Squeeze to Lower Blood Pressure

This is a non-drug method for lowering blood pressure. 

You use an ordinary hand grip with a spring. These can be purchased for less than $10 from an athletic store. You want to apply about one-third of your gripping strength for one minute. That means you don’t want the easiest one and you don’t want one that is extremely resistant, either. 

The idea is to grip continuously for one minute and then relax your grip for one minute. This is one cycle, and you want to do this cycle four times, three days a week. That’s all it takes to get results. 

Gripping a rubber ball will not work. You need to use spring-loaded hand grips.

Subjects in a scientific study who did this exercise for ten weeks experienced a 19-point drop in their systolic blood pressure (Med Sci Sport Exerc 03;35(2):251-6). The subjects had already been using medication for an average of nine years, and their average age was 67.5 years. Needless to say, the reported 19-point drop was very impressive.

Even though there was no explanation given for this effect, when I told this to a salesman who was selling me the set of hand grips, he said, “Oh, it’s obvious that if you exercise and get the stress out, then your blood pressure will drop.”

Health regimens are easy to start but difficult to keep up. I'll write  SQUEEZE  on the big wall calendar in my kitchen under Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. And I'll get back to you in ten weeks to let you know what happened! 

The citation for the original research has already been given above. I saw this information written up in the August 2004 issue of the newsletter Alternatives, Vol. 10, No. 14, “Exercise Doesn’t Have to Be That Complicated.” [www.drdavidwilliams.com]

Some Questions for Discussion:

1.     Have you ever successfully lost a lot of weight or changed a bad health habit? Was it difficult to lose weight? If so, did you use diet aids of some kind?

2.     Did you ever quit smoking? If the answer is yes, how many years were you a smoker before you were able to quit?

3.     They call high blood pressure the silent killer, because it has no symptoms. Have you had your blood pressure checked recently?

4.     Blood pressure changes constantly. Many people experience a rise in blood pressure whenever they see their doctor, maybe because it’s like taking a test. This is called the white coat syndrome or white coat hypertension. Does this happen to you?

Copyright © 2011      Barbara A. English

All rights reserved.

Occupy the Bus?

The old woman at Second Avenue and 34^th Street poked at the cross town bus with her wooden walking stick until the bus driver made the bus kneel. It was a so-called “kneeling bus,” which means the front of the bus can dip down with the assistance of hydraulic lifts. After the bus knelt down, a big platform covered in rubber flipped down to the sidewalk level so that this woman could board the bus.

I didn’t mind, since I was right behind her and could climb into the bus on a ramp. It had been irritating waiting for the hydraulics to finish their work, but overall I didn’t mind.

I was standing inside the bus, clinging to the overhead metal railing. Some out-of-towners asked me how they would know when the bus was at Fifth Avenue or Seventh Avenue. They had noticed from their previous bus rides that the buses tend to go speeding right past their stops without the bus driver saying anything. I assured them that the cross town bus usually stopped at all the avenues without skipping any.

Anyway, somebody started to make a noise in the back of the bus. I couldn’t see who was making the noise. I don't think the young man standing next to me could see any better than I could, but he said loudly, “Someone’s having a heart attack.” 

I looked at him and said, "It's just a joke." 

But the woman with the walking stick, who was seated behind the bus driver, immediately got on her cell phone and called 911. I had to listen to her speaking with 911 for about the next 10 minutes. She was trying to get the bus driver to take her cell phone and speak with 911, but he wouldn’t do it.

“Is it a man or a woman?” she shouted. The young man next to me replied, “A woman.” The old lady with the stick said into her cell phone, “It’s a woman having a heart attack.” 

It was highly unlikely that the young man standing next to me and the old lady seated near the bus driver knew each other. It was also highly unlikely that there was someone in the back of the bus having a heart attack. I bent my neck and looked back there a number of times, but all I could see were rather perplexed faces looking in my direction for some answers.

Somebody pushed through from the back of the bus and started yelling at the bus driver, telling him what to do. The bus driver ignored this man, who in reality didn’t have anything to do with anything.

The bus driver got up from his seat and went around outside to the doors at the middle of the bus. He asked if anybody back there needed assistance. There obviously wasn’t anybody having a heart attack at the back of the bus. 

A woman left the bus by the back door at that point, but she was not sick.

Then the bus driver returned to the front of the bus, climbed into his seat, and said, “This bus is going out of service. Would everybody please exit this bus.”

I bent down and said to the out-of-towners, “Best to leave this bus.” I was going to say “Best to leave this darned bus,” or "What a wild ride!" something like that, indicating that it was obvious that the passengers on this bus were not behaving properly.

We all filed out of the bus and some of us entered another bus that was immediately behind us.

But then someone noticed that the original bus was now back in service. To confirm this, one of the tourists, a young woman with long black hair who was wheeling her luggage behind her, turned around and asked the bus driver if the bus was back in service, and he said, “Yes.” 

Only half the passengers wanted to get back into the first bus. That was good because it was no longer overcrowded.

Somebody said the woman who had been causing the trouble was now gone, and I thought the woman with the walking stick was the one making the trouble, but the woman with the stick was still there. To tell you the truth, I don’t think she had ever gotten off the bus when instructed to do so. She had decided to become a fixture on that bus.

Needless to say, as soon as I found a chance to get off this bus, I did so. I had planned to go all the way to Seventh Avenue with one of the tourists, just to make sure she arrived there safe and sound, like a big sister. But I said to myself, “This is ridiculous. I’ve got to get off this bus. The tourists can take care of themselves. They probably have more patience than I do with this nonsense."

"New York City must seem like a form of entertainment to them," I thought.

Some Questions for Discussion:

1.     We have an extensive bus system in New York City. Some buses come every 45 minutes, but cross town buses come almost continuously. What is the average time waiting for a bus where you live?

2.     Our predominant culture in the U.S.A. dictates that passengers on buses and subway trains remain seated quietly and keep their thoughts to themselves. However, because of the ethnic mix found in NYC, some people like to make loud announcements and have very lively discussions on the buses. This is a culture clash. The majority does not appreciate loud speaking on public transportation. Do you have a story you could tell about a culture clash? 

3. I had the feeling that those who were participating in the 'Occupy the bus movement' were having a good time disrupting and obstructing the transportation system. Perhaps they were modeling themselves on the anarchy of the Occupy Wall Street movement. In any case, they were causing chaos, and I don't know how the bus driver put up with this. Using your own words, how would you cope with chaos or anarchy of this kind?  

Copyright © 2011     Barbara A. English

All rights reserved.

Gary's Silly Sayings & Profound Proverbs

My IQ test score came back negative.

Premature greying is hereditary; you get it from your children.

 

You’re never too old to grow up.

Smoking is the leading cause of statistics.

There’s always a good reason. Then there’s the real reason.

The reason angels can fly is they take themselves lightly.

A woman’s guess is much more accurate than a man’s certainty.

There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so. [Shakespeare]

It’s easy to spot the winners—they’re the ones not complaining about the rules.

Military justice is to justice what military music is to music.

A just peace is when our side gets what it wants.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Experience is the best teacher and it gives you individual instruction.

A near friend is better than a distant relative.

Everything that goes up must come down except the cost of living.

Take me drunk—I’m home.

One tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor.

I’m not an alcoholic. Alcoholics go to meetings.

Etiquette is the noise you don’t make while eating soup.

The map is not the territory.

An ounce of emotion is worth a ton of facts.

No man is a prophet in his own country.

A whale is harpooned only when it spouts.

There is no fun in the graveyard. Give me my flowers now.

I have no words. My voice is in my sword. [Shakespeare’s Macbeth]

I only date crack whores.

How much sin can I get away with and still go to heaven?

Nobody is hanged for thinking.

A chrysanthemum by any other name would be easier to spell.

Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.

When everything’s coming your way, you’re probably in the wrong lane.

We don’t see things as they are. We see things as we are. [Anais Nin]

If the shoe fits, get another one just like it.

Don’t let the tail wag the dog.

Don’t cut bangs with a hatchet.

A slice of eggplant makes a dandy sink stopper.

Early to bed, early to rise: The curse of the working class.

Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.

You can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs. [Robespierre, 1790]

Old mailmen never die. They just lose their ZIP.

Wars are sweet to them who know them not.

If you can’t laugh at yourself, make fun of other people.

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but old fleas don’t mind a new dog.

Don’t swap horses while crossing a stream nor ever change diapers in midstream.

What happens to the hole when the cheese is gone?

A woman who will tell you her age will tell you anything.

Beware of the butcher who backs into the meat grinder and gets a little behind in his work.

Lovers are lunatics.

Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.

You can still use a dime as a screwdriver.

If you had your life to live over again, you’d need more money.

When it rains, look for a rainbow.

Ah! But I was so much older then. I’m younger than that now.

Sometimes you eat the bear and sometimes the bear eats you.

Women and elephants never forget.

Once bitten, twice shy.

Little pitchers have big ears.

When in doubt, abstain.

Opportunity knocks but once, but temptation leans on the doorbell.

Reality is for people who can’t face drugs.

Gentlemen prefer blondes because they are easier to find in the dark.

One sees great things from the valley and only small things from the peak.

The fortune teller never knows his own.

The end doesn’t justify the means.

Too much and too little spoils everything.

The earth is infected, and we are the virus.

Luck is better than long legs.

There’s no logic as powerful as necessity.

Never spit in a man’s face unless his mustache is on fire.

When a man is in love for the first time, he thinks she invented it.

Behind every great man is a surprised woman.

An archeologist makes the best husband. He appreciates her more as she gets older.

Anxiety is the interest paid on trouble before it is due.

He was advised to find a good example and follow it, so he became a counterfeiter.

Better praise yourself than find fault with others.

Lean liberty is better than fat slavery.

A prodigy at five—a genius at seven—a meteor at eight—and senile at eleven.

God isn’t dead. He’s just screening his calls.

You can’t know too much, but it’s easy to say too much.

The pen is mightier than the pencil.

You can’t learn to ice skate without looking ridiculous.

The bread always falls buttered side down.

The love game is never called off on account of darkness.

It takes three generations to make a gentleman.

Be yourself. Who is better qualified?

It is not the same to talk of bulls as to be in the bull ring.

Live and learn.

Problems worthy of attack prove their worth by hitting back.

If power corrupts, powerlessness corrupts even more.

Happiness is just a state of mind, like insanity.

Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition.

Man is the only animal who blushes—or needs to.

Religion is a way of walking, not a way of talking.

Sometimes nothing succeeds like excess.

I do whatever my Rice Crispies tell me to do.

Some are great, some achieve greatness, and others just grate.

Lawmakers should not be law breakers.

A man’s wealth is his enemy. [1059 A.D.]

Where does a lamb go for a haircut? To the baa-baa shop.

Don’t piss me off. I’m running out of places to hide the bodies.

Don’t confuse me with the facts. I’ve already made up my mind.

Society is a hospital of incurables.

Though the teeth be false, let the tongue be true.

Grasp all, lose all.

Kindness consists of loving people more than they deserve.

Never scratch a tiger with a short stick.

Nothing is impossible except sneezing with your eyes open.

We only nag the ones we love.

Patriotism is the egg from which wars are hatched.

Praise loudly. Blame softly.

She got her good looks from her dad. He’s a plastic surgeon.

Never do anything for the first time.

Humor is in the funny bone of the beholder.

Bees are not as busy as we think. They just can’t buzz any slower.

An artist can’t speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.

Be yourself is about the worst advice you can give to some people.

Nothing makes you a better listener than hearing your name mentioned.

Any plan is bad that can’t be changed.

Faith is knowing there is an ocean because you have seen a brook.

Never say never. Never say always. Never say forever.

Don’t be veneer stuck on with glue. Be solid timber through and through.

Success isn’t permanent and failure isn’t fatal.

We are born to die. [Romeo and Juliet]

Medicare: Out of the coma and into the cab.

There are no atheists in an audit.

To do nothing is sometimes a good remedy.

You can no more win a war than you can win an earthquake.

One man’s strawberries are another man’s hives.

Out of the mouth of babes comes cereal.

Coming events cast the shadows.

Man, the missing link between apes and humans.

Extremity of right is wrong.

A fish stinks from the head.

Never ask a barber if you need a haircut.

Other people’s goats always have the biggest udders.

The tree is known by its fruit.

A man thinks he knows, but a woman knows better.

A beautiful theory killed by a nasty, ugly, little fact.

‘This hot dog is awful,’ she said frankly.

Love is an exploding cigar we willingly smoke.

Art is the illusion of spontaneity.

If you can’t buy happiness, charge it.

Life is not a popularity contest.

The mystery is not how the world is, but that it is.

Home sweet home—where you can scratch where it really itches.

Put your money where your mouth is. Lick a postage stamp.

A leopard cannot change its spots.

Familiarity breeds contempt. [6^th century B.C.]

The world is your cow, but you have to do the milking. [Vermont proverb]

Don’t be yourself. Be someone a little nicer.

An apple a day makes 365 a year.

You can’t tell a book by its jacket blurb.

What is brown, has a hump, and lives at the North Pole? A lost camel.

Every martyr comes with a built-in bully.

Trouble comes in bunches, like bananas.

No matter how you slice it, it’s still baloney.

Spiritual eyesight improves as the physical eyesight declines.

When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other.

Never lend your wife or your fountain pen.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Science has improved everything except people.

When money talks, it often says: Not guilty!

The art of governing consists in not letting men grow old in their jobs. [Napoleon]

Living well is always the best revenge.

Ring the bells that still can ring.

Forget your perfect offering.

There is a crack in everything.

That’s how the light gets in.

The silent man is often worth listening to.

Take human bites.

Copyright © 2011     Gary M. English

All rights reserved.

Depression From Lack of Sunlight

Working nights? Doing shift work? Feeling sad?

Make sure you get at least one-half hour of sunlight a day, if possible. When we don’t get enough sunlight, we may become depressed or weepy for no obvious reason. Our sleep may be disturbed and we make begin to suffer from the various forms of insomnia.  

If you use sunblock skin cream and gloves in the winter, it would be good to take off your eyeglasses for a few minutes when you’re outside during the day, just to let your eyes take in the sun.

Depressed people often want to go out only at night. If you are already depressed, make sure to get out of the house everyday before sunset to catch enough rays of the sun. Don't get into the vicious cycle of going out at night + lack of sunlight --> depression --> going out at night. The energy of the sun will serve as a natural pick-me-up!

Copyright (c) 2011    Barbara A. English 

All rights reserved.

The Pot Calling the Kettle Black

(1) THE POT CALLING THE KETTLE BLACK is an everyday proverb. Most kettles are black and most pots are dark on the bottom. Somebody who is not error-free is calling attention to someone's mistake, which is the same as his own.

I have noticed that we human beings usually like to accuse other people of our own errors, and this can be obvious to everybody -- except ourselves.

(2) DON’T ROCK THE BOAT

&  DON’T MAKE WAVES

This means we should lay low and not draw attention to ourselves.

(3) A STITCH IN TIME SAVES NINE

This is a good example of an old-fashioned proverb that has lost its meaning. There is no point speaking of stitches when people have no idea how to thread a needle anymore.

Hot Tip: Never pay for a class in idioms and slang expressions. Most of them will be out-of-date by the time the class ends.

(4) A WORD TO THE WISE IS SUFFICIENT
or: A WORD TO THE WISE IS ENOUGH

An intelligent person picks up on hints. She or he does not have to have the whole picture drawn completely. S/he is not A DIM BULB, a stupid person. But many people who are not stupid still do not pick up on subtle indications. Maybe they don’t want to know that something is changing.

These have been some proverbs. For one standard reference book on this subject, please see the Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable.

Some Suggested Topics for Discussion:

1. Students are said to think in a concrete way, not a metaphorical way anymore. If true, that would be a huge loss to our language ability as human beings. Have you heard about this issue?


2. Would a person who thinks concretely be able to understand the expression, 'Don't rock the boat'?

 

Copyright © 2011     Barbara A. English

All rights reserved.

Aesop's Fable: The Tortoise and the Hare

One day a hare was boasting about how fast he could run. He was laughing at the tortoise for being so slow.

The tortoise surprised him by challenging him to a race. The hare thought this was a big joke and said yes. The fox was selected to act as umpire and to hold the prize.

The race began. As expected, the speedy hare soon left the tortoise far behind. After he got half-way, however, the hare decided to stop. The day was warm, so he took a nap in a shady spot. He thought if the tortoise passed him while he slept, he could easily overtake him and reach the finish line first.

The tortoise went straight on towards his goal without stopping or resting.

The hare slept longer than he intended. When he woke up, he didn't see the tortoise and dashed off at full speed. When he reached the finish line, the tortoise was already there, waiting for him.  

Moral:   Slow and steady wins the race.

As you can see, a fable is a very short story with a lesson at the end called the moral.

Aesop’s fables present good human values, so parents often read them to their children as bedtime stories. There are about 50 of them. As in cartoons and animations, animals are the main characters, but the emotions and thoughts are human. Traces and echoes of these stories are deeply embedded in the English language. In addition to Slow and steady wins the race, here are some other sentences or expressions you might see or hear:

One good turn deserves another.

Leave well enough alone.

Don’t push your luck.

Familiarity breeds contempt.

Another Aesop's Fable, The Boy Who Cried Wolf is a story about how a boy yelled a warning so frequently that nobody believed him when a real wolf showed up. You may hear someone say: ‘He’s crying wolf.’ This is a good example of how the content of an Aesop's fable can easily enter into everyday conversation.

These tales counsel us to beware of people who suddenly want to be our friends and other flatterers, and those who insist they are not after our money. In a time when people did not know about unconscious motives, Aesop's fables carried the message: Never trust anyone based on how they look. These tales are filled with conservative advice. In modern terms, the basic message is that if the deal sounds too good to be true, it probably isn’t true.

Educated people know of Aesop’s fables but usually have not heard all of them. There is no definitive printed version. If you retell the story of the Tortoise and the Hare in your own words, you will find that the main points are very easy to remember.

Some questions for discussion:

1. People like Aesop’s fables. With their animal characters, they are more like cartoons. Why do you think they have stayed alive so long?
2. One of Aesop’s morals is: Misfortune tests the sincerity of friendship. Can you tell a story about how you realized your friend was not really your friend when he abandoned you in your time of need? But before you blame another person, are you sure you yourself never betrayed a friend?
3. Going by sayings and aphorisms, you could receive contradictory advice. For example, we have the saying, ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover.’ But we also have the expression, ‘Clothes make the man,’ which implies the opposite. What is the best advice? Can truth be determined from sayings?
4. One of Aesop's fables teaches the lesson: Never try to be someone you’re not. Can you tell a story from your own life that comes to the same conclusion?
5. One of Aesop’s fables has this moral: He who tries to please everybody pleases nobody. Tell a story about a time when you were trying to please everybody, and this had undesirable consequences.

Copyright © 2011     Barbara A. English     All rights reserved.

Freud Fever: China Beware!

I heard that Freudian psychotherapists in the USA have been looking for patients in Asia over Skype.

Freudian therapy is no longer popular in the USA and is considered to be old-fashioned and probably damaging to the patients.

The therapists are looking for patients suffering from anxiety, insomnia, depression, phobias—all the psychological disorders. Sigmund Freud invented a technique called ‘free association.’ The patient would say whatever came into his head, trying not to censor his words. Did it work? No. large-scale studies have found that psychoanalysis is useless as a treatment for disorders of the nervous system. There are very few Freudians left in America.

I know a woman who went through a classical Freudian analysis for ten years. That did not help her, so she went to see a different Freudian therapist for an additional ten years. She was not cured the second time, either. She went on to become a student of the method known as cognitive therapy.

Some questions for discussion:

1. Freudian therapy was very popular in the USA at one time but now has been discarded. Many other forms of therapy have sprung up. What is the most popular form of therapy for nervous sufferers in your country?
2. Do you think the most serious nervous disorders can be cured? Or do you think a cure is impossible and a nervous disorder must become chronic in nature?
3. If you think that a serious nervous disorder must become chronic in nature, why do you think so? What is your opinion based on?
4. Can you list some of the methods used in your country to treat or cure nervous or emotional disorders?

Copyright © 2011     Barbara A. English

All rights reserved

Follow Up: Echoes on the Line

I made a business phone call the other day and had echoes on the land line for one solid hour! It was so irritating!

We have extension telephones in two different rooms, an answering machine, and a computer -- all on one telephone line. I suddenly realized that we probably had too many machines hooked up to one phone line.
 

So I disconnected one of the machines on the line. Low and behold, no echoes.

I am waiting to see if I have hit upon the answer. I don't know yet.

Someone said that echoes can occur if a speakerphone button is left on, but I don’t think that was the problem in our case. 

I feel that I have found AN answer, but not THE answer.

Some Questions for Discussion:

1. Why do we need to have a telephone in every room? Have we all gotten so lazy we cannot walk from one room into another room?
2. Do we have to have a phone in every room because we have seen that other people have this?
3. Have comfort and convenience become so all-important to us that we will do anything to have more gadgets in our lives? 
4. We certainly need to be patient to solve some of these technical problems. Can you think of a situation in which you needed to be very patient?

Speaking the Truth

Galileo is a good example of how we can be completely innocent and still get into terrible trouble by speaking the truth. Galileo lived from 1564 to 1642 A.D. in Italy and is known as the father of modern science. He said the Earth is not the center of the Universe. For saying this, he got himself into big trouble. 

The Sun appears to rise in the east in the morning. It seems to set in the west in the evening. Because we can see sunrise and sunset with our own two eyes, people used to think that the Sun rotated around the Earth. They also thought the Earth was flat. However, as everybody knows, appearances can be deceiving.

When Galileo said that the Sun was the center of our solar system, some people thought he was attacking the Pope, who was the main authority in those days. Galileo thus alienated the Jesuit priests, an important religious order inside the Catholic Church.

Galileo was put on trial for heresy in 1633 and was forced to recant. Recant means that he was forced to say he was wrong.

After that, Galileo spent the rest of his life under arrest. This was perhaps not such a bad thing for Galileo, because he used the remaining nine years of his life to write one of his greatest scientific books.

Science goes step-by-step and there is no hurrying it. It took a long time for the world to believe what Galileo already knew. Even little children today know that the Earth orbits around the Sun.

Speaking the truth without understanding how that truth might be received by others is a kind of communications glitch that has little to do with cell phones, the computer, or any other electronic device. 

Communication is a two-way street. When you communicate, you must always think: Who will be hearing this or seeing this? How will they react? Unfortunately, most of us speak first ... and think afterwards. 

Yet we don't want to fall completely silent and live in fear of what other people will think ... or of what we think they will think about us. 

Where is that happy medium? Today, I don't know where it is.

Some Questions for Discussion:

1. Many scientists are idealistic and feel removed from traditional social and political considerations. Are you interested in science or engineering? Do you think the world runs along scientific principles? Do you think that social and political rules should be different for scientists?

2. The American writer Herman Melville wrote a classic short story, Billy Budd, in which a young man's innocence attracted bad luck. Perhaps it is not advisable, given the state of the world, for an adult to be too good and too innocent? Or is innocence a quality that we must always value and preserve?

3. Most Americans believe that the world is a better place because of the progress of science. Science is supposed to protect us from things that are beyond our control. What is your opinion on that subject?  

4. Have you ever gotten into trouble for saying something you thought was 100 percent true?   

5. Have you ever gotten into trouble by clicking on "send" after writing an email?  

6. Galileo's words startled other people who were not ready to change their beliefs about the world. Do you think Galileo should have kept his scientific observations secret in order to protect himself?

Copyright © 2011     Barbara A. English

All rights reserved.

Cellphone Echoes in my Head

Pictures are worth thousands of words. I'm still trying to sort out the events of the past couple of weeks around here. Everything is still happening ... I feel like I'm part of someone's science experiment.

In mid-September I began to hear echoes and repetitions of my own voice when speaking. Except I wasn't on a cell phone. I was on my land line.

Yesterday around 11:00 a.m., I suddenly saw a swirling, churning motion inside the upper right-hand corner of my own right eye. I was on the Internet at the time.I say that the visual effect was inside my eye, because if I looked to the right to see it better, the swirling movement would move off further to the right, as my eye moved.

At the same time, I heard people up on the roof. I live on the sixth floor, directly under the roof. In a few minutes, after calming down a bit, I went up there to look around.

The following photo shows you what I saw: Two rectangles on the surface of the roof exactly over where I sit when I'm on my computer on the floor below. 

It looked like two rectangular objects had been put down there to be painted, because there were flecks of what appeared to be white paint around the rectangular shapes. Also, one is more off to the right, which corresponds to the fact that the visual effect was inside my right eye, not in the left eye or in both eyes.

The photo at the beginning of the article shows you a new WiFi cellphone device, recently installed. All buildings owned by the landlord are now equipped with these.

The electrical wires from the WiFi cellphone device run along the outside the building and appear to go inside the building to connect to a big, black box mounted on the wall between the sixth floor and the roof floor. That black box is connected to the same electric line that supplies power to the building's hall lights. But maybe the black box inside has nothing to do with this story. I don't know.

None of this explains that odd swirling visual phenomenon I experienced for about 3 minutes yesterday morning when I was on the Internet. 

But the cell phone device on the roof a few feet above my head while I'm in the apartment probably goes a long way to explaining why I was hearing echoes and repetitions of  my own voice, even when I was on my land line telephone. The cell phone 'tower' is about 40 feet from my head when I am on the telephone.

I don't think the equipment on the roof was put there by Verizon, Sprint, Nextel, AT&T, or T-Mobile, the traditional cell phone companies, but rather by some other company, perhaps a start-up. I had better leave it at that, dear readers, since all these companies are currently fighting turf wars that are fierce and frightening. Such is the blood-thirsty nature of modern commerce.

We had an earthquake in NYC at the end of August. We also had a flood. In my personal life, I was bitten by a horde of virulent insects on September 8. Those events sound very Biblical. Then on September 13 I had minor surgery. By the end of October I experienced something very modern: I spoke to a psychiatrist about my difficulties with communication, and he thought I was suffering from paranoid delusions. 

Am I deluded and having hallucinations? 

If these echoes and other audiovisual effects are not hallucinations ... then what are they?

Are some people trying to make me so uncomfortable in my apartment that I am forced to move out? My apartment is located in a very desirable section of New York City. Many people would like it if I moved. 

In fact, if we moved out, the landlord could probably rent the apartment immediately for five times the amount.

Maybe some tenants currently living in this building want me to move out so their friends can move in?

Stories about ghosts, hauntings, vampires, and psychic attacks are very popular in the media in the USA right now, so I must ask: Am I under psychic attack? In other words, is someone or some group of people doing this to me? Someone I know said that was the only explanation.

Or am I doing this to myself?

Is this happening by accident, because of thoughtlessness, or due to ignorance?

Maybe I"m suffering from interference caused by the electronic devices in the apartment or from electromagnetic pollution? A couple of my relatives think so.

It's true that over the years I've had trouble with many appliances in this apartment. The original electrical wiring was done in a patchwork fashion, with the tenants in residence at that time (100 years ago) responsible as individuals for paying to have their own apartments wired.  

A crew of electricians came through a number of years ago, however. They installed four more outlets in every kitchen, one air conditioning outlet per apartment, and modern metal boxes with circuit breakers. So maybe the whole building was grounded and all the electrical problems fixed at that time. But I still have my doubts ....

A Question for Discussion:

1. What do YOU think is going on over at my place? 


Copyright (c) 2011      Barbara A. English

All rights reserved.

Dust?

I looked up dust in Wikipedia and read everything about it, from dust at home to dust in outer space. I guess you know that dust is one reason computers crash. After doing all that research, I still don't know what dust is. Dust is one of those great mysteries of life.

Sometimes I think men clean house better, because they don't spend much time on it. They don't care if it's done perfectly. They just do it.

Bedbugs

I have heard people say that bedbugs come into an apartment or a house because it is dusty or dirty. That is not true. Bedbugs usually enter a building on bags and luggage. Bedbugs are attracted by the carbon dioxide we breathe out as we sleep. They feed off blood, not dust or garbage. Dust has very little to do with bedbugs.

Who Should Dust?

Everyone has to dust, even though nobody wants to do it, as far as I know. Dusting is an important part of keeping a home neat, tidy and clean. Also, some people have allergies to dust and should therefore clean more frequently.

How To Motivate Yourself To Clean the House

I hate to tell you this, but microscopic bugs called dust mites really do live in mattresses, pillows, and other bedding. Also, you will probably need a vacuum cleaner to clean your apartment properly.

Tip: Invite a friend or relative to come over to your apartment! In the hours before your guest arrives, you will find yourself becoming highly motivated to clean up your space, for this obvious reason: You won't want to be embarrassed by dust!

Some questions for discussion:

1. Do you have to dust?

2. Do you like to dust?

3. If you are a woman, do you think men should help out with the dusting and other household chores?

4. If you are a man, what do you think about doing household chores that were traditionally done by women? Do you volunteer to do them?

5. If you are a mother now raising a son, do you plan to teach your son how to operate the washing machine, how to iron his own shirts, and how to dust the house—or would that be difficult for some reason?

6. If you are a mother now raising a daughter, would you teach her how to dust, sew, and cook, the usual household tasks, even though she aspires to a career outside the home?

Copyright © 2011      Barbara A. English 
All rights reserved.

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The Men Brought In the Food

I was born in my mother’s bed at home during a blizzard.

On the day I was born, my father ran down the street many times through the snow to a telephone booth outside the house to call the doctor. In those days, people may have had one telephone in a house, but in this case the telephone was down the street somewhere. The doctor refused to come. He was afraid he would slip on the ice and fall down.

The doctor came later. My parents did not have a name ready for me, since I had been born 63 or 64 days early. On my birth certificate, the doctor wrote: NO NAME.   

So I was born upstairs in my grandparents' house, a large rooming house in the Brighton Beach section of Brooklyn, New York. My father's two older sisters lived in the house, and each of them had one child. They were both divorced from their first husbands. My father’s younger brother lived there, too. He had not gotten married yet.  A number of lodgers also lived in this large house.  

Nowadays people in New York City rent or buy apartments, but in those days average people were more likely to live in a  boarding house and pay room and board. Meals were included in the room and board. 

My grandfather owned two restaurants in Brooklyn, and he cooked the food himself. He was an excellent cook.  

After I was born, my mother continued to work at her full-time job. Arriving home at the end of the day, she came upstairs to change out of  her work clothes and rest. Then she would take my hand and we would walk down the stairs together to dinner. Grandpa would be busy bringing in the food. Everybody sat around a big table and the conversation was lively, indeed.

When I was three years old, my sister was born. We moved out of grandpa's house to a small place of our own a few blocks away.

Babies do not remember their lives and I had no memory of all this. My mother told me the story of the day I was born on Mother's Day many decades later, when she and I started to speak long-distance.

My father's parents had come to the U.S. as immigrants. My father was born in this country, so he was a first generation American. I imagine he spent his childhood peeling potatoes and mopping floors for his father. Immigrants and first generation Americas are known for working exceptionally hard. They are striving to establish themselves and fit into a culture that is new to them.

My mother’s family had been in this country for many generations. But we don’t go by our mothers in counting generations. We go by our father’s line, so I am called a second generation American.

The lives of my parents were shaped by the Great Depression and World War Two. My grandfather's rooming house, my mother's mother's house, and the first house my father bought for us were all demolished a long time ago. My four grandparents are dead. My father, his two sisters, and his brother are dead; and so are their spouses. My mother was the eighth of nine children, and she is the only one still alive.
I am so lucky that my mother lived long enough to tell me the history of my own family. I am not sure if everyone in my family knows the family history, because the children tended to scatter in every direction away from New York City. People here are constantly on the move.

Let me tell you something funny. I still believe deep in my bones that the men should do the cooking and bring in the food! And then we should all sit around a big table, relaxing. Thus we can be nourished in many ways: with food, with seeing each others' faces and hearing each others' voices, and by losing ourselves in the discussions of the day.

Some Questions for Discussion:

1. Do you think the first few years of our lives—even if we cannot remember those years—give us our beliefs about the way life is supposed to be?

2. What do you think is better for the baby: being born in a hospital or being born at home?

3. What do you think is better for the mother: when the baby is born in a hospital, or when the baby is born at home?

4. What do you think is better for the father: when the baby is born in a hospital, or when the baby is born at home?

5. Almost everywhere in the world, women do most of the cooking but a few men are considered great chefs. When you were growing up, who did the cooking?

6. In your culture, do people talk around the dinner table? Or are people supposed to be silent when they eat?

Copyright © 2011          Barbara A. English          All rights reserved.