Jimro

So no kidding there I was.... I'd been preparing for "The Event" for quite some time. My stockpile of Wolf brand 5.56 was only half of my "comfortable level" so I hopped into the BOV (that's Bug Out Vehicle for you civilian types) and headed down to "Uncle Bob's* Gun Store and Bait Shack" for another couple cases, just in case. I noticed that the fuel gauge was a tad under a quarter tank and I knew then and there that I needed to fill up, just in case "The Event" happened and I needed to BORT (that's Bug Out Right Then for you civvies). So I bypassed the CITGO station (communist bastards) and pulled into a BP. While pumping my fuel into the main tank on my BOV I noticed the clerk behind the counter selling a military age male a drink. This got my attention because it somehow seemed out of place, I've read on the internet that you should always pay attention to your gut, so I do. Knowing deep within my soul that something bad was going down I raised my personal security status from "blue" to "orange". I bladed my body to the convenience store and put my right hand to the small of my back to palm my "carry piece". Some people are satisfied with a cheap import like Glock, but me I like the simplicity and reliability of the classic American pistol, the Star Model B. I chose the 9mm "B" as I call her, over a standard 45 like the awesome Norinco 1911 because I can use ammo I capture from the thugs trying to get me in case of "The Event". The gas pump finished fueling the BOV and I waited for the machine to spit out a receipt, all the while keeping my eyes firmly on the threat inside the store. "Hey Mr. got some change?" said a new threat to my right. I whipped around to address the new threat by pulling out the "B" and getting it on target. I slipped and fell to the pavement trapping my arm behind my back, lucky that this surprise move had caught "The Threat" off guard. I rolled left and right flailing my legs to keep "The Threat" away. "Mr. you ok? you try to stay still while I get some help." said "The Threat" and he proceeded into the convenience store to get his buddy as he obviously knew I was more than a match for him. I did a standing base and got to my feet, decided that the receipt wasn't worth waiting around for more enemy reinforcements to arrive. I got into the BOV, a highly modified Geo Metro, and peeled out of there using the "Rockford" technique. Unbeknownst to me someone had pulled in behind the BOV in an attempt to box me in, just like the Mujahadeen did to the Soviets in Afghanistan. My rear bumper slammed into the front of Range Rover and I decided to change tactics. I slammed the automatic transmission into "D" and exfiltrated with haste. Long ago I decided that I needed the automatic tranny even with the drop in mileage so I could shoot and drive at the same time, just like a SEAL. Those thugs, if indeed they were thugs and not undercover mercenaries, had been lucky, if I hadn't been able to get out of there safely then the only recourse open to me was the "B". I have the "B" in condition red, locked and cocked, filled with high quality steel cased Wolf 115 grain FMJ bullets. My gut was still giving me an uneasy feeling, and it wasn't the burrito special I had for dinner last night. Spiderman doesn't have the sense for danger that I do. I took a couple detours on my way to Uncle Bob's* Gun Store and Bait Shack, circled the same block three times just to see if anyone was tailing me. I pulled into the parking lot and backed into a stall, nose out so that I would have maximum maneuverability in case of rapid egress. I surveyed the damage to the rear of the BOV. Nothing some 100 mile per hour tape wouldn't fix. Uncle Bob* (name changed for his protection) knows me pretty well. When I walked in he asked, "You want the usual?" and I nodded. I try to never speak so that people don't get emotionally attached to me in case of "The Event". Bob put one box of Wolf 5.56 and 9mm each on the counter. "That'll be 17.93". I fished exact change from my pocket, careful to sort out any pennies minted before 1982. I took the newest addition to my stockpile and left. The bad feeling in my gut decreasing the closer I got to my domain. A man's home is his castle. The extra lock I installed on the front door of my 1977 single wide always slows me up for a second, but that's the point. Once inside I pulled the "B" and cleared each room to make sure no one had breached the perimeter. Safely inside of my sanctum I stashed my ammo with the rest of the cache in the living room. I keep a BOB (that's Bug Out Bag for you civilians) in each room just in case. My world was once in order again, so I booted up the Celeron and logged onto the internet to share my close call.

Well yes and no. If someone has allergy symptoms and there is antigen binding and by removing the identified allergen the symptoms are relieved then I would call that good correlation. My wife's wheat allergy was identified by IGG antigen binding, so I may be a little biased. Jimro

A blood test can be used to test allergies. Antigen binding is the principle behind ELISA, or Enzyme Linked ImmunoAssay. Basically a test surface is coated with a number of different allergens/antigens and the subjects blood is given time to bind. Then the blood is rinsed away and the test surface is exposed to UV light and where there is a lot of UV shine there is a lot of binding and therefore the subject is allergic to that antigen. Jimro

A quarter million dollars is not enough money for someone in there 50's to retire on. Also the productivity of people in their 50's is one of the driving factors of our economy. The average age of a construction worker in the US was 45 as of three years ago. Those in their 50's are the backbone and brains of our industry, from skilled labor to engineering to middle and upper management. I agree with you that the "stimulus package" doesn't do anything but throw money away. The only thing that would work is tax cuts, you can't spend your way out of debt, it's like digging deeper to get out of a hole. Jimro

Just checking the math... 40,000,000 x 1,000,000 = 40,000,000,000,000 Unless I'm way off mark that is 40 TRILLION dollars, or somewhere between 30 and 40 times the cost of the current ineffective bailout plan. Jimro

Paul Mauser, John Moses Browning, Nicola Tesla, George Washington Carver, ALL geniuses in their fields. Before them it was Leonardo Da Vinci, Isaac Newton, and Copernicus. If we see far it is only because we stand on the shoulders of giants. Jimro

Vitamin D is plentiful in fish like salmon and cod and red meat from ruminants, so even in northern climes you can get your daily dose by eating tasty animals. In fact a healthy diet including fish and lean red meat with lots of vegetables and whole grains is probably better for you than eating crap and taking a multivitamin.... Jimro

http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2009/02/soci...-practices.html Jimro

Vitamin D needs solar radiation to break a strong carbon ring structure, and if you spend plenty of time outdoors you probably have more than enough. Most people don't need vitamin supplementation, but it falls into the realm of "doesn't hurt, probably helpful". Jimro

Dr. Hess, That is an insane amount of vitamin D. Animal data indicates signs of toxicity can occur with ingestion of 0.5 mg/kg (20,000 IU/kg ), while the oral LD50 for cholecalciferol in dogs is about 88 mg/kg, or 3,520,000 IU/kg. That means she was taking 15mg of Vitamin D per dose, with an initial dose of 30 mg. That means the very first dose if the patients mass was under 60kg (132 lbs) she hit the agreed upon threshold for Vitamin D toxicity. Since Vitamin D is a fat soluble vitamin it clears from the body slowly. A normal multi-vitamin isn't going to have more than a few hundred IU's of Vitamin D, and a vitamin D pill normally runs in the 1,000 to 2,000 IU range. Say a daily total dose of 1,400 IU's. To equate those levels of Vitamin D to what that lady took on her initial dose, you would have to take 857 multivitamin pills, and 857 1,000 IU Vitamin D pills. Normal people don't swallow 1714 pills in a session. In the words of Paracellus, "The dose makes the poison". After all, even good old water is lethal in sufficient doses. Jimro

I wouldn't worry about overdosing from a multivitamin supplemented with a Vitamin D pill. You would have to take hundreds of pills to hit the LD50 for Vitamin D. LD50 means a Lethal Dose for 50% of the test population (usually mice). Jimro

If it is a dry powder toner then the vacuum method works fine. If it is an alcohol based toner, wait for it to dry before vacuuming.... Jimro

To build on what Dr. Hess has posted, Vitamins function as co-enzymes. Vitamin C works by activating the prolylhydroxylase enzyme. That's a fancy way of saying that it modifies the collagen proteins so that your connective tissue functions as planned. All enzymes catalyze chemical reactions, that is all they do. (edit: cellular signaling pathways can be triggered by enzyme activity, but pretty much every molecule has some signaling cascade associated with it.) Some vitamins also function as "anti-oxidants" which mean that they have a spare electron to donate to a another molecule that has been oxidized. However studies have shown that large doses of anti-oxidants provide no added benefit. The bottom line is that taking your vitamins doesn't hurt and probably does you good. Jimro

I did a quick search through Pubmed and found these abstracts. In 1981, R. Edgar Hope-Simpson proposed that a 'seasonal stimulus' intimately associated with solar radiation explained the remarkable seasonality of epidemic influenza. Solar radiation triggers robust seasonal vitamin D production in the skin; vitamin D deficiency is common in the winter, and activated vitamin D, 1,25(OH)2D, a steroid hormone, has profound effects on human immunity. 1,25(OH)2D acts as an immune system modulator, preventing excessive expression of inflammatory cytokines and increasing the 'oxidative burst' potential of macrophages. Perhaps most importantly, it dramatically stimulates the expression of potent anti-microbial peptides, which exist in neutrophils, monocytes, natural killer cells, and in epithelial cells lining the respiratory tract where they play a major role in protecting the lung from infection. Volunteers inoculated with live attenuated influenza virus are more likely to develop fever and serological evidence of an immune response in the winter. Vitamin D deficiency predisposes children to respiratory infections. Ultraviolet radiation (either from artificial sources or from sunlight) reduces the incidence of viral respiratory infections, as does cod liver oil (which contains vitamin D). An interventional study showed that vitamin D reduces the incidence of respiratory infections in children. We conclude that vitamin D, or lack of it, may be Hope-Simpson's 'seasonal stimulus'. And Calcitriol, also known as 1,25-dihydroxy-vitamin D3, is a steroid hormone that has been shown to have effects on cytokine production and lymphocyte proliferation. Coadministration of calcitriol with trivalent influenza vaccine in mice enhanced both mucosal and systemic antibody responses. We studied the effects of calcitriol coadministered with a commercially available influenza vaccine in 175 human volunteers in this double-blind, placebo controlled clinical trial. Subjects that received calcitriol experienced more pain at the injection site compared with placebo recipients. No significant differences in hemagglutination inhibition titers against H1N1, H3N2, or influenza B antigens were detected at 1 or 3 months postvaccination. We conclude that coadministration of 1.0 microg of calcitriol at a site adjacent to influenza vaccination does not enhance humoral immunity in human volunteers. So the available evidence is that Vitamin D gives an immunity benefits to mice and children. It isn't a huge stretch to assume that the same benefits would extend to adult humans as well. The caveat is that you can't take Vitamin D on the same day that you get sick and expect any benefit (as demonstrated by the calcitriol double blind study). Jimro

Yeah, nobody is jumping to get on board with that idea... A nations/regions currency is a reflection of that economy. There is no feasible way to have a currency based on the economies of India, Russia, China, Mexico, and the United states. Jimro

You know when a woman tells a man "go buy a new one" I think she has an ulterior motive.... Jimro

49 backpacks. Each backpack has 56 cats. 49x56x4 + 14 = 10,990 Unless there is a bus driver, then add the two, unless the bus driver only has one leg... Or maybe there is a bunch of prosthetic legs on the bus as well? Then again, who said any of the girls had legs? Maybe the cats ate them? Jimro

*The republicans love to get the gun owners stirred up so they can make points toward re-elected (just remember they didn’t do schit their last 12 years in power). Not true. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protection_of...rce_in_Arms_Act I know that we specialize in old milsurp rifles on this board, but that doesn't mean American manufacturers should be sued out of business. Jimro

at the end of WWI when the allies saddled Germany with all the war debt, Germany just started to crank out the Deutchmarks to pay the debt and consequently saddled itself with Zimbabwe style hyperinflation until the debt was paid. Right now the US is in a similar situation, saddled with a massive amount of debt that other nations are looking to have repaid. Will Obama pull a Reagan and balance the budget? Or will he cause choose to fire up the presses and throw America into chaos? Jimro

Not all foams are polystyrene. If gasoline doesn't work give acetone a try, it normally destroys polymers without hesitation. Jimro

Fedora and Ubuntu are Linux operating systems, also known as "Distros" which is short for "distribution". The actual Linux kernel is the same for both distributions, but the software that is layered on top of the kernel is different. There are three distinct "families" of Linux distributions that are commonly in use, Fedora (red hat), Debian, and Slackware. What makes each family unique is the management software for each, Anything Red Hat/Fedora based uses rpm packages, anything Debian based will use an actual package manager suite, and a distro like Slackware uses basic binary and tarball files that the administrator installs manually. To break it down by ease of use, I find Ubuntu to be the easiest, it's what I'm using right now on my laptop. I only had to tweak some drivers to get full functionality, namely the wireless and video card drivers. Getting any linux distro to work on a laptop is a major coup. Red Hat/Fedora is very popular because of relatively widespread use in industry. Red Hat certification is almost as prestigious as MCSE or CCNA. Slackware is possibly the grandaddy of ultra stable Linux distros, it is no frills and takes a lot more effort on the part of the user to configure. Once it is configured it is possibly the most stable of any operating system I've ever used. Jimro

Get your finances in order before any business venture. It isn't that hard to earn a living "working for the man" it's all about discipline and intelligent choices, the same qualities that you will need as a business owner. No matter who you work for if you consistently save 10% of your paycheck in some sort of growth account you will set up a good nest egg in a hurry. No matter your source of income good financial habits will help you succeed. Most Americans don't need a better paying job, they need healthier spending/saving habits. Jimro

Ok gents, here is the lowdown on cooking oils. All plant oils are at least mono-unsaturated, meaning that they have a carbon to carbon double bond somewhere in the chain. Of all the commonly available plant based cooking oils olive oil and canola (which is rapeseed) oils are the two that I stock in my kitchen. Olive oil is a "heart healthy" oil that you can use for everything from salad dressings to marinades or any other "low heat" applications (I like to shake quartered potatoes in olive oil and a little salt before roasting in the oven). Olive oil is a poor choice for frying or stir frying because it has a pretty low smoke point, and burnt tasting food is no good. Canola (rapeseed) oil has a very light flavor, very high smoke point, and it is my go too oil for stir frying. I don't pan fry any food because no matter how "healthy" an oil is it is still just fat and there are a lot of benefits to keeping your fat intake moderate. If you want to deep fry or pan fry foods routinely then consider peanut oil (once again a light taste and high smoke point) or Avocado oil (if you can find it) or plain old corn oil or sunflower oil. The cooking fats that you want to avoid are butter, shortening, and bacon grease. Animal fats (butter/lard/bacon grease) are all saturated fats which don't do your body any favors. Trans fats are unsaturated fats that your body treats as saturated fats (based on their chemical geometry). Hydrogenated vegetable oils (vegetable shortening) are unsaturated fats that have had the carbon to carbon double bond reduced to a single bond by adding two hydrogen atoms to the lipid molecule. Bottom line, plant oils good. Canola, olive, corn, sunflower, peanut, etc. Animal oils and chemically altered oils bad. Bacon grease, lard, butter, margarine, trans fats, hydrogenated vegetable oil. Hope this helps. Jimro

Karl, Have you checked out Ubuntu yet? While it doesn't have the services management package that the Fedora core based distros have it is a very functional distro right off the disk. Jimro

I have experience with only one Mcgowen barrel, but it has been nothing but great. Jimro