Coping: PH Tampering

Been meaning to mention – since several readers have asked – what ever happened with Elaine getting diagnosed with acid reflux?  Kind of an interesting story.  As I think I mentioned, she was referred to a conventional doc by our dentist, who’s a great guy.  Then, after he looked – mistaking it for thrush and a couple of weeks of anti-fungal, he gave up and sent her on to a local eyes/ears/nose/&throat doc.  About 5-minutes and the diagnosis was made.

 

Apparently, the number of people who suffer from nighttime acid reflux is on the order of 12-million (or so our research on the web has claimed).  He gave E a list of most of the foods she loved and said “Get off these and everything ought to clear up” and sure enough, the blisters on the side of her tongue and side of her mouth are about gone, along with the clearing her throat more often than most and so forth.  he offered to put her on some prescription antacids, but being the au naturel kind of person she is, the choice was made to stick to over-the-counter and diet.  So….a week later, she’s noticeably on the mend.

 

Of course, there’s been a price to pay:  Gone are the quick-fix meals of tortillas with veggies and hot peppery sauces with cheeses and tomatoes with a glass of milk.  Like I said, this does involve some sacrifices on her part.

 

Along the way we stumbled into a really interesting product at one of the local health food stores called “AlkaMAX”.  The idea of the stuff is you take a few drops of it in whatever kind of liquid you want and it will move your body PH back toward neutral.  Elaine’s up to her elbows in research at the moment, but turns out that a lot of bad, bad, bad illnesses are linked to having ones body go strongly acidic over a fair period of time.   We got the drops, not the powder, just to experiment with.

 

So now, along with ‘approved’ foods, she’s doing that and interestingly, we’re not pretty much on the same kind of diet.  Since I’ve been taking the stuff (10 drops of the liquid in my morning cu-p of coffee) it’s cut the acid sufficiently so that I don’t have that gnawing hole in the stomach demanding food.  Styill hungry by the time breakfast rolls around, but just there’s not so much a dull pain associated with drinking acidic coffee and sitting for three hours. 

 

Meantime, the eczema on my hands may also be improving because of it, but “Shhh!” -  Don’t want to jump to any conclusions, but it’s turning into an interesting little experiment.

 

One other thing about nighttime acid reflux:  Apparently helps to elevate the head of the bed about 5-7″ so that (you-know-what) will roll downhill.  Also has me pondering whether I should go looking for one of those Craft-matic adjustable beds for us; although sleeping in my man-chairs (side-by-side leather recliners in a TV seat/couch with drink holders etc) would do the same thing and I wouldn’t be tempted to get another TV…

 

One other item:  I’ve ordered some litmus paper and one of our friends up in the Dallas area recommended a particular type of enzyme regimen.  Don’t know as I’ll go that far, but I feel as good at almost 61 as I did at 40…which can’t be a bad thing. 

 

I thought in the name of science I’d run a litmus test on myself before writing one of my columns and then run a second test after to see how much venom I actual expend writing about the economic policies run amuck in today’s print-prone world.  I’ll keep you posted.

 

An Apology from Indonesia

After thinking about it a bit, our Indonesia bureau has issued an apology:

“Perhaps I was a bit hasty to call the American masses fluoridated couch jockeys. On second thought, maybe the interesting thing is to live in a country where the government still reacts to public demands, rather than ignoring them.

On another note, I am learning Mandarin now. I thought it might be a good recommendation for UrbanSurvivalists to do the same. Since China will likely end up owning most of North America in the not-to-distant future, it seems that learning Mandarin could be a leg up with the new management. Not that English will die of course. Anyone who has used a Mandarin keyboard will tell you the Roman alphabet is far easier to type. Furthermore, there has been a massive 100 year effort to make English in international business language. However, being able to say “Good morning, sir. Would you like tea or coffee this morning?,” in the boss’ native tongue might open a few doors.

Just a thought.”

Meantime, we happened to catch a mini-documentary on the English-language Al Jazeera satellite channel yesterday…a quite revealing appraisal of how American tobacco companies having been regulated in the West were now trying to get as many people in Third/Emerging world countries like Indonesia hooked on smokes and their report claimed 7 out of 8 adults in country are smokers with resulting health consequences.  I’ve asked our Indo Bureau to double-check that and get back to us.

 

Rogoff”s Boundary

I’ve only started to dig into former IMF Chief Economist Ken Rogoff’s book This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly (with Carmen Reinhart) and already love some of his concepts.

 

The main one early on is that when it comes to financial excesses, there’s some kind of a ‘boundary layer’ – a kind of tipping point – or point of no return – which is when economies tip into inflation, depreciation, or debasement of currency.  It’s one of those dandy ‘obvious as hell – hid in plain sight – things that once you grasp the concept slaps you upside the head and you think “Wow!  So that’s what’s going on…wonder why I hadn’t noticed before?”

 

The answer, of course, is simple”  You ain’t supposed to get it since it’s your behavior that makes it all possible for the mantra “this time is different” and traditional valuations get thrown out the door.

 

Particularly direct, by the way, is their description of ‘fiat’ money which they characterize as only having value so long as people accept the government’s decree that paper has value.  Like I tell the folks at the local liquor store every time I go in “Ain’t this an amazing world?  I can trade you pieces of dirty paper for perfectly good rum…”

 

They look at me like I’m nuts – and there’s a good case for that, too, I suppose.

 

Sorry, Larry – Sort of….
I suppose I should drop in an apology to the “Larry’s” of the world for my acerbic comments earlier this week that Larry Summers would be taken a lot more seriously if he would call himself Dr. Lawrence H. instead of plain “Larry”.  Which is just too darned reminiscent of Leisure Suit Larry’s adventure games.

 

A number of readers with the highly esteemed name “Lawrence” told me they were offended that I would point out their ‘Larry-ness.”

 

Sorry to offend, but the way humans work is there’s some kind of odd tribal pecking order.  The longer the name and more distinguished the title, the more ‘respect’ it’s supposed to buy amongst people who are not consciously inspecting everything that gets pumped into their heads.  The sheep have names like Dick instead of Richard, and once elevated part Richard it upscales to Dr. Richard, Sir Richard and eventually the deification is complete with Lord Richard Somethingorother.

 

But rather than gush an apology to all Larrys on earth for this highly obvious statement of facts, I’ll simple raise the bar a little and see if I can offend even more people who allow their names to be short-changed.

 

If your name is “Bob” and you’re trying to build credibility/power switch to Robert.  If it’s Mike, try Michael, if Jim try James, if Sue try Susan, or if Cathy try Katherine.  See how it works?

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Short names and the use thereof is best reserved for familiars (to borrow a Middle English/slander of theWiccan concept).  Which is why in my sales career I always tried to use longer proper names until I had established some rapport with people and then ask “Say, Richard, may I call you Dick?”  or “Robert – may I call you Bob?”  Four out of five times they actually preferred the longer name.

 

Seems that at some preconscious level people want to be upgraded to long-name and they tend to like people who give them the upgrade.  Which is why – if you’re in the #3 business employing sociopaths you figure a way to issue upgrades to buy sales, eh?  I assume you know this: Sales places third to politics and law employing sociopaths, but they already have their coding with words like “Your Honor”, “Senator” “Congressman” and so forth…

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Let me give you my personal example of how successful this strategy can be:  For a long time I had people yelling at me “Hey you! Dumb sh*t!”  I’ve actually convinced a few to call me George and it makes me feel good.

 

Outlook Entry

Our Luxembourg reader has been tinkering with dates and meanings of 2012 and suggests something worth considering:

“If you believe in the Codex Dresdensis of the Mayas, you should take into consideration also that their 21.12.2012 should be adapted for the passage from Julian to Gregorian calendar, i.e. the terrible ‘events’ will not happen before 2014. This will probably give Sony an opportunity for another movie. Also, stated in their codex, is that after this cycle of the sun supposedly ending in 2012, there will be another one, the last one. So that gives us at least another 5.125 years to endure this earthly life. Alas! “

Here’s the deal:  Way I have it figured is that as long as I can be bilked into handing over 33% (or more) of everything I make to people who want to “rule” me – and then go pick fights so they can ‘defend me” and then make me sick so they can “medicate me” and then wear me our so they can “retire me” they’ll keep me alive.

 

Gotta be at least a few among the PowersThatBe bright enough to figure out that if I’m not working and paying my tribute, they go down in flames, right?

 

Downer Under

Reader from Oz asks:

“Hi George Can you let me know what that ISP address is? Our internet filtering in Australia will soon be underway, and I don’t want to miss out on your posts. thanks “

Yep:  Try http://72.52.163.140/ for UrbanSurvival and http://72.52.172.133/ for Peoplenomics. Peoplenomics also has a secure layer: https://72.52.172.133/  and yes, it’s safe to continue to it.

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I will be setting up email addresses with auto-responders so you should be able to write to ip@urbansurvival.com or ip@peoplenomics.com and get an automatic email back with IP addresses.

 

Wouldn’t surprise me to see the PowersThatBe figure out that in order to keep a critical mass of humans from getting together and questioning Paradigm Control that they will need to turn off the easy/convenient way of surfing the net, so by going to fixed IP addresses they could no doubt buy themselves time.  Until, of course, forwarding thinking people figure out how to get around that and direct IP addressing may be one way…anyway, a lot cost high potential payoff to be implemented here anyway.  Might consider it for your company web site, too, if your income is web-dependent.  I like fixed IP’s a lot.

 

The Eternal Optimist

See how optimistic that last bit sounded?  Why, every so often I get ill-advised emails from people who say “You’re/Ure a doom and gloomer!”  No, I am not.

 

I’m more like the guy who – in the middle of an airplane falling out of the sky towards a horrific crash – will look at you from the seat to yours and says “Great!  We’re landing early for a change…”

 

There’s no excuse not to have a good attitude.  Unless you’re out of booze and pills, of course.

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Send your comments to george@ure.net

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The UrbanSurvival Mall:

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“Live on $10,000″ A Year

With another round of layoffs due to start later this month…a round which will start to axe many of the middle managers who have managed to avoid the HR grenades…might I suggest a preemptive tactical move?  Voluntarily dropping your lifestyle back a bit, since we’re all being marched down that road by either circumstances or some out-of-control-PTB types who write checks to Washington lobby and to anti-reformers in California!  A good starting point, at least if you’ve still got $10-bucks is my e-book “How to Live on #10,000 a Year…or less!”

 

 

 

It’s an automatic download.  It’s written in an information dense style: The whole thing runs about 65 pages, but it gives you a vision of how to not only live on the cheap, but also how to migrate up the economic foodchain if you have a little hustle left…  Click here for the index and details.

 

MyGroPonics

My commodity broker JB Slear and I have written a simple book to get you started on high density hydroponics.  It’s an example of how someone with a little creativity, access to a few ‘dollar stores’ and willing to try out some new farming techniques can grow an amazing amount of produce sin a very small space – like even an apartment balcony (if it gets some sunlight).  Sound interesting?  It’s just $10 bucks here…

 

       

 

Pass It On

The business model of this website is base Simply click here and send a link to this site to everyone on your distro list…Nothing more dangerous than sharp, clear-thinking upstarts who ask a lot of questions, eh?  Unless you believe WTC-7 fell over on its own, of course….

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 Last week’s report is here.    For back issues of this site, click here.  (Goes back to 1997!)