health

US Army Creates Single Vaccine Against All COVID & SARS Variants, Researchers Say – Defense One

US Army Creates Single Vaccine Against All COVID & SARS Variants, Researchers Say – Defense One:

Within weeks, scientists at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research expect to announce that they have developed a vaccine that is effective against COVID-19 and all its variants, even Omicron, as well as previous SARS-origin viruses that have killed millions of people worldwide. 

The achievement is the result of almost two years of work on the virus. The Army lab received its first DNA sequencing of the COVID-19 virus in early 2020. Very early on, Walter Reed’s infectious diseases branch decided to focus on making a vaccine that would work against not just the existing strain but all of its potential variants as well.

[Sounds like good news!]

∞ Apple Support: How to turn on AirPods Pro Conversation Boost

∞ Apple Support: How to turn on AirPods Pro Conversation Boost:

In a million years I would not have figured this one out. Watch the video below, see if you agree. This is some pretty low discoverability.

That said, props to the Apple Support team for making this video. Very well explained.

[There’s almost no way I’d remember all those steps… but at least they made the video.]

Source: The Loop

Morning rituals

I have long envied people who stick to their morning rituals. Or maybe they rely on them. I find the world highly ephemeral. I try not to rely on anything I don’t feel compelled to rely upon.

So I’ve watched over the years, now that people share, in the Instagram perfection of it all, their rituals, if not daily, then at least over time what appears to be a daily thing.

The first action of the day might be making coffee. They grind, froth, stir, and ease into their day. Some get kitted up and cycle to their favorite spot where they meet others of similar ilk and collectively drink and eat a bite of something before whisking off on their daily ride.

Lots of folks I know head quietly to their workshop of choice. Wood, pottery, metal–it matters not. They spend some time making things that they or others may cherish for years to come, a tribute before heading off to work. Sometimes it’s a wish, a hope, or prayer that they can spend more time doing the creative activity they love.

My mornings have been defined by external factors for a long time. Garbage and recycling 3 times a week. Getting DaKid™ on the school bus. Sometimes commuting. But not much in the way of taking a few moments to greet the day.

I have a pile of gifts that I’ve been making in my little wood shop for a while. Some of the folks have been waiting years for their gifts to be completed. Sad. So terribly sad. Last year and now this year have been banner years for completing projects. Bookcases, a dining room table, and now the gifts are all being finished. And while it’s a tiny fraction of what it used to be, I’m even working on some new music.

I find new rituals establishing themselves. After taking care of the other stuff (garbage, School bus, etc.) I make my way to the shop and spend a few minutes adding another coat of shellac to a board. Or some other not very risky task. Risk takes time. I need to be able to back away, think, come at it again. There’s little time for that in my morning.

Shellac is a beautiful finish. A bit high maintenance for some, but beautiful. I use very thin coats and many of them. Each day another thin layer is applied. It’s probably dry in ten of fifteen minutes, but work beckons, and so I don’t make it back there until the end of the day. It is ritualistic. I go down there, flick on the lights, put one glove on like a drunken surgeon, uncap the canning jars, one with shellac, one with the cloth pad. A few swipes later, and I’m done for now. The jars are lidded, and the glove, turned inside out as I remove it, goes in the trash.

More recently, as I began composing some new music, I started practicing again. I sit down, grab an instrument, turn on the metronome and lose myself in exercises for 15 or 20 minutes. Amazingly peaceful for me. A touchstone from an older aspect of my life and a meditation. And probably something I should every day for the rest of my life. It’s not “playing” or “performing”. It’s a simple discipline where I work toward increasing facility. Playing things that are hard for me now until they become smooth and easy. A new picking technique. A hard to play phrase. A difficult intervalic leap. A few concentrated minutes that stops time outside of my focus before the day is in full swing. A morning ritual.

First coat on the bottom… Just before, I knocked back the top's two coats with a #3000 grit automotive pad. I know it has its limitations...but shellac is such a beautiful finish. #whisperworkshop #handwork #handtools #woodworking #woodwork #everythingmatters

Here’s why your farmed salmon has color added to it

Here’s why your farmed salmon has color added to it:

The fact that consumers will shell out more for salmon that looks wild—even if it got that way by eating pellets in its pen—hints that people want to be eating wild salmon, but not quite badly enough to buy the real deal. If it’s price that’s keeping consumers from buying wild-caught salmon, they might want to consider saving a few bucks more and start demanding farmers cut out those expensive pigments—and sell them salmon that’s gray.

[Interesting. But I’d be surprised if it happened. Maybe if a company wanted to take on the marketing of a “new” fish and not call it salmon… and still charge nearly as much. What a mess. (I should add that assuming that none of the folks involved are lying to us, we buy wild salmon, we’re not fans of food coloring.)]

Why cancer sucks

Ezra Caldwell:

I could also pee like a big boy about a week ago, and now I’m resigned to peeing into a bag tied to my leg.  Just like that.  It’s just easier to go out into the world (or even just downstairs to make a cup of coffee) with an external catheter and a bag than it is to risk the anxiety of maybe having to find a couple of parked cars to dive between in order to suddenly pee (try finding parked cars in your kitchen while you’re making coffee!).  The notion that I’m just 40 years old and have had to simply accept that I am completely incontinent (and impotent),  is a reality that I’d never have imagined even just a couple of years ago.   You can throw a temper tantrum.  You can dig your heels in and refuse.  But what does it get you?  Wet pants.

[An incredibly painful story.]

FDA Tells Google-Backed 23andMe to Halt DNA Test Service

FDA Tells Google-Backed 23andMe to Halt DNA Test Service – Bloomberg:

“FDA is concerned about the public health consequences of inaccurate results from the PGS device,” the agency said today. “The main purpose of compliance with FDA’s regulatory requirements is to ensure that the tests work.”

The FDA used candid language in the letter to outline the work the agency has done with 23andMe since 2009 to no avail, including more than 14 face-to-face and teleconference meetings and had hundreds of e-mail exchanges. The FDA said it has given the company feedback on study protocols, discussed regulatory pathways and provided statistical advice.

[Here’s the thing… genetic testing can’t tell you whether or not you will develop a disease, only whether you carry a gene mutation that *statistically* puts you at a higher risk. Meaning they’ve found a correlation, but as far as I can tell, no one knows whether an individual gene by itself affects anything. It seems quite the opposite from what I’ve read… changing one gene seems to cause other genes to change as well and explain why in part all this is such slippery stuff… why there are no “cures” being batted about. (Yes, I know people are working on all kinds of stuff, but it all runs counter my experience that this form of “reductionism” applies well in complex systems.) Negative tests for a given gene mutation also don’t mean that you’re in the clear: For example it seems that only ~5% of breast cancers and maybe as much as 15% of ovarian cancers are caused by hereditary mutations in BRCA1 and BRCA2 the genes made somewhat famous by Ms. Jolie. As always, I’m not telling anyone what to do, and certainly if you’re not relying it diagnostically have at it. But between the margin of errors in the tests themselves, the limited number of markers that a service like the above checks, etc… seems like a really low grade indicator of anything. I know it appears high tech and shiny, but that doesn’t mean it’s accurate or reliable, or that we have any idea what it means when we see it.]

The noise of stuff

The noise of stuff — What I Learned Today — Medium:

You might be holding on to that book you bought a year ago that you swear you’ll read or those killer pair of shoes that you’ll bring out for just the right occasion.

But the reality is, you probably made a mistake in buying those things and it literally hurts your brain to come to terms with that fact.

Researchers at Yale recently identified that two areas in your brain associated with pain, the anterior cingulate cortex and insula, light up in response to letting go of items you own

[A work in progress to be sure, on so many levels.]

Sowing a Change in Kitchens

Sowing a Change in Kitchens:

The soil-tilling food experts happen to be every bit as expressive, and iconoclastic, as their knife-wielding counterparts in the kitchen. These days, many in the culinary world tend to view produce in a black-and-white way: You have either your delightfully lumpy, bumpy farmers’ market treasures, or your scarily uniform corporate Frankenfood. As Mr. Barber said, it’s “heirlooms over here, Monsanto maniacs over there.”

But Monday’s convocation, overseen by the Basque Culinary Center, suggested a third way: Independent breeders are ready to help make our breads and salads richer with deep flavor, bold color and plenty of nutrients. They just need someone to ask them.

What they do may also be seen as an old-school alternative to the spread of genetically modified plants, which have not been shown to be harmful but still frighten and concern many people.

“We’re making crosses within the same species, and we’re doing it the way it’s been done for 300 years,” said Dr. Stephen Jones, a wheat breeder from Washington State whose accessibly folksy lecture had the room transfixed. “There’s no forcing here. We put these plants together and we let them mate.”

[Since this ultimately will be driven by business and not love, it cares me a bit. But I’m curious to see where it goes.]

Zoë Goes Running

Zoë Goes Running | Running Le Tour de France for World Pediatric Project:

When I finally did finish, at 1:05 am, my knees and elbows were crusted with blood, and my palms dotted with blood blisters from falling down, my skin pickled and covered in a sun rash, my ankles swollen red and hot, dirt everywhere, and my face completely flushed with fever.  It was, after so many runs in my life, the first time I felt so deeply that I could not possibly have gone one extra step.  So often people have commented upon seeing me after a 30 mile day that I look great, considering.  I’ve always felt conflicted about that – sure it’s nice I can run that much and not look awful, but on the other hand, I want to look awful!  I want to look like I’ve been through something.  And finally, at 1 am on Friday morning, I looked like I had been through something.  23 hours, 110 degree heat, 8000 feet of elevation gain, all of it was written on my face, etched in my body.  Finally, I looked like hell.   And it felt great.

[It’s amazing anyone ever thinks of these things… let alone complete them.]

Fukushima leak is ‘much worse than we were led to believe’

BBC News – Fukushima leak is ‘much worse than we were led to believe’:

The Japanese nuclear energy watchdog raised the incident level from one to three on the international scale that measures the severity of atomic accidents.

This was an acknowledgement that the power station was in its greatest crisis since the reactors melted down after the tsunami in 2011.

But some nuclear experts are concerned that the problem is a good deal worse than either Tepco or the Japanese government are willing to admit.

They are worried about the enormous quantities of water, used to cool the reactor cores, which are now being stored on site.

Some 1,000 tanks have been built to hold the water. But these are believed to be at around 85% of their capacity and every day an extra 400 tonnes of water are being added.

“The quantities of water they are dealing with are absolutely gigantic,” said Mycle Schneider, who has consulted widely for a variety of organisations and countries on nuclear issues.

“What is the worse is the water leakage everywhere else – not just from the tanks. It is leaking out from the basements, it is leaking out from the cracks all over the place. Nobody can measure that.

[How many times do we need to go down this road? And guess where that sea water is headed?]