One of the first stories I ever wrote at U.S.News & World Report was about sunscreen, and how the FDA was planning to issue new rules. This was in 2003. I remember it well, because it was also the first real consumer health story I’d ever written, and I was really feeling the responsibility – you know, that if I got something wrong, somebody could take my advice, buy the wrong sunscreen, and die. Yeah, I realize this is unlikely. Also, I didn’t get it wrong.
Anyway, I was amused to see today that the FDA finally did put out its new sunscreen rules. I’m pretty sure they were already overdue in 2003, and my story said they’d be out in 2005. Oh yes – the Post story says they started working on this in 1978. People born that year have sunburned children of their own by now.
Some changes you’ll notice: “sunblock,” “waterproof,” “sweatproof,” and SPFs over 50 will disappear, and there is finally going to be a standard for “broad spectrum” protection – that’s sunscreen that protects from both UVB and UVA.
About three weeks ago I entered a stretch of a lot of work. I like work. Work is good. I like when people give me things to do. It also makes me quite busy.
Right at the beginning of this busy stretch, my computer died. And that is why I haven’t blogged in…oh, wow. I just looked. I didn’t realize it had been so long. Yikes. More than three weeks. But, not to worry, I have a whole list of blog posts to write when I get my digital life back on track. (All the photos I took at museums in Vienna are tied up on some external hard drive.)
For now, my thought of the day: I’m working on a feature story about neuroscience. It’s really weird and a bit icky to think about the electrical pulses in the neurons in the brain…and then realize it’s exactly those neurons and those sparks of electricity that are producing those thoughts…and this thought about those thoughts…and these finger movements that are typing those thoughts…and the visual check that the fingers are typing the right thing…and the impulse to backspace when there’s a typo….
Sometimes, I’ll admit, I get bored in conferences. I know! Even when surrounded by scintillating intellectual exchange and lots of PowerPoints! Since I basically always have my camera, this means I end up with a lot of pictures of floors. For example, look at this jazzy carpet from one of the convention center hotels in San Diego:
Then there’s this, from the Omni New Haven in New Haven, Connecticut:
Just as busy, but a little more autumnal.
A few weeks ago I was at a conference in Vienna and was excited to discover: wood floors!
Well, actually, the carpets make better pictures. But still, I was excited. Europe: It’s different. I guess.
For a story I was just working on, I needed to remember how a synchrotron works. (It’s a component of a particle accelerator.) I kind of thought I remembered, but I was happy to come across this video. It’s a surprisingly lucid explanation of a synchrotron…by a nine-year-old boy. Seriously, it helped me, and it’s totally charming. Check it out.
My current office comes with multiple nap locations – it’s one of the best things about being a freelancer and working at home. I work hard and I get a lot done (I support myself with this work, for goodness’ sake) but sleep is good for your mind and body. And totally unacceptable in most offices. Sarah Zielinski has a nice blog post about this up at Smithsonian today.
One of my former employers actually did have a nap room – complete with a door sign indicating it was the office of “Snooze You Can Use.” That was the best. What is the point of struggling to sit upright at your computer and look like when you’re working, when really everyone – you, your boss, your coworkers you have to talk to, the person you have to interview later – would be better served if you rested your brain with a quick nap?
A friend sent me a link to this story about debit card fees – you know, the thing that this nonsensical poster is about. The article makes more sense than the poster, but I’m still not going to try to summarize it here. Go read and learn.
My original rant about the poster was about the fact that when your home address is in Washington, “Washington” doesn’t automatically mean “evil government.” Well, yesterday I got a phone call from a local public broadcaster – WETA – in which the caller referred to defunding of public radio by mentioning the stuff “Washington, D.C.” is doing. Hwah? Also, the caller ID was in California – what is that about? I wonder if my entire annual contribution goes to fundraising – I’ve gotten two letters from WETA just this week.
“Interesting” can be kind of faint praise, but I’m excited that Smithsonian, one of my favorite freelance outlets, was ranked “most interesting” of the 225 magazines this one company does reader surveys on. I mean, if there’s one thing you want your magazine to be, it’s interesting, right? Here’s a blog post about it.
Another 110,000 chicks and 2,000 adults died when the tsunami hit the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge, but it’s nice that these two survived.
Of course, tsunamis are a thoroughly natural threat for the Laysan albatross. If you’re going to insist on nesting on low-lying Pacific islands, this kind of thing is just going to happen every now and then. The Save the Albatross campaign describes some of the less natural threats, like longlining – a fishing technique where a boat puts out a line of hooks, from one to 50 miles long; the birds try to grab the bait and are hooked and drowned. (You can solve this by weighting the lines.) They’re also prone to eating floating bits of plastic, which isn’t particularly healthy.
Here’s that sea chanty, “Rolling Down to Old Maui,” sung by the great Canadian folk singer Stan Rogers:
“We’re homeward bound from the Arctic ground, rolling down to old Maui.” The sailors have been catching whales in the Arctic, which had to be just awful work, and they’re pretty excited to be going to enjoy the tropical pleasures of Maui. Kamchatka is the wayyyy Eastern bit of Russia that dangles down between the Sea of Okhotsk and the Bering Sea. It’s one of the places where humpbacks go in the summer to feed. (I think they would have been catching other kinds of whales, there, too.) A slightly different version of the lyrics is here.
I'm a freelance writer living in Washington, D.C. I like to knit,sing, dance, and write about science. Only one of these pays the
bills. A few years ago I spent six weeks on an icebreaker in the Bering Sea and two
months in Berlin on a journalism fellowship, and who knows - I could find some more adventures sometime.
