6 imams walk on to a plane...

I know you have heard that one before. Well I wanted to share a bit of information with you. Specifically, the recent survey that Pew took of Muslims feeling about terrorists and terrorism.
You can read it yourself, if you want. I didn't, though. I just looked at the numbers on the front page and averaged them out for you. Basically 2.7 out of ten Muslims surveyed support violence against civilians often or sometimes. Three out of ten Muslims have some or a lot of confidence in Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden to the "right" thing regardless of world affairs (whatever that means).

Statistically, there was a decent chance one of those imams probably had very strong beliefs you should be blown up. Think about that next time you see him complaining about getting kicked off the plane.

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Cholesterol

As I may have mentioned in the past, my cholesterol is high for someone my age. My first test was in April and I recently went and got another one. Since April, I changed my diet, lost 20 pounds, and started exercising again. It took quite a bit of work to lose the weight and get back in shape. Buy the end of the running season (when daylight savings turned off) I was up to three miles again. I am going to try to maintain during the winter by running occasionally and lifting weights. My goal is to lower my body fat percentage by several points to bring it more in line with what is considered normal.

I had some dramatic changes to my blood chemistry, but not the ones I expected. I expected there to be a significant change in my cholesterol, because I heard triglycerides where tough to move with our medication. It turns out that triglycerides are very weight sensitive, and were adjusted the most. I think a picture will explain it.



Triglycerides and VLDL both decreased dramatically. HDL and LDL increased. LDL had the largest increase. Looking at the data, I have come up with my own theory concerning cholesterol and I think it holds a bit of truth (further research revealed my theory to be somewhat true. Read here and here).

First a little background. VLDL, LDL, and HDL all make up your total cholesterol level. VLDL is the smallest, LDL is the next largest, and HDL is the largest of all (update: actually the size information is wrong.). I believe that my VLDL got rolled up into LDL. Additionally, some LDL was rolled up into HDL. The decrease in VLDL shows a general trending of my body creating larger lipids (or cholesterol). How much of this is true, I am not totally sure. Either way, I feel my overall cholesterol improved a bit more than my raw number shows.

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Truth in googling…

"At the suggestion of Say Uncle here’s a google bomb effort to counter the anti-gunners google efforts.

Sensible gun laws

Sensible gun laws

Ban all guns

Ban gun ownership

Just doing my part, feel free to join in."

via Moral Flexibility

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Don't Forget

Don't forget, it is National Alzheimer’s Disease Awareness Month. Heh, that never gets old.

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A few Zim Dollars for your soul.

Recently a friend just happened to be passing through Zimbabwe and picked me up 200,000 Zim dollars. These dollars happened to be right during the currency redenomination, before three zeros got cut off the national currency. These 200,000 Zim dollars would buy you a coke, from what I am told.

Philosophy of self-defense: What is your life worth?

Remeber your life is only worth the price of a bullet, to a criminal with a gun.

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