts, they can jolly well change their thoughts, and if they can change their thoughts, they must be choosing to be in pain.
The first premise is probably wrong, and the conclusion, and yet I think mostly we operate as though all those items were true. Even people who by training or experience should know better.
The beloved has fibro and suffers from pain. Real hurty painy pain. Although in the long term a search for physical sources is a necessary thing, in the short term it's easier to not let the absence of something you can put your finger on slow you down.
* I think this may be my first quasi-serious use of dialectic ever.
** A dilute solution of ethanol was involved in the composition of this comment. -
Curse you Lisa, and curse you again. I'd just managed to forget about lovely, shiny, sexy, convenient, modern, commuter-friendly 8 speed internal hubs and you have to go and remind me.
There is a particular bike in a particular rack in a particular bike shop that I just stared at every time I went past this last month, until I stopped going past it. Because new bikes and new hubs are not on the list right now. House is on the list. Cannot buy new shiny things. House house house.
But I want one. If I didn't already have a bike set up for the run to work and back, I'd be getting an internal hub commuter tomorrow. (Bloke at the shop would do me $800 off list price of $1100, he told me...)
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Dude at the bike shop the other day told me that now-ish is a good time to buy bikes generally. Bike shops get rid of their old stock to make room for this year's models around now. People don't get the urge to buy a bike over winter, but wait until the weather improves (plus there's the xmas present bikes too. So mid-late winter is bike sale time. I was looking at a bike already on sale and then he said "but I could do you $XXX" (figure 20% lower again).
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Cycle Aware Wellington has created this map of Wellington black spots. Well worth perusing if you're planning a new route, and contributing to. They use it to help with submissions to the council.
My normal ride's a strictly utilitarian commute down from Marewa Road in Hataitai, through the Mt Vic tunnel and along Brougham St to Courtenay Place and ultimately Willis St. When I go home I usually follow the number 20 bus route up Mt Vic and then down from the summit. I find the mountain bike tracks a bit too rugged for street tyres and a bit too hairy in the wet or the dark.
Last year I made a commitment to myself that I'd treat myself to lovely new Ortlieb panniers if I rode every day no matter what the weather. I've pretty much stuck to that, and saved a bunch of money on bus and taxi fares. The panniers give me more jollies than just about any other material possession I have. SO useful.
On nice Sundays, I ride down to the market at Waitangi Park, load up the panniers with fruit and veg, and detour along the waterfront on the way home.
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The chorus to this is such an ear worm for me at the moment:
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That was extremely lucid, Stephen.
Thank you. I figured that after Dave Ferguson's observation on our contemptuous attitude, and Damien's perpetual lament at how we always rag on his avocation, that for once I could lay off my usual comment on how crap the TV news is and apply some brainpower to looking for structural reasons for the crapness.
I feel another extended comment on the news considered as a serial drama (you know, recurring characters, narrative arcs, that sorta thing) coming on though...
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What Bart said.
Also, just speculating here -- people increasingly watch things on their own schedule, whether via DVD, PVR, local file, or streamed off the internet. The only reasons for anyone to check in with the broadcast media are 1) they're showing something unobtainable elsewhere 2) they're showing something that has value for being live 3) they're showing something where I want the experience of debriefing with my social circle the next day.
Hence the proliferation of live crosses and the fake drama that surrounds them. Broadcast news groping for that sense of exclusiveness and immediacy that would justify you dropping everything for the news, instead of dipping into the media stream at a time of your choosing. The days of the family gathered around the set together to watch the news are going as fast as reading the morning newspaper over breakfast, and for much the same reasons.
And as far as broadcasts go, the more frequent broadcasts and "updates" are, paradoxically the less reason I have to tune into any particular scheduled show. I won't miss anything important.