fauxklore

Celebrity Death Watch: In a rather belated item, Richard Siegel, who was one of the co-editors of The Jewish Catalogue died in mid-July, but I missed seeing his obituary until this week. Tommy Peoples was a Donegal fiddler who played with The Bothy Band. Moshe Mizrahi was an Israeli film director, best known for Madame Rosa. Charlotte Rae was an actress, probably best known for her television roles on Diff’rent Strokes and The Facts of Life, but also significant for playing Mammy Yokum in the Broadway musical, Li’l Abner. Joel Robuchon was a French chef, who had the most Michelin stars of any restaurateur. Stan Mikita played hockey for the Chicago Blackhawks.

Avoiding Whininess: I wrote a rather kvetchy entry yesterday, mostly about the level of chaos in my life. I decided not to post it. Instead, I did get some decluttering done when I went home, including finding the most urgent thing I was looking for (new auto insurance card). And, more importantly, I figured out a way to sort some things out so I can tackle them in a more orderly manner. In other words, it is still chaos, but I feel more optimistic about coping with it.


Charities: A lot of people use social media (particularly facebook) to solicit charitable donations to celebrate their birthdays. I have reservations about this, as it seems both ineffective and pushy. But I will note that my birthday approacheth (as do the Jewish High Holidays, a traditional time for extra charity). So I thought I would recommend a few charities I think are worth giving to:

Mines Advisory Group – focused on removing unexploded ordnance in various countries. I have seen the good they have done in southeast Asia (Cambodia and Laos) and am particularly impressed with their efforts to educate children not to handle bombs they may find. They are also active in several countries in Africa. Not rated by Charity Navigator because much of their funding comes from government grants, versus individuals.


SOME – serves poverty and homelessness in Washington, D.C. Their services include affordable housing, as well as food, clothing, health care, job training, and addiction treatment. Rated 4 Star by Charity Navigator. You might also look for similar organizations where you live.


Women’s Prison Book Project – provides free reading materials to women and transgender persons in prison. Focus is on books with specifically relevant topics, including women’s health, law, and education. Not rated by Charity Navigator.


I also donate heavily to my alumni association, earmarked for scholarships. I also recommend donating to local arts organizations (e.g. I donate to Signature Theatre in Alexandria, Virginia). In general, it is better to donate larger amounts to fewer organizations, in my opinion.

Celebrity Death Watch: Jake LaMotta was a boxer, best known from the movie, Raging Bull. Lillian Ross wrote for The New Yorker. Maurice Nivat was considered one of the fathers of theoretical computer science. Liliane Bettencourt was a socialite who inherited the L’Oreal fortune and was, hence, the richest woman in the world, despite losing a lot of money in Bernie Madoff’s Ponzi scheme. Daniel Yankelovich was a social scientist and influential pollster. Charles Bradley was a soul singer. Kit Reed wrote both science fiction and mystery stories. Bobby Knutt, Elizabeth Dawn, and Tony Booth all acted on Coronation Street. Barbara Blaine was an activist who fought against clergy abuse.

Federal Budget: Last Tuesday night I went to an MIT Club dinner meeting with a speaker (Josh Gordon of the Concord Coalition, which exists to educate people about the federal budget) talking about the future of the federal budget. When I arrived, the organizer asked me if I had anything to do with the federal budget and I explained that my job touches on parts of the defense budget, so he decided I should sit at the head table. That meant some reasonably lively conversation with the speaker (and, of course, the others at the table.) I don’t think I learned much from the talk, but it was fairly interesting. Too many of the questions focused on health care for my interest level. In short, every other developed country has decided that single payer is the way to go to achieve good health outcomes at an affordable price. I formed my opinion on that long ago. For the record, our for-profit insurance system is inefficient, as a very low percentage of the money taken in actually goes to health care. The fact that there are thousands of people who are paid to figure out what code to use for a large number of different insurance companies is evidence enough of the absurdity.

The Anthem Controversy:I have no interest in football, but I do have a few things to say about the anthem controversy. First of all, it is clear that people have the right not to stand for the anthem. However, there are lots of other examples of first amendment rights not applying in the relationship between employers and employees, so the owners could require players to stand. That would send an undesirable message, but it wouldn’t be illegal. It would be akin to not allowing you to use corporate resources to write a letter to the editor of the newspaper.

Second, that particular protest is not inherently disrespectful to the flag or veterans or apple pie. One can argue about how effective it is, because it doesn’t really tie directly to the issue at hand (namely, racism in policing) but that is a separate (and irrelevant) matter. I can’t really fault people whp have a public platform for using it to speak up about important matters.

Third, some people have shown pictures of President Trump standing without his hand over his heart during the anthem as a statement of hypocrisy. While the Flag Code does say that the right hand over the heart is proper, it isn’t the case for the military, who are supposed to stand at attention. I would argue that the President, who is Commander in Chief of the military, could acceptably do that. And, by the way, remember that Obama was also criticized for not putting his right hand over his heart during the anthem. I will also note that when I was growing up, we put the hand over the heart during the Pledge of Allegiance, but not during the national anthem.

Application to My Workplace: By the way, our all-hands meetings at work start with the Pledge of Allegiance. This annoys me, but I don’t feel like I could not say the Pledge. I do ignore the applause when I am sitting in a conference room at the opposite end of the country where the actual meeting is taking place. We’re muted, so what’s the point of clapping?

Rosh Hashanah: I went to Sixth and I, which had its pluses and minuses. The traditional service was almost traditional. The deviations did, alas, annoy me – calling multiple people for an aliyah, for one, and not really doing the priestly blessing, for another. On the plus side, I thought Cantor Larry Paul did an excellent job of the balance between cantorial showiness and congregational participation, with most of the people around me singing quite a lot. Rabbi Avis Miller’s sermons could have been more tightly written, in my opinion. (I apparently missed Ruth Bader Ginsberg, who was there Wednesday night.)

The main thing I wanted to note was that the shofar blower during Shacharit had an interesting technique. I can’t really describe it well, but his shevarim had two notes, in a way that made a siren-like sound. I don’t know if that is specific to some particular region (e.g. I have heard a Yemenite shofar, which sounds somewhat different, but that is because it is made from an antelope horn, not a ram’s horn), but it was really quite striking. He did this both with the plain shevarim and the shevarim teruah, by the way. (For those who have no idea what I am talking about, there are three different shofar calls. Tekiah is the long drawn-out one. Shevarim is three shorter notes. Teruah is 9 or more short blasts.)


Mail: Both my email and my snail mail seem to have been especially slow last week. Should it really take 4 days for something to get less than 20 miles from where it was sent to my mailbox? And the 5 days for an email to reach me was even weirder.

Don’t Analyze This Dream, Part 1: I don’t remember the entire dream, but the gist of it was that two men, one American and one Israeli, had to kill and drink the blood of people to keep from being eaten alive by aliens who looked like a cross between spiders and starfish. They both kept journals about this, with the focus on their trying to be sort of avenging demons. For example, they directed three Korean women to a good diner and paid for their meals, and then went to kill the people who had been keeping the three women as slaves. It is possible that one of the men was actually Bat Boy. At least there was a scene where he was hanging upside down from the crown molding of a room, supported by his toenails.

Don’t Interpret This Dream, Part 2: I was at a restaurant for brunch. For some reason, I had to order at the hostess stand, not at the table. I knew what I wanted (a Mexican omelette), but couldn’t figure out what this particular restaurant called it on their menu.

Celebrity Death Watch: Marian Javits was an arts patron and the widow of Jacob Javits, who a few of you may remember from the days when there was such a thing as a liberal Republican. Joseph Wapner was the first judge on The People’s Court. Shrley Palesh played for a few teams in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. Howard Schmidt was a major figure in government cybersecurity strategy. Joe Rogers co-founded Waffle House, thus saving the stomach linings of many a drunken Southerner. Rene Preval served two terms as president of Haiti. Tommy Page was a singer-songwriter. Miriam Colon was a Puerto Rican actress. Edi Fitzroy was a reggae singer. Fred Weintraub owned The Bitter End, an important venue for folk music and comedy. Kurt Moll was an opera singer. Robert Osborne as a film historian and hosted Turner Classic Movies. Joni Sledge sang as part of Sister Sledge. Robert James Waller wrote The Bridges of Madison County. Amy Krouse Rosenthal was a prolific writer of children’s books, among other things. Mother Divine was the leader of a cult founded by her husband. Royal Robbins was a big name in rock climbing but, more significantly to me, founded an eponymous clothing company that makes awesome clothes for traveling, including that green plaid shirt I am wearing in the overwhelming majority of my travel photos.

Errata: I erred. It was Jason Chaffetz, not Paul Ryan who made the stupid statement about iphones and health insurance.

Don’t Analyze This Dream: I was in Japan and upset over finding I had inadvertently taken my (work) cell phone with me. I was with another woman and we went down an escalator to exit a building with a very tall skylight. We were held up at the bottom of the escalator until there was a group of 4 men and 4 women and we all had to walk through a metal detector and send our things through an x-ray machine. Then we had to sing a song together before we could exit. Afterwards, I found out there was a side exit and people waited in line to sing, with fans of them gathered at the side of the security screening.

Story Slam: This month’s story slam theme was Womanhood, so I pulled out my "Woman of Valor" story, which is starting to get to having a reasonable ending. It went fairly well, though I finished third, so didn’t walk away with any money. I do wish, however, that this would go back to being on a Thursday night, because it conflicted with The Grapevine and I had to make an actual choice.

World Baseball Classic: Oh, well. Israel had a good run, but blew it in the second round.

Culpeper Tells / Virginia Storytelling Alliance Gathering: This past weekend was the Culpeper Tells festival and, once again, the VASA Gathering was held together with it. I preferred when we had a separate retreat, which made for a different sort of event, but I’ll take what I can get. I took off from work on Friday, intending to get some household odds and ends done and drive out earlyish. But I fell prey to the lure of napping and hit the road later than I intended, subjecting me to the inevitable slog through Gainesville. I was not all that enthusiastic to arrive at the hotel and find myself parking next to a vehicle advertising Pest Control and, specifically, "thermo bed bug eradication." Either their method works or the guy with the bedbug truck was just staying overnight at the hotel, as I didn’t get bitten by anything, but it was still disturbing.

Anyway, a bunch of us went out to dinner at Luigi’s which is mediocre red sauce Italian food. At least our server was mostly up to dealing with a big group. We came back to the hotel for a concert by Lynn Ruehlmann and Megan Hicks. Lynn blended the story of Psyche and Eros with the story of her own marriage, while Megan told a folk tale and her personal love story separately. Both were very good. That was followed by a story swap.

Megan did a workshop on Saturday morning, mostly emphasizing that we are all living history. There was a lot of confusion about when we were supposed to get into the room at the library, as well as confusion over who was signed up for what.

The actual festival started after lunchtime. There were four tellers – Geraldine Buckley, Michael Reno Harrell, Adam Booth, and Donald Davis. Each of them had just under an hour in the afternoon and then another half hour in the evening concert. The highlight of the day as far as I was concerned was Adam’s telling of "Ashton," a story from his Appalachian series, involving a coal miner's wife, and the early recordings of country music. It was exquisitely crafted and well-told. I should also note that I thought it was interesting that all of the tellers were telling more or less personal stories and there weren’t any traditional stories at all. By the way, there was also a story slam, but my name didn’t get drawn from the hat, alas.

At the dinner break, I ended up with a few people at a small place called Four C’s. I have this theory that, if you see a few ethnic items on what is otherwise an American restaurant menu, you should order from those, because it means the cook is including some of his family specialties. There were several Peruvian items on the menu, so these were clearly the way to go. I ended up getting some very tasty grilled fish that way. There’s no atmosphere, but the food was good and very reasonably priced and the service was friendly and efficient. It’s a good place to keep in mind for the future.

There was another swap back at the hotel afterwards, but it was too late for me, especially what with changing the clocks.

Sunday morning had the VASA annual meeting (which hadn’t actually been mentioned on the schedule). All I will say is that I am really glad I am no longer on the board. That was followed by "sacred stories" (not my thing) and puns (very much my thing). I told "Why I’m Not a Millionaire" to transition us between the two.

Overall, it was a reasonably good weekend. I was annoyed at various little things, but being among my storytelling tribe made up for them.

Annoying Weather: We had been having lovely spring-like weather, but it changed radically for the weekend. And Monday night was a sort of winter storm. Only sort of, as the snow total can’t have been more than a couple of inches, but there was plenty of sleet. In other words, things were nasty and icy. OPM made a bad call with a three hour delay and my company made a worse call by sending out confusing emails. One said we were on a mandatory delay in the subject line, but the body said all offices were open. Another had a subject line reading "message 1 of 2" but there was no "message 2 of 2." I had brought my laptop home and told my boss I was going to work from home, so none of this affected me per se, but it made me grumpy. I dislike working from home to begin with (too many distractions, including the fact that I really need to replace my desk chair) so I was inclined to be grumpy.

I’m back in the office today. One area of my walk to the metro was treacherous, but most of it was clear. I expect it to be worse tonight, since it isn’t supposed to get above freezing all day.

More Corporate Miscommunication: We are all getting new phones. I got an email telling me mine was ready and that I needed to go to an office 30 some odd miles away to pick it up. Since that office doesn't open until 9 and we are talking about DC metro area traffic, that would kill half my day. In fact, our IT guy came around this afternoon delivering phones for the 50 or so of us in this office. This is much easier, of course, but I would have preferred them sending out the correct info to begin with.

Celebrity Death Watch: Richard Hatch was an actor in Battlestar Galactica among other things. Sir Peter Mansfield won the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2003. Mile Ilitch owned much of Detroit or at least its sports teams (the Red Wings and the Tigers) and a mediocre pizza company. Damian was a British pop singer. Al Jarreau was a seven-time Grammy winner for his jazz and R&B music. Raymond Smullyan was a mathematician and wrote books about logic puzzles, e.g. What is the Name of This Book? and This Book Needs No Title.

Non-celebrity Death Watch: Howard Margol was a major force in Lithuanian-Jewish genealogy and responsible for a lot of the resources I use regularly. He was helpful in answering questions and teaching others how to do their research. May his memory be for a blessing.

Storytelling – The Grapevine: I made it to darkest Maryland (actually, come to think of it, Busboys and Poets might be on the DC side of Takoma / Takoma Park) Wednesday night to see Jeff Doyle and Anne Thomas tell. I also told "The Three Sisters" in the open mike. Jeff told two stories involving encounters with bears. Anne did a few personal stories about disability. Overall, an interesting night.

Storytelling – Short Story Slam: Thursday night had me back in darkest Maryland – Bethesda, to be precise – for the story slam that Michael puts on monthly. I have mixed feelings about this sort of thing, since a part of me objects to competitive storytelling. But there was plenty of good material on the theme of matrimony. Michael led off with a particularly funny piece about getting married in Communist China, including what he referred to as "emergency sex education." I told an abbreviated version of "Border Crossings." I actually tied for the third highest number of votes, but since the top two vote-getters went over the time limit, it came down to the tie breaker, and I had the shortest story so won first prize, which was exciting. Overall, it was fun and worth the exhaustion the next day.

JGSGW: I spent most of the weekend between suspended animation (i.e. catching up on sleep) and trying, not very successfully, to get some housework done. But I did make it to the JGSGW meeting on Sunday, which had a presentation on debunking myths about Jewish genealogy. I can’t say I learned much, but it was entertaining. And the time for networking was potentially useful.

Weather Whine: I would rather it were consistently cold than this annoying up and down we’ve been having. It got up to 70ish on Wednesday and then dropped to the 20’s on Friday but was back in the 60’s all weekend. This morning it was 30-something (but 25 with the wind chill factor) when I left for work. Just make up your bloody mind for a few days in a row, please.

Metro: Both storytelling events last week involved the Red Line, which meant changing to the Orange Line for the rest of the way home. That’s fine, but they were single-tracking around McPherson Square at night and things aren’t synchronized, so I had 15+ minute waits at Metro Center both nights.

Friday had a different annoyance as they turned the Orange Line train I was on into a Silver Line train. I was napping, so missed the announcement. Fortunately, I woke up at McLean, so only had to go back one station to switch, but they shouldn’t do this. Especially as they already run twice as many Silver Line trains as Orange, despite ridership on the Orange Line being several times higher.

Today started a new SafeTrack surge, which means no Blue Line service for 18 days. I had an early meeting at the Pentagon, so took a bus which was way more crowded than I’d ever seen it before. That worked, but was still annoying. In short, expect me to be grumpy for the next several weeks. It’s still better than driving.

Celebrity Death Watch: Janet Waldo was the voice of Judy Jetson and Penelope Pitstop, among a large number of acting roles. George Voinovich was the governor of Ohio through pretty much all of the 1980's, after which he became a U.S. Senator.

Metro: Surge #1 is over and was not too annoying, thanks to the temporary bus service from Fairfax Connector. Except that last night I was coming from the city and had the usual lengthy wait for a train at Foggy Bottom, complete with inadequate information. It didn't really affect tme, but they were announcing a train as being a Blue Line one, when it was actually Silver. The exact same thing happened this morning at Rosslyn, which was more irritating as I was already in a bad mood and running late due to multiple Orange Line screw-ups. To wit: 1) despite there allegedly being no track work, there was still single tracking between East Falls Church and Ballston, 2) the announcements only were addressing a different (and supposedly resolved) track issue, 3) none of this info was on the rail alerts, and 4) the two trains before mine skipped Ballston, so my train ended up with Tokyo-level crowding.

The next surge includes two weeks of no service between Rosslyn and Arlington Cemetery. They are suggesting people stay on the Orange (or Silver) Line to L'Enfant Plaza and then take the Yellow Line south. Which only adds about 35-40 minutes to the trip. There are a couple of alternatives I know of, but the most useful one is that I am actually going to have to deal with that mess for two days, due to a mixture of travel and a conference.

Kinky Boots: I went to see Kinky Boots at the Kennedy Center last night (which is why I was waiting for the metro at Foggy Bottom in the first place). Anyway, the show has a book by Harvey Fierstein and music and lyrics by Cyndi Lauper. It tells the story of a young man, Charlie Price, who inherits his family's shoe factory and decides to save the livelihoods of the long-term factory workers by entering a niche market. And what niche market is that? High heeled boots for drag queens. See, he had met Lola, whose footwear needs inspire ideas that will be just the thing for this upcoming show in Milan. Winning over the workers, who aren't necessarily comfortable with Lola, is only part of the problem. See, Charlie has to convince himself, too.

You know that everything is going to work out just fine, including Lola's father issues, Charlie's love life, and, of course, the factory. This is pretty much your average feel-good, everything works if you just accept everyone musical, with some gorgeous shoes thrown in. And I say that as a devotee of flats. The score is also fairly predictable. Lola gets some big, showy numbers, while there's a little more thoughtful material about what being a man is ("Not My Father's Son"). The music was pleasant enough for the most part (though the production numbers weren't really my style), but not really memorable.

Adam Kaplan did well as Charlie, but was (of course) overshadowed by J. Harrison Ghee as Lola. I did find myself wondering if the casting was intended to be color-blind or whether Lola being black was supposed to add even more to the whole lack of acceptance vibe. The performer I need to especially single out is Tiffany Engen as Lauren, the factory worker with a crush on Charlie. She was a phenomenal dancer and really conveyed the emotions behind her apparently hopeless feelings.

The most interesting thing about this show is that it's touring here right now, while La Cage Aux Folles is playing at Signature Theatre. Drag queens, self-acceptance, Harvey Fierstein - do I see a pattern here? And that apparent coincidence is why I found myself wondering whether Kinky Boots is anything more than a rehashing of the same old same old. It's not a bad show, but why bother when Jerry Herman's music gives you something to inflict an ear worm on yourself with? (To be fair, I've never really seen the point of drag shows and I've been accused of being the straightest person on the planet. Stilettos don't make me feel good - they make my feet hurt.)

I have other things to write about, but let me drop a quick note re: how miserable this week has been for commuting. Monday was tolerable, but the metro was running on a holiday schedule, which meant long waits at Rosslyn for connecting trains.

Tuesday, the cold weather caused a different problem. But it is best to say it in my preferred poetic form:

Cracked rail outside East
Falls Church this morning. Single
tracking. Late to work.


And, of course, I just missed my connection, so:

It is as cold at
Rosslyn station as it is
outside. Brr, brr, brr.


Was it any better going home? Well, I had an errand to run near Union Station. I got on the Yellow Line at Crystal City and then:

Someone unconscious
on train at Archives. Single
tracking, long delays.


So yesterday I had a meeting for which it made sense to drive in. (I can get to where it was by bus, but that eats up a lot of time and is only worth it if meeting is at beginning or end of the day, not in the middle.) Things were slow coming in, for no particular reason. Going home was the issue. It wasn't even snowing until I was halfway home, but it was still slow. And, once there was a bit of sticking snow, it was just a slippery, nasty crawl.

Note that we got a whopping 1.2 inches of snow and it messed things up badly enough that it took me twice as long as normal to drive home. We are expecting 24-30 inches in the storm that is going to clobber us this weekend.
I am not going more than about 200 feet from my bed.

Please, buy me a condo in Punta del Este, Uruguay?

I have too many projects, few of which I am really excited about. There is one work-related one I would be enthusiastic about, except for various things getting in the way of getting information I need for it. I'm trying to get some things informally in order to figure out what to make a formal request for, but all I've managed so far is a few rounds of telephone tag (not helped by our voice over IP phones that need to be rebooted about twice a day) and an increased level of cursing at our knowledge management system.

If I can get caught up on at least part of my to-do list this weekend and maybe make some decluttering progress, my stress level will drop a lot. But, alas, I don't see that happening.

Things have been pretty routine lately – too busy at work, but time for things like story swaps and knitting group and trying to unshovel all the clutter at my house. If I wait for something important to write about, I will never write, so …

Celebrity Death Watch: Ruth Rendell was a British mystery writer. B. B. King was one of the most famous of all blues musicians. Guy Carawan was a folk singer who popularized "We Shall Overcome" as a protest song. Happy Rockefeller was the widow of New York Governor (and later, Vice President), Nelson Rockefeller and was important largely because their relationship was considered scandalous enough to thwart his Presidential ambitions.

Should-be Celebrity Death Watch: Syd Lieberman was a fabulous teller of a wide range of stories. I think his historical stories were particularly strong. He was a kind, generous man, always encouraging to other tellers. I was privileged to have taken a workshop with him and benefit from his wisdom.

Women in Aerospace Conference: I went to the Women in Aerospace annual conference a couple of weeks ago. It was a somewhat odd mix of technical presentations (e.g. on cybersecurity) and career advice. I was going to write a bit about the career advice, but I realized most of it amounted to: 1) STEM degrees are good and 2) everyone else on the planet has read Lean In. But I did learn a couple of interesting things. To wit, only about 10,700 people have ever served in Congress. Only 313 were women, including 108 now.

I also want to pass along this wonderful explanation of my working environment. "The Pentagon is a building with 5 sides … on every issue."

Achoo!: We’ve had a particularly heavy dose of pollen over the past couple of weeks. It did not help that the lights in my ceiling fan burned out, which led me to discover that I really should have been dusting the tops of the ceiling fan blades. That added a heavy dose of dust to my already irritated lungs. And then there is a virus working its way around my office.

Let’s just say this has not been a very good week.

Used Bookstore Run: I finally made a used bookstore run last weekend. I got rid of 31 books and came home with 19 new ones. Two of those were puzzle books, however, so are transient enough to not really count. About 50 more will be going out this weekend, as I plan to stop at The Book Thing to donate them on my way to New York.

I am distracting myself because I have some tedious routine odds and ends to get done at work (e.g. reviewing yet another revision of a document and, no, I still don't believe that you don't need to do design reviews for software) and because I am still playing around with the last bit of the story I am telling tonight.


So, here are some quick thoughts on things going on in the world.

Cheers:

1. The Vote for Scottish Independence - I am undecided on the issue itself, but voting is a nice peaceful way to settle things.
   
   
2. One of John Franklin's Ships Being Found - A Canadian expedition turned up one of the ships in the Arctic. They don't know yet whether it is the Erebus or the Terror, but this is still way cool
   
   
3. Baseball - This was a bad year for my beloved Red Sox, but at least the Nationals won their division title.
   
   

Jeers:

1. Ebola Panic - The reason ebola spreads easily in Africa has to do with living conditions, e.g. lack of sanitation. I have been inside African hospitals (fortunately not as a patient) and they have shortages of things as basic as rubber gloves. There is little reason for Americans to believe we are at risk.
   
   
2. Anti-immigrant Hysteria - I continue to believe that the only restrictions we should have are to keep out actual felons. The restrictive immigration policies of the early 20th century are responsible for the murders of about 90% of my family.
   
   
3. Bad Diet Research - There were lots of reports about a recent study that concluded low carb diets are better than low fat diets. The problems with the study are numerous, however. For one thing, a 2 year study is not long term. For another, a diet that is 30% fat is not low-fat. (The low carb diet was 40 grams a day, while most guidelines for low-carb allow up to 100 grams a day.) I'm not making a statement about what is or isn't better and, in fact, I believe that the answer is different for different people. But this is just bad research.
   

I got back late Monday night. I got home later than I'd hoped, largely due to Metro. The Blue Line is barely functional at rush hour nowadays, so I am not sure why I expected it to work at 10:30 at night, but that is what comes of being an optimist.

Anyway, Hong Kong was more interesting than I expected but the weather was beastly hot and humid. The biggest down side of that is that it sapped my appetite, so I ate less dim sum than I might otherwise have done. That may not be much of a down side.

Recovering from jet lag will take several days. I am not even through half the email backlog at work.

I am also having sporadic keyboard issues with my Mac again, so that may slow down some of my catch-up here. And, yes, I know I am not even done with April.