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I don’t know what made the producers of Cuil (no link on purpose) think they could be a “Google-killer,” but they neglected the part wherein their product actually has to work.

This morning, I tried searching on “esophageal cancer” to see what it would turn up. I got lists of “links” in certain categories; the categories were rather appropriate to the search. But, the links weren’t links. I had to go to a sub-page if I wanted the links to be clickable.

Here was the problem. Clicking on a link to a sub-page sent my browser into hijacked purgatory. I not only didn’t get the page of links, but got sent to those spurious sorts of pages that tell you that you have viruses, and would you like to buy their virus detection software?

I’ll not be going back to Cuil. Not unless I feel like being ad-spammed again.

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Maybe I don’t have enough sympathy for poor spellers, but I think there are just some things you need to do right. Spelling is one of them.

Spell it like it is | spiked
Many educators now consider the teaching of Correct Spelling as an elitist imposition that discriminates against the disadvantaged, or, in the case of Quayle, against those who have had a literacy-bypass.

You do learn to say that to yourself, and I think this is a major step forward for a cancer survivor. I know I had to say it today several times before the small moth-like anxieties fled.

Then there was a horrible show that I slurped right up on E! TV about stars’ mental problems. I felt so home there with Gwyneth Paltrow going through the “baby blues” as they’ve come to be called. I can just imagine us hittin’ back on the Prozac, side by side. …..Not, but it did the trick.

I’m now in command of my self…. All dressed up and nowhere to go.

Now playing on iTunes: The Unanswered Question from the album “Kosmos” by Isao Tomita

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In the “not raining but pouring” department, I found this extra tidbit of cancer news. Apparently, geography can make you ill.

There’s supposed to be another such area of heightened risk here in Cincinnati and surrounding areas, but right now, I can’t find news/proof of that. Just some information floating around the doctor’s office, I guess.

FOXNews.com – Government Officials Confirm Cancer Cluster Within 20-Mile Stretch of Pennsylvania – Health News | Current Health News | Medical News
HAZLETON, Pa. —  A federal agency admits there’s a 20-mile stretch in Pennsylvania where residents have an elevated risk of contracting a rare blood cancer.

I understand the fear that cancer brings; I’ve felt it myself. But surely part of winning the fight, or at least partaking in the fight, against cancer is simply showing up.

However, what if I had received worse news from the doctor? I did “only” have stage one of the cancer. Right.

(highlights are mine)

Older Patients with Cancer at Heightened Suicide Risk
In the first study, researchers at the University of Washington analyzed U.S. data from 1973 to 2002 and found that the suicide rate among cancer patients was 31.4 per 100,000 person-years, compared to 16.7 per 100,000 person-years in the general population.

Higher suicide rates were associated being male, white and older at the time of cancer diagnosis. Patients with the highest suicide rates were those with lung, stomach, oral/pharyngeal and larynx cancers. Suicide risk was greatest within the first five years after diagnosis but remained elevated for up to 15 years after diagnosis.

The second study found that older Americans with cancer are more than twice as likely to commit suicide as those without cancer. The Harvard School of Public Health and Harvard Medical School study compared 128 New Jersey residents, age 65 and older, who committed suicide between 1994 and 2002 and 1,280 living people in the same age group.

The suicide risk was 2.3 times higher among cancer patients than among those who were cancer-free. This increased risk held true even after the researchers adjusted for age, sex, race, medical and psychiatric illnesses, and use of prescription medications.

The local trees, a few of them at any rate, like the buckeyes, which get leaves first and drop them first, are starting to change color a little bit. They are turning a paler green, in preparation for the yellows to come next month.

There is definitely not the uniform lushness of deep green that there was everywhere in June.

I make a point of spending hours outside, sometimes writing, usually not, in order to store up the feelings for winter, when I will only rush out to the porch long enough to get Sophie inside, or to pick up a few more logs for the fire. I want to remember summer as the natural state of things, not winter. With the long, cold spring we had this year, it’s going to be difficult, but I think I’m up to the task.

Blogging more later… must wake up the chihuahua now.