I'm a lab rat!

[Joe Zeff]

Every now and then I get invitations to be screened for various clinical
studies related to diabetes. I always pass the preliminary part but get
turned down because the closest clinic that's involved is "too far
away." Never mind that most of the time the nearest location is closer
to me than the West LA VA Medical Center, where most of the various
doctors I see have their offices. Somebody back on the East Coast where
everything is crammed together has set a limit that just doesn't make
sense out here on the Left Coast.

Recently, however, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that there's a
location in Northridge, within that limit. Last Wednesday, I went down
to fill out the paperwork, but ran into a slight snag: I suddenly
realized that the Nurse Practitioner who is my primary healthcare
provider might prefer me not to get involved, especially as it would
involve taking myself off of one of the two oral medications (Glypizide)
that's been helping me keep my blood sugar under control for the last
several years. (The study itself is a classic double-blind study
comparing a new fast-acting insulin with a similar, already approved form
of insulin as the control.)

Instead of signing everything, I brought it home to read over, then used
the VA's Secure Messaging System to find out what she thought. The next
morning, I had a reply: she approved without question and pointed out
that as the VA already has access to the fast-acting insulin being used
as the control, I could switch over seamlessly when the study ended if
all went well.

I went back this afternoon to have a blood draw and an EKG and give a
urine sample. For this I received $40 in cash. I will receive the same
amount for every visit and, as some of my appointments will be phone
interviews, I'll get an extra $15 for each one, and if I'm able to
complete the full course I'll end up getting about $870 in cash.)

I'm now a lab rat.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info
Sounds a bit like Apple's iPrint Shuffle: you press a button and it
prints something somewhere at random.

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Joe Zeff" <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> wrote in message
news:5284652c$0$26113$862e...@ngroups.net...
[...]

> I'm now a lab rat.

Congratulations! Me being a non-native speaker, would this constitute
a 'windfall'?

Corrie participated in an academic study once, into the effects of
vitamin B. Also double blind, so she didn't know if the pills she
got were really high doses of vitamin B, or dummies.

Then her regular bloodscreen came up, and she had to explain why
here vitamin B level was three times normal. So much for that.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Joe Zeff]

On Fri, 15 Nov 2013 17:37:06 +0100, Maarten Wiltink wrote:

> Congratulations! Me being a non-native speaker, would this constitute a
> 'windfall'?
>

In terms of the payment, yes. And, if it turns out that I do better on
the new treatment than I am now, it's an extra bonus.

> Then her regular bloodscreen came up, and she had to explain why here
> vitamin B level was three times normal. So much for that.

Oops! She probably should have told her regular doctor about the study
ahead of time so that he'd be warned not to tell her things like that.
Oh well...

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

Computers work in strange and wonderful ways,
Their marvels to avoid performing.

[Joe Zeff]

On Thu, 14 Nov 2013 05:52:44 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> I went back this afternoon to have a blood draw and an EKG and give a
> urine sample. For this I received $40 in cash.

I went down again this morning, fasting. As it turned out, that wasn't
needed, although I'd been told to come in that way. I've been given a
new meter, new supplies for it and a set of insulin pens with the
Glargine/Lantus[1] that I've been using for the last several years and
I'm to switch from taking it in the morning to injecting myself at
bedtime.[2] As I'm no longer taking Glypizide, we expect my blood sugar
level to increase across the next few weeks, but that will give them a
base line to help set the dosage of the new drug.

More later if, and only if, I think it might be interesting. (I may be
interested in regular progress reports, but I doubt that the rest of the
froup is.)

[1]Both names are on the packaging; doctors call it Glargine, while
patients call it Lantus. Personally, I refer to it as Glargine unless
I'm talking to somebody who calls it Lantus.
[2]Most Type II take it at night, as I did at first. However, I didn't
respond that well so, instead of increasing the dosage, we switched it to
morning and it worked better. Now, I'm back to evening because that's
what the protocol requires.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

I still want a phone with caller-IQ.

[Ralph Wade Phillips]

On 11/26/2013 8:35 PM, Joe Zeff wrote:
> More later if, and only if, I think it might be interesting. (I may be
> interested in regular progress reports, but I doubt that the rest of the
> froup is.)

As my SO is diabetic, I would be also. Nobody else, possibly, but I
would ...

RwP



---
This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus protection is active.
http://www.avast.com

[mrob...@att.net]

Ralph Wade Phillips <ne...@philent.biz> wrote:
> ---
> This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus protection is active.
> http://www.avast.com

Fix your .sig.

Matt Roberds

[Alan J Rosenthal]

I guess you mean the reason is wrong.

It should say
This e-mail message is free from viruses and malware because it is
written in English. English, motherFUCKER! Do you SPEAK it?!?!!?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_mDTLphIVY

[Joe Zeff]

On Sat, 30 Nov 2013 14:16:30 -0600, Ralph Wade Phillips wrote:

> As my SO is diabetic, I would be also. Nobody else, possibly, but I
> would

Right now, I'm off Glypizide, but haven't started on the fast-acting
insulin yet. My numbers after dinner are high, but for the last several
days my morning (fasting) numbers are great. Possibly I should have
switched back to shooting up in the evening quite a while ago. Go know.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

ScotchGard (TM) isn't the best treatment for leather, but it
makes it easier to wash off the blood.

[Joe Zeff]

No, because it's not standards compliant for two different reasons.
Where is Thorfin when we need him?

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

NT and security should not be mentioned in the same
sentence without negation.

[Peter Corlett]

Alan J Rosenthal <fl...@dgp.toronto.edu> wrote:
[...]

> This e-mail message is free from viruses and malware because it is
> written in English. English, motherFUCKER! Do you SPEAK it?!?!!?
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_mDTLphIVY

In a certain amount of synchronicity, I heard a variant of this today to in
response to the shameful offerings at the bar of far too many pubs: "Beer,
motherfucker! Do you sell it?" I reckon CAMRA should adopt it as their motto.

[Joe Zeff]

On Sat, 30 Nov 2013 14:16:30 -0600, Ralph Wade Phillips wrote:

> As my SO is diabetic, I would be also. Nobody else, possibly, but I
> would

I just had a phone interview and earned $15. I gave them the time and
blood glucose readings for Saturday->Monday, along with when I took my
Glargine at night. (He was rather astonished that 11:30 PM was the
earliest, but I have problems getting to sleep and that's fairly early
for me.) He raised by Glargine by two units. More next week.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

But I don't mind, as it's the sort of thing that,
if it's percieved as insulting, probably ought to be.

[Ralph Wade Phillips]

Fixed about 10 seconds after that notice was sent out. Avast had snuck
that in on me. Dang it.

RwP

[Joe Zeff]

On Sat, 30 Nov 2013 14:16:30 -0600, Ralph Wade Phillips wrote:

> As my SO is diabetic, I would be also. Nobody else, possibly, but I
> would

For the last several weeks, they've been gradually raising my glargine
until on Dec 24, it went up to 26 units. Over the weekend, my morning
blood sugar was under 70 two out of three days, which are considered "low
blood sugar incidents." I'm now back to 24 units. Will report again
when I actually start taking the fast-acting insulin.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

“Transparency and the rule of law will be the tombstones of this
presidency.”

[Joe Zeff]

On Wed, 27 Nov 2013 02:35:30 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> More later if, and only if, I think it might be interesting. (I may be
> interested in regular progress reports, but I doubt that the rest of the
> froup is.)

After a longer lead-in time than I'd expected, I went in this morning,
fasting. I had some blood drawn, then drank two bottles of Ensure, to
give me 80gm of carbs. I had more blood drawn every hour or two for five
hours. Now, I've received either the new drug or the control and the
study is well and truly begun. Unless somebody asks questions, I'll
presume that nobody's interested and stop reporting on it.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

The problem with being a good sport is that you have to lose to prove it.

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Joe Zeff" <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> wrote in message

news:52e70a87$0$64051$862e...@ngroups.net...

> On Wed, 27 Nov 2013 02:35:30 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

>> More later if, and only if, I think it might be interesting. (I may
>> be interested in regular progress reports, but I doubt that the rest
>> of the froup is.)
>
> After a longer lead-in time than I'd expected, I went in this morning,
> fasting. I had some blood drawn, then drank two bottles of Ensure, to
> give me 80gm of carbs. I had more blood drawn every hour or two for
> five hours. Now, I've received either the new drug or the control and
> the study is well and truly begun. Unless somebody asks questions,
> I'll presume that nobody's interested and stop reporting on it.

"Hello Joe! How are things?"

Having been recently reminded of (outwardly) having the empathic
capabilities of a baked brick, I find it hard to _show_ interest.
That doesn't mean we don't care.

Corrie came to see me at the bloodbank yesterday because we both had
to be in town later anyway and took the opportunity for talking to
their doctor again about donation by diabetics. Still no luck; the
rule about insulin is still being applied rigourously[0]. That said,
she's down from four times daily to a mere six units once daily,
through losing weight, and has recently been dismissed by the
hospital's physician and specialised diabetics nurse. She has been
so stable for so long that the three-monthly checks are now to be done
by her GP. So she's hoping that another five or ten kilograms will
allow her to stop the last bit of insulin and give blood again.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[0] "You can either shoot insulin or donate blood." This is for the
protection of the donor, not the recipient, BTW. All the same
they won't take the risk even if you declare yourself willing to take
it.

[Joe Zeff]

On Tue, 28 Jan 2014 08:44:51 +0100, Maarten Wiltink wrote:

> That said, she's down from four
> times daily to a mere six units once daily, through losing weight, and
> has recently been dismissed by the hospital's physician and specialised
> diabetics nurse. She has been so stable for so long that the
> three-monthly checks are now to be done by her GP. So she's hoping that
> another five or ten kilograms will allow her to stop the last bit of
> insulin and give blood again.

Interesting. Back at LosCon, two diabetics had claimed that they
couldn't donate simply because of their condition. Maybe it's because
they're both on insulin. I do know that one of the conditions of the
study is that I don't donate, so maybe things are different out here. Of
course, there are other reasons for me to be a turnip, even if that
weren't true.

If and when there's anything interesting, then, I'll post it; glad to
know that there's somebody out there who wants to know what's going on.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

It's a funny world out there, and the only things that come in
absolute black and white are squad cars.

[Joe Zeff]

On Tue, 28 Jan 2014 09:46:04 +0000, Roger Bell_West wrote:

> Is this a strictly-controlled energy intake for the whole period of the
> study, or is it more that you do what you normally do and replace the
> usual drug with (maybe) the new one?

Before the study I was using metformin, glypizide (both oral) and
injecting glargine. Now, I'm off of the glypizide and I'm either taking
Novalog (a fast-acting insulin) or a new formulation with an added enzyme
that may make it work even faster. In fact, I'm told that I'm supposed
to have at least one bite of food before injecting it at every meal.
Normally, I'm supposed to have 45-60 grams of carb at breakfast, so the
Ensure was somewhat more than normal, but that's what the test calls
for. If all works well, the VA can provide Novalog, so I can simply
switch from getting glargine and Novalog from the study to getting it
from the VA.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

Accounts of Jesus’s miracles are rendered less credible
due to all the witnesses being fishermen.

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Joe Zeff" <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> wrote in message

news:52e802bc$0$29572$862e...@ngroups.net...

> [...] Back at LosCon, two diabetics had claimed that they
> couldn't donate simply because of their condition. ...

To be exceedingly pedantic, the rule at the Rotterdam blood bank
is that you're _not allowed_ when on insulin. There is no danger
to a hypothetical recipient, and, we suspect, only very hypothetical
danger to a diabetic but stable donor.

Also, their records on Corrie's condition were sufficiently sketchy
that lying was an option that would probably have seen her with a
needle in her arm within the hour.

Which we didn't, to be clear. But it may serve to suggest our level
of exasperation at all these well-meant rules, to the exclusion of
original thought as well as some very dedicated donors, like all
people who received transfusions in the past.

I feel like I should say something nice about them now, too.
They do excellent stuffed pelicans in a variety of sizes! (From
two inches up to six feet.)

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[The Nomad]

In .uk the blood donor lot stopped taking mine when I refused to use
their chlorhexidine hand gel stuff (avian 'flu panic) as it gives me a
_very_ mild dermatitis.

Reason, the swabs they use to disinfect the donation site are also
chlorhexidine based and so now not allowed, even though I offered to sign
a waiver.

:-(

Avpx

--
There are many rhymes about magpies, but none of them is very reliable
because they are not the ones the magpies know themselves.
(Carpe Jugulum)
15:05:01 up 4 days, 2:17, 8 users, load average: 0.14, 0.19, 0.22

[Joe Zeff]

On Wed, 29 Jan 2014 16:01:25 +0100, Maarten Wiltink wrote:

> To be exceedingly pedantic, the rule at the Rotterdam blood bank is that
> you're _not allowed_ when on insulin. There is no danger to a
> hypothetical recipient, and, we suspect, only very hypothetical danger
> to a diabetic but stable donor.

One of the conditions of this study is that I don't donate while I'm part
of the study. As you have to be on insulin to take part, this suggests
that (in some places, at least) being on insulin doesn't prevent you from
donating.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

Where there's a flamethrower, there's a way.

[Erwan David]

Joe Zeff <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> disait le 01/29/14 que :

> On Wed, 29 Jan 2014 16:01:25 +0100, Maarten Wiltink wrote:
>
>> To be exceedingly pedantic, the rule at the Rotterdam blood bank is that
>> you're _not allowed_ when on insulin. There is no danger to a
>> hypothetical recipient, and, we suspect, only very hypothetical danger
>> to a diabetic but stable donor.
>
> One of the conditions of this study is that I don't donate while I'm part
> of the study. As you have to be on insulin to take part, this suggests
> that (in some places, at least) being on insulin doesn't prevent you from
> donating.

In France, being on about anything prevents you from donating (in my
case I understand, since I take a cocktail of 6 different products among
them 1 for blood fluidification and 1 against coagulation).

--
Les simplifications c'est trop compliqué

[Joe Zeff]

On Wed, 29 Jan 2014 21:56:14 +0100, Erwan David wrote:

> In France, being on about anything prevents you from donating (in my
> case I understand, since I take a cocktail of 6 different products among
> them 1 for blood fluidification and 1 against coagulation).

Please keep those last two far away from me! If I'm lucky, my platelet
count is about half normal.

My sister has MS, and has been on Avonex for several years. She donated
platelets[1] Monday.

[1]No, they couldn't give them to me if needed. Wrong blood type.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

Frankly, I expected better than straw men and stupidity from the
inhabitants of this group. I guess I won't make that mistake again.

[Maarten Wiltink]

"The Nomad" <no...@the.desert.com> wrote in message
news:-vydnTV7G6kTh3TP...@giganews.com...
[...]

> In .uk the blood donor lot stopped taking mine when I refused to use
> their chlorhexidine hand gel stuff (avian 'flu panic) as it gives me a
> _very_ mild dermatitis.

Is that for the bladder you squeeze while the blood goes out? Over here,
they wrapped that in a bit of gauze for several years. They stopped doing
that a few months ago.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[The Nomad]

Nah! on entry to 'prevent infection'

Doubt it would actually do any good but hey!

Something needed to be (seen to be) done

& that was something

Avpx

--
Rincewind had always been happy to think of himself as a racist. The One
Hundred Meters, the Mile, the Marathon he'd run them all.
(The Last Continent)
15:15:01 up 5 days, 2:27, 8 users, load average: 1.72, 1.16, 0.83

[Ralph Wade Phillips]

On 1/27/2014 7:40 PM, Joe Zeff wrote:
> On Wed, 27 Nov 2013 02:35:30 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:
>
>> More later if, and only if, I think it might be interesting. (I may be
>> interested in regular progress reports, but I doubt that the rest of the
>> froup is.)
>
> After a longer lead-in time than I'd expected, I went in this morning,
> fasting. I had some blood drawn, then drank two bottles of Ensure, to
> give me 80gm of carbs. I had more blood drawn every hour or two for five
> hours. Now, I've received either the new drug or the control and the
> study is well and truly begun. Unless somebody asks questions, I'll
> presume that nobody's interested and stop reporting on it.
>

I am interested, although I may not say much very often (I don't check
in but weekly - or weakly, depending on your viewpoint.)

Sweetie is due to get a gastric bypass, to help her with her weight and
also because the bypass "does stuff to the hormones" and seems to almost
cure adult onset diabetes. Won't fix the side effects (the neuropathy
in her feet, for instance), but it gets her off meds (so far she's
avoided taking insulin, being on primarily Glipizide and Metformin ...
and Januvia.)

RwP

--
I was sitting there, under my blanket, with fever and flu-like symptoms.
I was fuzzy in the head and having a hard time concentrating.
I had a horrible thought - "Is this what NORMAL feels like for average
IQ people??"

[Joe Zeff]

On Tue, 28 Jan 2014 19:23:46 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> Before the study I was using metformin, glypizide (both oral) and
> injecting glargine. Now, I'm off of the glypizide and I'm either taking
> Novalog (a fast-acting insulin) or a new formulation with an added
> enzyme that may make it work even faster.

Went in yesterday, so that they could look at my numbers and make any
needed adjustments. As expected, things had been bouncing all over the
place because it takes a little while for my body to adjust to the new
regime and to get the three daily doses right. I'd already had three
hypoglycemic episodes, all documented, but I've been able to handle all
of them without outside intervention. The closest I came was on Sunday,
when the episode hit just when my sister and I were leaving a meeting at
the LAX Marriott, and my reading was 45. Marcia got me some food, and
when we left, I gave her my keys and said, "You're driving."

Last night, I got to bed late. Woke up at about 5 AM, hungry, and had a
light snack. Went back to sleep and stayed that way until about 11 AM.
When I checked my blood sugar before breakfast, I was astonished to see
that it was only 64, because I felt fine. With luck, things should be
settling down RSN.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

If it ain't baroque, don't fix it.

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Joe Zeff" <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> wrote in message

news:52f40d26$1$29550$862e...@ngroups.net...
[...]

> Went in yesterday, so that they could look at my numbers and make any
> needed adjustments. As expected, things had been bouncing all over the
> place because it takes a little while for my body to adjust to the new
> regime and to get the three daily doses right. I'd already had three
> hypoglycemic episodes, all documented, but I've been able to handle all
> of them without outside intervention. The closest I came was on Sunday,
> when the episode hit just when my sister and I were leaving a meeting at
> the LAX Marriott, and my reading was 45. Marcia got me some food, and
> when we left, I gave her my keys and said, "You're driving."
>
> Last night, I got to bed late. Woke up at about 5 AM, hungry, and had a
> light snack. Went back to sleep and stayed that way until about 11 AM.
> When I checked my blood sugar before breakfast, I was astonished to see
> that it was only 64, because I felt fine. With luck, things should be
> settling down RSN.

Europe has a different scale, so remind me: what are normal values?

(Normal for Corrie is between 6 and 8. Her first hypo was at something
like 5.5, now she sometimes doesn't feel anything until well below 4.)

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Joe Zeff]

On Fri, 07 Feb 2014 13:21:36 +0100, Maarten Wiltink wrote:

> Europe has a different scale, so remind me: what are normal values?

Normal before a meal should be 80-108. Under 70 is bad. Recently, I've
had readings under 45 on several occasions.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

The point here is that there are stupid people all over.

[Lawns 'R' Us]

On 2014-02-07, Maarten Wiltink <maa...@kittensandcats.net> wrote:
[...]

> Europe has a different scale, so remind me: what are normal values?

Or, alternatively, please state the units you're using. A simple
number assumes that the reader knows what you're talking about, and
that frequently isn't the case (especially when one of the
reader/writer pair is in the US, and one isn't.)

Interesting reading, though, nonetheless.

[David Scheidt]

Lawns 'R' Us <nob...@nowhere.example.com> wrote:

US blood glucose levels are meaured in mg/dl. most of the rest of the
world use mmol/l. 1 mmol/l is about 18 mg/dl for glucose. There may
also be some places that report whole blood numbers, which are lower than
the more usual (at least in the US) plasma level. I've never, ever,
heard anyone actually provide the units in the US, though. (They're
printed on lab reports, but always reported orally as a unitless
number.) Wouldn't surprise me to learn that the rest of the world is
the same way (it's a meaningless unit in everyday life, after all).


--
sig 107

[Brian Kantor]

David Scheidt <dsch...@panix.com> wrote:
>There may
>also be some places that report whole blood numbers, which are lower than
>the more usual (at least in the US) plasma level.

Back when, I used to do the finger stick measurements where you put a
drop of blood into a meter. The results from my meters (more than one)
NEVER agreed with the lab readings, even when using the same sample.

I put this down to the the lab using plasma levels and the meter using
whole blood, but was never able to confirm that's why they differed.
The difference was never very large. Interestingly, the two meters I had
which used different analysis techniques usually were pretty close to
each other. Once I tested the meter with calibration solutions and it
was spot on.

Our lab's normal range, BTW, is 70-110 mg/dl.
- Brian

[David Scheidt]

Brian Kantor <br...@karoshi.ucsd.edu> wrote:

The normal conversion rule of thumb is whole blood * 1.15 = plasma
level.

There are also differences in accuracy between testing methods, and
blood that sits around will have a lower level than it did when it was
drawn. (Red blood cells will metabolize glucose in the plasma, and do
not need insulin to do so.) I don't remember the rate at which that
happens, but it can be enough to make a difference in test results.

I don't know if the test strip systems measure whole blood numbers, or
plasma numbers. (And, if they do one, whether they 'correct' to
report the other.)

--
What's the rule on that?

[Bernard Peek]

On 08/02/14 05:59, Satya wrote:
> On 06 Feb 2014 22:31:02 GMT, Joe Zeff wrote:
> [oybbq tyhpbfr fghss]
>
> So since I'm probably going to have to start something some time soon[0]:
>
> Do y'all still have to inject stuff, like insulin? I seem to think that
> some people are treated with diet+exercise, pills, and then insulin, in
> escalation order. True? I'm at the diet+exercise stage.

Type 2 diabetes is mostly a progressive disease and most sufferers go
through all of the stages in order.

The first stage is effectively symptomless. The insulin you produce gets
to be less effective so your pancreas has to produce more to compensate
for that. While it's capable of compensating your blood glucose will
stay close to normal. Typically this first stage takes ten years. At the
end your pancreas simply can't produce enough insulin any more even
running flat-out.

At that point you start the second stage and start to show symptoms.
Your blood glucose goes up a bit and you might notice increased thirst.
Or you might not. My first symptom was that I threw up when I drank
full-fat cola. There's a long list of possible symptoms and you might
get any or all of them. Thirst, taking longer to heal from cuts and
scratches, unexplained numbness or pain in fingers and toes, impotency,
fungal infections such as thrush, changes in eyesight, cataracts,
thromboses. That's if you are lucky. If you aren't then the first
symptom might be a fatal heart-attack.

The second stage blends smoothly into the third. Your pancreas is
running nearly flat-out and your blood glucose is still rising. The
third stage happens when your increased blood sugar starts to damage
internal organs. The double-whammy is that one of the first to get
damaged is your pancreas. So not only does your insulin become less
effective but you also gradually lose the capacity to produce it.

Diet and exercise can slow down progress through stage 2 and can
sometimes stop you going into stage 3. The next step is to take
medication that either makes your insulin more effective or coaxes your
pancreas to produce a bit more insulin. Once stage 3 is under way and
your pancreas has started to rot those medications become less and less
effective. It's now downhill all the way.

Stage 4 is when the increased blood sugar starts damaging critical
organs. You lose sensation in your toes and fingers and need to keep
constant watch for signs of gangrene. Lots of diabetics lose their legs
to gangrene. Eyesight deteriorates because of damage to blood vessels in
your retina. Premature senility cuts in too so you gradually lose the
capability to cope with the other symptoms.

Stage 5 is when your kids put you in a home.

The next stage is easily predictable.

In the UK the powers-that-be have just done their sums and discovered
that it works out cheaper to spend £30k on bariatric surgery than to
keep a stage 3 diabetic alive for 20 years. Under the current rules I'm
not overweight enough to qualify for it even though I'm borderline stage 4.


--
Bernard Peek
b...@shrdlu.com

[Wojciech Derechowski]

On Sat, 08 Feb 2014 14:18:58 +0000, Bernard Peek wrote:
[...]

> There's a long list of possible symptoms and you might
> get any or all of them. Thirst, taking longer to heal from cuts and
> scratches, unexplained numbness or pain in fingers and toes, impotency,
> fungal infections such as thrush, changes in eyesight, cataracts,
> thromboses. That's if you are lucky. If you aren't then the first
> symptom might be a fatal heart-attack.

...apud actum urinationis et defaecationis. Fuck.

--
WD

Who is Entscheidungs and what is his problem?

[Joe Zeff]

On Sat, 08 Feb 2014 02:22:41 +0000, David Scheidt wrote:

> I've never, ever, heard
> anyone actually provide the units in the US, though. (They're printed
> on lab reports, but always reported orally as a unitless number.)
> Wouldn't surprise me to learn that the rest of the world is the same way
> (it's a meaningless unit in everyday life, after all).

For that matter, when you go to the doctor's office and the nurse takes
your temperature and blood pressure they never mention the units.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

People with Alzheimers get to hide their own Easter eggs!

[Joe Zeff]

On Fri, 07 Feb 2014 21:46:06 -0800, Brian Kantor wrote:

> Back when, I used to do the finger stick measurements where you put a
> drop of blood into a meter. The results from my meters (more than one)
> NEVER agreed with the lab readings, even when using the same sample.

This is probably why the clinic had me bring the meter they'd issued me
and use it to check my blood sugar just before giving me the Ensure; it
keeps the readings consistent with the ones from home that I'm reporting.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

One interesting feature of Latin is that you ROT13 it and get Welsh.

[Joe Zeff]

On Sat, 08 Feb 2014 05:59:05 +0000, Satya wrote:

> Do y'all still have to inject stuff, like insulin? I seem to think that
> some people are treated with diet+exercise, pills, and then insulin, in
> escalation order. True? I'm at the diet+exercise stage.

I started off with diet+pills and eventually escalated to taking Glargine
insulin. Now, I'm also taking a fast-acting insulin at mealtime for the
study. I'm told that continuing with this when the study's done will be
easy because the VA already provides the insulin used for the control
section, but I'm not so thrilled with the extra work. Short term, for
the study is one thing, but I've not really accepted, as yet, injecting
myself a total of four times a day, and testing my blood sugar each time
for the rest of my life. Of course, by the time this is over it may be
so routine that I don't care, but not yet. Only time will tell, and it
hasn't as yet.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

*Sigh* It's almost as if they interpret the Bible as Microsoft does
RFCs.

[Bernard Peek]

On 08/02/14 19:18, Joe Zeff wrote:
> On Sat, 08 Feb 2014 05:59:05 +0000, Satya wrote:
>
>> Do y'all still have to inject stuff, like insulin? I seem to think that
>> some people are treated with diet+exercise, pills, and then insulin, in
>> escalation order. True? I'm at the diet+exercise stage.
>
> I started off with diet+pills and eventually escalated to taking Glargine
> insulin. Now, I'm also taking a fast-acting insulin at mealtime for the
> study. I'm told that continuing with this when the study's done will be
> easy because the VA already provides the insulin used for the control
> section, but I'm not so thrilled with the extra work. Short term, for
> the study is one thing, but I've not really accepted, as yet, injecting
> myself a total of four times a day, and testing my blood sugar each time
> for the rest of my life. Of course, by the time this is over it may be
> so routine that I don't care, but not yet. Only time will tell, and it
> hasn't as yet.

I'm taking a mixed fast/slow insulin four times a day. It still hasn't
got to the point where it's an unconscious routine.

Taking insulin all the time is very much like growing old. It's not good
but it's better than the alternative.



--
Bernard Peek
b...@shrdlu.com

[Joe Zeff]

On Sat, 08 Feb 2014 22:01:42 +0000, Bernard Peek wrote:

> Taking insulin all the time is very much like growing old. It's not good
> but it's better than the alternative.

Yeah. I know. And, I guess, it's probably not that good to have my
blood sugar reading over 200 two hours after dinner, and around 130 or so
before breakfast. Keeping it in the 80-108 region all day is probably in
my long-term best interests. If that's what it takes to keep me alive
and (reasonably) healthy, I'll do it, just as I've gotten used to taking
28 pills a day, down from a high of 33.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

You've got to love a newsreader with a menu option
named "Kill this Author".

[Garrett Wollman]

In article <slrnlfbcp8...@gort.thesatya.com>,

Satya <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote:

>So since I'm probably going to have to start something some time soon[0]:
>

>Do y'all still have to inject stuff, like insulin? I seem to think that
>some people are treated with diet+exercise, pills, and then insulin, in
>escalation order. True? I'm at the diet+exercise stage.

There are a lot of things that influence the progression of the
disease. Genetics is one of them, but so too is the state of your
intestinal flora, and of course your overall weight and exercise
habits. (Some people have microbial populations that make ingested
carbohydrates more bioavailable than other people's. There has been
some promising research suggesting that it may be possible to readjust
one's microbiota, but this research was shut down, at least
temporarily, when the FDA decided that human fecal transplants should
be treated like an investigational medication.)

My doctor believes that I have a pretty good chance of stopping the
progression if I can just manage to get to and maintain a healthy
weight. All those fat cells provide a lot of metabolic "inertia" that
throws off the normal insulin/glycogen/glucose control loop beyond the
ability of pancreatic cells to compensate. In the past few months[1]
I've been using a smartphone calorie-counting app that has worked
pretty well for me (although being software, and advertising-supported
software to boot, it still sucks mightily[2]). The app is configured
with your current weight, goals (gain, lose, or maintain), activity
level, and desired dm/dt (in lb orkg per week), and generates a daily
"net calorie" limit. I try to treat the "net" limit as a "gross"
limit instead; that way, if for some reason I'm unable to exercise
(due to travel, health, or whatever) I'm still aiming at the target.

It seems to work. I can't tell from looking in the mirror, but the
scale does not lie. I've lost about 25 lb (11 kg) so far, and
intending to stick with it for as long as I can. Like most
weight-loss treatments, a big part of it, I find, is really aversion
therapy: it's such a pain to enter every little thing that I eat, and
watch it all add up ("oops, there goes my dinner plan"), that I just
eat less -- particularly at work where there is often a lot of "free"
food about. (The app's database is heavily weighted towards chain
restaurants and national-brand packaged foods, so one is often reduced
to asking "which one of the 30 different chocolate-chip
cookies/chicken kormas/scallion pancakes/spinach lasagnas listed here
do I think is likely to be closest to what J. Random Local Caterer
would have made?")

I haven't yet gotten to the point where my vitals are improved enough
to drop either my blood-pressure meds or my diabetes meds. Depending
on how permanently things are messed up inside, I may never get there.
But for now at least I have some hope, and it's one of the few things
that I have actually felt good about lately.

-GAWollman

[1] Credit where it's due: I ran into David Parter at LISA'13 in
Washington last November and he recommended this particular app and
said he was happy with how it worked for him.

[2] One example: it has a function to enter recipes, but the food
database has no means of doing unit conversions, so if I'm entering a
baking recipe, for example, I have to figure out on my own how many
teaspoons of sugar there are in 3/4 cup (or worse, 5 oz, since the
better baking recipes are given in weight). Near as I can tell, all
of their database has just been entered manually by their users, with
no error-checking nor duplicate suppression. When I have the
nutrition label in front of me, I cross-check their values with what
the label says, but there are still far too many prepared foods that
come without any nutrition labeling at all. On the plus side, once
I've entered the recipe, I can make up a pseudo-FDA-style "Nutrition
Facts" label for my Web site, so other people don't have to go through
the same process. Not as accurate as sending off a dozen samples for
laboratory analysis, but better than I've ever had before.
--
Garrett A. Wollman | What intellectual phenomenon can be older, or more oft
wol...@bimajority.org| repeated, than the story of a large research program
Opinions not shared by| that impaled itself upon a false central assumption
my employers. | accepted by all practitioners? - S.J. Gould, 1993

[David DeLaney]

On 2014-02-09, Satya <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote:
> On Sat, 08 Feb 2014 22:01:42 +0000, Bernard Peek wrote:

>> On 08/02/14 19:18, Joe Zeff wrote:
>>> section, but I'm not so thrilled with the extra work. Short term, for
>>> the study is one thing, but I've not really accepted, as yet, injecting

>> Taking insulin all the time is very much like growing old. It's not good
>> but it's better than the alternative.
>

> Lbh gjb unir fpnerq zr rabhtu. Naq gung'f orsber lbh tbg gb gur *vawrpgvat*
> cneg, juvpu vf jung V bevtvanyyl zrnag gb nfx: gur arrqyrf ner fgvyy n guvat,
> naq jr qba'g unir cnvayrff ulcbfcenlf, be orggre, whfg cvyyf, lrg? xgukonv

Yes, they are a thing. They come generally after the stage where they try to
contain it with pills. However ... it turns out, for me at least and I don't
see why it wouldn't work the same way for others, that if you're injecting into
your abdominal-fat area, then with only a little trial and error it's usually
possible to find a spot that -doesn't hurt- when you put it in. Apparently
nerves aren't everywhere dense in the skin, or something. This makes things
easier, though it's still frustrating for me to think about having to do this
once a day (at my present level), plus take 7 pills at one end of the day and 4
at the other (yes, I know Joe is laughing) _every dang day for the rest of my
life_. So I'm also trying to work on some weight loss. Have only got about ten
pounds down, but it's better than having it rise.

I am actually sort of encouraged to hear that it's NOT just me that thinks
microflora environment in the intestines might be at least somewhat related;
for me this all started, near as I can tell, after a year when I had to take
general antibiotics for dental reasons three separate times. So maybe there's
also a hope of someday getting the Right Bugs Back In There.

--Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting thru EarthLink - "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
http://www.vic.com/~dbd/ - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.

[Joe Zeff]

On Sun, 09 Feb 2014 05:59:06 +0000, Satya wrote:

> Lbh gjb unir fpnerq zr rabhtu. Naq gung'f orsber lbh tbg gb gur
> *vawrpgvat* cneg, juvpu vf jung V bevtvanyyl zrnag gb nfx: gur arrqyrf
> ner fgvyy n guvat,
> naq jr qba'g unir cnvayrff ulcbfcenlf, be orggre, whfg cvyyf, lrg?

If you get it Just Right, you don't even feel it, and if you don't, it
doesn't hurt any more than it does when the doctor/nurse does it. And,
yes, there are cvyyf, but sometimes they're not enough.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

"I meant what I said, and I said what I meant,
A sysprog is faithful, 100%" (Horton Hears an IPL)

[Joe Zeff]

On Sun, 09 Feb 2014 06:44:26 +0000, Garrett Wollman wrote:

> My doctor believes that I have a pretty good chance of stopping the
> progression if I can just manage to get to and maintain a healthy
> weight.

In that case, you're going to hate me. I'm 5'7"[1] and when I started
the new insulin I weighed 155. I've already gained almost 10 pounds and
still consider myself underweight, especially as I'm fairly sure that
almost all I've gained is water weight. And, as long as I take the
appropriate pills, my blood pressure is around 110/70, even after I've
smoked my pipe. If you really want to drop weight, go broke. It's
amazing how fast you can lose weight when you can't afford to eat
properly for several months.

[1]Down from 5'10" when I was younger.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

A species willing to implement RFC1149 has already proven itself without
shame.

[Steve VanDevender]

wol...@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) writes:

> [1] Credit where it's due: I ran into David Parter at LISA'13 in
> Washington last November and he recommended this particular app and
> said he was happy with how it worked for him.

I almost didn't recognize Parter a couple of years ago because of how
much weight he had lost. It did work very well for him.

--
Steve VanDevender "I ride the big iron" http://hexadecimal.uoregon.edu/
ste...@hexadecimal.uoregon.edu PGP keyprint 4AD7AF61F0B9DE87 522902969C0A7EE8
Little things break, circuitry burns / Time flies while my little world turns
Every day comes, every day goes / 100 years and nobody shows -- Happy Rhodes

[David Scheidt]

Roger Bell_West <roger+a...@nospam.firedrake.org> wrote:
:On 2014-02-08, David Scheidt wrote:
:>I've never, ever, heard anyone actually provide the units in the US,

:>though. (They're printed on lab reports, but always reported orally
:>as a unitless number.) Wouldn't surprise me to learn that the rest of
:>the world is the same way (it's a meaningless unit in everyday life,
:>after all).

:My experience of medics is that they don't ever mention, know, or care
:about the units. The test says 6, normal range does not include 6,
:time to panic.

I make a point of asking for units when someone gives me a result, or
number. About 50% of the time, they can give it to me. Pharmacists are
by far the best at doing so. Techs are the worst, but some do know their
area.



--
sig 3

[Joe Zeff]

On Sun, 09 Feb 2014 01:23:21 -0600, David DeLaney wrote:

> Yes, they are a thing. They come generally after the stage where they
> try to contain it with pills. However ... it turns out, for me at least
> and I don't see why it wouldn't work the same way for others, that if
> you're injecting into your abdominal-fat area, then with only a little
> trial and error it's usually possible to find a spot that -doesn't hurt-
> when you put it in.

Dan Alderson did that. By the time I knew him, he had two deep pits in
his abdomen, over an inch across. When I was injecting, I rotated, both
sides of the abdomen followed by the inside of each thigh. I still do
that for the Glargine, but I've been instructed not to use the thighs for
the new drug.

Amateur.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

number chooser thinks your current ISP's complaints number is one of your
nearest and dearest.

[Bernard Peek]

On 09/02/14 06:44, Garrett Wollman wrote:
> In article <slrnlfbcp8...@gort.thesatya.com>,
> Satya <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote:
>
>> So since I'm probably going to have to start something some time soon[0]:
>>
>> Do y'all still have to inject stuff, like insulin? I seem to think that
>> some people are treated with diet+exercise, pills, and then insulin, in
>> escalation order. True? I'm at the diet+exercise stage.
>
> There are a lot of things that influence the progression of the
> disease. Genetics is one of them, but so too is the state of your
> intestinal flora, and of course your overall weight and exercise
> habits. (Some people have microbial populations that make ingested
> carbohydrates more bioavailable than other people's. There has been
> some promising research suggesting that it may be possible to readjust
> one's microbiota, but this research was shut down, at least
> temporarily, when the FDA decided that human fecal transplants should
> be treated like an investigational medication.)
>
> My doctor believes that I have a pretty good chance of stopping the
> progression if I can just manage to get to and maintain a healthy
> weight.

That's true of pretty much every type 2 diabetic, at least in the early
stages. What the docs don't tell you is that everyone has a built-in
feedback system that tells them whether they are eating enough. If
that's screwed, as it is for most type 2s, then dieting is only going to
reduce your weight temporarily.



--
Bernard Peek
b...@shrdlu.com

[Bernard Peek]

On 09/02/14 07:33, Joe Zeff wrote:
> On Sun, 09 Feb 2014 06:44:26 +0000, Garrett Wollman wrote:
>
>> My doctor believes that I have a pretty good chance of stopping the
>> progression if I can just manage to get to and maintain a healthy
>> weight.
>
> In that case, you're going to hate me. I'm 5'7"[1] and when I started
> the new insulin I weighed 155. I've already gained almost 10 pounds and
> still consider myself underweight, especially as I'm fairly sure that
> almost all I've gained is water weight.

Maybe not. Another side of the double-whammy is that taking insulin
makes you hungrier.



--
Bernard Peek
b...@shrdlu.com

[Peter Corlett]

David Scheidt <dsch...@panix.com> wrote:
[...]

> I make a point of asking for units when someone gives me a result, or number.
> About 50% of the time, they can give it to me. Pharmacists are by far the
> best at doing so. Techs are the worst, but some do know their area.

At least in the NHS, pharmacists have to know their stuff because they're the
last line of defence against incompetent GPs, and provide a useful second
opinion on whether a paricular level of medication is appropriate.

Micrograms, milligrams, they're much the same, no?

Our pharamacists are also excellent at detecting pseudoephedrine abuse without
needing the whole Big Brother thing they've got going on in the USA[0]. I was
able to obtain several grams of the stuff without question in a corner of
London that has a bit of a meth lab problem[1]. Perhaps I have an honest face,
or maybe just a face that still contains enough teeth.


[0] Although given it's a pointless and intrusive government database, it can't
be long before the UK copies it.

[1] It would of course not be a problem if it wasn't illegal, as it'd be made
in a factory far away from residential areas, and not require criminals to
protect it from police.

[David DeLaney]

On 2014-02-09, Satya <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote:

>> Satya <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote:
>>>Do y'all still have to inject stuff, like insulin? I seem to think that
>>>some people are treated with diet+exercise, pills, and then insulin, in
>>>escalation order. True? I'm at the diet+exercise stage.
>

> Jryy, gvzr gb znxr na nccbvagzrag jvgu n inzcver. V'yy frr jung gur ahzoref
> fnl, ohg ertneqyrff, V oryvrir vgf gvzr gb cnavp. Be engure, gur gvzr gb cnavp
> jnf lrnef ntb naq vgf abj gvzr gb pbagnva gur qnzntr.

Well, you can still cnavp if you like, it just may not help much.

The most retro-annoying part of it for me? Turns out there isn't a good record
of what my blood sugar levels WERE before all this started. A year back, five
years back, whenever; it apparently just wasn't something tested for and put
into the records unless there was some reason to think it was needed. This
inability to _know_ when things actually started going Wrong frustrates me.

[mrob...@att.net]

Peter Corlett <ab...@mooli.org.uk> wrote:
> At least in the NHS, pharmacists have to know their stuff because
> they're the last line of defence against incompetent GPs, and provide
> a useful second opinion on whether a paricular level of medication is
> appropriate.

They don't sell detergent, though.

> Our pharamacists are also excellent at detecting pseudoephedrine abuse
> without needing the whole Big Brother thing they've got going on in
> the USA[0].

> [0] Although given it's a pointless and intrusive government database,
> it can't be long before the UK copies it.

I think it started on pieces of paper at each pharmacy. Then, I think
the next step wasn't *a* database, it was *up to 50 separate* databases.
This was done to make it OK politically (yes, really), and lets you sell
up to 50 copies of the database software instead of just one.

Looking at the current situation, it appears that there is now a
national-level database, but not all states use it. The image that
should show which states participate is 404, but there is another
graphic of participating pharmacies, which can give some idea.
uggc://acyrkfreivpr.pbz/ (I don't know what's different about
Arkansas or Mississippi.)

While I was living in Oklahoma, they instituted purchase limits on
psuedoephedrine. If I remember right, a few years later, the state
police found that the number of labs in the state went down, but that
there was an increase in imports from other states and Mexico.

Matt Roberds

[Garrett Wollman]

In article <ld9o4d$jbq$1...@dont-email.me>, <mrob...@att.net> wrote:

>While I was living in Oklahoma, they instituted purchase limits on
>psuedoephedrine. If I remember right, a few years later, the state
>police found that the number of labs in the state went down, but that
>there was an increase in imports from other states and Mexico.

But that's OK -- they've successfully made it Somebody Else's Problem.

-GAWollman

[Bernard Peek]

On 10/02/14 01:22, David DeLaney wrote:
> On 2014-02-09, Satya <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote:
>
>>> Satya <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote:
>>>> Do y'all still have to inject stuff, like insulin? I seem to think that
>>>> some people are treated with diet+exercise, pills, and then insulin, in
>>>> escalation order. True? I'm at the diet+exercise stage.
>>
>> Jryy, gvzr gb znxr na nccbvagzrag jvgu n inzcver. V'yy frr jung gur ahzoref
>> fnl, ohg ertneqyrff, V oryvrir vgf gvzr gb cnavp. Be engure, gur gvzr gb cnavp
>> jnf lrnef ntb naq vgf abj gvzr gb pbagnva gur qnzntr.
>
> Well, you can still cnavp if you like, it just may not help much.
>
> The most retro-annoying part of it for me? Turns out there isn't a good record
> of what my blood sugar levels WERE before all this started. A year back, five
> years back, whenever; it apparently just wasn't something tested for and put
> into the records unless there was some reason to think it was needed. This
> inability to _know_ when things actually started going Wrong frustrates me.

Historic blood sugar readings wouldn't tell you anything useful. Sugar
levels don't start to rise significantly until quite a late stage and
are often masked by random variations. To catch diabetes early they
would have to monitor your insulin level. It starts to rise right from
the start, blood sugar levels might not go up significantly for another
ten years after that.

Another word of warning: a lot of doctors tell patients with slightly
elevated sugars that they are "pre-diabetic." That's actually like being
slightly pregnant. By the time your blood sugar *starts* to rise you are
already a member of the club that nobody wants to join.



--
Bernard Peek
b...@shrdlu.com

[Firesong]

On Sun, 9 Feb 2014 06:44:26 +0000 (UTC), wol...@bimajority.org
(Garrett Wollman) wrote:

>... In the past few months[1]

>I've been using a smartphone calorie-counting app that has worked
>pretty well for me (although being software, and advertising-supported
>software to boot, it still sucks mightily[2]). The app is configured
>with your current weight, goals (gain, lose, or maintain), activity
>level, and desired dm/dt (in lb orkg per week), and generates a daily
>"net calorie" limit. I try to treat the "net" limit as a "gross"
>limit instead; that way, if for some reason I'm unable to exercise
>(due to travel, health, or whatever) I'm still aiming at the target.
>

>[1] Credit where it's due: I ran into David Parter at LISA'13 in
>Washington last November and he recommended this particular app and
>said he was happy with how it worked for him.
>
>[2] One example: it has a function to enter recipes, but the food
>database has no means of doing unit conversions, so if I'm entering a
>baking recipe, for example, I have to figure out on my own how many
>teaspoons of sugar there are in 3/4 cup (or worse, 5 oz, since the
>better baking recipes are given in weight). Near as I can tell, all
>of their database has just been entered manually by their users, with
>no error-checking nor duplicate suppression. When I have the
>nutrition label in front of me, I cross-check their values with what
>the label says, but there are still far too many prepared foods that
>come without any nutrition labeling at all. On the plus side, once
>I've entered the recipe, I can make up a pseudo-FDA-style "Nutrition
>Facts" label for my Web site, so other people don't have to go through
>the same process. Not as accurate as sending off a dozen samples for
>laboratory analysis, but better than I've ever had before.

I believe I may be able to guess this app's name, and if it is the
same as mine, I concurr, although with a side whine due to the fact
that the U.K. does not use cups to measure anything, almost ever.
So at least half the build it yourself entries in the database are
utterly useless from my perspective.

The upside of being a UKadian is that virtually all ready meals and
packet sauces etc come with nutrition information, so a calculator at
least allows you to enter the 'quick calories' section.

Still the nutritional database is sufficiently borxed by Lusers
entering some of or incorrect values for the other parts of the
database (salt content, fat content etc) that calories is about all
you can actually take as 'factual'.

Iain

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Bernard Peek" <b...@shrdlu.com> wrote in message
news:blmsme...@mid.individual.net...

> [...] My first symptom was that I threw up when I drank full-fat cola.

I'd start worrying if I _didn't_ throw up after that.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Peter Corlett]

Firesong <fire...@firesong.co.uk> wrote:
[...]

> The upside of being a UKadian is that virtually all ready meals and packet
> sauces etc come with nutrition information, so a calculator at least allows
> you to enter the 'quick calories' section.

Which is dead handy for those of us who are suspicious of processed products[0]
and tend to cook from basic ingredients. If I peer at diet resources, they
helpfully provide a laundry-list of proprietary branded American processed
crap, which presumably already have the information printed on the packet, but
fail to list anything that I'd actually put in my mouth.

Sadly, evolution has so far failed to advance to the point that nutritional
information is printed on the side of cows or fruit trees.


[0] I'm not bothered too much about the additives per se, but more that they
are usually there to cover up the fact there's not much actual food
present.

[Garrett Wollman]

In article <20140210143709....@firedrake.org>,
Roger Bell_West <roger+a...@nospam.firedrake.org> wrote:

>That's OK, using cups is utterly useless too because of variations in
>packing density. For most recipes, you can often get away with it; for
>nutrition, forget it.

Flour is essentially the only common ingredient that is compressible
in this way. Other less common ingredients with the same problem
include cornstarch and powdered sugar. Normal sugar has a standard
crystal size and shape, so the density is consistent, and other
ingredients are generally used in quantities too small for variations
in density to matter. But it matters a *lot* for flour, so when given
a recipe that doesn't give the mass of flour, you have to try to
figure out how much flour they think a cup actually is. (Depending on
the type of flour and how aerated it is, this can be anywhere from
4-1/2 oz to 6 oz!)

>(This is why US bakers who are any good use scales, like the rest of
>the world.)

Commercial bakers use scales. Very few home bakers, or home cooks
generally, have any kind of scale (other than the bathroom variety).
In commercial bakeries, bread formulas are often given as weight
ratios: the baker starts with some weight of flour, and then multplies
out to determine the quantity of the other ingredients.

The use of volumetric measure for dry ingredients is often put down to
the original "cup cake".

-GAWollman

[Brian Kantor]

Another factor is other meds you're taking, for example some of the
psych meds are known to push you into diabetes. When this happens,
whether you would have developed diabetes without those meds is unknown.

After many years of trying diets and other things that didn't last and
in the face of rising blood sugar levels, I gave myself a 50th birthday
present of bariatric surgery, and lost 100 lbs over the course of two
years. It was difficult, but looking back a decade later, yes, I'd
still do it. And I'm alive, which I suspect I wouldn't have been.

The surgery clearly reset my weight setpoint.

And my diabetes is controlled without the use of insulin so far.

The psych meds I currently take give me strong, sometimes irresistable
cravings for carbs, so it's difficult, but I'm working on taking some
of those 30 off again. So it's back to high protein small meals, zero
snacks, and daily hikes. I hope that'll do it again.
- Brian

[Alexander Schreiber]

Roger Bell_West <roger+a...@nospam.firedrake.org> wrote:

> On 2014-02-10, mrob...@att.net wrote:
>>While I was living in Oklahoma, they instituted purchase limits on
>>psuedoephedrine. If I remember right, a few years later, the state
>>police found that the number of labs in the state went down, but that
>>there was an increase in imports from other states and Mexico.
>

> Of course, this means that the easiest way to get pseudoephedrine in
> many places is just to buy some meth and reverse-synthesise.

Given that your typical meth cooker isn't exactly working under full
medical grade lab conditions, I would rather keep my distance from any
pseudoephedrine produced from his product.

Kind regards,
Alex.
--
"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and
looks like work." -- Thomas A. Edison

[Alan J Rosenthal]

ab...@mooli.org.uk (Peter Corlett) writes:
>Sadly, evolution has so far failed to advance to the point that nutritional
>information is printed on the side of cows or fruit trees.

Wouldn't evolution select for something which causes the cow _not_ to be
eaten? So perhaps the label would say that it's much higher in fat than it
is, or that it contains hemlock or something.

(Yes, I know that if the label says "this cow is higher in fat than it is"
everyone would realize it was false, but perhaps it would be more subtle
than that.)

[Garrett Wollman]

In article <2014Feb10.1...@jarvis.cs.toronto.edu>,

Alan J Rosenthal <fl...@dgp.toronto.edu> wrote:
>ab...@mooli.org.uk (Peter Corlett) writes:
>>Sadly, evolution has so far failed to advance to the point that nutritional
>>information is printed on the side of cows or fruit trees.
>
>Wouldn't evolution select for something which causes the cow _not_ to be
>eaten?

No, why would you think that? More steers getting eaten means more
cows and bulls get to reproduce. The ones that are destined to become
meat get removed from the gene pool early on; they are more biddable
that way. And dairy cows don't remain in production for very long
unless they are re-impregnated.

[Brian Kantor]

ab...@mooli.org.uk (Peter Corlett) writes:
>Sadly, evolution has so far failed to advance to the point that nutritional
>information is printed on the side of cows or fruit trees.

Well, as second best, there's <http://ndb.nal.usda.gov/> where you can
look up eg, 'apples, raw, with skin' and get nutritional values in great
detail. A medium apple, for example, weighs 182 grams, yields 95 kcal,
and contains no caffeine, thus making it unsuitable for sysadmins. And
yes, they give units.
- Brian

[ppint. at pplay]

- hi; fl...@dgp.toronto.edu "Alan J Rosenthal" allowed:

- "the bovine surgeon-general has determined that
smoking this cow would be hazardous to your health" - ?

- love, ppint.
[drop the "v", and change the "f" to a "g", to email or cc.]
--
Vat girls - the missing piece to the puzzle of Utopia.
- "quadibloc" (j savard) on rasfwr
(09:08:03 -0700) 16:08:03 gmt 14/8/10 (8/14/10 for merkins)

[Peter H. Coffin]

On 11 Feb 2014 00:53:33 GMT, Alan J Rosenthal wrote:
> ab...@mooli.org.uk (Peter Corlett) writes:
>>Sadly, evolution has so far failed to advance to the point that nutritional
>>information is printed on the side of cows or fruit trees.
>
> Wouldn't evolution select for something which causes the cow _not_ to be
> eaten? So perhaps the label would say that it's much higher in fat than it
> is, or that it contains hemlock or something.

Dunno... being tasty and farmable seems like a very good way to ensure
that your genes stick around, if you're not the absolute top of the
environment.

--
15. I will never employ any device with a digital countdown. If I find
that such a device is absolutely unavoidable, I will set it to
activate when the counter reaches 117 and the hero is just putting
his plan into action. --Peter Anspach's Evil Overlord list

[Shmuel Metz]

In <ld884c$68s$1...@reader1.panix.com>, on 02/09/2014

at 03:50 PM, David Scheidt <dsch...@panix.com> said:

>:My experience of medics is that they don't ever mention, know, or care
>:about the units.

c 'the units' 'anything'

I spent a week in Basic with pneumonia before they finally let me see
a doctor. Wouldn't it be cost effective to replace them with tape
recording of "take an APC twice a day"?

--
Shmuel (Seymour J.) Metz <http://patriot.net/~shmuel> ISO position
Reply to domain Patriot dot net user shmuel+bspfh to contact me.
We don't care. We don't have to care, we're Congress.
(S877: The Shut up and Eat Your spam act of 2003)

[Joe Zeff]

On Thu, 06 Feb 2014 22:31:02 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> Went in yesterday, so that they could look at my numbers and make any
> needed adjustments.

Got a call yesterday afternoon that they'd appreciate it very much if I
came down to fill out some paperwork because the auditors were coming in
the next day and that they'd pay me an extra $25 for my time. As it
turns out, they needed me to fill out a diary with data from my most
recent phone visits because the auditors expect to see them, and in the
patient's handwriting. As it happens, asking me to bring in my current
diary would have been much simpler.

I also discussed two issues with the doctor. One is the way I've been
waking up late in the night hungry. After making sure he understood what
was going on, he lowered my basal dose from 26 units to 20, because it's
no good getting my daytime levels just right if they're going to go wonky
when I'm asleep. The other is how I've not been able to do a complete
(for me) gym routine since I went on the new insulin. He told me that if
I'm expecting to exercise, I should eat more than is normally recommended
before I do. I'd kind of figured that, but wanted to make sure so that I
didn't mess the study up. Also, if anybody's interested, most of the
weight gain is, as expected, water.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

If you can't play with words, what good are they?

[Wojciech Derechowski]

On Tue, 11 Feb 2014 22:00:43 +0000, Shmuel Metz wrote:
[...]

> I spent a week in Basic with pneumonia before they finally let me see
> a doctor. Wouldn't it be cost effective to replace them with tape
> recording of "take an APC twice a day"?

We had our own version of Gus and Wes. I could go to the hospital whenever
I wanted because I was not afraid of them.

--
WD

Who is Entscheidungs and what is his problem?

[Ignatios Souvatzis]

Roger Bell_West wrote:
> On 2014-02-08, David Scheidt wrote:
>>I've never, ever, heard anyone actually provide the units in the US,
>>though. (They're printed on lab reports, but always reported orally
>>as a unitless number.) Wouldn't surprise me to learn that the rest of
>>the world is the same way (it's a meaningless unit in everyday life,
>>after all).

>
> My experience of medics is that they don't ever mention, know, or care

> about the units. The test says 6, normal range does not include 6,
> time to panic.

"Units? We need no steenking units. If we cared about precise science
like those nerds in class, we'd studies physics or chemistry* like them."

At least that seems to be a widespread attitude, with a few exceptions.
(Older) physics students who tutored students of medicine during their
single course on basic physics always complained.

-is

*) or even biology
--
seal your e-mail: http://www.gnupg.org/

[Erwan David]

Roger Bell_West <roger+a...@nospam.firedrake.org> disait le 02/09/14 que :

> On 2014-02-08, David Scheidt wrote:
>>I've never, ever, heard anyone actually provide the units in the US,
>>though. (They're printed on lab reports, but always reported orally
>>as a unitless number.) Wouldn't surprise me to learn that the rest of
>>the world is the same way (it's a meaningless unit in everyday life,
>>after all).
>
> My experience of medics is that they don't ever mention, know, or care
> about the units. The test says 6, normal range does not include 6,
> time to panic.

I got same experience last week .

My lipase was tested at 185 unit/l, with a normal at 60
But my doctor found I was once tested at 300 unit/l with a normal at
200...

Same biologist, just 18 month between tests...


--
Les simplifications c'est trop compliqué

[Joe Zeff]

On Fri, 07 Feb 2014 17:28:26 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> On Fri, 07 Feb 2014 13:21:36 +0100, Maarten Wiltink wrote:
>
>> Europe has a different scale, so remind me: what are normal values?
>
> Normal before a meal should be 80-108. Under 70 is bad. Recently, I've
> had readings under 45 on several occasions.

I have another visit tomorrow. By now, I've been below 70 so many times
that I've run out of the forms in my diary to report it and have printed
out a large list of extra reports that I've kept in a text file on my
computer, including two today. (dinner and bedtime) Having to fight
this hard to avoid low blood sugar after being fairly stable is a tad
depressing, as this is supposed to be keeping my numbers right where they
belong. We'll see what the doctor says. (He's already lowered my
Glargine from 26/day to 20; he may be lowering it again.)

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

I am Marvin of Borg. Existence is futile.

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Joe Zeff" <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> wrote in message
news:530d9e1d$0$29080$862e...@ngroups.net...
[...]

> I have another visit tomorrow. By now, I've been below 70 so many
> times that I've run out of the forms in my diary to report it and
> have printed out a large list of extra reports that I've kept in a
> text file on my computer, including two today. (dinner and bedtime)
> Having to fight this hard to avoid low blood sugar after being fairly
> stable is a tad depressing, as this is supposed to be keeping my
> numbers right where they belong. We'll see what the doctor says.
> (He's already lowered my Glargine from 26/day to 20; he may be
> lowering it again.)

Wouldn't that be a _good_ thing? It certainly sounds better than
having to fight to avoid high blood sugar. Here, have another
chocolate tablet. (No, I'm not diabetic. I do have to watch my weight.)

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Joe Zeff]

On Wed, 26 Feb 2014 09:18:38 +0100, Maarten Wiltink wrote:

> Wouldn't that be a _good_ thing? It certainly sounds better than having
> to fight to avoid high blood sugar. Here, have another chocolate tablet.
> (No,
> I'm not diabetic. I do have to watch my weight.)

AFAIK, I've never had an issue with hyperglycemia since I've been
diagnosed. (Before that I'd had a diabetic thirst, which I tried to
treat with regular Coke; not exactly the best course of action.) I've
woken up in four different ERs, but always because of hypoglycemia. And,
one of the side effects of Novolog[1] is hypoglycemia because it pulls
your blood sugar down during and after a meal, but doesn't stay in the
body very long.

[1]The new drug is Novolog with a new enzyme that makes it even faster
acting, which may be why the standard instructions in this trial are to
eat a bite of food *before* injecting the bolus dose. No, I'm not
assuming that because that's what I was told that I must be on the
investigational drug, I'm assuming that everybody is told that for
consistency's sake and because the techs don't know who's getting what.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Joe Zeff" <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> wrote in message

news:530da636$0$29117$862e...@ngroups.net...
[...]

> AFAIK, I've never had an issue with hyperglycemia since I've been
> diagnosed. (Before that I'd had a diabetic thirst, which I tried to
> treat with regular Coke; not exactly the best course of action.)

Ouch.

> I've woken up in four different ERs, but always because of hypoglycemia.

OUCH. We've never had that, fortunately. Corrie has occasionally
been jittery for ten or fifteen minutes before thinking of measuring
her blood sugar, and there have been times when I reminded her that
getting snappy is an early symptom, but she's never passed out.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Joe Zeff]

On Wed, 26 Feb 2014 07:56:13 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> I have another visit tomorrow. By now, I've been below 70 so many times
> that I've run out of the forms in my diary to report it and have printed
> out a large list of extra reports that I've kept in a text file on my
> computer, including two today.

Just got back. On the way down, I stopped for lunch and had yet another
hypo with no symptoms. The techs were very impressed, again, by my
record keeping. The doctor in charge lowered my nightly Glargine from 20
units to 16, which was what I was taking before this whole thing
started. I also learned that many of the participants have reported
large numbers of hypos, about half or so with no symptoms, just like me.
Apparently, this is a very difficult study.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

I don't suffer from insanity; I enjoy every minute of it.

[Joe Zeff]

On Wed, 26 Feb 2014 08:30:46 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> And,
> one of the side effects of Novolog[1] is hypoglycemia because it pulls
> your blood sugar down during and after a meal, but doesn't stay in the
> body very long.
>

Things are starting to get just a tad ridiculous. About 3 PM today, I
had a small snack so that I could go to the market without having my
blood sugar go through the floor. When I got home, I had lunch, with
decent numbers. Said lunch had more carbs than normal, but by 7:30 PM, I
was going hypo. Dinner was high carb, and I had a snack at about 10 PM.
At 11:30, I tested again: 37mg/dL[2], and the normal range is 71->108.
Currently, I'm eating something to get me back where I should be so that
I can reasonably expect to wake up tomorrow. As I've mentioned before,
this is turning out to be a very difficult study.

> [1]The new drug is Novolog with a new enzyme that makes it even faster
> acting, which may be why the standard instructions in this trial are to
> eat a bite of food *before* injecting the bolus dose. No, I'm not
> assuming that because that's what I was told that I must be on the
> investigational drug, I'm assuming that everybody is told that for
> consistency's sake and because the techs don't know who's getting what.

[2]Just to be sure, I checked twice and got the same results both times.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

Acme Bungee Adventures
Good to the last drop!

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Joe Zeff" <the.guy.with....@lasfs.info> wrote in message

news:5316d7ff$0$59012$862e...@ngroups.net...
[...]

> At 11:30, I tested again: 37mg/dL[2], and the normal range is 71->108.
> Currently, I'm eating something to get me back where I should be so
> that I can reasonably expect to wake up tomorrow. As I've mentioned
> before, this is turning out to be a very difficult study.

It sounds hard on you for sure. But it also sounds as though this new
insulin simply works more different from the old one than you expect,
and you're not stable with it yet. From your description, it was
modified to act _faster_, but is the effect also that it works _more_.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Joe Zeff]

Before this, I wasn't taking any mealtime insulin. Just one dose of
Glargine every day. And, from what I've learned from the people running
the study, my experience is typical and everybody in it's having trouble.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

Computers work in strange and wonderful ways,
Their marvels to avoid performing.

[Joe Zeff]

On Wed, 05 Mar 2014 19:30:27 +0000, Joe Zeff wrote:

> Before this, I wasn't taking any mealtime insulin. Just one dose of
> Glargine every day. And, from what I've learned from the people running
> the study, my experience is typical and everybody in it's having
> trouble.

I just spoke to the tech at the clinic, and the doctor wants me to cut my
nightly Glargine down to 12 units, less than I was taking before this
started.

--
Joe Zeff -- The Guy With The Sideburns:
http://www.zeff.us http://www.lasfs.info

You've got to love a newsreader with a menu option
named "Kill this Author".

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Satya" <sat...@satyaonline.cjb.net> wrote in message
news:slrnlhhjn7...@gort.thesatya.com...

> On 05 Mar 2014 23:25:51 GMT, Joe Zeff wrote:

>> I just spoke to the tech at the clinic, and the doctor wants me to
>> cut my nightly Glargine down to 12 units, less than I was taking
>> before this started.
>

> At this rate you'll be on zero units by summer!

That sounds like the same reasoning which predicts that very large
formations of skydivers will start falling upwards. (Holes inside
a formation have much higher drag than the same space at the boundary,
so the more skydivers you assemble, the slower they fall. Unfortunately,
it's asymptotic.)

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Steve VanDevender]

I can't believe it's truly asymptotic in that it shows a convergent
limit as the number of skydivers goes to infinity[1], and even in the
region where it looks asymptotic it must still some non-zero velocity.

[1] In true Randall Munroe "What If?" style, I immediately start
imagining cases like a ring of skydivers glightly larger than the
circumference of the Earth, or the number of skydivers that when packed
together would collapse into a black hole[2].

[2] Assuming a typical skydiver with gear weighs 80 kg and is roughty
the density of water, I get an estimate of 5.9e36.

--
Steve VanDevender "I ride the big iron" http://hexadecimal.uoregon.edu/
ste...@hexadecimal.uoregon.edu PGP keyprint 4AD7AF61F0B9DE87 522902969C0A7EE8
Little things break, circuitry burns / Time flies while my little world turns
Every day comes, every day goes / 100 years and nobody shows -- Happy Rhodes

[Steve VanDevender]

Roger Bell_West <roger+a...@nospam.firedrake.org> writes:

> On 2014-03-08, Steve VanDevender wrote:
>>I can't believe it's truly asymptotic in that it shows a convergent
>>limit as the number of skydivers goes to infinity[1], and even in the
>>region where it looks asymptotic it must still some non-zero velocity.
>

> Asymptosis doesn't necessarily approach zero; any limit is possible.
> Consider c. Or have I misunderstood you?

Perhaps slightly. I didn't intend to imply that asymptosis meant
approaching a limit of zero. I was arguing against the notion it could
be truly asymptotic to any constant limit, but I see that Marten also
did not necessarily imply the limit was zero.

Hmm, actually once the ring of skydivers exceeds a size much larger than
the Earth's circumference, they will be less and less attracted by
Earth's gravity and fall more and more slowly toward Earth. And
sufficiently large rings would be attracted more strongly by other
celestial bodies and fall away from the Earth. Which is probably not
the same logic that Marten was arguing against, but does lead to the
same conclusion that sufficiently large rings of skydivers *will* fall
away from the Earth.

[Maarten Wiltink]

"Steve VanDevender" <ste...@hexadecimal.uoregon.edu> wrote in message
news:lfeg81$9ig$1...@thames.novusordo.net...
[...]

> [2] Assuming a typical skydiver with gear weighs 80 kg and is roughty

> the density of water, ...

The typical skydiver who gets invited to formations that large does
indeed tend to be fairly skinny, with a density close to that of beer.
Dissolved in them are generally also high concentrations of nicotine.
Especially the ones who live upside-down can be quite high-strung.
Flatfallers are, by comparison, teddybears. Precision jumpers come in
both types but seem to develop after _decades_ of aging.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Måns Nilsson]

Den 2014-02-10 skrev Garrett Wollman <wol...@bimajority.org>:

> Commercial bakers use scales. Very few home bakers, or home cooks
> generally, have any kind of scale (other than the bathroom variety).

Being here, of course, is a dead giveaway of being among the very few. I
weigh all my ingredients as much as possible. Digital scales (of course
using SI system units) are incredibly practical in getting things right
to a precision that is entirely within reasonable margins.

In the interest of culinary recovery, I present the Good Metric Baguette:

25g yeast
600ml cold (below 10° C but above say 4° C) water
1 pinch of salt (very precise!)
780g wheat flour.

Mix yeast, 100 ml water and salt until yeast is dissolved.

Add flour gradually, working it in. Using a wire mesh sieve to break up
lumps in flour is beneficial.

When all flour is in, stop. Ideally, the surface of the dough should now
be matte and not very sticky. Some additional flour may be required to
achieve this.

It is important, especially so if you have normal-protein-flour (as
opposed to the high-protein flour sometimes used in industry) to minimise
the mixing and let the dough be.

Still in mixing bowl, cover the dough with a cloth and set it to rise
in a cold environment, below 15°C but above freezing. Some 6 hours is
usually fine. (I do it overnight, setting the dough just before bedtime)

After rise period:
Set the oven for 250° C. Tip the dough onto the baking table, keeping
manipulation to a minimum, and split in three parts. Gently coax them
into oblong shapes (300 x 45mm ø is usually fine) and put them on a
baking sheet or even better a baguette tray. Let them rest until the
oven is hot, and put them in for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, lower to
150° C and set for another 15 minutes.

Take out, turn upside down and knock. They should have a hollow sound. Let
cool upside down under a towel until you can't wait anymore, usually
around 30 seconds or so.

The only really acceptable spread is butter, preferably demi-sel from
Normandy. Other good pairings are air-dried ham or Comté / Gruyère
cheese. But butter is the best.
--
Måns Nilsson primary/secondary/besserwisser/machina
MN-1334-RIPE +46 705 989668
I'll eat ANYTHING that's BRIGHT BLUE!!

[Maarten Wiltink]

"M�ns Nilsson" <mans...@besserwisser.org> wrote in message
news:slrnln9e07....@jaja.besserwisser.org...

[...]

> In the interest of culinary recovery, I present the Good Metric
> Baguette:
>
> 25g yeast
> 600ml cold (below 10� C but above say 4� C) water
> 1 pinch of salt (very precise!)
> 780g wheat flour.
>

> Mix yeast, 100 ml water and salt until yeast is dissolved. ...

I read through the whole recipe, and as left with one burning question.

What to do with the remaining half litre of water?

Which leads me to this story: Years and years ago, we tried to make
bara's. These are made from chickpeas. The recipe called for dry peas,
but we could only get chickpea flour. The ingredients list mentioned
oil but not water. We scratched our heads for some time and in the end
tried using the oil to make a dough from the flour. It did not become
a very good dough.

We should have used water after all. Water that you were supposed to
boil the peas in, and mash the boiled peas into a paste functionally
equivalent to a dough. We never thought of that.

Tebrgwrf,
Maarten Wiltink

[Bernard Peek]

On 15/05/14 13:50, Måns Nilsson wrote:
> Den 2014-02-10 skrev Garrett Wollman <wol...@bimajority.org>:
>
>> Commercial bakers use scales. Very few home bakers, or home cooks
>> generally, have any kind of scale (other than the bathroom variety).
>
> Being here, of course, is a dead giveaway of being among the very few. I
> weigh all my ingredients as much as possible. Digital scales (of course
> using SI system units) are incredibly practical in getting things right
> to a precision that is entirely within reasonable margins.
>
> In the interest of culinary recovery, I present the Good Metric Baguette:
>
> 25g yeast
> 600ml cold (below 10° C but above say 4° C) water
> 1 pinch of salt (very precise!)
> 780g wheat flour.

That's more yeast and less salt than I would use.

I use non-stick baking pans for my bread. I put the dough in the pan and
leave it in the oven overnight to rise, then all I need to do in the
morning is switch the oven on and set the timer for an hour. When the
oven cuts out the bread is ready. I need to keep the morning part of the
task simple because it's done pre-caffeinisation.


--
Bernard Peek
b...@shrdlu.com

[Mans Nilsson]

Den 2014-05-15 skrev Maarten Wiltink <maa...@kittensandcats.net>:
> "Mans Nilsson" <mans...@besserwisser.org> wrote in message

> news:slrnln9e07....@jaja.besserwisser.org...
>
> [...]
>> In the interest of culinary recovery, I present the Good Metric
>> Baguette:
>>
>> 25g yeast

>> 600ml cold (below 10 degrees C but above say 4i degrees C) water

>> 1 pinch of salt (very precise!)
>> 780g wheat flour.
>>
>> Mix yeast, 100 ml water and salt until yeast is dissolved. ...
>
> I read through the whole recipe, and as left with one burning question.
>
> What to do with the remaining half litre of water?

Add it once the yeast is dissolved, before the flour. I once forgot
this while processing the recipe, so making it here too seems quaintly
appropriate.

> We should have used water after all. Water that you were supposed to
> boil the peas in, and mash the boiled peas into a paste functionally
> equivalent to a dough. We never thought of that.

Assumption is the mother of an impressive array of fsckups.

--
Mans Nilsson primary/secondary/besserwisser/machina
MN-1334-RIPE +46 705 989668
Mmmmmm-MMMMMM!! A plate of STEAMING PIECES of a PIG mixed with the
shreds of SEVERAL CHICKENS!! ... Oh BOY!! I'm about to swallow a
TORN-OFF section of a COW'S LEFT LEG soaked in COTTONSEED OIL and
SUGAR!! ... Let's see ... Next, I'll have the GROUND-UP flesh of CUTE,
BABY LAMBS fried in the MELTED, FATTY TISSUES from a warm-blooded
animal someone once PETTED!! ... YUM!! That was GOOD!! For DESSERT,
I'll have a TOFU BURGER with BEAN SPROUTS on a stone-ground, WHOLE
WHEAT BUN!!