Group Doctor Appointments

This is not a new Obamacare thing and it’s not ripped from a TV sitcom either. The list of other things it’s not could go on, it isn't AA or OA or any of the A for anonymous group thingies nor is it group therapy. But perhaps all these and the influence of social media (think it takes a village and we are all part of the village) created a gentle nudge toward this idea of group doctor appointments. Group doctor appointments are just that. Instead of seeing a doctor one on one you see the doctor with a group of other patients with the same condition. I like the idea. I notice a lot of people share information (think TMI-too much info) on line and on TV and everywhere really so why not in group appointments. I like the idea that I may have my questions asked and answered, and that may include some questions I hadn't thought to ask or felt too uncomfortable to ask. I can easily picture a group of pregnant women sharing concerns and supporting each other in this setting. I think the group idea is a good one for patients dealing with other issues too, like knee or hip replacements or diabetes. Here is another list that could go on when I think of all the possible illnesses conducive to group appointments and the various reasons we go to the doctor. And maybe we wouldn't have to wait so long to be seen or feel like the appointment time was too short. I would think the atmosphere would be a bit less tense for the patient, but maybe not the doctor, though that’s what they get the big bucks for. The doctor may even prove to be a bit more personable and that is a good thing.

The downside? Save that for those one on one doctor to patient appointments because I am sure there will be times when you will need one of those too.     

The Surf Debate

Here are the two sides of this debate, in my mind at least, nature (waves in the ocean) versus machine generated (waves at water parks or on cruise ships). For the surf purists there probably is no real argument. Communing with the elements on, above, and below the surface of the ocean is what surfing is all about. On the ocean it is usually just you and the ocean along with a few dedicated fellow surfers. At competitions the fans are farther from the action. On machine generated waves there is no paddling out and waiting for what the surf enthusiast would call and only nature could create - the perfect wave. Instead surfing the wave park wave is consistent and constant sort of like riding a mechanical bull and unlike a live bull at a rodeo or the running in Pamplona there is a significantly smaller chance of being run down and gored with the mechanical bull. With the mechanical bull you may also have help from alcohol with its anesthetizing assistance. The crowds cheering you on (or waiting for their turns) are also closer in the wave park, cruise ship, or bar with a mechanical bull. That said there is also something to be said for the other amenities on the cruise ship, at least (I’m thinking those cute towel animals here), but even so those hardly compare with the majesty of the sea, the roar of the surf, and the feel of sand between my toes. I've never found a shark’s tooth or sea glass at park like Wild Adventures or Summer Waves and I’m really not a surfer either but if I was I’d probably compromise and try both. Surf parks may be the latest wave but the ocean endures.   

New Trailhead Facility to Enhance Woodbine Trail

The popular walking, biking, and running trail along where the railroad tracks used to be in Woodbine (three and a half miles long) that starts with a boardwalk at a park on the Satilla River and continues on under the U.S. 17 bridge and beyond is getting a new trailhead facility paid for by a $100, 000 Recreational Trail Grant from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources. The grant will pay for restrooms and a trailhead facility with a parking area, bike racks, and water fountains. The construction battalion from Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base is providing the volunteer labor. I am planning to lace up my sneakers and check out the trail and the new features when they’re complete. At the very least I figure that I can walk off the crawfish dinner next April during the annual Crawfish Festival.

Turtle Mull

The mull is short for mulligan as in stew and no, this isn't

 a recipe, although you can Google them pretty easily. Most of my posts regarding turtles are less than widely received. But this one is different enough to garner some attention, I hope. Turtle Mull caught my attention when I was reading the paper the other day. A turtle named Zip is in danger of becoming a main ingredient for it since he slipped away from his owners in Northeast Georgia. Zip pushed apart some fortified hog panel fencing and made his escape into a 1,000 acre tract of woods behind his home. His owners have put up flyers and hoping for the safe return of this rather large yet endearing family pet before the weather gets cold and negatively impacts Zip’s survival chances.

Zip’s a 50 pound Saharan Desert turtle (African Spurred Tortoise) or possibly the consummate part of a large batch of turtle consommé, one or the other. 

Tweet, Tweet, A Little Birdie Told the NRA

The NRA has long ‘arms’, so to speak. A professor of journalism at the University of Kansas was placed on indefinite administrative leave for his #NRA tweet about the Navy Yard shootings. Kansas politicians (possibly campaign funded by the NRA?) were appalled by the tweet also and called for the university to remove David W. Guth from the faculty. The offending tweet-“blood is on the hands of the #NRA. Next time, let it be YOUR sons and daughters.” I was expecting the NRA might respond that their sons and daughters would be well enough armed to have taken down the shooter or something like that because they tend to answer guns with more guns, like the idea about arming teachers in schools to protect kids from gun violence. Apparently plenty of others were offended by the tweet because the professor and others at the university have received email threats as a result of the all the attention generated. I don’t really know exactly where my argument in writing about this tweet is going because I have heard a lot of passionate pro-gun arguments before and they are mentally cycling and refuting the points I’d like to make here. I think the professor’s biggest problem is that his expression of anguish over the events in the Navy Yard that resulted in so much death may be that his words are indelibly etched in cyberspace for ever. He did not heed the old admonition, to be careful what you put in writing (or in tweets). Maybe I’ll just write this, Rep. Brett Hildabrand, a Shawnee Republican urged via Twitter the university to take “appropriate action” against David W. Guth. Maybe Rep. Hildabrand and his fellows should be urged to consider taking “appropriate action” against gun violence.  

The Eyes Have It

Our eyes are more important when determining location that our ears. A study at Duke University verified this. The study concentrated on how the brain combines information from two different senses, in this instance, hearing and seeing. The experiment used 11 human test subjects and 2 monkeys, placed in a soundproof booth (probably not all together at the same time) and the experimenters used speakers in various locations with lights attached. Then they moved the sounds and lights around sometimes simultaneously and sometimes not and tracked the subject’s eye movements. The eye can take a snapshot and send the image to the brain but the ears don’t have anything that concrete to work with. And as with ventriloquists the eyes stay with the puppet’s moving mouth (rather than the ventriloquists mouth where the sound is actually coming from) leaving the power of vision to correct errors.

The experimenter at Duke University’s conclusion was that vision is much better at informing location. Must be why somebody invented flashlights!

Ocean Acidification

Carbon dioxide from air pollution is being absorbed by the ocean causing acidification. Not good, because this is altering the ocean’s makeup and while the damaging effects are still reversible eventually they won’t be. The changes due to the carbon dioxide resulting from the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas are happening faster than at any other time in human history. Instead of lush, colorful, marine life filled coral reefs the ocean’s floor in areas damaged by acidification due to the absorption of carbon dioxide look like lifeless slimy lake bottoms. Billions of oysters along the Washington coast have already been killed and other shellfish have been destroyed too. Plankton in Antarctica is dissolving because carbon dioxide mixed with water becomes corrosive and erodes exoskeletons of some animals and robs the water of the ingredients needed to grow shells in the first place. Another effect of carbon dioxide’s acidification along with the decline of coral reef is the increase in sea grasses and an even greater increase in red tide toxicity. The bottom line is that since the dawning of the industrial revolution there has been a 30% increase in ocean acidification and 15% or the increase has occurred since the 1990’s. Changes that were thought by scientists to be half a century off in the future have occurred much more quickly, within the last five years. It appears to me that there is a lot more to global warming than just changes in the weather.