August 2012 Word Of The Month – Rhetoric

Tags

argument, christe, eastwood, ethos, fiction, logos, non fiction, obama, pathos, politics, rand, rhetoric, romney, rubio, speeches, Writing

This week I’ve watched much of the Republican National Convention, the RNC, and this leads to my word of the month: Rhetoric. It is easy to get caught up in speeches. They are well crafted and powerful. They are designed to be persuasive. They employ the techniques of rhetoric. Rhetoric is the art of discourse in formal discussion. It usually refers to spoken words but also includes written words.

Aristotle is the father of this idea. His idea was that effective, persuasive speech consisted of one or more of ethos, pathos, or logos.

Ethos – appeal to the speaker’s own character.

Representative Paul Ryan: I’m a Catholic deer hunter.

Pathos – appeal to the emotions of the audience.

Senator Marco Rubio: But America was founded on the principle that every person has God-given rights. That power belongs to the people. That government exists to protect our rights and serve our interests.
That we shouldn’t be trapped in the circumstances of our birth. That we should be free to go as far as our talents and work can take us.

Logos – inductive or deductive logic.

Senator Rand Paul: When you seek to punish Mr. Exxon Mobil, you  punish the secretary who owns Exxon Mobil stock. When you block the Keystone Pipeline, you  punish the welder who works on the pipeline. [This is a combination of ethos and logos. It is a logical argument that appeals to the heart strings of investors who have seen their savings dwindle.]

Some passages contain all three:

Governor Chris Christie: They said it was impossible to cut taxes in a state where taxes were raised 115 times in eight years. [pathos and logos] That it was impossible to balance a budget at the same time, with an $11 billion deficit. [pathos and logos] Three years later, we have three balanced budgets with lower taxes. [Ethos and Logos]

We also have the term rhetorical question. It is a question made for effect and is unanswerable.

Governor Mitt Romney: If you felt that excitement when you voted for Barack Obama, shouldn’t you feel that way now that he’s President Obama?

The RNC speeches were not debates or discussions. Ethos and Pathos are not valid when arguing. These speeches are designed to trigger emotion. If you’ve followed various news channels, you’d note that they could not sift through the speeches point by point and argue for or against. Their analysis was very much message oriented: so and so appealed to gun owners or his message was to show Romney was a caring person. One can easily get caught up in the rhetoric. At times even I did. I felt Governor Christie’s emotions. I felt Senator Rubio’s conviction. I felt Clint Eastwood’s humor. I enjoyed the speeches. I thought most were fantastic examples of rhetoric.

Next week is the Democratic National Convention. Watch it and pick out the rhetorical arguments and questions. Dissect the speeches for what they are. Then as we approach the election, hopefully we can sift out the rhetoric and get down to the real issues at hand. Better yet, maybe we can use such techniques in our own writing, fiction and fact.

Changes

Tags

author, character, diabetes, focus, novel, personality, plot, riptide, story, theme, unemployment, Writing

You can read David Bowie’s lyrics here and listen to his song here.

I’ve seen a lot of changes in my life. I’ve described this diabetes affliction as a ball and chain, an inhibitor of change. I’ve drug the thing around for nearly 37 years, and yes, it is a heavy burden. But I’ve moved forward. I no longer live with unknown blood sugars, hopelessness, 911 calls, constant late night hypos, or fear. Yes, those were the days prior to me pumping, prior to June 26, 2006. I’ve made major changes in my own health care. I’m now my doctors’ best patient. They shake their heads when I leave the room. I still carry the ball and chain, but I swing it like a grandfather watch. I look at it and ask it what time it is, and I slide it in my pocket as the master of a business empire might.

No, things are not now perfect, but they’re good. I have much more focus and much more confidence. I now call myself one of Canada’s best read authors based on my correspondence in various diabetes forums. I’ve made well over 15,000 posts, some of them quite lengthy. Even a mere 100 words each comes out to 1,500,000 words. Some have been read tens of thousands of times, some over a hundred thousand. That many posts times 1,000 reads each is 15 million reads. If this was my novel writing, I’d be rich and famous. I’m obscure at best. Many posts are fluff, but most are serious. I have fans. People have told me I’ve saved their life. I’ve told people they’ve saved my life, and they have. Their words have. The words they spoke when I asked the right questions. The questions I asked when I changed my attitude. The answers I finally heard when I began listening to others, the real experts, the other diabetics out there seeking help, seeking change.

I’ve learned to write, at least that’s what I tell myself. I am a type B personality. I am the furthest person on the scale my university organizational behavior professor had ever seen. I wish I could remember her name. She was hot. She wasn’t hot in the entertainment sense; she was hot as a person. She was strong, confident, yes she was good looking, but she moved forward with power and grace. She was not a woman young men ogled over. She was a woman young men feared. When she walked through the halls full of students, she didn’t fit in. She stood out gracefully. She never smiled in the halls. In class I could feel her words, her message: learn your own strengths; learn to change. I nearly failed that course. I found it distasteful to surgically categorize people, yet I loved it. It’s the one course in business school I use almost all the time when writing fiction: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Herzberg’s Dual-Factor Theory, and Vroom’s Expectancy Theory of Motivation stay with me. Dr. Stuart-Koetze’s textbook is the only one left on my shelf. Oh how that shelf has changed over the years too [blog idea alert]. I learned that I need to communicate. I love working on teams with people. I hate sitting alone working on a project — that didn’t sound right for a writer. I also learned I don’t lead by talking. My ideas come to the surface slowly. They perk like a good cup of Folgers, and my ideas are good to the clichéd last drop. Writing suits my soul. I love sitting alone working on a project when I’m tapped into my mind, when I’m free to let my ideas flow. I do think it’s my strength.

I have never looked negatively on change. I look negatively on stagnancy, even though I’m guilty of wearing boots unfit for trudging in mud. I’m a type B personality. I don’t create change for the sake of change; I simply ride the waves and enjoy the ride, trying to steer my board to a beach rather than rocks. I’m good at riding waves, not at finding new, better waves.

And now I’m faced with a new change in my life. I am no longer employed with the firm that employed me yesterday. Technically I still am, but I’m free to stay home and write blogs, drink rum, and play computer games. It’s not a change I’m upset about. It was expected. We used to be a shop of 150 and now about 30. I’m one of the last to go. I’m happy to be moving forward. I admit I needed a push. I have no idea what I want the new wave to look like or go, no, yes I do know. But that approach, that stretch of sand is filled with big, scary sharks and sharp rocks. It’s almost assured I will crash and be swept out to see, a casualty of this wave called life. I want to write. I want to be a writer. I remind myself it’s not the beach that’s important but the wave. It’s the words and ideas and self expression that matter, nothing else.

I can carry this attitude for a while; then I will have to find new employment. Joy. It’s tough writing these words; because, well, I am not a writer. I have no training, no experience, no supporters. When I tell people I’m writing a novel I get the standard “that’s nice John, but what are you really doing with your life” look. My wife is afraid to read it. She’s afraid of breaking John’s heart. My writing group nods passively — I don’t know if they really like it or if they don’t want to upset me with criticism. My friends think I’m just crazy. Novelists don’t make money; they don’t support their family; they have no hope for success. I admit I’m no Stephen King or Ken Follett. I have an impossible task in front of me.

This writing business is a real ball and chain. It’s not the same burden as diabetes. It’s a load I choose to carry. This is not a culmination of a life of experience; it’s merely another fad hobby in John’s life. It’s not hockey [midget AAA]; it’s not chess [CFC 1900 class A]; and it’s not photography. My infatuation will end like all my other diversions have ended. I no longer play hockey or chess. I no longer photograph much. I could drop writing just like that, couldn’t I? I have said over the years that I have a peculiar strength: I can see patterns others can’t. Playing hockey I could see the whole ice and the movement of every player. I had hands of stone, though. In chess I saw more forces at work than most players could see. I’ve surprised masters with my analysis. I’ve beaten a master. Yet I couldn’t easily see the straight route to the king. I find photography a natural fit. I let the lines and shapes fall into position on their own, yet photographing people posing for the shot is a completely mind-boggling task. I really think my strengths are suited to writing: I can see the plots, themes, motivations, tensions, etc. I am also not suited to writing. My focus on the complex story often leaves good writing technique drowning in a riptide as I walk along looking for shells and lost coins.

I wrote last night, and I think I wrote well. I now have 92,201 first draft quality words with 15,492 left to work through. I am planning on making the time over the next weeks to finish a draft of this thing ahead of schedule, get my wife to read it, then if she doesn’t die from embarrassment, get someone qualified in vetting stories to read it. I have two people in mind, both have suggested they are willing to help. But I need some feedback soon, and I need to get this weight off my shoulders. I also need cup of coffee number two and a shower.

Later.

*One of the drivers of wanting to complete this story is its potential commercial viability. I’ll be honest here: such thinking is wrong. I’m writing these words largely to expel them from my head; because they do not belong in a writer’s head. But it’s a big, attractive story. It’s a story any adult in Canada would turn their head at, and I can’t find any equivalents in my head. It’s not a fluffy character-based story where the plot needs to be extracted and can only be seen at the end. My story is not on the level of Harry Potter or Lord Of The Rings. I’m not that pretentious. The Grapes of Wrath comes to mind: it’s a national story, a story everybody will immediately recognize, but it’s a story with attractive bling not dusty destitution. I won’t claim the writing matches the story. I will need an expensive editor. I may need a new author.

Final 20,000 Words

Tags

editing, jig saw puzzle, music, novel, rolling stones, story, Writing

Last night’s session left me with 88,000 words edited of my 105,000 word story. About 150 pages have been through a second edit and 200 or so a first edit. This doesn’t add up to 20,000 left to edit, but I know a few things:
– my ending is wrong. It needs a complete re-write.
– the setup for the ending is incomplete. It needs more internalization, and a character needs to go away.
– the penultimate scene needs a better focus, and I think I found it this morning in the shower.

Many words need to go, many new words need to appear, and it probably adds to much more than 20,000. But I like the number, and there is a reason I like the number.

I started thinking about this story back in 1977 when I turned 16. I received a stereo system for that occasion, and I still run the turntable. I also bought a lot of records that year. My favorite, and still my favorite, was The Rolling Stones’ Beggar’s Banquet. I must have played it a thousand times since then.

One song on that album always caught my attention. I can’t say it’s my favorite tune. In fact, it’s possibly the most difficult for me to listen to. The lyrics are largely non-sensical, at least to me. But it created an image in my head, a radical image of big encounter between 20,000 grandmas and Queen Elizabeth and her Guards. The song of course is Jigsaw Puzzle.

JIG-SAW PUZZLE
(M. Jagger/K. Richards)

There’s a tramp sittin’ on my doorstep
Tryin’ to waste his time
With his methylated sandwich
He’s a walking clothesline
And here comes the bishop’s daughter
On the other side
She looks a trifle jealous
She’s been an outcast all her life

Me, I’m waiting so patiently
Lying on the floor
I’m just trying to do my jig-saw puzzle
Before it rains anymore

Oh the gangster looks so fright’ning
With his luger in his hand
But when he gets home to his children
He’s a family man
But when it comes to the nitty-gritty
He can shove in his knife
Yes he really looks quite religious
He’s been an outlaw all his life

Me, I’m waiting so patiently
Lying on the floor
I’m just trying to do this jig-saw puzzle
Before it rains anymore

Me, I’m waiting so patiently
Lying on the floor
I’m just trying to do this jig-saw puzzle
Before it rains anymore

Oh the singer, he looks angry
At being thrown to the lions
And the bass player, he looks nervous
About the girls outside
And the drummer, he’s so shattered
Trying to keep on time
And the guitar players look damaged
They’ve been outcasts all thier lives

Me, I’m waiting so patiently
Lying on the floor
I’m just trying to do this jig-saw puzzle
Before it rains anymore

Oh, there’s twenty-thousand grandmas
Wave their hankies in the air
All burning up their pensions
And shouting, “It’s not fair!”
There’s a regiment of soldiers
Standing looking on
And the queen is bravely shouting,
“What the hell is going on?”

With a blood-curdling “tally-ho”
She charged into the ranks
And blessed all those grandmas who
With their dying breaths screamed, “Thanks!”

Me, I’m just waiting so patiently
With my woman on the floor
We’re just trying to do this jig-saw puzzle
Before it rains anymore

The imagery of the song overwhelms the melancholic tune and makes it an underground fan favorite. And this image of battling grandmas has stayed in my head all these years.

In the winter of 2010-2011 I had completed my first NaNoWriMo and was searching for a new story. Of course I played this LP during that time and the image came up once again. I let it ferment awhile. I played with it. I played with current events. My coworker Bill and I went outside everyday for a smoke and a political talk. Bill and I share the same birthday and we both photograph. Our personalities contend, and we have interesting discussions. He can be uber-serious, but he always adds his friendly laugh. He’s one of my favorite people to be around.

I mulled over different scenarios that might end up with 20,000 grandmas rioting. Your mind is probably racing right now as mine did, and there are many problems creating such a scenario. I won’t discuss my options or solutions, but this song is the root of my inspiration.

Then one morning in February I woke up with a whole novel in my head, just like that. “Wow” I said to myself; this works. This really works. So I worked it. I worked it a lot, and I’m still working it. It’s an epic plot, naturally, but I think it’s balanced with a strong character and tied together with interesting themes.

*Sigh* I know I want to tell the story to people, I think. I’m still battling the ending. It’s a difficult book to end properly, and I’m sure I will discuss it with my readers and hopefully agents and editors lining up for a cut of John’s book. *wink*

Target date for completed two rounds of edits is still end of September.

Weekend At The Cottage

Tags

cottage, friends, huggable, nubile, Writing

We spent the weekend at a friend’s cottage along the Northumberland Strait in Nova Scotia, just east of Rushton’s Beach if you can find it on a map. The water was warm, the beer cold, and the 30 or so friends all friendly. We smoked some huge pieces of meat, played games, talked, and just vegged out.

I thought a bit about my writing and how I want to proceed. These casual discussions told me I’m not perceived as a writer, not by my wife, not by my friends, not by anybody but people who have heard me read.

Ah, a key piece of the puzzle. People need to read my writing. It’s a scary thought, though. I’ve been pounding the idea into my head for the last couple of years that I can write, that I do write, and that I should write, write for fame, and fortune, write to make a difference, write to write. I don’t know if I believe these purposes or not, but the last one sticks out whenever I think about it. It pops its head up like a previously sleeping dog smelling a plate of pulled pork entering a room. I need to write for the sake of writing.

Looking back over the year since last November I think I can say I have written. I expanded my current story from 52k words to a current 105k, and this effort involved ditching completely probably 50k words. I’ve written a lot of poetry too. I can’t honestly call it poetry, though. It’s more like prose-poetry, to me. Still, it’s creative. I’ve spent the majority of my writing time editing: massaging my prose. It’s hard work. It is creative work too, but it’s harder. It’s different.

A meal alone is different than a meal with friends. The extra food I took home will taste good, but it won’t taste as good as it did straight out of the oven and shared with 30 huggable people. And Ross, nubility does not apply.

By the way, my blood sugars stayed perfect, and I didn’t get drunk enough to fall down.

Writing is similar. There’s creatively juicy writing and businessy polished writing. I feel my creative juices flowing right now. I have an urge to write

The problem is I have story already to begin for NaNoWriMo. If I dig into it now, I’ll need a new story for November. It may also put my current editing on the shelve. I don’t like that idea; I may never get it off. But then again, maybe this creative outlet will help me with my editing. Maybe It will satisfy the urges enough for me to be able to sit down with my business focus.

Steven King does it, so why can’t I? The King works on two projects: one during the day and one in the evening. One is a new write and the other an edit. He can pay for his time, though. I can’t. I need to be a little more frugal.

Maybe I can try writing new stories one or two nights a week. Maybe that will be enough to whet the appetite and motivate me to edit more. Feed creativity with creativity.

Heck, what’s the worry? I’m a  writer. It’s only writing.

Change Of Plans

Tags

beach, jellyfish, party, pooh, rain, summer

The rain is falling, on the ground
and the jellyfish dance in the incoming tide
They don’t know it’s a safe day to swim
They don’t know the speed boats and daredevil teens
Won’t  rupture their journey
They plunge away, like they always have

 

The Prompt
For today’s prompt, write a change of plans poem. The change of plans can be a good change or a horrible change. It can be prompted by the weather or a person (or group of people). Everyone’s been there, right?

Experiment: Weight Training

Tags

diabetes, exercise, weight loss, weight training

A brief history:
– four years LCHF eating
– down 21lbs and fluctuating up and down
– Blood Sugars fairly good but not best
– Constant ketosis and feeling great
– Not exercising regularly

The last point, no regular exercise, is something I want to tackle. Let’s face it though, I’m a thinker. I’d rather sit in a nice soft chair with a coffee and think random thoughts all day. To get up and say mow the lawn takes a Samsonian effort. Procrastination is my middle name. My Google blog, which I haven’t posted to yet, is called “Hopelessly Delinquent.”

Of course my endocrinologist, God’s gift to diabetics everywhere *that was sarcasm*, harps on me for not exercising more. According to the holy one, it’s the only way I can lose weight. And after these four years of fighting him, I think he may be right. I participate in many discussion forums, and a common thread I hear is “you gotta work!” The time has come for John to work at getting those fifty pounds off, and if that doesn’t work, we’re going to have a serious discussion with the almighty endo.

I have 400 pounds of standard weights, 7ft, 6ft, and a curl bars, and a power rack. You’d think there’d be no excuses for using it. Mind you the room has been filled with junk all summer as we’ve replaced the floors in the house. But there’s no more acceptable excuses. It’s now Grok time!

I’m hitting a routine I’ve used before, a basic full body workout where I perform three sets of 8 to 12 reps, generally. Some exercises like bench press I’ll do 6 to 10 reps, and others like squats, I’ll do 15 to 20 reps. This is a program out of an old Lou Ferrigno book. It has worked for me before, and I plan on following it for three months to build up my all around strength steadily and safely.

I’m starting out very light, extremely light. People will laugh at my weakness. Pfft. Remember, I’m overweight and out of shape. I need to get my muscles used to lifting and I need to find my points of failure. I will add weight rapidly. Anybody who has ever started from scratch knows that you feel like a convoy of trucks ran over you in the early going. Your stiff all over and your body shakes and quakes from the intensity. You really do need to start out light.

I also know I won’t go real heavy. I work out at home alone. I am protected by my power rack — my squats and bench presses are statically spotted. I can drop 500lbs on my chest and know the bars will catch them. They restrict movement slightly, but hey, I’m doing the exercises. It takes me an hour, maybe a bit more. Joining a gym would cost me two to three hours plus lots of bucks I don’t have. The hardcore trainers will of course cringe, but feel good that John performs safely. He doesn’t lift more than he’s capable of, and he practices good form.

I progress steadily. When I hit my max reps, say three sets of 12 reps, the next session I will add weight and drop the reps down to three 8’s, or maybe a bit higher. I will then progress the reps until I max out again. Here’s an example.
– Day 1 100lbs 10 10 10
– Day 2 100lbs 12 11 10
– Day 3 100lbs 12 12 12
– Day 4 110lbs 8 8 8
– Day 5 110lbs 10 10 10 (previous day felt awesome, so I stepped it up)
– Day 6 110lbs 12 11 10
– Day 7 110lbs 12 12 12
– Day 8 120lbs 8 8 8

You can by following this method of progression my resistance increases steadily. The idea is that the final rep on th third set will be very close to failure. For obvious reasons I don’t go to failure, especially for the dangerous exercises such as squats and bench presses. But if I fails on a leg extension, who cares? I might make a long bang, but I won’t drop anything on a body part.

I listen to my body. I’ve never strained a muscle training before, but if something does happen, I know enough to stop, rest, and seek help. I hope.

My first session was Friday Aug 10. I started with two sets of squats using 70lbs. I did 20 reps each. I proceeded through leg extensions, leg curls, calf raises, bench press, bent rows, overhead press, upright row, bicep curls, and tricep curls. I skipped wrist rolls. I performed only one rep of the last two exercises. These are not major muscles, and I already felt worked. Again, we’re talking very light weights here. 40lb bench presses will not impress anybody.

I’m tracking vitals while I do this:
BP 132/71 before and 120/65 after
BG 6.0 before and 9.0 after then 10.0 an hour later

It’s interesting that BP dropped and blood sugars rose. These were actually expected. Another interesting note is I didn’t hypo later. Past sessions have always resulted in major BG drops through the night.

On day 2, Sunday, I upped intensity. I felt stiffness in my calves, but nowhere else. I barely felt stressed, but I didn’t let that go to my head. I upped my reps to three sets of each, and I upped my squats to 90lbs, 3×15. I didn’t fail at anything; though those nasty 40lb bench presses stung. I’ve always struggled with upper body strength. At one point I could squat 350lbs and barely press 120. Pfft.

I felt worked after this session, and my vitals were once again interesting
BP 130/71 to 108/62
BG 6.2 to  8.9 and it kept rising. I changed my pump set and got it around 7 for bed. I woke up around 7, so once again no major hypos following. This morning I’m feeling worked. I’m feeling muscle tingling and tightening in my legs, butt and chest. I feel the work, and that is an awesome feeling.

So we’ll se how this goes. We’ll see if I can continue, if it helps me lose fat, and if it helps me feel better and write better. I’ll revisit after a month.

[Starting weight: 229.6]

Harmonizing Guidelines for the Treatment of Chronic Illnesses – Diabetes

Premiers Forge Own Healthcare Path

Whoop! NOT!!

Recently Canada’s premiers [equivalent to American Governors] all got together for their regular talks. Don’t ask me when they meet. I’m an American and can’t vote for them, so I don’t usually pay attention to the details of such things. Actually I wouldn’t remember anyway; I focus on important topics. *har har*

I only want to talk about one statement in the article. I feel the impetus to discuss the entire realm of social medicine, but that would be going down a rat hole. The statement is harmonizing guidelines for the treatment of chronic illnesses.

Yes, I’m saying this is a bad objective. In fact, I’m saying it’s pure folly. It will kill even more people off early.

“Pretty dramatic statements there John.”
“Yup.”
“Can you explain what you mean by them?”
“Yup.”
…

But do you really want to listen? Do you really want to think? Let’s begin with a startling statistic:

In the United States alone, nearly 90% of adult diabetics — more than 16 million adults aged 35 and older — have blood sugar, blood pressure, and cholesterol that are not treated effectively, meaning they do not meet widely accepted targets for healthy levels of blood sugar, blood pressure, and cholesterol. In Mexico, 99% of adult diabetics are not meeting those targets. The study, “Management of diabetes and associated cardiovascular risk factors in seven countries: a comparison of data from national health examination surveys,” is published in the Bulletin of the World Health Organization’s March edition.

We have a 90% failure rate to achieve our objectives. Nine out of every ten diabetics is headed to an early grave. That’s about 7% of the entire population, and in Canada that means about 2 million people are not effectively treated for their diabetes.

“That’s a double negative. You can’t use double negatives.”
“Why not?”
“Because it doesn’t work.”
“Exactly!”

The system is broken. Why do we want to strengthen a broken system?

“It’s not broken, John. Patients simply refuse to follow directions.”

Amazingly this is the same reason the USDA gives for the obesity epidemic.

“It’s not broken, John. People simply refuse to follow our guidelines.”

Let me tell you something. People are following orders, sorry, guidelines. I always did. But then, well, I stopped following them.

“Bad John!”
“But they weren’t working. Why should I do something that doesn’t work?”
“We can’t help you if you do not follow our directions.”
“I’ll try harder this time.”

Thirty two years later John is being wheeled into surgery, unable to see anything but the blood in his left eye. Sorry, I wish I followed directions a little better. Dang.

There is a group of people actually doing very well managing their diabetes. There are no statistics, but I estimate at least half are achieving the required objectives. It might even be as high as 90% success rate. Many blow these target numbers away. Mine do, usually:

Measure->Target->John’s Number
A1C<-6.5%<-6.4% (best 5.6%)
LDL<-2<-1.82
HDL->1.6->2.92
TG<-1.5<-.44
BP<-140/80<-130/71

What is this group and how do they do it? It is called the DOC or Diabetes Online Community. We discuss, debate, encourage, support, cheer, hold hands, love, and we help each other. If I have a question about anything, all I need to do is ask. I go to a forum, post the question and wait. Ten minutes later I have half a dozen experts giving me their opinions. Let’s be clear about my numbers. I set my own basal rates and I:C ratios. I basal tested intensively. I profiled my meals and titrated my doses. I adjusted my diet to a very high fat, low carb eating style to where my lipids look outstanding and my complications have halted, and I got my own blood pressure down to near normal. I tested tonight after exercise at 106/59. I’m almost 52 years old and have been diabetic for 37 years. Under doctors’ care I bested my A1C at 7.3%, ran high BP over 140/80, and my cholesterol sucked so bad I actually agreed to take a statin. I learned almost every technique I used from other diabetics, either directly or from a website such as a blog. My endo never heard of basal testing, doesn’t agree with high fat diets, and won’t even comment on my BP.

Actual conversation when I asked about better ways to set my basal rates:

Dr. John: “Linda [DE] has algorithms for setting basal rates.”
Linda:”Dr. John sets all basal rates.”

Later:

Spike: “Simply basal test. Basal rates should keep your basals flat without food, and the only way to do that is skip your meals and test.”
John: “That sounds too easy.”
Spike: “It’s very simple. I don’t understand why all doctors don’t do this.”

I know why; because they are resistant to change, stuck in their ways, and reliant on guidelines.

“These aren’t doctors. They don’t know what they’re talking about. It’s dangerous.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Stay away from them.”
“Okay, so what do I do when I have a question?”
“Read our pamphlets.”
“What if it’s not in a pamphlet.”
“Call your diabetes educator.”
“What if it’s in the middle of the night?”
“It can wait until morning.”
“Can I call you?”
“I don’t take calls.”

You know, I make a half a dozen or so life and death decisions every day, and I don’t take days off. I have this ball and chain attached to me permanently, and I can’t live my life by carrying around a suitcase full of fucking pamphlets. Sorry, but I can’t. That fact is that under the current system, when things don’t work well people get frustrated and quit.

“You can’t quit. This is too serious.”
“Don’t you think if it’s so serious, you’d design a system of help where I could ask for assistance 24*7 where I could get advice relevant to me, where I could talk to someone matter-of-factly instead of being lectured to, where they would consider my own choices and not try to force me into a one-size-fits-all diet, insulin regimen, or exercise program?”
“We talk about those things at your annual check-up.”
“You talk about these things. I am only allowed to listen.”
“I can only spend 15 minutes with a patient.”

*Red Alert, John is about to go postal!*

We don’t need more pamphlets or courses or doctors visits or endo visits. What we need is 24×7 assistance whenever we need it, wherever we are, from someone who will accept our individual care plans, who will not berate us, cajole us, or lecture us but who will cheer us and make us feel good about what we are trying to do.

We are not getting this from our healthcare system, and anything that moves us further away from the support we need is a bad move, a very bad move.

Suck it up, healthcare policy makers and practitioners. Accept the fact that patients in the DOC do a far better job than you ever will. We are the true masters of this domain, and it’s time you listened to us! John’s recommendation? Prescribe a membership at a diabetes forum to every patient. Set an official target of 1,000 posts a year. Berate them if they fail!

An the answer to whether I will take a statin is still no!

Cholesterol Logic

Tags

asociation, carbohydrates, cholesterol, faith, food, insulin, LDL, nutrition, saturated fat, science, studies, sugar, sugar kills

Cholesterol is a hot and complicated topic. It’s not easy to wrap your head around it, especially when you consider that even the experts haven’t so far.

Here’s a bit of proof: The National Heart Lung and Blood Institute is in charge of cholesterol treatment policy. It tells the rest of the world what to do. Nevermind for now that Big Pharma tells the NHLBI what do do. The fact is the NHLBI does not know what causes atherosclerosis. They cannot say without reasonable doubt that cholesterol causes it. In fact, they say outright “The exact cause of atherosclerosis isn’t known.”

For the logically feeble readers: if you do not know what causes something, you cannot say what causes something.

“Bill, somebody egged our windows again.”
“It’s those damned Pentecostals, Martha.”
“How do you know it’s them and not the Catholics?”
“Because I see them driving up and down the street all the time in their bus!”

This is cholesterol logic. It’s thinking like this that has made the western world fat and sick. It’s this type of logic that has made it okay to drink Coke and Pepsi, to add sugar to 87% of the 600,000 food products in America *Dr. Lustig Rumor from #AHS12*, and to consider bread a household staple because it tastes good and is full of added vitamins which many think we only pee away.

The path to cholesterol policy has not been paved with good science. We fed excess cholesterol to rabbits, herbivores, and they developed atherosclerosis. Nobody asked why. Nobody speculated if that cholesterol was sitting in a box for three months that it might be somewhat rancid. Nobody asked whether feeding a foreign substance to a herbivore was valid. Nobody asked whether no dead rabbits was important.

“Eating cholesterol hardens arteries, and that’s all that matters.”

Apparently that’s not all that matters. Anything that raises or lowers cholesterol also matters. *palm-plant* Eating saturated fat raises cholesterol; therefore it’s bad for you. Oatmeal lowers cholesterol; therefore it’s good for you.

“But the Presbyterians also drive their bus up and down the street, Bill.”
“It can’t be them. We’re Presbyterians.”

Cholesterol logic.

There have been lots of studies about the associations between cholesterol and heart disease, and there have been many studies on associations between foods and cholesterol. By extension, either directly or implied, there are also associations between food consumption and death by cause. Which of these is most important?

The answer is none of them. All association studies do is raise questions. We cannot assign cause to associations. I don’t care how good your math is, statistics do not form physical links between two things. This has been written about time and again, and I’ve argued it with mathematical geniuses. But the fact remains: math can never explain a cause of anything. You always need to proceed with scientific experiments to validate the questions.

Scientific experiments have never proven cholesterol or saturated fat causes heart disease; therefore the NHLBI’s assertion that we do not know its causes is correct.

And we should, therefore, not be saying what is or isn’t dangerous based on such evidence. The Seven Countries Study, The China Study, the Nurses Health Study, The Farmingham Study, and countless others should only raise questions; they do not provide any answers. Anybody who makes a conclusion about cause based on an association study is either totally incompetent or biased, take your pick.

Let’s quickly take a look at a confounding study: Dr. Ronald Krause’s 2010 Meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies evaluating the association of saturated fat with cardiovascular disease. This study basically says all the other food studies are wrong: they do not prove there’s an association between saturated fat consumption and heart disease.

“But it’s obvious that eating animal fats and meats raises cholesterol; therefore it must be bad.”
“I hope you don’t bet on the races much.”
“The races? They have nothing to do with this discussion.”
“Exactly!”

Cholesterol logic.

I won’t get into metabolism much; because I am not a biologist, but I do know enough to be a little dangerous. Please correct me if I’m wrong here.

Dr. Peter Attia states that LDL-P is the problem, not LDL-C. Let’s first look at the “science” of fat metabolism without getting into the details. Fats are packaged in our guts into chylomicrons which utilize an APO-B 48 protein. The liver packages available carbon energy into triglycerides utilizing the APO-B 100 protein. The 100 means it expresses 100% of an LDL particle. Fats do not contribute directly to LDL counts. Period. This simple gap should exclude all such discussion, but of course it doesn’t. We have to place our trust in more remote, black box effects like studies.

“These people ate more fat and their LDL-C went up. Therefore, fat cause cholesterol to rise.”
“Couldn’t something else cause it to rise?”
“What kind of stupid question is that? You get a C for your grade.”
“Sorry, I thought science programs encouraged stupid questions.”
“Only stupid questions that make us rich and famous.”

Cholesterol logic.

Possible explanations: Eating high sugar degrades LDL quality. The resulting particles are smaller, and since the Friedwald Calculation is based on volume, the LDL-C looks lower. And when sugars [fuel for TG production] are eliminated, the rise in LDL-C is due to large, fluffy, benign particles. We are pretty sure that high triglyceride production results in low LDL particle size, but I do acknowledge that this is an association as is small LDL particle size with increased risk of atherosclerosis. But if you want to trade association punches, I submit that mine are stronger than yours. Let’s go! Actually, the smallness theory lives in somewhat of a doubtful house. The whole retention-response theory holds very little attraction due to scarce and conflicting evidence. Still, it seems likely that whatever causes small particles may also cause heart disease, just like whatever causes obesity also causes diabetes [not all type 2 diabetics are obese].

“That makes perfect sense John, but your LDL-C is still higher than I want. Take this statin.”
John sits in stunned silence for a few moments. “No.”

Cholesterol logic.

Here’s an interesting study on Iranian women. These women had very low levels of triglycerides and when their LDL-P was measured, it was discovered the value was far lower than their LDL-C values. It even prompted a proposed new calculation of LDL-C when triglycerides are very low. By the way, if triglycerides are very high, LDL-C isn’t performed because the calculation isn’t reliable. Just sayin’.

Another interesting study shows glycation [attack by sugar] directly decreasing cholesterol size and quality making it atherogenic. To me this is very damning evidence against sugar.

What does John know? Well, his cholesterol numbers are outstanding on a high saturated fat diet, so all of you saturated fat causes cholesterol causes heart disease good can bugger off. John’s eye-artery issues have gone away with his diet. We might say they’ve gone away with his lower blood sugar levels, that’s still a possibility, but it’s more sure with his diet. Zero signs of eye disease in last four years of LCHF. My good BGs have lasted six years. Those first two years were hell. And of course less sugar consumed equals fewer blood sugar problems. Back to logic. If fat was a cause of arterial issues, wouldn’t John’s eyes be getting worse? There’s been zero new blood vessel growth, zero bleeding, zero background retinopathy, and zero artherosclerosis seen in his eyes in four years of LCHF eating. And when I say high fat, I do mean high fat. 60-70 percent of my calories come from fat. I drink a quarter to a half litre of whipping cream every day and use two to six tablespoons of coconut oil plus fatty meat, butter, high fat cheese, olive oil, and more.

Examination of the small blood vessels (arterioles) in the retina of the eye with an ophthalmoscope is valuable for diagnosis. Atherosclerotic arterioles reflect light (emitted by the ophthalmoscope), giving them a “silver wire” appearance.

I am living my life on faith. I am following an ancestral style of eating and dispensing with modern man’s conclusions of what a healthy diet is. I do this largely because what man has said doesn’t add up but also because the results of my forays have been spectacular. I’ll be honest here: I don’t trust humans. They are biased, corrupt, and stupid. I raised my kids by telling them that 80% of people were idiots. “Be in that top 20%,” I said. They said I was wrong. It’s more like 90% are idiots. The biggest fault I see is the populations’ lack of sound logic. They think with Cholesterol Logic.

My Simple Backup System

Tags

backup, novel, security, story

Data stewardship is important. There’s a saying I like to use: “There are two types of computer users: those who have lost data and those who will lose data.” I take it as a given that something bad will happen, and it has. I’ve owned home computers since 1985, a state of the art IBM AT clone with a 40MB hard drive and maybe 16k RAM. After investing hundreds if not thousands of hours into a story, the last thing I want to see on my computer is a big honkin’ error message telling my story is toast.

We need to discuss objectives first. Not every data solution fits everybody’s needs. I guess I’m a power user. I work in the business and I know how to do things your average Joe could never dream of knowing. But I’m a software guy. I’ve always left backup and recovery to the hardware guys, the server administrators.

I need access to my story wherever I am. I like to write at Starbucks, Magnolia’s Café, the city library, and if I’m on the road, a hotel. I also write in various locations around the house: my office/writing room, the living room, bedroom, or basement rec-room. I’ve even ventured out on the deck, but the light there doesn’t agree with my damaged eyes. *I’ll have to blog about diabetes proliferative retinopathy

I want easy recovery. I don’t want to have to rely on a piece of software to compress then decompress my files. If I need to recover, I want to copy the files. I have tons of backup space. My main rig has three drives. Two are two-gigabyte monsters and the other half a gig. My play box has a single 320 megabyte drive. Not sure what my netbook has. I also use my wife’s laptop. I have more than enough space to make copies, and I have enough boxes to spread the risk.

Lets look at some worst case scenarios. Say the house gets robbed and they steal one computer. My other one, hidden under the stairway, remains. I’m safe. Say the house burns down completely. Oops, there goes John’s novels. Say John’s wife once again leaves a tap running and the flood shorts out his downstairs box. We’re safe. Say a hard drive crashes completely. We’re safe. The biggest risk, from a complete loss perspective, is where all my boxes are destroyed. A house fire, a major earthquake, or maybe a hurricane or tornado are threats. Really only the house fire is, and I suppose theft is as well.

Fortunately enabling access from many points and keeping a backup copy off premise are easy objectives to fulfill. It’s called Dropbox. Dropbox is a cloud service that lets you store files, and it’s free for basic usage. I have a low 2.5 GB of free space, far more than I will ever need for my text files.

I also use another service called Evernote. It’s also a cloud service, but this one is designed to help you track notes. I’m always bookmarking websites, and this helps me organize it and store it. It actually stores copies of the webpages versus a simple link. How many times have you linked to something only to have it disappear on you? Then all your bookmarks need to be clicked on. With Evernote, I can browse all my bookmarks visually. But back to backups.

My primary workspace is Dropbox. That’s where my current files live. But of course I don’t trust Dropbox, not with my bestselling novel. For all I know, I might wake up one day to find it gone, a victim of chapter 11. *poof* No, I copy my files to my own computer drives.

I keep all my data in a folder called “_John” which lives on drive D. I back my files up with simple scripts that run an xcopy command. Here’s the simple steps to create the files:

1. Right-click on a folder, preferably the folder to file your backup scripts in, and create a new text document. Give it an appropriate name and change its file extension to .bat. Bat files will execute when double-clicked. *You can also run a bat file from anther bat file by including a single line with its path and full name.

2. Right-click the new bat file and edit it.

3. Type in the xcopy backup command and close the file.

4. Double-click the file and watch it run.

Step number three needs some elucidation. I assume you are running windows. If you are running anything else, you do not need these instructions anyway. Click the start button or windows button and in the search or run box, type “cmd” and hit enter. A black console window will open. Now type “help xcopy” in the new window and hit enter again. The resulting list shows you what all the switches do. Switches are added to the xcopy command to tell it how to perform in specific situations. I use the “/e” and “/y” switches. The first tells it to copy all subdirectories — otherwise you’ll need to run many, many commands — and the second says don’t ask if it’s okay to overwrite. I run these at night while I sleep, and I can’t sit there and say “yes” to everything. his is not a fancy command, but I don’t have fancy needs. I copy everything and let it run.

xcopy needs to use mapped files. You can’t copy server locations using UNC (universal naming convention) format such as \\servername\filename Let’s run through this process quickly. By the way, dropbox will map itself to your drive, so if you are simply copying from dropbox to disk location, no mapping is involved.

Main Writing Files: Dropbox at D:\_john\Dropbox\Dropbox *only the last folder is in the cloud. D:\_john\Dropbox is on my D drive.

All John’s Data Files: D_\john

Backup on 2nd PC”  We’ll call the pc “2nd_PC” because I don’t want to give out the names of my computers for security reasons. I mapped it to drive J and created a file on it which I shared and called _Backup_Dropbox. Here’s the quick steps.

*note that I like to start data file names with an underscore. It tells me it’s my data and not some file Windows or some stray software created.

1. Create the folder on the target computer

2. Right click the folder and share it. (You may need to enable file sharing. Google it.)

3. On the source computer, where you are copying from, you should now see the destination computer in teh network section of windows explorer. If not, fix it.

4. Browse to your shared target folder. Click on the target computer name listed under “Network” in windows explorer, and your shared folder should show up. If not, fix it. Refer to Dr. Google. Copy the address from the address bar.

5. Find your computer listing, where all your drives are displayed. Right click on the word “Computer” and click “Map Network Drive …” Select a drive letter to map to and paste the name of the folder you just copied. You do want to connect always. Click Finish.

File Location Summary

Location of Work:  D:\_john\Dropbox\Dropbox which is my dropbox cloud share.

Backup target 1 on pc_1:  D:\_john\dropbox\_backup

Backup target 2 on pc_2: j:\_Backup_Dropbox *my shared folder

Backup target 3 on pc_1: E:\_D_JOHN_BACKUP\_DROPBOX

The image shows five copy commands. The first three copy my Dropbox working files to three backup locations. The last two copy my writing folder from D to E. No, I am not yet copying this to pc_2.

So how do I execute this? There are two ways I use. Whenever I think I’ve written a significant amount of words that I don’t want to lose — it may only be a single comma 😉 — I will browse to the file and double click it.

I also schedule an execution each night via Task Scheduler. You need to be an administrator to create and execute a task, so if you are not, try to learn how to become one. You can find Task Scheduler in Control Panel->Administrative Tools. Create a task and a wizard will walk you through the steps. It’s pretty easy. Know where your bat file is so you can enter it into the schedule.

Test your work. First, double click your backup bat file. You should see a window open, and it will display all the files being copied. Resolve any errors. Create a new test file in Dropbox or wherever your main files live, and check the next day whether it got copied.

Remember, you can nest work. I also run backups for all my photos, but it takes forever to run. I only run that script once a week.

Good luck.

Thank You Jimmy Moore

Jimmy Moore at Livin’ La Vida Low-Carb Blog included me on his list of new low carb bloggers list for August 2012. If you don’t know Jimmy or have never listened to one of his podcasts, I encourage you to do so. He’s a sweet man, intelligent, and open to all points of view. He’s one of the big drivers in the low carb world but his number one goal is like mine: discover the truths. Neither of us cares about doing what’s right just because we believe in it. We like to examine all sides of arguments. We like to strip things down and see the naked truth.

For those people refered here by Jimmy, I am not devoted to any single subject on this blog. I blog to write. I want to improve my writing, and this blog is a tool I use. I write about writing, diabetes, nutrition, politics, and whatever else might strike my fancy. I am a long time type 1 diabetic, and I’ve found that LCHF eating is what works for me. No other eating regimen has come close. I think everybody should eat lower carb, but I think each of us have our own set points.

An interesting post I read [somewhere¿] last night about skinny type 2’s suggests insulin resistance really may be the target we should be addressing, and high carb increases insulin resistance. But don’t assume IR makes us all fat. IR is not a blanket. IR fluctuates in the various tissues differently. In fat people, IR makes them fatter. In skinny people, IR directs food to muscle. But the outcomes may be the same: the pancreas becomes overloaded, triglycerides rise, LDL become small and oxidized, inflammation rises, and we get sick. Vegans, marathoners, and healthy looking everyday skinny people are not immune from western diseases. It’s not just the overweight people who get sick.

Yeah, Paleo for all seems the easy way to go for me. And for the vegans that will want to respond, understand that I do eat a lot of vegetables. I currently eat about two servings of meat a day, about six servings of veggies, and lots of fat, much of it vegetarian such as coconut oil and olive oil. Last night I picked an early cabbage from the garden, a dozen carrots, and I made a large batch of coleslaw. It’s both a Paleo and a Vegan dish. We have much in common.

The largest thing we should have in common an agreement upon ditching grains and refined carbs from our diets. That is the killer, not the red meat or saturated fat. You stop pushing those unsubstantiated claims on me, and I won’t bother you for your PETA priorities.

PETA brings up another point. Don’t for a second think I or any Paleo or Primal practitioner like to eat Frankenfood. We don’t. We abhor the whole idea of it. I want to re-establish our natural relationship with food. I want to be able to eat food that is as natural as possible, and that is what I shop for. I don’t buy much grocery store meat at all. Mine comes from a butcher who only deals in locally grown, pastured animals, ethically treated animals.

And I also don’t buy your global warming bullshit (that’s a pun, btw). Tens of millions of acres of land have been basically destroyed by crop farming. There are about five thousand micro-organisms per gram of healthy topsoil. On the standard Iowa corn farm, there’s close to zero. The Gulf of Mexico houses one of the largest of many dead zones in the oceans, all because of fertilizer to grow food. How sustainable is that? If the oceans die, we all die. It’s a simple relationship to understand. Global warming will change things. Ocean death will kill the planet.

Can we feed 7 billion people with Paleo? Probably not. This is one of the topics I’ve blogged about but have deleted. It’s a topic that makes everybody upset, including me. I don’t know how to write about population control in a way to make anybody happy.

So if you are reading this far, I commend you for also searching for truths. Good luck, and you may enjoy this post. https://cafemoi.wordpress.com/2012/07/26/wont-that-high-fat-diet-raise-your-cholesterol/