Richard Feynman
I’d never heard of Richard Feynman, before tonight, when BBC2 had a program about his work on the Enquiry into the Challenger Disaster and a profile of his life. Wikipedia says this about the report on Challenger.
He warned in his appendix to the commission’s report (which was included only after he threatened not to sign the report), “For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.”
It’s a wonderful quote and all politicians should have it tattooed on their bottom.
Grilled Pork With Asparagus And Shiitake Mushrooms
This recipe was taken from Saturday’s Times and I cooked it for lunch for myself today.
The paper says that for four people you need the following.
4 French trimmed pork cutlets
Knob of unsalted butter
2 crushed cloves of garlic
20 shiitake mushrooms, stalks removed
20 spears of asparagus, cleaned and trimmed
Seasoning
1 hard cheese, I used a French sheep’s one.
Lemon juice and olive oil
I did half quantity and just used pork steaks, as my Waitrose isn’t a posh one, that does French-trimmed pork cutlets. Here’s the pork, mushrooms and asparagus, ready to cook.
Pork, Mushrooms and Asparagus
The asparagus was of course English. I just snapped the ends off.
I cooked the pork in my chargrill pan for a few minutes each side.
Cooking The Pork
After they were cooked I put them in the top oven to keep warm.
I then melted a good knob of butter in my frying pan and when it was very hot, put the garlic and the mushrooms in and cooked them for nearly a minute. I then added the asparagus and gave it another minute.
Cooking The Mushrooms And Asparagus
I then arranged it over the meat, with a few potatoes and scrapings of the cheese and some lemon juice.
Ready to Eat
I did find the two steaks I cooked rather a lot for me, so one will be tomorrow’s lunch. but it was a pleasant change to have the mushrooms and asparagus with pork.
Are There Indirect Consequences Of Bereavement Or Divorce?
Yesterday, I met someone, who has divorced after a fairly long marriage. I’m not sure how long ago it was, but they did move house in the last year.
I first noticed their nails and they appeared to be short and brittle just like mine below. They also had similar bumps to those I have on my index finger.
My Left Hand
On questioning, they revealed that they lived in a south-facing flat, although it doesn’t have under-floor central heating, like my house.
So are they living in a hot, dry atmosphere, like I have for a lot of the time, since I moved into this house? There is only one way to find out and that is buy one of these.
Maplin Hygro-Thermometer
I got mine from Maplin. Click here for details.
Since the begining of January, I’ve kept the temperature most of the time in the range of 19-21 °C, with the humidity as high as possible. Admittedly, it’s a bit hotter this morning, but then the sun is on and both the heating and air-conditioning are off.
The consequences for my gut have been dramatic. Ever since my stroke in 2010, my gut has been lively, which an expert neurologist said was strange, as if stroke sufferers have a problem it’s usually constipation. For a long time, I thought I’d been glutened in hospital.
Now I was married for forty years and my lunch companion had probably been married for a long time, although they had got divorced. So the nails and the hands got me thinking.
Could it be, that when you are living with someone, you get into habits and a pattern of living? C and myself, were a couple, who did things together, but she was very definite in what she wanted. She always slept on the same side of the bed, kept the temperature of her car at a precise 22.5 °C and always liked to eat at particular times. She also was the first to complain, if the inside of a house or hotel room was too hot, and I would be told to do something about it.
I was happy to live at her temperature, but she always complained that my office or car was too hot.
After she died, I decided to warm the house up. I changed radiators and also switched from blankets to duvets in a quest for more warmth.
Unfortunately, I didn’t do any before and after measurements, but it was about this time that my rhinitis or as I thought at the time, hay fever, started.
This rhinitis got very much worse after the stroke in Hong Kong. My hospital room, had a big picture window and the sun streamed through. Could it have been very hot and dry?
When I moved to this house, it was very hot and I started to feel unwell and even thought the house was trying to kill me.
I have now got air-conditioning and control the temperature and humidity as tight as I can. But all of this does illustrate the chain of events from C’s tragic death, that ruined my health.
There may also be other factors, that come in on either bereavement or divorce, or even just moving house.
I hate gas cookers with a passion, as I don’t like naked flames anywhere, but others won’t cook on anything else. C and I, were both very happy with an AGA.
I don’t like draughts either and generally keep the windows shut and go for a walk if I want fresh air. After a bereavement or divorce, you may have a tedency to shut yourself away, so perhaps acquiring a dog that needs to be walked is maybe a good idea. I haven’t gone for the dog, but I do walk quite a bit.
How many women after a divorce, go from a comfortable air-conditioned car to an affordable hatchback, as the settlement is not in their favour?
There are obviously other factors, and if anybody has any ideas, I’d be pleased to hear them.
But I always remember a story of a couple, who moved a mile or so from their new sealed house, with fitted carpets in the town centre, to a country cottage with stone floors and ill-fitting windows. Their son’s asthma disappeared after the move.
So are there any scientific papers on the effects of temperature and humidity on health.
I found this paper from Harvard, entitled Hospital admissions for heart disease: the effects of temperature and humidity. Read the summary. It seems to indicate, that in their specific study, temperature was important, but humidity wasn’t.
My only advice would be to get yourself, one of Maplin’s meters, so that you know your preferred temperature and humidity.
A Bail-Out Too Far
The Sunday Times is reporting that because of the big fire at Daw Mill, UK Coal is close to collapse. The story is also here in the Newcastle Journal.
For many decades now, I’ve been against the mining of coal and its use as a fuel. My objection probably stems more from the dangers of mining, the bad disasters of my childhood years and recollections of a few former miners, that I’ve met, and not from any political reasons. When global warming became known, it just reinforced my views that we should get rid of this dangerous and polluting fuel.
If we don’t put UK Coal out of its misery this time, we’ll only be delaying the inevitable for a few years, as some other problem will come along.
They Can’t Tell Sheep From Goats
The Sunday Times is reporting that goats meat has been found in some lamb products.
This doesn’t strike me as serious as the horsemeat scandal, but yet again, it shows the importance of knowing where food has come from.
I’m cooking some pork for my lunch and will be particular, where I buy it from. It will probably be Waitrose, but on other days it could be Marks and Spencer or a proper butchers, like the one on the Essex Road.
If you pay a crap price for food, you probably get what you deserve.
A New Superwheat
You’d think as a coeliac, I would not be in favour of the new superwheat developed at Cambridge as reported on the BBC.
British scientists say they have developed a new type of wheat which could increase productivity by 30%.
The Cambridge-based National Institute of Agricultural Botany has combined an ancient ancestor of wheat with a modern variety to produce a new strain.
But I think this is a victory for traditional high-class science. As I understand it, after hearing the scientist on the radio, the combining of the two plants was done using the sort of methods, that have been used for years. Albeit with some clever seed incubation. No direct manipulation of the genes was involved.
So as this could give a yield increase of 30%, what would happen if these methods were applied to the other staple crops of the world.
Sadly, the problem is that, the Cambridge route doesn’t make any money for the big corporations of this world, who feel that the GM route is much more profitable.
I am not totally against GM, but it has to be used ethically and where it is demonstrated that it the only way to create an important product, such as a new cancer drug.
The Anonymous Widower 