milk and evidence for something "we have known a long time"

Being from Northern Europe means I have always drunk milk. Not only since I was a child but also even nowadays. Although I must admit I still find some of my friends’ habits of drinking milk to food when they are about 35 years a little unsettling. Not too strange, just a fair bit odd ;) Anyway, PNAS has an article about the research done of prevalence of genes connected to lactose intolerance and northern Europeans… Of course they have added in some studies of people drinking milk in Asia and Africa as well and have discovered that the tolerance of lactose has emerged several times in various places. Interesting indeed.

Personally I find it fun that “something we have always known back home” is now a fact and ‘proven scientifically’. As stated in the review of the article in New Scientist (PNAS is not online yet…) : http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11261-early-europeans-unable-to-stomach-milk.html
“Thomas also notes that the low levels of sunlight in northern Europe during winter mean that people have lowered levels of vitamin D in their bodies, and therefore have difficulty absorbing calcium. Milk solves this problem by providing them with both calcium and some vitamin D.”

This is also a problem when people move to our very beautiful, yet scarcely populated countries up north. People born in these countries are use to eat supplements when young, very small children always get supplement of vitamin A and D (back in the days it was the famous cod-liver oil but nowadays it actually tastes a little better) as a complement. Note though, that these supplements are not added in the food (baby formula or baby food) but rather giving on its own since you then can control the actual amount the child will ingest. (Usually 2 drops a day keeps the doctor away…) If not born in these countries this might be a little hard to know… and especially since most people moving there really don’t understand how little and bad sun we get. Not enough vitamin D to keep you happy, strong and as healthy as those sun drenched countries closer to the equator.

Enough of this navel gazing (again I feel a suspicious thought of this not being an actual word… but belly button staring seems even more silly to be honest – any English native that can help me out??)

...phone call about herpes

[at work, cell phone rings, unknown number at the screen. Me thinks it is “one of those calls to wrong number, as always!”]
Me: Hello!?
A guy I recognise: Hi, I just wanted to ask you can you get herpes in your mouth?
M: [thinking, I know this guy, don't I. Isn’t it X? but not sure… since I have his number in my phone ahh well…] yes you can. Why do you wonder? [thinks again, gee.. you have been a naughty boy now haven’t you? Or are you worried your gf has transmitted something to you? I did watch the Sopranos yesterday when they talked about ‘taking a trip south’…]
A: I’m just a work and we were betting that you could.
M [walking away from my SHARED office since this might be a private conversation and being a scientist I want to explain what I mean with herpes]: Yes, you contract herpes in your throat, mouth but usually it is visible outside your lips… as a rash… it is the same thing as ‘the other’ herpes. [Why on earth I didn’t call it genital herpes I don’t not know… maybe because I don’t want to be found talking about genital herpes in a private conversation on my cell at work…. I don’t know.]
A: Ok princess, thanks. I’ll see you later. Ok babe?!
M: Ok, take care.

Princess? See you later? Babe? All this time and I am not really sure on who I was speaking to. I mean, one could say again that those nick names (pet names?) really always throw me off guard. I am not use to them and every time I hear them I feel special… [Note to self; probably the reason the men hand them out like candy. Your weak knees…. ;) ] Gosh, I really should learn to ask “who’s calling please”/”who’s this” or at least say that since I am at work I pretty much disconnect my brain from the knowledge of the actual people I know and enter work mode. (ok, not all the time – I obviously spend an awful lot of time trailing the internet, reading emails etc… but still, when someone calls I can tell my brain is unawake in that aspect.)

Well, that kind of set a theme for the day. Thinking about who that was (I think I know but that makes it all even more strange since he is not working this week and he was clearly at work now.) and thinking about that small jolt in my tummy when I heard princess and babe, again. Yes, I have a feeling Valentines actually will suck this year… maybe I should just go bowling?

Morts sans sépulture - The Victors (Döda utan gravar)

Dead without graves as I think it would be called in English (although, it is called The Victors or Men without shadows) , maybe one of my favorite plays and also by Jean-Paul Sartre. I miss it. I have a copy on the other side of the ocean… not here. But at least I found a small part, the important part where they tell Jean he has to be quiet or they will kill him, just before Henry kills the young boy, the brother (forgot his name now), who will talk when the come to interrogate him. And the sister is torn between the love for Jean, turning into contempt when everyone else is braver than he is – or are they? He is their leader and yet he is the one that tries to be stay moral…

Jean: Les mains libres? Vous m'avez garrotté. Si je dis un mot, si je fais un geste: "Et les copains?" Vous m'avez exclu, vous avez décidé de ma vie comme de ma mort: froidement. Ne venez pas dire à présent que je suis votre complice, ce serait trop commode. Votre témoin, c'est tout. Et je témoigne que vous êtes des assassins. (Un temps.) Tu l'as tué par orgueil.

Henri: Tu mens.

Jean: Par orgueil! Ils t'ont fait crier, hein? Et tu as honte. Tu veux les éblouir, pour te racheter; tu veux t'offrir une belle mort? Ce n'est pas vrai? Tu veux gagner, tu nous l'a dit. Tu nous as dit que tu voulais gagner.

...not in my family...

Sometimes the headlines are too visible to ignore. New York Times has at least two of them today...

Not in my family, or rather "only poor people beat their wives", got yet another counter evidence for that statement
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Professors-Wife-Slain.html

It is still a tradgedy of course, I am still surprised about that violence when divorce comes up. It is clearly a reaction of control or rather the lack thereof, in my opinion anyway. Makes me a little hesitant at times, and yes especially now…

And the next note of how to fight that fat. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/08/health/08obesity.html?_r=1&ref=us&oref=login

I am not entirely sure that a note with your BMI on it to give to your parents is the right way to go… but maybe actually reintroduce physical education (PE) every day at school. At this time I really doubt if we have to have ‘real’ PE including running and playing ball every day. Maybe an hour walk would give these kids a more healthy way of looking at life? I know it worked at my last job where we were allowed two hour long walks a week within our work hours… that was nice, especially during winter months when light is a scares commodity in northern Europe.

Ah well, back to work. Need to process that data and try to analyze it so I understand what it really means. I have tried for a good afternoon and it still looks strange…

...nose bleed...

Funny how yucky it feels when all of a sudden, in the stillness in front of the computer, something wet and sticky starts its way down your face. The faces of my co-workers when I more or less moved quickly towards the paper towels in the common room (the bathrooms are way down the hall...) while holding a couple of fingers on the bridge of my nose, pausing for a second while the pain from the still slightly swollen cartilage (can cartilage really be swollen?) made my eyes fill with water (aka tear fluid) and finally I reached the wondrous paper to help stop the blood from being everywhere in my face….

Combined with the knowledge that my jar of Advil is almost empty, the memory of when I last had spontaneous nose bleeds makes me think a little more. Again, I can see why hiding is tempting, but still - it is going to be like Jack Torrence ‘Come out, come out where ever you are’ or Roy Batty ‘Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.’ - which makes the hiding quite irrelevant.

And as always, the rational cynic man (Gaff) sums it up: It's too bad she won't live! But then again, who does?

[quotes from The Shining and Blade Runner. I still wonder how it would have been to act against Jack Nicholson when his character is also called Jack. How could you distinguish them apart, when trying to explain “are you like that. No I am like Jack… Jack who?” Redrum indeed.]