Badly phrased, I'll admit. I have a tendency to get distracted in the middle of typing by some crises with small children that can't be fixed by the grandma. What I meant is that statistics work well over a generalized large group of people, but you can't tell an individual's health profile from a larger average,…

And yet I have, amongst my friends, someone who got his bone density measured and mathematically proved that if he were literally nothing but skin and bones—no organs, no muscles, nothing but skin and bones—he would still be classified as "overweight" by BMI. I understand that the plural of anecdote is not data, but…

BMI was a "measurement" created by a Belgian who surveyed his friends to create a height/weight average that he plotted to a curve. It gained traction when insurance companies discovered that they could charge certain people more without getting medical information from them (often privileged and protected under…

The thing I get from dreams are locations—the most vivid one was at John Muir's house, of all places. I got a weird feeling before stepping onto a small bridge, looked to the right, and saw a bricked creek diversion that had been in a dream I'd had some time before. Sometimes I just know things, though.

Heh. I would have been skeptical too, except that I saw a coworker who was a hardcore exerciser (biking his age in miles as a birthday thing, and he's in his 60s—so you can guess what kind of shape he's in to be able to pull that off) get diagnosed with heart disease and diabetes (oops) and drop ~60 pounds in a couple…

I think the worst part is that therapists from other Mennonite colonies—mostly in North America—have offered to come down and help the women. These are female therapists who have been raised in Mennonite traditions (which do vary), and who speak Low German. The women in this colony don't even know this help was…

One book. Originally titled A Planet Called Treason and later updated and renamed Treason. (I've read both versions, and basically he smoothed out the story a bit.) The protagonist is from the group who basically regrow anything they lose, only he's one of the mutants who keep growing new bits regardless. Since he's…

I definitely default to "white." The funny thing is, though, that I come from a fairly integrated area of the country, so what I think of as "white" often isn't. I had that brought home to me fairly thoroughly when I went to college in an area near a known racist compound, and a friend's brother had racist language…

I go to the dance store and get "character shoes." They're rounded, but they're shoes with a heel height that varies according to your choice, and they look vaguely 1930s-1950s (hence the name; they're the default stage shoe for when the costume designers don't want to get too particular *and* want their actors to be…