Prof. Keith Scott-Mumby's Total Health Newsletter #52. Week ending June 13th, 2010
Please feel free to forward this to friends who might be interested in reading it.

Menu:

• This week's Quote

1. Home At Last back from the UK
2. You Gotta Read This
3. The Determinants Of Happiness
4. The Other Cell Phone Danger
5. More Accidental Deaths. Button Batteries Killing Children.
6. What's In A Word?

Use your BACK browser button to return to the menu at any time.

full index of past issues of Letter From Serendipity

Sign up here if you want to receive "Letter From Serendipity" on a regular basis Email address:  I do not spam and do not sell, share or lend email addresses.

click the image or click here for more info

This Week's Quote:

“The applied sciences should free men of material problems at least. Medicine controls diseases. And the record here seems all to the good. Yet there are men patiently working to create great plagues and poisons. They are to be used in warfare tomorrow."

-- Richard Feynman, US physicist, Nobel laureate

1. Home At Last

Yes, the USA is my "home", in every sense. I joke a bit and push the margins about the American way of doing things. But in the end, it's the best place on earth to live. The wild lands are so beautiful, it makes your head hurt and heart ache. There isn't much freedom left but there is plenty of cameraderie and enterprise. Apart from conspicuous ethnic minority groups, not many people here whine for the government to help them solve their problems like they do in Europe.

Just as well, since the US government is busted!

Flying back had a special privilege this time. I was carried to the far north and overflew Greenland, Baffin Bay, Baffin Island, Ellesmere Island (almost) and the fabled North West Passage. There was nothing to see from the sky but virgin unbroken land, with hundreds of pure white glaciers. It was awesome!

For many years I have been writing a novel about whaling, part of which is set in Baffin Bay. So I know a lot about the topography of this region. It was great to see the "summer ice" from the air. But historically it sank many a fine ship and cost the lives of thousands of British sailors (not to mention a good many whales too!)

The climate is brutal, the winds sudden and savage, the ice perilous at best and the currents among the most treacherous on Earth. Yet from on high it looked so serene and beautiful, it must rank as one of God's best creations!

Baffin Bay ice

2. You Gotta Read This

See, I'm back to talking like an American already!

But seriously, this book is really lovely. I read it while in the UK. It's called "Hector And The Search For Happiness" by Francois Lelord. In this case, Hector is a fictional psychiatrist but the author, Lelord, is a real-life psychiatrist. And it's anything but a stuffy, academic book!

It's very funny, perceptive and wise.

Hector is a good psychiatrist and kindly (a bit of fictional license, maybe?)  He often knows how to help his patients, but he struggles with those who don’t really have an identifiable illness; they’re just unhappy.  Even when they are rich, in successful marriages, with smart children, these people aren’t happy.  And sometimes Hector finds that he is also unhappy, which he doesn’t understand. So he sets off on a worldwide tour in an effort to find the secret of happiness, if there even is one.

A lot of the secrets of happiness that Hector discovers, could be described as simple and obvious. Doesn’t of course make them any less pertinent though! I like two of them especially:

• Making comparisons can spoil your happiness
• Happiness is to be loved for exactly who you are

The language style is part of this book's magic. It's naive, almost childlike and quite witty. Here's a funny passage:

"Firstly, the plane was full of African men and women. Hector was practically the only white person on the plane. Many of the men and women were smartly dressed, almost as if they were from another era, like Hector's grandparents in the country, when they went to mass. The women had on long flowery dresses and the men rather baggy suits. Another thing that reminded him of the country was their huge shopping bags, and some even had live chickens and ducks in cages! These animals were quite noisy, but that was just as well because they drowned out the noise of the plane, which also dated from another era. Hector remembered the patients who came to see him because they were afraid of flying, and he told himself that after this flight he'd understand them a lot better..."

3. The Determinants Of Happiness

Actually, this is straight from Lelord's novel. He's supposed to meet a professor who tends him these question. I think they are GREAT qustions and invite you to work with them and see at what level your happiness exists:

1. First, think about the differences between the life you have and the life you wished you would have had. Draw conclusions. Make changes.
2. Second, think about the differences between the life you have now and the best period of your life previously. Draw conclusions. Make changes.
3. Third, think about the difference between what you have and what others have. Draw conclusions. Make changes.

These humble questions are practically tools for living. Answer the question honestly and work with what you find.

By the way, Lelord's novel will not answer the questions for you. It's not that kind of book. The "draw conclusions, make changes" is my addition. It is a fairy tale but with a bit of self-development topspin. Buy it to enjoy.

4. The Other Cell Phone Danger

This is adapted from my upcoming book "Anti-Aging Outside The Box". There is a lot of stuff in it that's truly "outside the box". It's not obvious, unless you think about it, why this should be in an anti-aging book!

A lot is written about the dangers of cell phones, meaning the radiation threat.

There’s another danger I perceive from cell phones. They get inside your head and cause stress. Phones can mess you up. Cell phones are with you all the time and don’t let up in their relentless presence.

Cell phones are a constant YES! [this extract is taken from an article entitled "Say No, Live Longer"]

Living in the USA, I wonder why it is that some people feel absolutely compelled to answer the phone when it rings. It obtrudes into your time and thoughts; it will kill relaxation time; cell phones create an urgency, so that just about anything you do is speeded up, quicker than before and (mostly) quite unnecessary.

You know the old joke: most uses for a cell phone are things like “Remember to drop by the store and get an extra bottle of milk”. That never used to happen. If you forgot, you forgot. Now somebody can ring you up and hassle you; or even call you a dope for forgetting.

We used to have plenty of moments of down time. Now most people think they are not alive and breathing, unless they are talking to somebody. It's always idle, worthless chatter. But people do it anyway.

Who needs all that stuff?

I like Jon Gordon on this, from his book “Energy Addict: 101 Physical, Mental And Spiritual Ways To Energize Your Life:

There is nothing in the user’s manual to say that your phone of pager must stay on 24/7. If you don’t want to be bothered during a movie, dinner, at home, or during a conversation, just shut the phone off and let your voicemail accept the call. When you are ready to talk, simply turn your phone on, check your messages, and call people back in your time instead of theirs. You’ll be amazed at how simply shutting off your phone at certain times will help you focus and increase energy.

5. More Accidental Deaths. Button Batteries Killing Children

Following up on my striking article on drowning, here’s another little suspected form of accidental death that mainly affects children: swallowing little “button batteries”.

The incidence of this unfortunate death modality has gone up seven-fold in the years 1985- 2009.

That’s serious. It’s not always fatal but it is such a meaningless loss of life, it should be known about and avoided at all costs.

Trouble is, button batteries are found in remote controls, singing greeting cards, thermometers, DVD players and many other products to which children have ready access. These have become very popular in recent years. Whereas in 1990 about 1% of all small 20 millimeter-sized batteries were lithium coin cells, now that figure has risen to about 18% to 20%.

The problem, however, is that in the hands and mouths of children under four -- who account for about 85% of accidental swallowing cases -- an otherwise invaluable product can prove lethal.

Typically pediatric ingestion results in the battery getting lodged in the esophagus (gullet), rather than in air passages. So the risk is primarily not a question of choking, but rather one of a potentially fatal alkaline burn. The burns from lithium button batteries result not from battery leakage, but to exposure of body tissues to the battery's external current, resulting in hydroxide that can burn through the throat or esophagus.

To prevent serious injury or death, a swallowed battery has to be removed from the child's esophagus within two hours of swallowing.

Source: the journal Pediatrics, June 2010

[Note the name of this journal is mis-spelled: pediatrics means foot doctoring. The correct word is paediatrics—Ooops, back to criticizing the Americans! Ha well, I’m home at last…]

6. What's In A Word?

Nouse

Nouse is an old English word meaning know-how or skills, as in "He's got the nouse" for someone who can perform.

A nouse is also a computer mouse that is operated by the nose. It's not just for handicapped people but an attempt to break away from hand operated devices. A camera on top of the computer interprets nasal movements, eye blinks etc. [Image and Vision Computing, Volume 22, Issue 12, 1 October 2004, Pages 931-942, Proceedings from the 15th International Conference on Vision Interface]

What is it with those Oregonians? For them nouse means penis. I'm sure of my fact here but totally unsure how this came to be. One source suggested a derivative of pen-nouse.

So, that's all for this week!

Be well; find the sacred in all you do, otherwise don't do it!

Prof.

Sign up here if you want to receive "Letter From Serendipity" on a regular basis Email address:  I do not spam and do not sell or lend email addresses. Unsubscribing is easy.

This publication is copyright of Keith Scott-Mumby (www.alternative-doctor.com)
© 2009 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Disclaimer

All content within this information letter is commentary or opinion and is protected under Free Speech laws in all the civilized world. The information herein is provided for educational and entertainment purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for professional advice of any kind.

In no event shall Professor Scott-Mumby be liable for any consequential damages arising out of any use of, or reliance on any content or materials contained herein, neither shall Professor Scott-Mumby be liable for any content of any external internet sites listed and services listed.

Always consult your own licensed medical practitioner if you are in any way concerned about your health. You must satisfy yourself of the validity of the professional qualifications of any health care provider you contact as a result of this newsletter.