A polarized world

The last two months have been very depressing. Lots of work, travel recovery, news in general, a busier schedule for the kids as school and all their extra curriculars start off full swing and all these made the bags under the eyes more pronounced and dropped my energy level to an all time low. 

It became noticeable to the point where wife and kids pushed me out of the house and said "why don't you go to yoga class?" That was a clear signal that something was way off. They said that at least for an hour after coming home I was a little chirpy. (that used to be 4 hours after coming home!). Got a doctors appointment last week and told my doctor "wife and kids are saying I am moping around all the time and my energy level or interest level in anything and everything is going down rapidly".

The doctor said I was physically very fit. My blood pressure was excellent as was my blood oxygen level. A blood test for a bunch of things was checked off to see if there are issues related to metabolism etc. etc. While I did not understand the jargon, went for the test and got the results. Turns out my Vitamin D levels are off the charts this time on the low side and that is directly related to being depressed. I did have the same issue three years ago but it was low, not this low. 

Going to walk in the sun at least for an hour with short sleeve shirts or no shirt if possible every day, take prescription Vitamin D and check again in few months. That takes care of one part of the problem.

The kids extra curricular schedule has been juggled to the best of our ability, some classes have stopped, others combined to multitask with groceries, yoga class drives, conference calls that can be done while driving long distance to drop kids off in class etc. etc. That will hopefully help in the coming months

The last part is the "news". I interact with "news" once in the morning and evening listening to NPR during work and home drives. Check google news headlines once during lunch and the rest of it is from watching Daily show or Colbert report (now watching previous nights show online at dinner time of Trevor and Colbert's shows). Also watch John Olivers Sunday show on one of the weekday nights at dinner time.  Everything I hear in those interactions is downright depressing. 

It almost appears as though the sane folks have lost their voice and the extreme loonies are the only ones left screaming from the rooftops. 

Forget the war on drugs and the war on terror. My opinion is that there is a war on facts and data right now. Have a lot of data points that say it is not just opinion, but a fact.

There is a lot of fear mongering out there which is pitting people against people on almost every issue. 

You turn on the news and it is all about Immigrants, refugees, war, weapons and discrimination. Some of it is not even news. It is a bunch of folks peddling outright misinformation on national channels. How they are able to do this with impunity with no consequence is beyond me. They should be prosecuted for hate crimes and treason because the misinformation they propagate is actually not in the interest of the country or the people watching them.

Having lacked Vitamin D and being lost in thought all the time, one thing keeps recurring. The basic ability to put oneself in another's shoes seems to have become a rarity. The people who do not have the ability to reason out things seem to have a louder voice than the folks who can ask the repeated "why?" and dig down deeper. 

How do you reason with the unreasonable? That is a tough one. 

Had a long rant of a post on faith vs. religion and what is going on in the US and India with all the Islamophobia and if there will be any reprieve for the folks in the middle east. It was about how poor muslims and sectarian minorities in local geographic areas get screwed over by richer muslims or western countries. The post in itself was so depressing to read that I deleted it. 

There are still a lot of good people in this world that can move it forward. Working on raising two that will hopefully join that category. First thing to work on is to teach them that faith in something (preferably themselves) is a good thing. Next thing to work on is to teach them that religion is a crutch not an asset. Think they are already on the right path on some things but they are fanatical about Apple. So have to wean them off of that. 

Enough with the rant. Onwards we move.. and to post something positive to make up for all this negativity...

Today I learned the difference between having your "chin touch your shoulder" vs. "cheek touch your shoulder" and what a big difference it makes! A post on that later.

Exploding at the gates

Was driving to work this morning listening to the news. The Winter Olympic reporting was going on.. and in every alternate sentence..

Shaun just exploded from the gates

Lyndsay just exploded at the start..

What is going on with every Olympic gold medal winner either exploding at the gates, being explosive at the start or just having an explosion?

Way too many Iraq Green Zone reporters now at the Olympics and they cannot get over their old style?!

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The News, brought to you by..

News today seems to be sponsored, by someone who gets to benefit by the news...

It is just something that gets more polarized by the day.

Any fact seems to have two view points, depending on who the target audience is and one starts to scratch ones head to find out what the truth is. That says something about the quality of news.

Some fundamental themes today are:

1. Focus on the exception, not the rule

for example

a. "54 year old Indian man has not brushed his teeth since he was born!" could make the headline here.. they would even go to break that sentence to suggest that Indian men do not brush their teeth..

b. "Billions of people across India have been brushing their teeth since 3000 B.C. till today, starting with neem twigs to the latest Ultrasonic brushes!".

Let's see...

a. makes better headlines.

2. Take sides irrespective of the truth

a. Lashkar-E-Toiba is definitely a terrorist organization and granted there may have been some collusion with Pakistan in the early stages of the organizations creation where ISI had a hand in it, but the organization has been banned by the Pakistani govenrnment since 1998 for almost a decade! Also LET was started in the disputed territory in India, Kashmir which is being claimed by separatists, but is administered by India! So it is not fair to say that Pakistan is responsible for the Mumbai attacks...

b. Al-Qaeda is definitely a terrorist organization and granted there may have been some collusion with Afganistan in the early stages of the organizations creation where the Taliban had a hand in it, but the organization has been banned by the Afganistan government since 19xy.. So it is not fair to say that Afganistan is responsible for 9/11

again a. makes better headlines..

Except for the fact that a. was actually the headline in the NPR news today. Just couldn't believe what we were hearing! The logic was unbelievable.

To top things off, apparently the USA is going to give India all the support it can and also give Pakistan all the support it needs.

Did not quite get the part where Pakistan needs support right now. What am I missing here?

Ps. There are a lot of Peace loving Pakistanis out there and no doubt, they feel bad when all Pakistani's are portrayed as terror junkies. If LET and Pakistan are divorced, then the Pakistani government and the people should have no problem in helping India launch an offensive against LET, no?

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Smartass Sundar

Driving back from work to home on one of the worst highways in the local area. Worst in the sense that the highway is in really bad condition. As soon as you merge in, the noise level increases tremendously due to the roughness of the surface and the numerous bumps.

As is customary, I just have the radio on and drive, zombie mode. The dude on the radio is going on and on about greenhouse gases, auto industry, environmentalists recommendations and suddenly something jumps out and wakes me up..

"we can significantly reduce greenhouse gases if everyone in America can inflate their vehicle tires to the correct pressure! under inflated tires cause not just more wear and tear and frequent tire disposal, but they also decrease gas mileage!"

the inventor in me went to overdrive!

What? Is that really that simple? Half the time I dont check my tire pressure. Is this the real reason for all the noise or is it the crappy highway. In this day and age when we have diapers which turn color on the outside, when the little one does a number on the inside, how come we dont have an automatic tire pressure indicator that goes red or green? Should I patent that and make millions? If it is that easy to improve gas mileage, there should be one already? and given free with every tire! Hell, it should be built into the tire and there would probably be a law that mandates all tires have built in pressure sensors that alarm when the tire needs to be inflated some more! So far we have not seen anything like it!

Smiling from ear to ear on hitting a possible jackpot and visualizing myself as the next tire sensor baron, I came home, logged on and went on the internet and checked for tire pressure indicator ... and the future tire sensor baron sank into the couch more like a tired senseless moron.

Looks like there is one out there (or god knows how many more). But they want 15 bucks for four sensors. Now, I am upset! Why shouldn't tire manufacturers who charge 75$ a tire add this under 5$ sensor to the tire? Why doesn't the state of California which is hit so hard with emissions, mandate that all tires come with sensors?

I am going to see if someone gives out these things for free. In the meantime, if any of you who read this blog, know of any other such indicator that is cheaper or free, let me know. For now, it is back to the gas station to check tire pressure...

ps. there is an automatic tire pressure indicator in my Toyota Sienna van. But this light is perpetually on!! I know my tires have the right pressure (every local mechanic has told me so, except the toyota service!).
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