Sigh

So, here's today's XKCD.

Now, I don't really have (that much) of a problem if people just outright disagree with Ayn Rand.  But misinterpretation on this scale gets pretty annoying.  Or, worse, if it's not actually misinterpretation, and people somehow believe that letting people bear the consequences for their actions equates with "be a huge asshole".

Since the general consequences of being a "huge asshole" to people are that you wind up bitter and alone, I'd have to say that the philosophical recommendation of Objectivism (inasmuch as there is one) would be "don't be a huge asshole".  Why do people think that it's in your self-interest to be a hateful jerk?  It's so much easier to get people to do what you need when they have a reason to give a damn about what happens to you.  Heck, if you're enough of a jerk, people may not even be willing to help you out when it's otherwise in their own personal, immediate interests, because they'd rather suffer a little than tolerate you.

This doesn't mean you should go around handing out bits of your life and soul door-to-door, desperately trying to buy the affections of people who mean nothing to you.  It CERTAINLY doesn't mean that you should do this to try and buy the affections of people who are actively out to harm you.

If that's being an asshole, so  be it.

What I'm On

So, I've been taking a lot of pills lately.


With breakfast I take:
1 Multivitamin
3 Vitamin D
1 Probiotic

And at bedtime I take
2 Melatonin

I've only just started taking the probiotic and the melatonin.  I think my gastric flora (or fauna?  Are bacteria plants or animals?  Wait, they're neither.  Hmmmmmmmmm.) have been a bit messed up and starting to recover, and I think taking the probiotic will help speed this process.  In any case, I plan to only take it a until I run out of what I bought.  It doesn't make sense to me that probiotics would be something you should take forever.  To refresh your gut, yeah.  But if your internal environment is in such condition that you can't support the bugs after reintroducing them, I suspect you need to change something ELSE instead.

The melatonin is an experiment to see if it can help me sleep better.  I sleep a LOT (like 12 hours a day, consistently), and I've always had problems falling asleep and then later, waking up.   I'm not insomniac, exactly (once I am asleep, I STAY THAT WAY), it's just that my body seems to have a hard time switching between "I'm tired" and "I'm awake now", and vice versa.

Some of this I suspect is related to body temperature regulation.  If I take a hot shower either first thing in the morning or last thing at night, it kicks me over into either "I'm awake" or "Sleepy now".  Eating first thing in the morning actually seems to make me MORE sleepy, although I do feel better later in the day if I have some kind of breakfast.  Plus I need breakfast so I can take my pills.  Long experience has shown me that if I take pills without food, I feel ill.

I'll try to report later on whether the melatonin seems to be having any kind of effect.  Thus far it seems to have helped me reset my sleep cycle so I'm going to bed at a reasonable-ish time (1 am) and waking up at a reasonable-ish time, (9 am) but it's too early to tell.

50 lbs!

So, I've lost 50 lbs. Not bad, although considering I started this, what, sometime last June, it's not exactly stellar weight loss, like 5 lbs a month. I've fallen off the diet a couple of times (for a day or two), so it might have been better. But my clothes are all quite loose now, and I'm about a quarter of the way to my goal weight. That's a substantial percentage.

Now to keep on keepin' on.

Awesome

I just ran across this announcement from Wikipedia. Bravo, guys. The fact that SOPA is horrible, horrible legislation cannot be stated often enough.

Say Something

I ran across a couple of things today that just made me want to say something about Iran in particular and Islam in general. Or maybe Islam isn't general enough, maybe it's just stupid, vile, barbaric, monstrous evil. Yeah, that sounds about right.

Anyway, the first thing I ran across was this news item, courtesy of the Escapist. I know it's really nothing to be surprised about. It's par for the course, about what you'd expect of that violence-and-hatred-spewing pit people refer to as Iran. Nevertheless, I was genuinely shocked and sickened when I read about Amir Mizra Hekmati, former U.S. Marine, being sentenced to death for developing video games. Oh, the White House is calling for his release. Isn't that nice. Is it too much to hope that they'll take some real action that cannot be ignored and has a chance of producing some results? Probably.

The second thing was this blog entry from Diana Hsieh. These are pretty much the sentiments I've expressed before. If you self-identify with barbarians, don't be surprised if people treat you like one. It's part of the reason why I've become increasingly reluctant to self-identify as an Objectivist over the years. It's not that I disagree with Objectivism, far from it. In fact, the older I get and the more I learn, the more solidly Objectivist I am. Do I agree with every word Ayn Rand ever wrote? No. I'm not sure its actually possible to BE an Objectivist AND agree with EVERYTHING Ayn Rand ever wrote. I think she might even agree with me on that point. However, my real problem is that I vehemently disagree with many of the whackjobs out there who go around claiming to be Objectivists. Some of these people make me, quite literally, sick to my stomach, and since they are universally loud and obnoxious, people often have a greater awareness of them than of real Objectivists or of the philosophy itself.

The only reason I self-identify as an Objectivist at all is because people ask presumptuous questions they don't really want answers to, usually because they will also fire off complex philosophical statements as if they were self-evident facts, expecting the company to agree with them. I'm sorry, but I'm not willing to just let that sort of thing pass. Just letting it pass is how you eventually end up with Iran. Far better to speak up when the worst thing that will happen to you is that someone you likely despise anyway will get huffy or call you names. If you wait until they have weapons and a following and feel free to use them, it's too late. Maybe not too late in some cosmic sense--even the worst, biggest, most oppressive barbarian regime can be overthrown. But it WILL be too late for all the hundreds, thousands, millions of people who will suffer and die before that gets done. Anyway, identifying as an Objectivist is my way of giving a concise answer when people ask questions like "so what do you believe?" and immediately stop paying attention. They don't care to hear the full answer, the reasons for the answer.

I don't often speak up any more. I more or less avoid forums where speaking might be required, partly because I'm only now starting to realize just how sick I've been over the past couple of years. I don't mean sick of talking. I mean sick, physically ill. Now, due to radical changes in my diet, I'm starting to get better. So, I'm saying something. Maybe more later.

Steve Jobs, RIP

I was shocked when I saw the news about the death of Steve Jobs. My iPod is one of my most beloved possessions. Even though it's a simple thing, it has changed my life for the better.

So, I'd just like to take this moment to say thank you to Mr. Jobs for all his hard work. I hope it made him as happy as it made me, only, you know, about a million times magnified.

13 Lbs.

So, from my earlier total of 379 lbs, today I'm down to 366. No kidding. Not exactly the speediest weight loss ever, but not bad, either. I'm not hungry, but I wouldn't say I have tons of energy--I've been sleeping a lot the past few days. A LOT. 12-14 hours a day. I've tried getting up after 8 or 10 hours, but I'm tired and cranky and I feel stressed for the entire rest of the day.

I think what's causing it is that over the past few days I've been getting most of my calories from protein (specifically, meat) instead of fat. On the days when I eat more fat and less protein, I have better energy. So today I'm not having any meat. For breakfast I had a big mug of tea and cream. I've kind of skipped lunch since I slept until 2, and for dinner I'm having avocado salad with almonds and some provolone slices. It was originally going to be guacamole, but I put the tomatoes in before I mushed the avocado (I wasn't paying attention) so I just mixed it around a bit instead of smashing it into goo. It still tastes good. I also discovered, rather amusingly, that I had 3 containers half-full of sour cream in the fridge. If I only use half the container, it doesn't register on me, so I just buy a new container instead of using what I already have. I prefer making my guacamole with sour cream instead of cream cheese. I like the texture and the more acid flavor better. I'm sure most people don't make it with either, but eh, whatever, bite me. This is how I make it.

My no-soap (well, sort of) project is going really well. I don't use any soap or body wash on my skin at all. The only thing I use is some Tom's Natural Deodorant (it's not an antiperspirant, just a deodorant), which works quite well and doesn't irritate my skin (much), so my pits look more like skin and less like the surface of the moon. It doesn't last as long as an antiperspirant, but it works well enough. (Yeah, I'm sure everybody wants to hear all about my pits. Whatever. Bite me.) The skin on my face (er, and my butt, but I won't go into that) is where I've seen the biggest difference--it feels MUCH softer and I have no need for moisturizer. If I take a hot shower, it'll still feel a bit dry/tight immediately afterward, but it goes away very quickly. I also don't seem to need to exfoliate--except on my feet, but that's more of a result of my refusal to wear shoes unless I absolutely have to. If my skin feels a little dry, I'll use some olive oil in the shower and it goes right away.

My hair was giving me grief for the longest time, though, as I could NOT get it to stop feeling greasy, which was sad because it was lovely and glossy and healthy, you just couldn't touch it because it was nasty-feeling. However, I've started using Kirk's Castille Soap on it every 3-4 days, and the greasy feeling is gone, while still leaving all the nice benefits of no shampoo. I have no need to use conditioner, my scalp doesn't itch, it's all good. The funny part is that I've found if I soap my ears really well my hair takes longer to start feeling greasy again. Apparently my *ears* produce massive amounts of oil, enough that removing it with soap is beneficial.

I probably would continue this even if it didn't improve matters, because why pay money for products that basically don't do anything but make bubbles. However, since I have seen improvements I don't see any reason to go back to using body wash/shampoo.

Tits and Ass

Something that has bugged me for a long time, but in a somewhat inarticulate way, is women (and men) complaining about various artistic portrayals of women being "hyper-sexualized" or "objectified", particularly in video games, comic books, the media, whatever, as if this is an assault on "regular" women. An assault perpetrated by men for the purpose of hurting women.

My problem with this, I've come to realize, is that it's just ignoring way too much context. Are these portrayals of women exaggerated? Yes. But so are the portrayals of men in the same media. I don't know a lot of men who view the impossibly-ripped superhero as an assault on their self-esteem.

I think it has more to do with how men and women view physical attractiveness. Most of the men I know view it as something you build--which is true, if you want to get ripped, you go to the gym, you work out, you eat right, and you develop a nice muscular build. So if they don't have one, they don't view it as some hopeless endeavor, it's just that they're not that interested in it. They do other things with their time, and get their self-esteem from those things.

For women, though, having a perfect body/face/skin/hair seems a lot more of a genetic thing, so no matter how much effort you invest, you can only do so much. Even cosmetic surgery can only go so far. They are defeated before they begin. A *hopeless* ideal does not inspire self-esteem. It inspires self-loathing.

It's just another example of the destructive effects of irrational perfectionism.

Lead me into Temptation

So, today I thought about having some chocolate. Then I decided not to. I wasn't really craving chocolate, it was just that before when I've been feeling a bit ill like I did today, chocolate helped. The caffeine, sugar, fat, and seretonin effects really do make me feel better.

The trouble was, it didn't seem worth it. I have to eat a LOT of chocolate for it to have a noticeable effect (practically OD on the stuff), and I didn't want to go off my diet because I've been having several really good effects from the low-carb, high-fat method I've adopted. I'm losing weight (370.6 today at my Official Weighing) and about 75% of my joint pain/stiffness has just vanished. Gone. Kaput. I can sit (or stand, or lie down) in one position and I don't swell like a balloon and wind up so stiff I can barely move.

I don't want that to go away. At all. It's taken me a little over 10 days of consistent 100% attendance to the best diet practices I've been able to discover to attain that. I do NOT want to start over again at day one. Not even for chocolate.

So it's not at all difficult for me to decide to avoid the stuff I know will throw me off. And the longer I go, the less I want to get reset back to day one. At last, a trait I can use to help me instead of hinder me. Once I've sunk a certain amount of effort into something, I don't want to go back and start over no matter how beneficial it might be.

Mad Science!

So, I decided to experiment a little with making a LCHF (low carb high fat) dessert. It did not go so well.

First I made a crumble crust for a pie. Only instead of using graham crackers, I used flaxseed meal and chopped almonds held together with butter. This was the only really successful part of the pie, and it tasted great. I think I needed to chop the almonds a bit more thoroughly, though, as the larger chunks had a tendency to fall out of the crust. But it certainly held together as well as any graham cracker crust I've ever made.

Then I made custard for pie filling. This went okay. I used egg yolks and cream with stevia and lemon extract to make the custard. Next time I'm going to use more cream and fewer egg yolks. I think I may just go ahead and use a little sugar or honey, too, as the Stevia tastes kind of salty to me after it's been baked. It just doesn't have any real sweetness to it. Also the lemon extract was a bust--it could not be tasted in the final product AT ALL. Next time I'm using lemon juice and lemon zest instead. (I was planning on using it this time, unfortunately I forgot to get an actual lemon on my way out of the store.)

Then I tried to make meringue using the egg whites. This was laughably bad. Apparently you HAVE to use SUGAR to make a proper meringue. Also it was hot and humid in the kitchen so the stuff just would NOT set. I gave it my best shot but I think I'm just not going to bother with this next time. The custard is plenty indulgent without any meringue, and I can use the egg whites to make egg drop soup or something.

Also, as a note, if you've never made meringue before, it makes about 10 times the volume (or more) than you had of egg whites. Useful to know so you don't end up overflowing your bowl.

Overall, not the best dessert I've ever made, but it was really low in carbs, for sure. And dinner (oven-roasted chicken drumsticks and creamed spinach) was good.

Also, it was the first time in three years that I used that eggbeater.

Grandstanding?

First, click on this link.

See that red text across the top? Doesn't that sound ominous? Really sounds like Turbine is screwing someone over, eh?

Except that having all classes for free is NOT part of the VIP agreement. In fact, one of the classes in DDO (Favored Soul) is ALREADY buy only (or it can be earned with favor). Artificer uses precisely the same model--you can buy it, or you can earn it with favor. It's my understanding that during the shakedown period while the new update gets implemented, it may *temporarily* be impossible to get it just with favor. Whoop-te-doo. Every update takes a while to get fully set up. Why? 'Cause it's friggin' complicated, is why.

I'm not hugely in favor of grandstanding even when your grievance is legitimate. THIS is just DUMB.

That Is . . . Large

So, my mom got me a scale for my birthday (which is next month, but never mind) so I can have some help in my dieting. It arrived today. It is a nice scale. I really like it. Except it appears to be broken, because when I stand on it it says 391 lbs.

Faith and begorrah. That is way more Jennifer than anyone could possibly want.

No WONDER my ankles hurt.

Addendum: Actually, my joke about the scale being "broken" was quasi-accurate. It got stuck somehow and I had to take the batteries out and turn them around and whack them a few times before it would zero. So the actual number is 379 lbs. Wow, I feel SOOOOO much better.

Not. Bleh.

Mastermind?

I stumbled upon this game:

It's a memory game, fair enough, and I played it for a few minutes. The thing I found really odd about it was that when I just looked at the images, I had about a 50% success rate. Not particularly noteworthy. When I NAMED the images in my mind (even if it was the most basic description of "man with dog"), my success rate INSTANTLY jumped to 100%.

Yeah. Verbal. That's me.

Trashed

So, our bathroom is kind of exploded at the moment. Fortunately we have a spare.

Updatery

Well, thus far the diet is going well, meaning that I'm still on it. I feel that I've lost some weight (still no scale, so I'm not sure), but my various ailments are much reduced. I was taking vitamins daily for a while, but I've stopped because they were making me sick to my stomach. I don't seem to digest solid vitamin pills well and after a few days of taking them I get all kinds of unpleasant digestive symptoms.

I've been reading Tom Naughton's Fat Head blog and watching his various videos. from the "Fat Head" movie (which you can watch free on Hulu) to "Science for Smart People" (which you can watch free on YouTube) and "Big Fat Fiasco" (which you can watch free on YouTube). I find these to be both amusing and (somewhat) informative. I'm not sure how much science there is behind the explanation of how insulin resistance causes you to get fat, though. It sounds sensible, but so does the lipid hypothesis, you know.

However, that being said, the biggest recent change I've noticed is that I now get hungry in a reasonable sort of way (and I want reasonable amounts of food). Today I had some beef liver pate and celery sticks for lunch, and now I'm hungry and making chili (no beans) for dinner. I was hungry around 5pm and it's almost 10 now. If I'd gotten hungry around 5 before, by 10 I would be an absolute wreck, shaky, feeling half-frozen, possibly even passed out in bed. I feel fine. I'm not tired, (I am hungry), but I don't feel wasted and shaky.

So that's good, at least. I'm going to track down a scale so I can weigh myself. It's been approx. 2 months since I started so I figure the water weight loss has mostly ceased and now I can actually get an idea of how much I weigh and what/if I'm losing.

Really? Really?!

I saw what has got to be the dumbest commercial ever to exist last night. Well, okay, maybe not, but still. It was a spot advertising MSNBC, which apparently is some sort of leftist propaganda channel or show (not sure about that, but I caught less than a minute of it and they used the term "plutocrat" to describe wealthy Republicans THREE TIMES. IN LESS THAN A MINUTE.). Anyway, this advertising spot consisted of a woman standing in a canyon with a rather large bridge behind her. She said, self-righteously, that "we need government leadership because there aren't enough profits out there for any private enterprise to build something like this on spec".

Um, what?

There's just so much wrong with that idea that I decided to make a list. Note that this doesn't even *approach* being a comprehensive list.

1. Enormous things get built by private enterprise all the time. On spec. Even with our enormous bloated government draining the economy. So money is not the problem.

2. If there is money to be made but not enough for your grandiose bridge project, private enterprise will come up with SOME kind of solution. Maybe not as scenic.

3. The government (via tons of building and environmental regulations, among other things) is generally the force *preventing* huge undertakings from going forward. See: nuclear power or gas pipelines or oil drilling. So looking to government "leadership" probably means that you didn't want that bridge built in the first place.

4. Said government "leadership" has no incentive to provide infrastructure that is actually well-designed and well-placed. As such it is generally inefficient and wastes most of the money it uses.

5. Government money is taken by force from the very people you claim can't make enough profits to do this on their own. Huh, I wonder if a crushing tax burden coupled with rising inflation has anything to do with that.

Yeesh.

But I Don't Believe That!

Here's something I'm never going to understand:

Radical members of X group expressly believe some outrageous bit of stupidity, like that video games are "corrupting youth" or that having sex is somehow "sinful" or that non-believers ought to be viciously murdered or that humans are "destroying the planet" or whatever. Then, when some better person says "you X's are idiots for believing this bit of outrageous stupidity" some marginally-less-radical X comes along and says "I'm an X, and I don't believe that, therefore X is perfectly fine!"

WRONG.

The correct interpretation of the statement "I'm an X, and I don't believe that!" is not "X is perfectly fine!" it is "But I self-identify with X regardless of the fact that I don't actually believe in X thus granting sanction to the outrageous bit of stupidity and encouraging the people who do believe it".

Bottom line: if you disagree with the actual tenets of a belief system, don't identify yourself as a follower of that belief system. If you go ahead and call yourself an X anyway, guess what, you *deserve* to be tarred with the same brush. Heck, you're WORSE than the radicals--they at least have the courage of their convictions. Or the courage to HAVE convictions. YOU are a disgraceful milquetoast hypocrite parlor pink.

Hmph.

Captain America

So, first let me start out by saying that if you like superhero movies, you'll probably really enjoy Captain America. By most standards it appears to be a really good movie. I just had a terrible time getting into it, myself.

That's not to say I didn't enjoy it, I did, but the progress of the story all felt extremely wooden to me, kind of like watching Saturday Morning Cartoons where everything is telegraphed a little too much so the (presumably younger) audience can follow along. The camera just dwells way too long on things in order to let you know they're Important, and much of the dialog is delivered in a way that makes it feel too pat.

This is probably just a personal thing, but I found it irksome enough that I didn't enjoy the movie thoroughly.

Limitless

Adam and I watched this movie last night, and I have to say the movie I'm most strongly reminded of is No Country for Old Men. Not because they have any superficial qualities in common, but they share a self-sabotaging sort of ending that purposefully and maliciously destroys the theme of the movie and replaces it with something rather vile.

Oh, just as a quick aside before I get started pulling this thing to bits: from the trailers I honest-to-goodness thought Bradley Cooper was Jake Gyllenhaal. Now that I look them up, they don't look all that similar, but good grief how many brown-haired scruffy youngish men are there hanging about in Hollywood? Do they all have to have the same haircut? Sheesh.

The general plot of this movie at the start is not too original (more, unusual, as in you don't see it quite as often). Cooper plays Edward Morra, a down-at-the heels would-be writer who is too depressed and out-of-focus to produce anything. He is, essentially, the most stereotypical of stereotypical smart-ish loser types. Heck, I'm one myself. He lives in a crappy apartment, he's divorced, his girlfriend left him, it's all pretty pathetic.

The character/situation development is rather undercut by this whole part of the story being narrated, by the way, and the movie begins with a flash-forward scene informing you, in no uncertain terms, that Something Bad Is Going To Happen. Even the trailers weren't too coy about the basic premise of Limitless. As a result, I spent most of the movie waiting for the surprise. That's just the problem though--there isn't one.

Limitless doesn't only lack surprise, it lacks any conflict whatsoever. Time and time again, you think some sort of conflict is going to develop--Morra is going to be forced to question what he's doing and where he's going--something is going to happen. And it never does. Terrible things occur as a result of this miracle drug that turns Morra into a super-genius. Many people die, some of them at Morra's hands. Yet what happpens in the end? He outsmarts everyone and gets away free.

This is, essentially, a story of someone who magically wins the "lottery of life". At the beginning of the movie, anyone who is struggling in their life can certainly identify with Morra's situation. Yet by the end that identification and meaning are completely stripped out. I'm not a super-genius with all the money in the world and the solutions to everything. Why the heck would I root for someone who is just because he is?

The problem is that Morra never displays any *moral* characteristics. He doesn't decide to "do good" with his newfound superpowers. He doesn't decide to bring the drug to the world (even though it's revealed by the end that he's figured out how to "beat" the horrendous side effects). At the end, he's running for president, but goodness knows what kind of policies a characterless non-entity would decide to implement. It is the ultimate in Naturalist movie-making, just a series of randomish events that don't add up to anything other than, hey, I got lucky and got a hold of a big pile of money and killed some people and drank a guy's blood and whoop, I totally got away with it! Awesome!

While that might be a fun wish-fulfillment fantasy for some, it's not a story that means anything. It reminds me of the sentiment in Terry Pratchett's novel Hat Full of Sky: "In any story worth the telling, the third wish is the one that puts everything back the way it was." It is not wishing or luck or miracle drugs that get you ahead in life.

By presenting intelligence in this light--as an amoral faculty of luck and deceit--what Limitless really conveys is a profound hatred of the intellect. But this isn't the misguided yet honest hatred of a man of limited intelligence who is suspicious or envious of something he cannot have. This is a form of what Ayn Rand called "hatred of the good for being the good"--a wish, not to seize a value, but for it to cease to exist. It is a parade of anti-intellectualism wearing the trappings of the intellect, all the worse for its sheer banality.

Fortunately, due to its banality it is likely to disappear without even a ripple. At least, one can hope.

Carbs: I Need Dem

So, in the third week of doing Paleo here, and I've started adding some "non-toxic" carbs back into my diet out of desperation, because I basically turned into a zombie there for a while. I could not stay awake. Well, I could, but I was sad, weepy. All the time. And I couldn't focus. It took me (literally) 45 minutes to put on a pair of pants yesterday. Finally, I had some ice cream.

Boom, fixed.

I waited up to make sure it hadn't just spiked my blood sugar and sent me into a sugar high, but I didn't have any sugar high symptoms, I merely felt "normal" for the first time in days. I could pay attention, I wanted to do stuff, I felt normally tired at the normal time. So I'm going to start eating some potatoes and whatever else I find I tolerate well (excepting grains/legumes for the time being). And I won't worry about adding a small spoonful of sugar to my tea.

I don't think I've ever really been hyperglycemic. I've had my blood sugar tested immediately after eating a large, carb-filled meal and my blood sugar was NORMAL. I suspect, but do not know, that I may be generally HYPOglycemic. It'd be nice to have an actual professional I could ask about this, but I've ALWAYS had low blood sugar in the mornings (part of why it's so painful for me to haul myself out of bed). My average body temp is lowish--97.9 instead of 98.6.

I don't want to go crazy and start diagnosing myself with everything under the sun. I don't have *most* of the symptoms of hypoglycemia, just incredibly sluggish tiredness. I don't get lightheaded or pass out, but I will feel really weak and shaky if I've gone a while without food. While I suspect some of this might be the result of my former habit of loading up on carbs and sugary foods, over the past few weeks I've definitely learned that the tiredness is NOT an effect of that. I NEED some carbohydrates for fuel so I don't turn into a zombie.