New warnings for Paxil use, especially for pregnancy

MedWatch - August 2006 Safety-Related Drug Labeling Changes - Detailed

I'm no longer on Paxil, but for those of you who are, you should be aware of these, especially if you are pregnant, plan to be, or at risk of pregnancy. Other warnings include the potential for suicide, especially in young adults and serotonin syndrome, especially with concomitant use of MAOIs. An adverse reaction that has been added is the possibility of hallucinations. Check it out if you're concerned.

Humans and Apes joined by Humpbacks in 'Spindle Cell Brigade' - The Money Times

Humans and Apes joined by Humpbacks in 'Spindle Cell Brigade'

Spindle cells are found in the brains of only a few creatures on the planet. They are thought to be linked to intelligence.

Furthermore, in cetaceans they evolved earlier and are found in additional areas of the brain than those of primates.

It does make you wonder just how intelligent whales, dolphins, and porpoises are, and what it means for the ethics of the whaling industry and other hunts for these animals.

I'd also be interested in whether elephants have spindle cells in their brains, since they also exhibit complex behaviour.

By the way, I love Wikipedia

Not only do they have an entry for just about everything, there's one on:

The Amelia Peabody mysteries by Elizabeth Peters, my favourite mystery series

and one on Heroes my current addictive TV show upon which I'm hooked (well, the only one I watch on a regular basis, as I have no cable and watch with a friend). You have to love a show whose taglines include: 'Save the cheerleader. Save the world.' :)

Well, it's back to work

and I'm taking a quick part of my lunch to update. Yesterday was all I hoped it could be; I was very productive in preparing for the game, the game itself went well, Dee and Margaret stayed late and we all had a great discussion on various topics ranging from the Bunyip to silly neo-Pagans with staves to scary neo-Nazi Satanists, and all the time we were talking I was ticky-ticking on the keyboard and finished not only the notes from that day's game but the whole notebook! Woo-hoo! Okay, I was supposed to have finished about 18 notebooks by now. But still, it's a start, right? Plus, there was good conversation. I haven't really had fun, meaningful conversations in a group setting for a good long while, mainly because my circle of friends have shrunk as the loonies have fallen away. It was nice to talk to sane people about estoeric weirdness, too.

Today some of us at work are exchanging e-mails in preparation for our Secret Santa holiday celebration. We take a week and get little presents for someone (and in return, get them), followed by a slightly bigger gift at a party. It's very fun, and went really well last year. Two of the people are on maternity leave, so I hope they can come.

I think I'm going to get some small things for my family (I'm including a couple of friends in that category) and for the members of the game, too and cover all the bases. This year isn't as tight as past years have been, although I'm having an almost irresistable desire to get a $300 computer for a friend who has a slow not-quite-dinosaur of one, and I really can't afford that, so I AM resisting. I don't know where that idea came from, it's out of the blue, but I actually priced some. For $300 you can get a really decent computer these days.

Well, that's enough for now. Nothing in the news struck me as blogworthy. Hope you had a happy holiday. It's hard to believe that by Friday it will be December. Eek! When am I going to be able to go shopping? Oh, well, I have bills to pay first anyway. :)

I wish

You Should Weigh 190

If you weigh less than this, you either have a fast metabolism or are about to gain weight. If you weigh more than this, you may be losing a few pounds soon!

How Much Do You Weigh?

A nice day or two

although today was spent working my normal 10-hour shift, things seemed to go pretty quickly. The weather was beautiful, in the 60s. I wish I'd been able to enjoy a little more of it, but tomorrow is supposed to be nice as well. It was also nice to get some rest over the last few days. I feel better than I have in awhile. I'm excited about the game tomorrow and I'm looking forward to the next few weeks and the holidays.

I will be working on Christmas, probably during the evening, but that's okay; I agreed to that to get Thanksgiving off and it's double-time-and-a-half. Besides, I'm not Christian--it's not my holiday. My family will get together sometime around the holiday, even if I have to take some vacation time off another day.

I've changed when I take my meds; the Provigil and metformin are still in the morning, (well, and the metformin is again later in the day) but the Lamictal and Abilify have gone to bedtime, because I was getting very drowsy in the daytime otherwise. Apparently Lamictal can cause drowsiness. I had originally started taking everything in the morning so I'd remember to take all my meds, and the Provigil has to be in the morning, but I'll just have to remember to take the others at bedtime. I think it's doing much better now. The real test will be next week at work, when I'm not necessarily being pelted with lots of stimuli (like at the gas station, which stays busy). I've been having a hard time staying awake, especially once I get to the projects I should be working on that aren't urgent or directly for others. Of course, it would help if I could get enough rest, too. And I'm going to start checking my blood sugar again to see if that's part of the problem (you get really fatigued when blood sugar is high). I just need to get some testing strips this week from the pharmacy.

In a couple of weeks I have an appointment with my nurse practitioner which will be my last; they won't be taking my insurance after December 15th. I got the notice the other day in the mail. So it's time to find another medications manager. I've already had two psychiatrists who have moved away, and now this. Sigh. I also have a dental appointment coming up. Yay. (Yes, that's facetious, although actually I really like my dentist and her staff).

We've cut my hours down at the gas station to mostly Saturdays, which should help for making doctor's appointments and maybe having a bit of a life during the week. I'm wondering if there's a way to fit in the gym. I'm really starting to get winded whenever I walk anywhere and I'm disliking my size. I want to be in better shape (I know I'll never be svelte, but I'd settle for feeling a lot better). It's almost resolution time, I suppose, but also, I pay for the experience--I might as well avail myself of the equipment. It may mean getting up much earlier, though, which is hard for me. :)

Well, I guess that's enough for now. It's almost time to go get a friend from work. Take care.

Cloak and Dagger Extraordinaire

The Revenge of the Kremlin? gives a fairly in-depth look at the poisoning a former Russian security officer Alexander Litvinenko, who had been highly critical of the Kremlin and specifically Putin. His death by poisoning with a rare radioactive substance had sparked concern that others, such as his family and those who cared for him in the hospital, or those who ate at the restaurant linked to the radioactivity, might have been exposed.

It reads like some Tom Clancy novel, riveting and full of twists. But unfortunately, this is the case not only of historical drama (that will no doubt be researched intently in the future) but that of a man who became a shadow of his former self through exposure to something you'd have to have access to nuclear materials to even obtain. It has also been linked to the death of a Russian journalist last month, so the story (and the human cost) may turn out to be much greater than it is on the surface. Meanwhile, since he had obtained citizenship and there is a strong possibility that foreign concerns are involved, there may be a breakdown in British and Russian relations. It's a far-reaching bit of cloak and dagger. I hope the people responsible--all of them, no matter how high this goes--are brought to justice. Perhaps it is a rogue plan, perhaps part of a personal vendetta of an old comrade, but if it is the result of the Russian forces, that needs to come out. Otherwise the perpetrators win.

Listening to

I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker by Sandi Thom

Chorus:
Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair
In '77 and '69 revolution was in the air
I was born too late into a world that doesn't care
Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair

When the head of state didn't play guitar
Not everybody drove a car
When music really mattered and when radio was king
When accountants didn't have control
And the media couldn't buy your soul
And computers were still scary and we didn't know everything

[Chorus]

When pop stars still remained a myth
And ignorance could still be bliss
And when god saved the queen she turned a whiter shade of pale
My mom and dad were in their teens
And anarchy was still a dream
And the only way to stay in touch was a letter in the mail

[Chorus]

When record shops were still on top
And vinyl was all that they stocked
And the super info highway was still drifting out in space
Kids were wearing hand me downs
And playing games meant kick arounds
And footballers still had long hair and dirt across their face

[Chorus]

I was born too late into a world that doesn't care
Oh I wish I was a punk rocker with flowers in my hair

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Of course, I was born in '67, so I was much too young for the hippie movement--I was born right before the Summer of Love to parents of that generation--and was still too young for the punk movement, but I saw the beginning of the changes that made the world she talks about. I always felt, though, that I would have made a good flower child, and instead I'm a GenXer through and through, but my idealism and mentality are kind of stuck in the 60s. I am a product of 70s cartoons and TV that sought to make everyone equal and represented in happy multicultural ways, and I have an annoying habit of asserting that everyone is equal even though I know that each person has unique abilities and background. But I remember when vinyl was all that, radio was king, and computers were still scary. But at least we still don't know everything...we just tend to think we do. I'd never have made a good punker, though...I just never got the whole punk thing, for which a friend mocks me on occasion. :)

The only religion spit out by the Belief-O-Matic I wasn't familiar with

New Thought, courtesy of Wikipedia

A giant leap forward in genetics research

Building on the known areas of the human genome, a new style of mapping shows areas beyond the traditional paired chromosomes that may affect inheritance in myriad ways--and the researchers making the discovery have made their databases public to help fuel further research.