Random thoughts:

I got drunk and bought an orchid. That's a first for me. Damn that barleywine's siren call! Anyway, the name of the the sub-specie is "Santa Barbara," so I've named him Jim. We'll see how I do with a high-maintenance plant. You know, orchids with the misting and the feeding and the just-so lighting.

I went to a couple of intellecual events this weekend: the Portland Auto Show and the Gun and Knife Expo.

I love cars, apparently. So I dragged Gene there to look at the new stuff, of which there was greivously little. Audi pulled their usual stunt of bringing a bunch of pre-production cars that were all locked up, and unavailable for any hands-on. If you wanted to play with the $90,000 flagship, you were in luck, but an A4? No dice. The guy gave me some lame ass excuse about not having room on the truck to bring more. BMW, by comparison had everything on the lot, all open and with interiors powered up to play with.

The Gun and Knife show was another let down, of course. I particularly liked that the first booth on the right was a shrine for All Things Nazi. Stupid fuckers. All the One Man/One Woman bumper stickers on the SUVs in the parking lot didn't help, either. I brought Sister-In-Law with me, so that mostly kept me on good behavior. Anyway, the quality of the merchandise was just crappy. I'd initially wondered why Benchmade or Gerber weren't there, but then I realized that this was not the market they want- overpriced knock-offs of real brands. There was exactly one guy selling custom knives with just amazing workmanship, blue dyed giraffe shinbone with 14k gold inlays, but I just was not up to spending $300 or more on something I have no pratical use for. Sister-In-Law got her hands on her beloved Desert Eagle .50 cal, so that part of the trip was a success. Yea! Weaponry!

Well, I wrote all this before I got sick- I think all the redneck fun wore down my immune system. Consequently I am too tired to elaborate further.

Val Kilmer is my new hero.

The best possible source of information: the lay press.

Today there are fears about naproxen "causing" cardiac death. Today, there are 800+ news articles refernced by Google news. Interestingly, there is no information on this from the NIH page, MDConsult, AAFP site or MedScape. Basically, the lay press will try to "scoop" the people who might actually be able to synthesize and present the data in a reasonable manner (that might not cause widespread panic). What good does it do to call your doctor, when the media releases information before his journal could even be delivered, assuming same-day delivery?

One day ago, the last data available on naproxen was that it was cardioprotective. Why the reversal? Oh, that's right, none of the studies involved were actually designed to observe cardiac outcomes. Could you use a microscope to read your newspaper? Maybe, but you might not see the whole thing correctly.

We'll see how I feel about this in a few days, after my articles come in the mail. Until then I shall continue to dine off of the 99 cent menu at the drive though, anticipating the day I can sue Roche, the maker of naprosyn, for my untimely cardiac event.