Covid

Covid
Widows

Covid
Orphans

We've seen
Them all in
This year.

Is that
Reason
Enough
To celebrate
Life or to
Celebrate
Death in the
Coming new
Year?

© Aparna Chatterjee

Have you heard of him?

He is Philip Galanes

Usually in many newspapers and magazines, we come across agony-aunt columns wherein people ask questions relating to their personal problems and there's a lady (agony aunt) who gives suggestions and advice regarding how to resolve those problems and issues.

But here is a man, rather an agony uncle, and he's really good at giving advice.

I follow his columns, his series of Q&As with the various readers of The New York Times and how intelligently and sometimes very humorously, he tells them what to do to get out of the mess they are in.

His way of responding to them is very interesting and I love the way he counsels them with his unique way of thinking.

He's marvellous in expressing himself and getting his thoughts across to his readers and has a really superb vocabulary.

Here are some of his erudite writings.

https://www.nytimes.com/by/philip-galanes

https://muckrack.com/philip-galanes/articles

Have a read when you can.

Cheers

Aparna

Have you tried this?

Head & Shoulders Sensitive Scalp Shampoo

http://kenajaye.blogspot.com/2020/11/head-shoulders-sensitive-scalp-shampoo.html

It's really worth a try :-)

As UK has been in and out of various kinds of lockdowns because of Coronavirus, many of our regular items have been out of stock in the supermarkets because of irregular deliveries of their supplies.

We've gone through months of rationing as supermarkets allow us to make limited number of purchases.

During one such lockdown, I couldn't get the shampoo that I usually use

Head & Shoulders Sensitive Scalp Shampoo

I had to use some other shampoo of some other brand that was also a sensitive shampoo but nowhere near to the H&S shampoo that I use.

I realised that the shampoo was very watery, not much foam, it kept sliding down my head as it was slippery like a thin liquid and if by chance any of that liquid got into my eyes, it left a stinging sensation (as compared to the H&S sensitive scalp shampoo which didn't give me any such reaction).

Moreover, that other shampoo left tangles in my hair and my hair was so sticky, rough and gluey whenever I combed it for quite a few days of having used that shampoo.

It was so uncomfortable combing my hair and I was really waiting for my regular shampoo to come back in stock and I was so glad it did :-)

This Head & Shoulders Sensitive Scalp Shampoo leaves my hair feeling so soft, silky and shiny and when I use it, it's so lathery, gives a good foam and most importantly doesn't keep slipping and sliding through my visage because it's a thick foam.

It stays in place till I wash it all off, sparing me the uncomfortable action of frequently washing my face and eyes to clean off the shampoo that I endured with that other runny liquid that the supermarket was selling as a sensitive shampoo.

The H&S shampoo left my hair tangle-free and chemically, it doesn't have any parabens, phosphates and colourants.

It's my favourite shampoo and whenever I get a deal / discount, I buy it in bulk just in case it again vanishes during future lockdowns.

That's why I recommend this product to you and I hope you like it as much as I do :-)

Happy washing :-)

Cheers

Aparna

Pets

I've grown up with cats and dogs. There was a cat and a dog in our home that were so friendly and peace-loving that they used to sleep together on the same mat.

There was another cat who used to accompany my mother on her daily evening walks and used to always walk behind her and come back home with her when she finished her walks.

My dog used to sit under my study table and I used to stroke its fur while studying.

I've seen my pets birthing in my home and the cats used to have kittens and the dogs (bitches) used to have puppies.

All these are cherished memories of my parental home.

So I was really surprised to find this article and I thought of sharing it with you so that you are also well-informed.

These are extracts from an Article that was News for me, informing me that keeping pets can cause cancer.

The marketing departments of the $70-billion-a-year pet products industry are working overtime these days to convince you that pet ownership is the key to human health and happiness. But the corporate PR departments and the media conveniently ignore studies that report pet-owners are more susceptible to a host of maladies. These include hypertension, anxiety, depression, insomnia, gastric ulcers, migraine headaches, and obesity. And I suspect the pet food industry is not going to send out press releases on three recent studies that link pet ownership to cancer death rates.

The pet owners were more likely to be heavy smokers than non-pet owners, and more of them had been diagnosed with asthma. And while pet owners were more physically active than non-owners, this did not translate into better health. Indeed, the pet owners were just as likely to be overweight as people who did not live with pets.

After adjusting for socioeconomic and demographic factors (“covariates”) such as age, smoking and drinking, exercise, race, and income, the researchers found pet owners were almost 3 times as likely as non-pet owners to have died of colorectal cancer (hazard ratio = 2.83). Surprisingly, this dramatic difference in colorectal cancer deaths was mostly attributable to living with a cat (hazard ratio = 2.67).

Pet-owning women were more than twice as likely to die of lung cancer as women who did not live with pets (hazard ratio = 2.67). Female cat owners were nearly 3 times as likely to have died of lung cancer as women without cats. Pet-owning women, however, were 40% more likely to have died from cancer (hazard ratio = 1.40).  And the effect was largest among women who owned birds (hazard ratio = 2.41) and cats (hazard ratio = 1.48).

Women who owned cats or birds had considerably higher rates of lung cancer deaths and deaths from all forms of cancers than women without pets.

The researchers concluded, “Using data from a nationally representative cohort, we found that keeping a pet in the household was associated with an increased risk of dying of cancer, mainly among women.”

The researchers suggest that the cat and bird owners might come into contact with carcinogenic chemicals called Aflatoxins through exposure to contaminated pet foods or animal feces. They also point out that some studies have found women are more susceptible to the effects of cancer-causing chemicals than men.

Other studies have also reported that pet owners are at more risk than non-pet owners of contracting lymphoma, breast cancer, leukemia, and lung cancer.

I don’t have a clue why there would be a link between cancer and pet ownership. I am, however, pretty sure the suits in the marketing departments of the pet food companies are not going to be churning out press releases announcing, “Women Who Own Cats and Birds Have Higher Death Rates from Cancer."

You can read the rest of the article here

https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/animals-and-us/201908/the-strange-link-between-pet-ownership-and-cancer-in-women

The author of this article is Hal Herzog. He is Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Western Carolina University.

He's an award-winning teacher and researcher who has published more than 100 research articles and book chapters. 

If you find this article useful, please share it with your near 'n' dear ones.

Well, I didn't know this

Did you?

I always thought that Smoking can cause Lung Cancer

But here it says that Smoking can also cause Bladder Cancer

In this article Dr. Srinivas Vourganti informs us that

Smoking causes more than half of all cases of bladder cancer, and smokers are three times more likely to get bladder cancer than non-smokers.

Dr. Vourganti who's a urologist at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago says: "The same harmful chemicals you inhale when you smoke accumulate in your urine, and as the bladder holds urine, it is exposed to these toxins at a higher rate than other parts of the body."

Bladder cancer is the 6th most common form of cancer in the USA.

It's over three times more common in men than in women, and the risk increases with age.

9 in 10 bladder cancer patients are older than 55.

You can read rest of the details by clicking here

Quit smoking, your bladder will thank you

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-11-bladder.html

Please pass on this news to the smokers around you so that it makes them quit smoking and live a healthy life.

Four Types of Marriages

 I've come across this very interesting article on Four Types of Marriages:

1. Supportive - high in support, low in strain

2. Ambivalent - high in support, high in strain

3. Indifferent - low in support, low in strain

4. Aversive - low in support, high in strain

Which one is yours?!  ;-)


The author of this article David Ludden defines Support as "any interaction in the marriage that boosts physical or psychological well-being" and Strain includes those "interactions that damage physical or psychological well-being."

Supportive marriages seem to be the Happiest and yield the Best health outcomes for both Men and Women whereas Couples in Aversive marriages tend to be the Unhappiest.

Ludden's informative article begins with these insightful lines:

Plenty of research shows that being married is generally good for your physical and psychological health. Spouses aren’t just companions and intimate partners; they also help each other maintain healthy habits, and they provide emotional support in times of need. However, there’s also plenty of research showing that bad marriages are far worse for people’s health than not being married at all. Even when there’s no physical or psychological abuse, the frequent tensions that arise from conflicts and complaints can lead to considerable physical and psychological harm. As people enter their senior years, marriage becomes even more important in their lives. When they retire, they tend to lose the network of relationships that can help offset some of the tensions at home. Likewise, grown children leave home and often move far away, while friendships shrink in number due to loss of mutual interests, health problems, or death.

To read the rest of this article and its relevant research findings, you can click here

https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/talking-apes/202012/how-marriage-affects-health-in-older-adults

Happy Reading,

Cheers
Aparna

It

It's not only

For the

Who's who

It's also

For

Commoners

Like me and

You

If you taste it

You'll like it

What is it?

It's

Haldiram's

Motichoor

Laddoo :-)

(wrote this after having some delicious laddoos from this brand - the taste was grand)