Dec 7, 2019

Wordology, Anosognosia

My brother, whatshisname sent this to me, although he swears he never read it. Anosognosia is a deficit of self-awareness, the inability of a person to be aware of their own disability or illness.

French Professor Bruno Dubois Director of the Institute of Memory and Alzheimer's Disease at La Pitié-Salpêtrière - Paris Hospitals says, "If anyone is aware of his memory problems, he does not have Alzheimer's. . .The more we complain about memory loss, the less likely we are to suffer from memory sickness."

Many people over sixty forget the names of family or friends, forget where they put things, forget why they walked into another room, or misplace keys and other items. It is usually temporary forgetfulness. Half or more of these people have some symptoms that are due to age rather than disease or Anosognosia.

We are learning that forgetfulness is not a disease, but rather a frustrating characteristic due to age. The important thing is, those who are conscious of being forgetful have no serious problem of memory, but those who suffer from a memory illness, Alzheimer's, or Anosognosia, are not aware of what is happening.

Benefits of Hugs

Scientifically, hugging a loved one releases the hormone oxytocin that lowers blood pressure, reduces stress and anxiety, and can even improve your memory. In reality, it just feels good to get and give hugs.

Nov 30, 2019

Happy Friday

Happiness is relief from all the world's pain.

Am still full from yesterday, but am happy and have no pain today!

Wordology, Third Tier

The third tier of the theater was very large box seat areas to be rented by the year by wealthy patrons. These came complete with private areas where a curtain could be drawn. This was something quickly criticized for allegedly being so that the elite could solicit the services of prostitutes who often could be found at theaters of the age. In fact, many of the actresses themselves supplemented their income on the third tier.


This also led to the British expression, “Said the actress to the Bishop”, implying illicit things actresses would tell ministers during confession. This was a precursor to the American version of an expression with the same meaning, “That’s what she said”, which was first popularized in the 1970s on Saturday Night Live.

Windows Keyboard Tip

 In Windows 10, press the Windows key + semi-colon key to bring up a box with emojis, kaomogis, and symbols.

Pluto TV Free

Pluto TV has been adding new content and now has 244 free channels. It has mostly live TV shows with ads, but also has news, sports, movies, viral videos, cartoons, and more. The streaming service also has on-demand content, but focuses heavily on live TV. If you get bored with your cable or streaming service some evening, try Pluto. You may be pleasantly surprised at all the new free stuff to watch.

The Pluto TV app is available on smart TVs and all the boxes, like Fire TV, Roku, Apple, Chrome, etc.

Fake Meat vs. Real Meat

Big names in real meat products, including Tyson, Perdue, Hormel, Smithfield, and Nestlé, are all trying to get a cut of the fake and alternative-meat products. Following the success of Impossible Burgers and Beyond Meat, real meat producers have developed their own plant-based versions of burgers, chicken nuggets, sausages, and more.

In April, Nestlé served up its Awesome burger, made with soy and wheat protein, plus extracts from beetroot, carrot, and bell pepper. Tyson followed with its own plant-based and blended products of nuggets and burgers, as well as sausage and meatballs made with both chicken and plant-based ingredients.

Perdue introduced nuggets, patties, and tenders made with chicken, cauliflower, chickpeas, and plant protein.

Big pork producer Smithfield Foods announced an entire line of plant-based meat and dairy alternatives. Also, Hormel announced its own plant-based and blended products, including plant-based beef.


To me, it is still easy to discern the difference between all of the real vs. fake meats - Real is cheaper and tastes better. Plus, it is better for the climate to eat a methane producer.

Neighborhood Sex Offenders

That is enough to get your attention. There is a site that you can go to that will identify sex offenders in your neighborhood. It has scary information in some areas. Type in street, city, etc and you will see a map. Click on an icon to see a picture of person and other information. LINK

Happy Friday

We first become happy, then our happiness becomes us.

We can celebrate both on a Happy Friday!

Presidential Turkey Pardon

The presidential turkey pardon tradition might have stemmed from Abraham Lincoln, who made Thanksgiving an official U.S. holiday in 1863. According to White House reporter Noah Brooks, Lincoln’s son Tad got upset when he found out someone was going to kill the live turkey that had been brought for the presidential family’s Christmas dinner in 1865. Eventually, the turkey’s life was spared.

The first president to throw a ceremony rescuing a bird from being doomed to the Thanksgiving table may be John F. Kennedy in 1963, according to the White House Historical Association. That year, the turkey had a “Good Eating, Mr. President!” sign around its neck. Reportedly, JFK said, “We’ll just let this one grow,” and had the bird sent back to the farm. The Los Angeles Times ran an article about the event calling it a “presidential pardon” so the presidential turkey pardon tradition began.


Incidentally, though the residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is painted white, it was known as the Executive Mansion and the President’s Palace until October 1901, when President Theodore Roosevelt referred to it as the White House. He made the name official when he had it engraved on his stationery.

What's in a Name, Mach

Ernst Waldfried Josef Wenzel Mach (d.1916) was an Austrian physicist and philosopher, noted for his contributions to physics such as study of shock waves. The ratio of one's speed to that of sound is named the Mach number in his honor.


Mach's main contribution to physics involved his description and photographs of spark shock-waves and then ballistic shock-waves. He showed when a bullet or shell moved faster than the speed of sound; it created a compression of air in front of it. Using schlieren photography, he and his son Ludwig were able to photograph the shadows of the invisible shock waves.

In homage, his name was given to: Mach, a lunar crater; Mach bands, an optical illusion; Mach number, the unit for speed relative to the speed of sound.

During the 1860s he discovered the physiological phenomenon that has come to be called Mach’s bands, the tendency of the human eye to see bright or dark bands near the boundaries between areas of sharply differing illumination.

More Google Search Tips

A search for “What is the who” is going to summon results about the English rock band. Search instead for “What is a who” and you see top results around the whimsical characters in Dr. Seuss’ “Horton Hears a Who!”
Word order - Leave common terms in the correct order. Typing “blue sky” yields very different results from “sky blue.”
It is better to ask, “What is the average length of an octopus” rather than “Is the average length of an octopus 21 inches" You may see search results confirming 21 inches, but maybe other sources are wrong. When you include the answer in a search query, you bias results, which may not be correct.

Add a minus sign to that same search along with the thing you want to eliminate from your results. So you might type “kitchen remodeling -stainless” to leave out stainless steel. Or “kitchen remodeling -stainless -granite” to eliminate both stainless and granite. Add a space before the -.


If you are searching for a specific quote, but one of the words slips your mind, put an asterisk in its place, such as "Four score and * years ago."         

Climate Change

Climate change describes changes in the state of the atmosphere over time scales ranging from decades to millions of years. These changes can be caused by processes inside the Earth. e.g. volcanoes and forces from outside, e.g. variations in sunlight intensity. Other significant factors include: temperature, atmospheric pressure, wind, solar irradiance, humidity, precipitation, and topography.
The major greenhouse gases are water vapor, which causes about 36–70% of the greenhouse effect; carbon dioxide (CO2), which causes 9–26%; methane (CH4), which causes 4–9%; and ozone (O3), which causes 3–7%.


A 2012 United Nations report revealed that the earth’s cattle population produces more carbon dioxide than automobiles, planes, and all other forms of transport combined. Also, the cow pies they drop and the gas they produce equals a third of the world’s methane emissions, which traps 84 times as much heat as carbon dioxide.

In the summer of 2016, EcoWatch published an article confirming that greenhouse gas emissions from livestock actually account for a higher percentage of total global emissions than the world’s 1.2 billion automobiles.

Real ID Act

Starting October 1, 2020, every US state and territory resident will need to present a Real ID-compliant license/ID or another acceptable form of identification (like a passport or passport card) for accessing federal facilities — including boarding commercial airplanes.
If it is Real ID compliant, there will be a star in the top right corner; many drivers may not realize they already have one, since some states have been issuing them for a few years.

You need a Real ID if:
• You want to fly with only your state-issued ID
• You do not have a passport or another TSA-approved ID
• You need to visit a secure federal facility, such as a military base, and do not have a military ID

Incidentally, a Real ID is not a substitute for a passport for international travel.