Grab Bag Gift to Yourself:

Here’s the problem…. we’ve become so accustomed to buying so many products for so long that we trust them implicitly. Cosmetics and personal care manufacturers enjoy a virtually self-regulated industry in this country.

We need to be aware that MANY of the chemicals used in our everyday products are BANNED in Europe. The reason they are still used here is about money and not about health. Know that.

Please, please please…. give yourself 8 minutes sometime this week to watch this video. Even better, follow it up by clicking on this link to view the transcript with footnoted, additional backup information. This video is not unfounded.

 The fastest way to protect yourself also happens to be the fastest way to change the industry:

Let’s vote with our dollars by purchasing safer products. If we keep buying the same chemical-laden fare, they will keep making it, guaranteed. They think we like it!

Let’s tell them we don’t by ceasing to buy products with undesirable ingredients.

Grab Bag Quote of the Day:

From the brilliant mind of  esteemed Anatomist, Gil Hedley, PhD…. you may find this meaningful… I did:

If you feel stuck emotionally or physically, remember, you are a liquid form, and mostly space. We have enormous potential to meander and flow to a new position. Even if you are frozen solid for a time, keep hope: we have come to a tilted spinning planet knowing that we will eventually turn towards the sun, and melt.

Photos of Sasha Waltz Dancers

Grab Bag Pop Goes the Kidney:

To continue on the foray into the anatomy lab, I must tell you that I came “kidney-to-face” with some seriously diseased kidneys. To be exact, when I explored the mass of gel-filled “bubble wrap” I found in the kidney location, it was difficult to identify the kidney in there.

Here’s a healthy kidney

and here’s a polycystic kidney

this image is quite similar to what I encountered in the lab

Polycystic kidney disease is not pretty, my friends. To be avoided at all cost, for sure.
How do we do that? Here’s a start from the docs at RealAge:

A recent study revealed that — especially for women — guzzling two or more servings of sugary soda per day could increase the odds that they’d have unhealthy levels of albumin in their urine. Why is that so bad? Because high levels may be a marker of early kidney disease. Researchers aren’t sure why soda seems to stress the kidneys, but it could be that high-fructose corn syrup, phosphorous, or some other ingredient in the fizzy stuff gives kidneys a hard time. (Did you know? You could fix up your kidneys with fish.) 

We should consider ALL that we consume from the perspective of all our hard-working organs who do their best to clean up after our dietary missteps 🙂

Grab Bag ‘Netucation:

Good news! I just got accepted to Yale, Berkeley, Carnegie Melon, Stanford, Columbia and a whole lot more… full ride scholarship… tuition=nada. 

And you did, too. Congratulations. 

Just click on the Open Culture image above and browse the vast FREE offerings from some of the finest universities in the country. 37 foreign languages, Literature, History, Philosophy, Poli Sci, Biology Engineering, Chem., Physics, Psych., you name it… it’s pretty amazing.

We’re all looking smarter already. Now….  do we have to do virtual frat parties, too?

Grab Bag Time Stopper:

Believed to be shot four days before the 1906 earthquake, this film is thought to be the earliest 35mm film that has come to light. 

A camera was attached to the front of a cable car traveling east on Market Street in San Francisco, and the view you get tells an amazing amount about life as it was there. 

The dress, the cars, the carriages, the buildings… it’s all fun to see. Clearly, jaywalking was just how they rolled 🙂

Equally fascinating is the story of the silent film expert who was able to pinpoint when this was filmed by using length of shadows, announcements of the film in a New York newspaper, and even the registration dates of the cars he identified by license plate!

Enjoy.

Grab Bag Brain Game:

Here’s an opportunity to play Backgammon against a computer… you might miss the feel of the dice, but the willing competitor, always ready to take you on, is quite a draw.

BACKGAMMON

Grab Bag Funny Stuff:

Yes, we’ve all likely seen this before, but the timing was so perfect…. and it’s still hauntingly close to scenes that have played out in homes just like, maybe even EXACTLY like yours and mine…