Right, that’s me heading off to Beijing tomorrow. I’m nervous, of course, given the anxiety over my health lately, but my doctor gave me the green light. I have another test to do when I return, but other than that, I’ve got a clean bill of health. He actually said my heart’s great (according to an 85% accurate test involving an EKG and a treadmill), my cholesterol and other bloodwork looks wonderful, my blood pressure isn’t significantly high, and that I’m going to live a long life if I cut back on the stress and get more exercise. (He also …
Month: January 2007
Weird Medical Fact of the Day
Yes, another that I realized I hadn’t posted yesterday. In the course of explaining her feeling that anyone considering plastic surgery should be required to see a surgery, be present for one and really experience how gross it is to cut open a human body and fiddle with it, Lime mentioned a weird fact to me… it surprised me, but of course, I know rather little about the practicalities of the practice of modern medicine. Anyway… apparently during operations, it stinks. It stinks something awful. You know what it stinks like? Cooking meat. See, in some operations, they use these …
2006 State of the Bookshelf
Saw a post by a title similar to this on Tina’s site and loved the concept. Decided to copy her (just this once), even though I’m still sure I’ve missed a few books. I’m going to post my book review log for 2007 in a category of its own explicitly to make this easier in the future. In 2006 I read the following books: italics = reread asterisk = new (to me) author (*) bold = my favorites this year exclamation mark = !unfinished strikethrough = never finished, never will Jennifer Government by Max Barry(*) Kabuki 1: Circle of Blood …
Things You Learn From Your Mother, Your Girlfriend, Your Urologist…
It’s funny, the things you learn from a urologist: The left testicle normally hangs lower than the right one, because of the arrangement of the circulatory system. The Chinese word for “not” is “bu”, which is important when you’re in Beijing but not so important in Shanghai, where many people speak English. If you’re getting weird sensations on the left side of your body, including heightened awareness of your circulatory system, it’s probably stress. Meanwhile, my mother and my girlfriend have been recommending green tea to me. Mom says it’s good for maintaining or losing weight, as it supposedly affects …
Subs/Acceptances/Rejections 2006
As Caroline says, all the cool kids were doing it, and it might be a nice yearly ritual. Let’s see: In 2007, I made 12 submissions. I got 5 rejections, 4 personal and 1 form (though I’m told it’s semi-personal). Everything else is still out, though one of them is on hold at Interzone till sometime soon. I expect bigger things in 2007, but as always, we’ll see how it pans out. I’ll post again in about a year, I guess.