🙂
Jed’s radical choice to quit his job and ride his bike across the world is a perfect challenge to the rest of us to get out of the routine and make some scary decisions. …
Click PLAY or watch it on Vimeo.
Category: health & fitness
Ron Shewchuk conquering cancer – again
Funds raised through The Ride to Conquer Cancer will support life-saving research and enhancements to care at the BC Cancer Agency, bringing hope to cancer patients in B.C. and beyond. …
donate HERE
Click PLAY or watch Ron’s plea on YouTube.
my bike was stolen
I bought a new Hybrid at MEC. Within a week it was stolen.
Ghost Panamao X 3 Bicycle (Unisex) – CAD$725 (US$582)
Using the wifi at McDonald’s at 3611 17th-AVE SW Calgary, I’d locked it to a tree close to the busy road. Seemed a good idea at the time. Who’d cut that lock? It’s such a busy spot.
Police told me that homeless guys tend to hang out at McDonald’s. There were a number the night I was there.
Though seemingly hopeless, I filed an online Police report next day. I wanted the cops to know what bike was targeted where.
Immediately I got a phone call. They’d recovered my bike. Wow!
Actually, they called before seeing my report. A new Ghost (unusual brand) was spotted outside a Mac’s convenience store with no lock. The police took it when no owner could be located. (No doubt the thief fled the scene when he saw them.)
Knowing that only MEC sold Ghost, they stopped by the store to ask the manager about that particular serial number. He gave them my phone number.
I love the Calgary police now. 🙂
When I met the police to collect my bike those partners told me that they pick up about one stolen bike a week.
Thieves try to “change the appearance” of stolen bikes. In my case they took off the hybrid wheels and put on a pretty good set of (stolen) mountain bike wheels. They added two small lights. And took off my bell.
But a Ghost bike is pretty conspicuous. There aren’t many of them around yet.
I decided to buy a replacement set of Hybrid wheels. And put the mountain bike wheels on one of my mountain bikes. All in all, I’m pretty happy how things worked out.
And I’ll be much more careful with my good bike in future.
Bait bikes won’t be coming to Calgary any time soon, according to city police, who now say there has been no progress on such a program since last summer when they were dealing with a spike in bicycle thefts.
It was nine months ago that Sgt. Katrina O’Reilly told Metro several departments within the police service were working on an in-house version of a program similar to those in other jurisdictions, which see GPS tracking devices hidden inside bicycles placed in public areas as “bait” for would-be thieves. …
Sgt. Katrina O’Reilly told Metro last summer there had been a “tremendous increase” in the number of bikes being stolen in break-and-enters, rather than from an outdoor rack or off the street. …
Bait bike idea shelved by Calgary police, cyclists frustrated with mass thefts
love outdoor escalators
Love ’em. 🙂
Over the last century, cities have been designed to accommodate the automobile. So, how do we redesign them to benefit people?
Outdoor escalators (climate allowing) are a low cost part of a solution to reduce the use of motor vehicles.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube. It highlights the system in Medellín, Colombia.
The Central–Mid-Levels escalator and walkway system in Hong Kong is the longest outdoor covered escalator system in the world. The entire system covers over 800 metres (2,600 ft) in distance and elevates over 135 metres (443 ft) from bottom to top. …
related – Medellín made urban escalators famous, but have they had any impact?
Norway tops the Social Progress Index
Gross Domestic Product has become the yardstick by which we measure a country’s success. But, says Michael Green, GDP isn’t the best way to measure a good society.
His alternative? The Social Progress Index, which measures things like basic human needs and opportunity. …
The Social Progress Index determines what it means to be a good society according to three dimensions: Basic Human Needs (food, water, shelter, safety); Foundations of Wellbeing (basic education, information, health and a sustainable environment); and Opportunity (do people have rights, freedom of choice, freedom from discrimination, and access to higher education?) …
Some countries over-perform on social progress relative to their GDP per capita. Costa Rica is the biggest aggregate over-performer, showing strength across all the dimensions. The key lesson here is that building social progress takes persistence. Costa Rica has had strong education, health and welfare systems for a long time, as well as a long democratic tradition. SPI measures outcomes — life expectancy, literacy rate — not inputs, like laws passed or money spent. There are no cheats or quick fixes
Saudi Arabia is the biggest underachiever. I’ve just arrived … Actually I’m scheduled to get to San Jose, Costa Rica May 1st, my first visit.
every day should be ‘Buy Nothing’ day
🙂
‘Live Rich’ – A spoken word film about the true meaning of wealth.
‘Live Rich’ is a film about our relationship with money in a world where we are always being sold to, and how the most important things in life can’t be bought.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Written, Performed & Directed by Gary Turk
Original Score by New Desert Blues
Featuring Megan Turk & Jonathan Royston-Claire
Spend less. Live more.
Buy more experiences, fewer things.
(via Films for Action)
Placebo and Nocebo effects
A placebo is a simulated or otherwise medically ineffectual treatment for a disease or other medical condition intended to deceive the recipient.
Sometimes patients given a placebo treatment will have a perceived or actual improvement in a medical condition, a phenomenon commonly called the placebo effect. …
In the opposite effect, a patient who disbelieves in a treatment may experience a worsening of symptoms. This effect, now called by analogy nocebo (Latin nocebo = “I shall harm”) can be measured in the same way as the placebo effect …
anti-vaxers are wrong, wrong, wrong
The New Jersey Governor, normally a smart guy, bungled this one. It seemed to me he was pandering to the anti-Obama, lowest common denominator base of the Republican Party.
Now he’s trying to back-pedal.
Watch A Discredited Vaccine Study’s Continuing Impact on Public Health on the NY Times.
It’s not uneducated people, but rather wealthy L.A. and San Francisco area parents. Jenny McCarthy fans, I wildly speculate.
If you don’t want to wade through the specifics of why anti-vaxers are wrong, Penn and Teller will give you a graphic explanation.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
That all said, I agree that we should be researching vaccines. Finding the best. Looking for side effects.
But to not vaccinate your kids for measles is near criminal parenting behaviour.
who was most wrong about Ebola?
Good news. The outbreak is still in decline – New Ebola cases fall most in week since June.
Economist Oct 2014:
IN THE crowded field of Ebola alarmists, Rand Paul of Kentucky stands out. …
Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana says planes must be grounded “to protect our people”. …
Some leaders are more responsible. The Republican governor of Texas, Rick Perry, has tried to keep people calm. Few countries are better equipped than America to keep the public safe, he has assured Texans. He is right. It should not need saying. …
The Ebola alarmists – Stoking panic will not help America fight Ebola
Senator Ted Cruz should be apologizing, as well.
A world pandemic will come, sooner or later. But Ebola is not it.
The Dash – Wireless Smart In Ear Headphones
The ideal music/book player. IF it ever becomes available for sale.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
… I’m worried about battery life in a device so tiny.
(via Gear Junkie – 10 Innovations From CES 2015)
