Reclaiming Our Legacies: a progress report

    Thanks to those of you who have offered financial support for our legal challenge of the "terms of use" agreement imposed by Legacy.com, the online site that handles obituaries for the vast majority of U.S. newspapers. I will be happy to contribute the relatively modest fees needed to proceed, and we have found a lawyer who is excited to be involved. He will represent us on a pro bono basis. He retired just a few months ago from a New York firm, where his primary focus was estate law, but doing First Amendment and intellectual property law is what launched his career, and he said he is "psyched" at the prospect

Muscle Your Way Into Lifelong Brain Health

Move over, Mr. Tiny Pants!

     (5/17/12) Let's all drag out our inner Schwarzeneggers and say to ourselves, affectionately but sternly:

"I am going to pump you up!"    

     Weight training doesn't just give you a toned, shapely body. It also offers powerful protection against Alzheimer's, according to a new study.

     The recently released MRI evidence is too dazzling to ignore: Strength training vividly lights up areas of the brain responsible for problem-solving, decision-making and memory. It can can prevent or delay cognitive decline, and even reverse it. Plus: You'll feel like Wonder Woman!

NPR's purple prose shows little mettle

   Wow, NPR reporters finally did some investigative reporting this morning! They had to have someone to hold their hand, though, so the excellent ProPublica team was brought in to help uncover a TERRIBLE SCANDAL: Some soldiers who get concussions are not receiving Purple Hearts. 
   Surely NPR could have found an injustice somewhere in the world -- and probably in any American city -- that is more worthy of what little investigative energy it has.
   More than 45,000 Purple Hearts have been hauled out

Crazy Little Thing Called Love

The question is: Can a once-obscure hormone, synthesized and squirted up my nose, make me a more loving, generous and trusting person? Or will it just make me lactate? I'll keep you posted as the possibly disastrous, possibly hilarious Oxytocin Chronicles unfold.

   Several years ago, I was watching one of those wonderful "Nature" programs on PBS. This one was about elephants, which I have come to regard as some of the most poignant animals on Earth, although I have become quite emotionally attached to most animals, thanks to public broadcasting.

   An elephant was giving birth, and as the big little baby came slopping out of her massive behind, she turned her head to see what she had wrought. It was at this moment, the narrator said, that a hormone called oxytocin flooded the mother's bloodstream, and forged in her a strong maternal bond with her perky, adorably clumsy newborn. 

    That was my introduction to oxytocin. I learned that in the animal kingdom it not only instigates maternal behavior but also can create "pair bonding" among monogamous species and cooperative relationships among tribes of animals.

   What was interesting to me was that just as the narrator was describing the hormonal surge in the mother, I felt a surge in myself, and I felt that I was falling in love with the baby right along with her.

Scar Tissue

    I've always admired the actor James Earl Jones for his dignity and his deep-voiced diction, but there was something about the way he spoke that subtly distressed me. I felt an uneasiness -- which  was almost like a mild fear response -- and I couldn't figure out why.

   Then, a couple of years ago, an interviewer asked him how he had developed such a refined elocution, and he replied that he had endured a terrible stuttering problem in his youth. Even now, he added, he had to speak with care and control to avoid relapsing into his old impediment.

   It was a revelation to me to realize that I -- a former stutterer myself -- had been so attuned, subconsciously, to his ongoing anxiety and that it produced anxiety in me.

An Appointment with Disappointment

Part Three of "Impatient"

    (april 14, 2013) How do people who are really sick -- who hurt, who are weak and dizzy, who are feverish and nauseated -- manage to survive the arduous process of getting help in today's vast, dread-inducing health-care monstrosity?
      It is a test of endurance that really ought to be reserved for those of us who are flushed with robust vitality. We need to march in there, and confront a doctor, and say: This system is terminally ill!

Inside the Bubble: Breathing Room

       The past few weeks in Salt Lake City have given us by far the longest stretch of decent air quality that I can remember. I still can't have my bedroom window open at night, though -- which I have enjoyed for most of my life -- because of all the wood burning. And there are still people who insist on warming up their cars in the morning, which fills the air with toxic fumes when I'm jogging.

   But for the most part, it has been incredibly refreshing not to regard breathing out of doors to be hazardous to your health.

   Over the past many years, though, the air has been so bad so much of the time that it has had an impact on me psychologically as well as physically. It was very ominous and oppressive. I felt trapped and powerless. Ultimately, though, I found a solution.

An Eye for an Eye: Compassion in the Flesh

      In a city park somewhere, dozens of ducks float contentedly in a large pond while dozens of others roam around on the surrounding grass, taking in the sun, pecking at the dirt and occasionally squabbling. One duck is far away, waiting expectantly at the curb, her head raised in anticipation, but for what? At last he arrives, zooming up on his metallic red scooter: A nice-looking gray-haired gentleman who takes off his helmet and warmly greets his feathered friend.

      They were featured in a story on the national news last week, which showed them taking their daily, amiable walk together around the lake. She looked up a him with such affection and joy as she waddled along beside him, and when he looked down at her, it was obvious that the feelings were mutual. If any other duck, or any other person, approached, she warded them off. This was her man. It was incredibly touching.

       When a reporter asked the guy if the relationship had changed him, he promptly replied, "I don't eat poultry anymore."

Happy Sabbath: On the Religion of Running

 

     Today is a Sunday, as it was then. I was jogging through my beautiful, tree-lined old neighborhood near Liberty Park. It was a mild, fragrant spring morning with all the Disney effects: chirping birds, scampering squirrels, daffodils and violets, and a coral-colored glow in the clouds. I had been running for an hour and hadn't seen even one other person. Then, in my peripheral vision, I sensed someone across the street, on the sidewalk, going in the opposite direction. I didn't look over there, but I soon felt that what had gone past had a rather odd silhouette. I came to a full stop in the street and looked back. At the same moment, an elegant deer with a face of pure innocence stopped and looked back at me. (She must have thought that I had an odd silhouette as well.)

Dead Right

  

In some situations, suicide can be a dignified,
 rational, generous and courageous act.

    It was very sporting of the Founding Fathers to let us have the right to life and liberty, but I am claiming a human right that is just as fundamental, which is the right to die, whenever I decide I want out. I refuse to be bound by any official criteria (“terminally ill"), or to seek anyone‘s permission, or to travel halfway around the world to get it taken care of “legally.” My life is mine and only mine -- it doesn‘t belong to the state (that‘s a medieval concept that we can “live“ without). My right is not subject to the ideologies of those who regard suicide as immoral or those who believe we are obliged to bear our burdens with dignity and humility until a “natural death" comes to the rescue. Go ahead, if that’s what you’re into. But leave me -- and everyone else who disagrees with you -- out of it  What we do with our lives is none of your business.

Controversy over obituary site takes on a life of its own

 

    Since my first post on February 22, I have received 192 emails from around the country regarding the fraudulent and predatory policies of Legacy.com, the online obituary web site. I answered them for awhile, but I apologize for not being able to keep up.

    The controversy has become national thanks to Jim Romenesko, who graciously placed a link to my coverage on the widely read media site Poynter.org. 
    And it is a national issue,

Paddling pleasantly through a lame-duck life

Long-lasting relief, without quackery.

     (3/10/2015) Several years ago, a former newspaper colleague who was nearing retirement confided that he had just bought the last pair of dress shoes he would ever need.
    What did he mean by that?

    "I don't wear them very often, so they last about thirty years," he said. "I expect to be gone by then."

    This struck me as sad and scary at the time. But now that I've reached that stage of life, I'm finding that it's a relief to start winding down and closing shop. It's a lame-duck life, and it's strangely exhilarating. I feel positively presidential, freed from all those hassles that come with the desire to hold onto your position. At last, the finish line is visible! I will buy one more mattress, and I'll never have to do it again. I'll replace my 25-year old car with a newer-model used one, and that will be my last car, forever! I am enjoying this premature -- yet oddly mature -- approach to the end-of-life issue.

How Stupid Can Education Be?

 
   University tuition, we learned yesterday, is going up again because of a “tight budget,” while hundreds of millions of dollars have been allocated for fabulous, “top of the line” and “state of the art” campus buildings, some designed by "world class" architects.
    Do we in this country EVER get our priorities straight?

I know who you voted for, and I'm telling the whole world!

   Several years ago, I was doing a bit of Googling to see if I could find some long-lost friends. Many had died, including some of the most fascinating people I'd known in New York. A couple of them had gone to prison for white-collar crimes (those bad boys, but they sure took me to some fancy restaurants before they got caught). An anxiety-ridden, henpecked former city employee I worked with had become one of the wealthiest and most ruthless large-scale developers in the five boroughs (way to go, Bruce! But don't you hate being hated?).
   I found numerous fascinating stories about my old pals, heartbreaking and heartwarming ones, a couple worthy of a feature film. Even so, I have never grown completely comfortable with these idle searches, despite my benign (usually) intentions.
   What really bothered me, though, began when I searched for a delightful doctor friend, who had escorted me to the kind of parties you read about in Vanity Fair (a United Nations ball and a soiree at Gloria Vanderbilt's mansion). Having known him for many years, I had never learned -- because he probably didn't want me to -- that he is a right-wing Republican.

NEGLIGENT HOMICIDE: Doctor, please take your filthy hands off of me!

Doctors deserve the claps. Plain folks merit applause.

     (march 29, 2015) A new study of 4,000  hospital personnel at 37 hospitals found more than 14 million instances where a caregiver had contact with a patient and should have washed his or her hands and did not, according a report on NPR last week. "Thousands of patient deaths and millions of infections occur,  and tens of billions of unnecessary dollars are spent" as a result of medical personnel's failure to wash their hands, the study authors concluded.
    This is important: In a study published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, hospital workers who were not aware they were being monitored washed their hands less than 10 percent of the time. 
    If a doctor won't wash his hands between patients, he should be fired -- not seduced with the promise of free pizza if he'll change his ways. On May 28, 2013, the New York Times described the extraordinary -- and truly pathetic -- lengths to which hospitals are going in order to entice doctors, and other front-line personnel, to practice basic hygiene.
    Some hospitals are handing out gold stars (I'm serious) when medical personnel comply with this fundamental imperative (yay! back to kindergarten!), but they're awarding dining-out coupons and other prizes as well. Some turn it into a contest, with an Honor Roll, a big jackpot and a buffet dinner party.
    This got me thinking: Why should these overpaid hotshots be the only people in the workforce who are given gifts simply for doing the basics of their jobs? I propose that the dear ladies in that same hospital who diligently and thoroughly scrub toilets, cope with fecal incontinence, and clean up vomit be treated to a Hawaiian cruise.

Sweet Dreams are Made of This?

The expression "sleep on it" acquires a nightmarish new meaning.

Carcinogens, endocrine and neurological disruptors, and respiratory
irritants, enfolded in satiny luxury, as depicted on the SleepBetter.org site.

   (10/04/2014) I was very pleased to find a handsome, solid memory foam pillow on sale at an excellent price a few weeks ago. It was "Made in America," which was a nice touch. At least that's what I thought at the time.
    When I removed it from its package, I was hit upside the head with a stunningly toxic, chemical odor. Undeterred, I put three pillowcases on it, and jumped into bed.
    Even with the cool, fresh air from the swamp cooler blowing over me, the poisonous fumes were intolerable. I didn't last five minutes.
    I thought airing out the pillow for a couple of days on my balcony would probably take care of the problem. Two weeks later, the stench was as bad as ever.
    I wrote to the pillow's manufacturer, international conglomerate Carpenter Co., to lodge a complaint. What I learned within a few hours was a nightmare -- not what one might expect from a "respected innovator" in the "sleep comfort" industry.

WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOU FEEL THIS BLUE?

After 30 years of psychic pain, I embarked on a sort of "cuckoo's quest." I underwent a therapy I never dreamed I would have the courage or recklessness even to consider: shock treatments. All they did was to blow my mind, but a growing, profitable electroconvulsive-therapy industry is targeting both younger and older patients -- and claiming overwhelming success. Meanwhile, there is new evidence that it damages the brain in ways that were never anticipated. A detailed overview, both personal and journalistic, is behind the "Shock Treatments" tab above.

Obituary site's lawyers ponder a grave dilemma

   One of my darling, ever-vigilant whistle-blower elves -- this one in Illinois -- has informed me that Legacy.com has retained a high-powered Chicago law firm to determine whether its so-called user agreement will hold up in court. I say 'so-called' because the user never agrees to the "agreement," and is unaware of the rights and privileges that Legacy is claiming with respect to its stash of millions of obituaries.

Narcissistic NPR deserves its "whiny critics"

   Yesterday, Slate writer Farhad Manjoo called NPR critics "pseudo-intellectuals" and "the stodgiest, whiniest, most self-importantly insufferable snobs of all time." (that sounds like a description of NPR's top personalities to me)  
   They "see NPR as their own," he added, "a 'safe,' high-minded palace that should never be sullied by" popular culture, celebrity scandals and other lowbrow, sensationalistic ephemera.
   I agree for the most part with those whiny people.

We like big butts, and we cannot lie

"When a girl walks in with an itty-bitty waist

and a big thing in your face, you get sprung!"

Jennifer Lopez hit rock bottom, and then she rocked it some more.

    (march 3, 2015) Bounteous butts have become the cool new thing in physical attributes in the 23 years since Sir Mix-a-Lot's irresistibly funny, vulgar song -- "Baby Got Back" -- was released. It is quite a turnaround. As recently as a few years ago, a great big ass was viewed as an embarrassment, a sign of low class & laziness, a trigger for snickering and ridicule. Whole exercise programs were dedicated to flattening your posterior into a cute, modest little derriere. Today's exercise programs are devoted to building up that behind into a vast mound of fertile sexuality. If you don't want to work out, just get butt implants, or buy undergarments with soft, proudly protruding, built-in buttocks. There are even "magic creams" that do the job.
    It seems that J Lo started this mass stampede toward robust rumps, although they have been highly prized in the black community pretty much forever.
    J Lo was getting so much attention for her bum that Beyonce recently got jealous and had some nice blossomy implants inserted. That pissed off J Lo, who promptly got even bigger ones for herself.
    And thus began the "arms race" for butts. To what lengths will people go? I guess I shouldn't even use the word "length." That's a whole different subject, and one of my least-favorite.

Good Heavens! Media One gives obituaries "eternal life"

Media One CEO Brent Low called Tuesday to say he had exceeded his own original intentions by extending the longtime 30-day limit for free online access to obituaries that have appeared in the two Salt Lake City dailies. "Forever" is the new limit. He had stated on Monday that he would immediately change the allotted time to one year as an initial step in reforming obit policy, but he decided not to bother with incremental change, and to go all the way right now. I expressed my support, but reminded him that the more serious issue is Legacy.com's unconscionable and illegal commandeering

2013 Resolutions: Running Out of Excuses

    (1/1/13) You can always find excuses not to go jogging. At the moment, my cat is dying. My herniated discs are inflamed. I have lots of housecleaning and kitchen work to do. I have a writing deadline looming. The temperature outside is in the single digits, and air quality is poor. I just had surgery, for pete's sake! It would be stupid to exercise.
    Anyway, who cares? Pretty much everyone else is still in bed. When they do get up, they'll be cramming themselves with sausage, pancakes with syrup, and fried eggs. Sure, it's nice to be healthy and slender, but is it worth the effort? Why pressure yourself? Why not just be a regular person, and purge yourself of those wild and crazy jogging fantasies?
    Now is a good time to kick the excuses out of your head, and hit the road. You may soon regard it as the most profound resolution you ever made.

"Tear Down This Wall," Media One tells obituary site

Brent Low, CEO of Media One Utah, has vowed to force Legacy.com to remove the paywall it has erected on its obituary site, and "if they don't, we'll find another vendor." As my earlier post noted, Legacy.com -- which gets 7 million hits per month -- not only charges for access after an initial 30-day period. It also claims comprehensive rights and privileges with respect to the obituaries themselves "in perpetuity."

My Daddy Died, I Cried and Cried

    Please say it isn't lupus. Couldn't it just be a side-effect

of sobbing, or an overdose of collard greens? Will I look like a

this forever? The saga of so-called modern medicine is contained in the Lupus tab at the top of this page. It is a melodrama filled with colorful characters, like in "The Bonfire of the Vanities," except without the bonfire.

The case of the shrinking toilet paper: Let's get to the bottom of it

This post also includes a colorful look at how other cultures and

 other eras have avoided tree slaughter and still maintained excellent hygiene.

The Rorschach ink-butt test

    Over the past several years, our noble capitalist system has been downsizing everything in the grocery store while upsizing the prices. This they generally do in a deliberately deceptive way, keeping the packaging size the same, but cutting back on the amount of product.

    For some reason (I guess Freud would know), the thing that really kicked me in the behind was the toilet paper. I recently bought a couple of 36-roll packs at a case-lot sale, and when I took out a few rolls to put in the bathroom cabinet, I was stunned. They were about 20 percent smaller and cost 20 percent more than the last ones I bought, several of which were still in there. What makes this especially shitty is that the industry is already "flush" with profits.  

Obama's targeting YOU, Edward Jones

    (Feb. 23, 2015)  President Obana is unveiling a plan to impose a standard known as a fiduciary duty on financial-services brokers, which will crack down on “backdoor payments and hidden fees,” according to a fact sheet issued by the White House.
    That's bad news for Edward Jones, which has infamously made its fortune by steering clueless investors into its "preferred family" of high-fee mutual funds. Those funds return the favor by paying Edward Jones tens of millions of dollars in kickbacks. It has been sued and fined repeatedly for defrauding its customers, but the pain hasn't been sufficient for it to change its devious ways.
    Obama's plan would require brokers to act in a customer’s best interest, a change that could limit the earnings of financial advisers in the handling of Americans’ $11 trillion of retirement savings, according to Bloomberg News.
    It's called "fiduciary duty," which seems like an obvious foundation for a financial adviser, but Edward Jones has always run like hell from this concept. The firm would lose a big chunk of its fat profits, but investors would finally (theoretically) be getting valid, unbiased advice.

Silken deception: No pumpkin, no spice

'Raise a glass to a wholesome, healthy
holiday with delectable seasonal
flavors from Silk. Silk Pumpkin Spice
is delicious chilled or warm.

• Dairy-free
• Lactose-free
• Cholesterol-free
• Worry-free'

Memo to Mama: You need to read the label, even if it's a "health food." The ingredients in this product are soy milk, cane juice, flavorings and a thickener. No pumpkin, no spice -- and none of the color, flavor or nutritional benefits you understandably expected.  I've written to the manufacturer, White Wave, but they don't seem to care.

Rancor over Ratings

   For three months, area media were inundated with ads proclaiming that the University of Utah Medical Center had been named best academic medical center in the nation by the University HealthSystem Consortium. The rousing news that the U. had “catapulted” over 49 previously higher-ranked institutions and was now superior “even to the prestigious Mayo Clinic and Johns Hopkins Medical Center” was puzzling, to say the least, although both Salt Lake newspapers reported this very questionable news unquestioningly.
   One clue that should have aroused a bit of investigative fervor (does that exist anymore?) is the fact that the U. med center is not included AT ALL in any of the several established rankings of best hospitals -- it's not even in the top 100. So how did it capture the Consortium's heart?
   And what is the Consortium, anyway? From whence did this rather ominously named beast emerge? It is a tale involving "complex algorithms," lots of tentacles, "suites" for the suite, billions of dollars, federal investigations, “The Threat of Incrementalism,” and a telling code of silence. Just click on the Consortium tab above and prepare to be flabbergasted. 

An Afternoon With the Ladies

They were true gentlemen.

     (4/23/12) Have you ever had a chivalrous young inmate in a crisp waiter's uniform slip you a lavender-blue note, along with your fruit plate, as you dined with the prison's top "brass"? Rikers Island's House of Detention for Men was always a hotbed of intrigue, especially since my job there was essentially to spy on the administration and advocate for prisoners, but this mysterious missive suggested that a new adventure was about to fall into my lap.

Edward Jones saga

    My 5-part investigative series on financial services firm Edward Jones can be found behind the tab at the top of the page: http://kronstantinople.blogspot.com/p/edward-jones-saga.html.

Obituary web site buries your loved one a second time

   My father died on May 10, 2010. A couple of days later I submitted his obituary and paid over $800 for it to be published for one day in the Salt Lake Tribune, and to be posted on the Legacy.com web site.
    I was shocked and hurt several weeks later, when I went to "visit" my dad, to see that Legacy had shunted the obit behind a paywall. I was only permitted to see his picture and read the first two lines of a long obituary unless I paid Legacy for the privilege of having access to my own writing and my own father.

I'm not happy, but I'm gay, Putin will reveal at Olympics closing ceremony

The Russian president enjoys reeling 'em in.

    (Feb. 20. 2014) Sources characterized as "intimates" of Russian President Vladimir Putin have notified Kronstantinople that he will disclose his homosexuality in a "personal but not overly emotional fashion" during closing ceremonies for the Sochi Winter Olympic Games on Sunday.

A Half-Hearted Valentine to the Chauvinist Pigs of the Past

Why I (finally) stopped manipulating men

    (2/14/12) What I remember most about my Valentine's dinner with The Colonel, at New York's venerable Luchow's Restaurant, is not that he ordered my six-course dinner for me, without seeking my permission or knowing anything about my preferences. It is that I was strangely, startlingly thrilled. How outrageous of him! How condescending! He took charge, just like that! It was done in a debonair, understated fashion.  The rush of pleasure I experienced was very confusing.

Thrift Shop: It's not just a song -- it's a multinational scandal

SAVERS STORES: Tricking donors, treating themselves, screwing charities

Cloaked in fuzzy deception, and leaping all the way to the bank, the multimillion-dollar
Savers operation claims to benefit Big Brothers. It does: with a $1,500 donation.

   (7/4/14)

     PRELUDE: When you telephone any of the eight vast, bustling Savers stores in Utah, the phone is answered with a cheery, "Savers Thrift Stores: Supporting our local Big Brothers/Big Sisters!"
    Being a cynic is a tough job, but somebody's got to do it. Otherwise, we'd never find out the truth about anything. 
    I have learned that of the millions of dollars these eight stores take in each year, ONLY $1,000 TO $1,500 GOES TO THE HIGHLY REGARDED CHARITY. THE REST IS PROFIT.  Savers is at the bottom of Big Brothers' long list of donors on its web site, many of which gave more than $20,000.
    Big Brothers/Big Sisters (and various other charities in other states) allow themselves to be used as lures to attract hundreds of millions of dollars in donations in exchange for a shockingly paltry return.
    I was skeptical the moment I heard a public service announcement in early 2014 about the new Savers thrift shop in our area, which described itself as a "compassionate" operation, "dedicated to helping one of the most deserving charities in the state."
    "Go shopping, and help underprivileged children at the same time!" a radio ad said enticingly.
    "Give your gently used items to Savers and help those in desperate need," another commercial implored. 
    "Proceeds go to Big Brothers Big Sisters!" a jaunty TV commercial claimed, tugging at those proverbial heartstrings. What a wonderful rationale for a buying spree!
    But it is pure hype, and blatantly misleading.
    My first question was: Is Savers itself a nonprofit? The answer is NO. It is "a U.S.-based multinational profit-making conglomerate" with more than 350 stores in three countries.
     My second question was: How much of its $1.5 billion annual net goes to the charities it claims to benefit? The answer is: None of your business.  Savers has always refused to  disclose its outlays to the nonprofits whose names it uses to attract both donors and shoppers (and the charities flatly refuse to discuss the matter as well). I found estimates ranging from one percent to 10 percent. Savers earns more in one year than it donates every 10 years, according to documents regarding its second recapitalization.
 

Move over, Doritos. E-cigarette enters Super Bowl ad frenzy

Looks like a mighty fine smoke to me, you electronic Marlboro Man.

     (2/1/2014) NJOY, one of the most successful e-cigarette marketers, is broadcasting a controversial ad during Super Bowl tomorrow. For some reason, it's only being shown in in Miami, Denver, San Antonio, and Nashville, but you can check it out here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tH0KW37bfDk.

    It's nothing like the sexy and luxurious promotional materials we've seen to date, particularly in print. It's wacky and high-spirited, waiting until the end to raise the issue of smoking. When it does, it portrays NJOYs as something you should urge your friends to try, as a much safer option than tobacco.
    NJOYs aren't designed to be cute, hip high-tech fashion accessories or inhalable, calorie-free candy. Plain and menthol are your only choices. The packaging is generic. The aim is not to be enticing.
    "We’re committed to ending this health epidemic by getting people to no longer need cigarettes. Our mission is to make tobacco cigarettes obsolete," says CEO Craig Weiss
    But some  are fuming at the return of smoking ads to TV, whether tobacco combustion is involved or not.

E-cigarette safety: A particle of doubt leaves us in a fragrant vapor of confusion

Now you can "pimp your vape" to create cooler flavors and a cloudier cloud!

Buy a special e-cig for every outfit and mood, in yummy lollipop flavors!

    (UPDATE: Dec. 20, 2013) In "The E-Cigarette Seduction -- Are We Blowing It?" (http://kronstantinople.blogspot.com/2013/08/the-e-cigarette-seduction-are-we.html), I described this exuberant, colorful, delicious and diabolical new industry.
    In some respects, it has displayed entrepreneurialism at its best: A scramble of creative fervor, technological innovation and marketing genius.
    I expressed my concern, as have many in the public-health sector, about the possible downside of these yummy products, and urged rigorous study.
    Now I have found distressing new research that says e-cigarettes may expose smokers and those around them to PARTICULATE POLLUTION, possibly containing heavy metals. Please be wrong, you guys!

How I "made up" the Biggest Lie of my life...

(...and then finally did an About Face)

    (December 2013) A friend who's known me for many years recently threw out this casual remark: "You used to be so pretty, Sylvia. I mean, you were really stunning."
    He didn't hurt my feelings. Actually, I laughed. I was never beautiful, or even cute. I aggressively, desperately, painstakingly camouflaged my natural homeliness with makeup. Ha, ha, Fred: I fooled you!
    Beginning in my mid-teens, and continuing through my mid-40s, I embraced a career as a fine artist. Each morning, I approached the bland, blank, quite icky canvas of my face, and painted upon it the most striking portrait I could muster. From sun-up to sundown, I was in "full regalia," forging through life disguised as good-looking girl. My time-consuming labors served me very well. I got pretty much everything I wanted.

Roubidoux is a basket case

So we were made for each other. We're also inveterate poseurs, but he's better at it.

Elderly Girl Helps Win the Civil War, and then Conquers 1890s Paris

    (1/19/14) After chopping off her fabulous hair, binding her bounteous breasts, and gluing a mustache above her oh-so-kissable lips, Elderly Girl distinguished herself as a Union soldier during the Civil War. Her fellow troops were so drawn to her heavenly essence, that they theorized they must have been "turned gay" by the stresses of mass slaughter, and they pursued her relentlessly, even during the Battle of Bunker Hill. What a disgrace! While fighting off her own comrades, she avoided killing the enemy by dazzling them into helplessly shooting themselves. She then went South to help with Reconstruction, and was such an adorably tireless advocate, she was named an "honorary Negro," which was the greatest distinction of her life. The rednecks down there leered at her as if she were a meaty ham hock, and smacked their lips as she walked past.
    Exhausted  by the wanton callousness of American men, she boarded a ship to Paris, hoping to discover a whole new world of civility and provocative ideas. Oh dear, that poor girl. It was more of the same:

    All those Romeos called her "Juliette" as a nod to her Shakespearean grandeur, but she really was the same exact Elderly Girl to whom we still look for advice on beauty, fitness,  interior design, conversational brilliance, lying with conviction, mindful eating and sanitary protection. It's a dirty world, ladies. Beware.

The golden gaze: My kitty's final premonition

Catalina, 1994-2013

    (Jan 16, 2013) For nearly 20 years, my cat and I had a complex, rewarding bond. During the first few years, I was puzzled when she persistently refused to have eye contact with me. Then I read that this is an instinctive behavior: Cats avert their eyes to avoid conflict. In the feline world, eye contact indicates aggression.

    But about 10 weeks ago, Catalina began turning her head toward mine -- as she sat on my lap in the evenings -- and looking directly and deeply into my eyes. I held her gaze, like a nursing mother. It was exhilarating. There was a yearning in her amber stare, something profound. I felt as if she were trying to tell me something, or trying to memorize my face.

    "Either my cat is going to die soon, or I am," I told Joe. He has learned to ignore my melodramatic perspective. I have learned not to ignore my cat's mysterious wisdom.

2B or not to be: An apartment mirrors an existential dilemma

    In the middle of my decade in New York, I lived in apartment 2B of the William and Clara Baumgarten House, at 294 Riverside Drive. I was told several times that this small mansion was originally built for the mistress of a famous tycoon in 1915. My balcony is on the right. I often sat outside in my midnight blue Jean Harlow-style lounge pajamas, drinking coffee, or something more helpful. 

    I loved living there, despite the loud, drunk, sex-screamy neighbors (on both sides of me), the roaches everywhere (laying eggs in one’s underpants…doesn’t that sound like something Kafka would think up?) and the rotting, tiny bathroom and kitchen. I had so many friends, I sometimes forgot how profoundly lonely I was.

FTC action proves yet again that Oz's ethics and expertise need to gain weight

Sorry ladies: Acai is no weight-loss miracle. Oz misoverestimated it.

    (Jan. 8, 2014) Four companies that sell weight-loss products, three of which have been promoted by "The Dr. Oz Show," have been charged with deceptive marketing practices and fined $34 million, according to an article in yesterday's New York Times.
    This is really quite an anticlimax. Anyone who follows Oz, and who has half a brain, realizes that MOST of the "astonishing," "miraculous," "surefire," and "life-changing" strategies he proposes for weight loss, wrinkle prevention, and a mind-numbing list of other health concerns, are simply bogus. He must have hired "Daily Show"-wannabe interns who simply make most of it up, laughing hysterically as they do so.
    The FDA repudiated claims by the HCG diet, Sensa, and LeanSpa (which peddles acai extract), and vowed to crack down on an industry that is rife with unsubstantiated claims, adulterated products and deception.

I don't "kneed," you Dr. Orthopedic Surgeon. Get Bent!

WHAT A FEELING! Being cut open for your doctor's fun and profit!

     (Jan. 6, 2014) Months after I had expensive and ineffective knee surgery a year ago, I just happened to come across several old and new studies that concluded the procedure is "useless." Naturally, I was pissed.
    Now, the most credible clinical trial to date has determined that meniscus surgery -- the most common orthopedic procedure in the U.S., performed about 700,000 times a year at an estimated cost of $4 billion -- works no better than totally "fake" operations. Thanks a lot, Dr. Lancome, you fancy-pants impostor!

Does 2014 Make You Look Fat?

HAPPY 'YOU' YEAR 2014

Ignore negativity, and reject the pressure to conform.

    Let's begin with the premise that all body types have their own special attractiveness, and that each is potentially healthy. We've got to stop trying to jam ourselves into shapes that are not in our genes. But let's face it: Most of us are far from optimally healthy. This year, maybe your resolution to shape up will stick!

    Every year about this time, my previous posts on exercise, weight-training and health in general go viral for a few weeks. Then, interest dies down, and I guess people go back to their cheese-pizza, couch-potato, "fat-pants" lifestyles. I fear that most of us don't really give the idea of "a new Me" a chance. We hurl all our fantasies about a fit body and wholesome lifestyle out the window, and say, "Maybe next year."
    I wish I could convey to you how rewarding this process can be. If you regard it as a huge, exhausting, multifaceted overhaul, of course you'll retreat back into your cozy status quo. But if you begin every day to make lovely new choices from one moment to the next, you will sense the benefits immediately. Eat a banana, walk around the block, do some light stretching while you're watching TV. Pleasure will befall you.

My Fairy Princess Decree: $100,000 a year (at least) for every working adult

Let's end income inequality by equalizing incomes. Is that so complicated? .

     (Jan. 2, 2014) I have just now been informed that I am have been named the first Fairy Princess of 2014. I have 24 hours to announce my decree. Thanks guys -- a little bit of advance warning would have been thoughtful.
    But I'm ready for you, which you probably hoped I wouldn't be. I don't even need time to prepare:
    I decree that everyone who has a job -- and who does that job with energy, competence, good nature, enterprise and reliability -- be paid $100,000 a year. I don't care if you're an investment banker or a convenience-store clerk, a lawyer or a ditch-digger, a supermodel or a custodian, a bus driver or an advertising executive.
    Everyone deserves a GOOD DAY'S PAY for a good day's work. This is so elementary, my dear Watsons. There should be no such thing as the working poor -- why do we  need to keep saying that? I want everyone to have a HOME, plenty of wholesome food, decent clothes, and a chance to provide opportunities for their children.

Lupus update: It flared, I glared, and it slunk away

Oh no -- not again.

    (Jan 2, 2015) In 2010, I developed a florid, oozing red rash under my eyes while my dad lay dying in the hospital. I thought it was because I was crying so much, but it turned out to be the outward manifestation of a form of Systemic Lupus Erythematosus, and it remained -- swollen and crusty and itchy, burning, and crawling -- for nine months. With great care and determination, I have kept this unsightly and uncomfortable symptom at bay all these years. Recently, it flared back, as I cope with my mother's terrible decline.
    I just couldn't handle this, on top of everything else, including a hateful legal battle over my mother's care and finances. I used my "what would Cleopatra do?" approach to medicine, and I forced the fucker back into its hole

Unwrapping a Psyche on a Dark and Stormy Christmas Eve

               

Happy Holidays! Or something! 
               art by Justinian Ghita
                             

    (Dec. 25, 2012) Nathan knew that the "yuletide season" was of no interest to me, so he asked if I'd be willing to come in and work with him on Christmas Eve Day. Everyone else had a four-day weekend, and we needed to do a final edit on a presentation for a prospective client.
    I was delighted to oblige. He was the creative vice president of one of the country's top advertising agencies, and I wanted to know him better. In the month that I had worked there, he had stood out as a particularly gentle, respectful and humble man, even though it was his job to keep 200 employees -- many of them neurotic and ruthlessly competitive, as well as creative -- devising one stylish ad campaign after another. He was the great soother and smoother. I would never have guessed that he saw himself as Steppenwolf: "My face was gray, forsaken of all fancies, wearied by all vice, horribly pale."

The Ravaged Face of Delirium

Before delirium: a face of radiance, serenity and beauty.
(photo courtesy of Gina Kronstadt).

Even after four days of treatment, she remained tortured.

    (Dec/ 25. 2014) Delirium, if it's not happening to you or someone you love, is a fascinating phenomenon. It reminds me of "The Exorcist," in which the patient becomes taken over by a deranged and ominous being. My mother screamed, moaned, hallucinated, writhed, and spoke in tongues when she had delirium last month. Delirium increases mortality (about 35 to 40  percent of hospitalized patients with delirium die within 1 year), and expedites the process of dementia. It can take months to recover.
    My father had delirium twice  when he had dementia. We didn't dream that some mad thunderbolt could pierce his brain and propel him into a fury of storytelling, urgent confessions, scientific theorizing, twisted reminiscence and vivid hallucinations. If you live to be over 65, it is very likely to happen to you, whether you have dementia or not. 

'Enthralling' blogger unlinks herself from a 'Chain of Fools'

"You treated me mean: Oh, you treated me cruel!" Aretha Franklin

   (dec 24, 2012) My five-part, 25,000-word series on financial firm Edward Jones, which was originally published by the popular Motley Fool investment-media empire, disappeared from their site a few weeks after it was syndicated and warmly received late last summer. Various aggregator sites and message boards still provide links to my stories, but "page not found" is all you'll see if you click on any of them. 
    No, it's not because of threats from Edward Jones, I assure those who have emailed me about this strange demise. And it's not because my work was found to be biased or unreliable, although it's clear that many people are getting that impression. 
    It's because Fool editors felt rebuffed when I declined their offer to work with them on a repackaging project  that would give my "riveting and insightful" series "the broader visibility it deserves."

I'll be "Home Alone" for Christmas

Macaulay Culkin was freaked out at first. Then he had a blast.

    (dec 24,2014) I'll be home for Christmas, but it will be my  home, alone, without all the uproar of frantic cooking, shopping, gift-wrapping, Happy Holidays card-sending, and forced festivity that virtually always amounts to a big-bummer-anticlimax, and a huge mess to clean up. Plus all those leftovers. And the gifts that I didn't want, and the ones I bought that they don't want, and all those false "Just what I wanted!" exclamations.

    I am usually home alone, but it's even nicer on Christmas, when everyone else is rushing around, worried about blizzards, about familial blowups, about the turkey still being raw inside, about gaining weight, about the pressure of spending too much or too little. Credit-card debt and stress galore.. The stack of stuff that needs to be returned or exchanged. That empty feeling, and maybe even some hurt feelings, and that little dread feeling when you start counting down the days until the next Yuletide extravaganza."The most wonderful time of the year" it's not, in my opinion.

    So when I'm home alone during all of this madness, I have an enhanced feeling of pleasant detachment. My solitude seems especially precious. I'm a Christmas renunciant. I object, your honor! I'm an escapee, hiding out and feeling totally cozy. I don't have to exclaim anything, or respond to small-talk exclamations ("You look younger every year! I heard you were named Miss Blogger Universe -- what a cool compliment!) or explain for the umpteenth time why I'm eating nothing but vegetables. And no one can lure me from my fortress, not even a SWAT team dressed like Santa and his elves.

I am not a crook. Almost always never.

    
    (6/23/11) I had just arrived in Denver last night from New York, hoping to start a wholesome new life away from all those Big City temptations and pressures -- and there I was at seven o’clock the next morning, already drunk on tequila.

    What’s funny about it is that I was hunkered down in my bedroom's huge walk-in closet,  because “The Heart of Denver Home for Christian Girls,” where I had rented a room until I could find an apartment, harshly forbade smoking, drinking and rock 'n roll (in other words: everything I held dear).

    The more I drank, the more hilarious this "Bible-centered" incarceration became. But there was a dread thing happening in my stomach at the same time.  I had vowed that when I left the career and friends I loved so much, I would get myself together, and rescue my imploding psyche. Already I seemed to be screwing up.

    Even so, I never would have predicted that by noon, I would be in jail.

My Vitamin Addiction, a Delightful Affliction

    Part Two of "My beautiful so-called eating disorder"

    (12/18/2014) It started when I moved to New York during what has since been deemed the dirtiest and most crime-ridden decade of the century. I loved it anyway, but I couldn't quite get used to the fact that every surface one touched was sticky: subway straps, elevator buttons, pay phones, doorknobs, even faucets in the restrooms. Having grown up in a home where everything was disinfected CONSTANTLY with Lysol and Clorox, this was hard to tolerate. My feelings of joy at being in this grand city were punctuated by shudders of revulsion (and this was long before various TV investigations informed us that practically every surface around us is covered with fecal matter and seminal fluid).
    I launched my career of pill-taking innocently enough, ingesting a Vitamin C tablet several times a day to ward off the germs. Then I read that zinc boosts immunity and is good for your skin, so I added that. Then I read that Vitamin E maintained heart health, so I thought "why not?"
    And thus it began.

Consorting with the Consortium

After it ranked University of Utah Health Care  No. 1 in the nation, could anyone, 
anywhere, take its program seriously?

The U. essentially reverse-engineered the super-secret Consortium algorithm, so it could focus on those criteria that were going to be measured. It was a brilliant strategy, but ethically dubious, and UHC abandoned its ranking program when this article revealed the flaw in its system.

   
Instead of conducting its own assessments, UHC began making use of established ranking programs, such as U.S. News and World Report and the Thompson-Reuters survey. Now it has developed a "Quality and Accountability Study" that uses "scorecards" "to provide comparative ranking information for academic medical centers in each of six domain areas, an overall star rating, and a listing of the top performing organizations in rank order." 

In July 2014, the University of Utah was ranked 35th in primary care and 52nd in research by U.S. News and World Report.  It did not appear in the lists of top 10 medical school programs in primary care, internal medicine or pediatrics. As one might expect, the school did not publicize these data, unlike its exuberant advertising in 2011.

 

UHC is representative of the very tiresome Brave New Breed of web-based consulting firms that revels in massive quantification and dazzling jargon. These outfits, gain clients by using a sort of stun-gun approach. They portray their data-driven services in such overwhelmingly glorious, domineering, all-encompassing terms that one doesn't dare proceed in today's cutthroat world without their assistance. The Consortium promises to provide “interoperable workflow solutions“ in its “robust array of resources and tools.” Everything, it seems, is part of a “suite” that is comprehensive, exclusive, benchmarked, trademarked, high-impact and integrated. It promises a  sheen of order, ease and rationality to institutions that are “at the crest of the wave,” facing “The Threat of Incrementalism.”

Online Obituary Site is Doing it to Death

He calls it capitalism. I call it identity theft.

      If one of your loved ones were to die, would you mind if an aggressive, profit-making corporation created an online obituary page for that person -- without your knowledge or consent -- which was designed to increase traffic to its site? Would it bother you that relatives and friends, who encountered  the listing in search results, would be asked to upgrade the page (for a fee, and after providing their email addresses) with memories, photos and condolences, by making an audio tribute, or by lighting a virtual candle?  Would it offend you if this site asked them, for its own financial gain, to send you food and flowers, mementos or e-cards, or to make a donation or plant a tree in your loved one's name? Does this feel a bit like grave-robbing to anyone besides me?
    Tributes.com, which "harvests" death notices from the Social Security Death Index, claims to have a listing for everyone who has died since 1936.

RESISTANCE IS FUTILE: The political, economic, ethical, environmental, educational, social and psychological collapse of "The Greatest Nation in the History of the World" -- which was really a ruthless, hypocritical, paranoid, power-mad criminal enterprise -- is near completion. Protesters will be shot.