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Monday links
May. 11th, 2009 09:20 amUp here in Redmond the sun is rising before six, and it's not setting until 8:30, which is nicer than the 4:30 in winter and hey! So far it hasn't screwed up my sleep patterns yet! And it does still get dark!
I liked this writeup of Klingon.
...and this tackles the question of whether the modern 1st-world food supply is more or less safe than it used to be. One example is the recent peanut butter recall; modern tracking meant we could identify loads of foods that used the factory's output, but modern distribution meant there were thousands of products using peanut butter and paste from the one factory. Bagged lettuce means a bad head can be scattered among many bags and affect more people. Then there's Ms. Tardiff, a California nurse, who bought organic and less processed foods whenever possible, including raw milk which caused in an intestinal illness and nerve disease. She woman still can't stand or use her hands. Her illness was caused by campylobacter, which is killed by pasteurization.
I liked this writeup of Klingon.
[Creator and linguist Marc Okrand] cribbed from natural languages, borrowing sounds and sentence-building rules, switching sources whenever Klingon started operating too much like any one language in particular. He ended up with something that sounds like an ungodly combination of Hindi, Arabic, Tlingit, and Yiddish and works like a mix of Japanese, Turkish, and Mohawk. The linguistic features of Klingon are not especially unusual (at least to a linguist) when considered independently, but put together, they make for one hell of an alien language.
...and this tackles the question of whether the modern 1st-world food supply is more or less safe than it used to be. One example is the recent peanut butter recall; modern tracking meant we could identify loads of foods that used the factory's output, but modern distribution meant there were thousands of products using peanut butter and paste from the one factory. Bagged lettuce means a bad head can be scattered among many bags and affect more people. Then there's Ms. Tardiff, a California nurse, who bought organic and less processed foods whenever possible, including raw milk which caused in an intestinal illness and nerve disease. She woman still can't stand or use her hands. Her illness was caused by campylobacter, which is killed by pasteurization.
Hello, November
Nov. 3rd, 2008 04:47 pm
Happens every year: The Earth has tilted its north away from the sun. Oz's sunlight per day is growing, ours is decreasing. Sunday morning we ended "summer time" and reset our clocks back. Once again Seattle's sunset is before 5pm. It'll stay that way until next year.
We also hit less than 10hrs between sunrise & sunset this week, but it's the "dark before 5" that's been bugging me the last few years. I don't remember noticing it when I was younger...1
Some people aren't affected by the swingin' circadian rythym. So what if it's dark when you go to work and dark when you head home? Others of us plan our days so we get actual daylight even in December, stock up on caffeine, bake, or generally hibernate and laugh at the book on the right.
The "less than 10 hours of dark" bugs me in June (and May and July) too, but between
- My sleep mask (
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dianthus' suggestion) - Dark drapes
- Watching caffeine before dinner
- Taking melatonin a couple hours before I intend to sleep
Other than making sure I get outside during daylight for a walk and maybe installing more outdoor lights2, I'm not sure I've got a solution for The Big Dark. Maybe getting outside more on weekends? Hitting the library for funny mysteries? More sex?
1I think it did affect me, but that I wasn't consciously aware that it was tied to the changing sunlight patterns. School was always easier in spring or early fall than in winter - and once I was on a quarter system, I definitely got better grades in spring & summer than fall & winter. Before that - I remember going to bed at 8 and being asleep by 9 with no problem in winter, but come June I could not get to sleep until after it was dark.
2One of my frustrations with how soon it gets dark is that it's always dark when I get home - increased visibility might help me avoid stupid things like slipping in my own damn driveway.
oh yeah....
Jul. 1st, 2008 10:17 pmLast night I got 8 hours sleep for the first time since Thursday or Friday. W00t.
Things that helped:
Things that helped:
- Adjusting to leaving the windows open and the bedroom fans on. This makes the bedroom cooler, but means getting used to more noise and ...
- Adjusting to the sleep mask. This is to keep the sunlight from the (open for airflow) windows from waking me at 5 or 6AM.
- A lukewarm or cool shower or bath before bed lowers my body temp and helps me over the "too hot to sleep" factor.
- Keeping in mind that yes, upstairs is a little bit warmer than downstairs, so go up a bit earlier and plan to just have some acclimation time.
