detroit
oracknows | March 9, 2017In case anyone's interested, the reason that there was no post today is because we had a rather massive windstorm here in the Detroit area that left 800,000 without power. Unfortunately, that number included my wife and me. I valiantly tried to take care of my blogging addiction last night, as the temperature in the house plunged to the 50s. With nothing but residual battery on my laptop and mobile hotspot from my phone I ended up giving up in order to save battery charge, particularly on the phone. Given that the power is still out and I'll be surprised if we get it back before tomorrow or…
pgleick | January 19, 2015By Peter Gleick (Pacific Institute) and Carl Ganter (Circle of Blue)
1. The California Drought Becomes an Emergency
California’s multi-year drought grew dire enough in 2014 to prompt Governor Jerry Brown to declare a drought emergency in January. By the end of the year, California had experienced the driest and hottest 36 months in its 119-year instrumental record. Some researchers described the drought as 1) the worst in over 1200 years and 2) evidence of rising temperatures globally as climate changes accelerate. As of mid-January, the drought is continuing.
As the California and western…
oracknows | July 31, 2014We all seek immortality in some way. Death has been a terror of nearly all since humans first started realizing that everybody dies. After all, no one wants to face the end of everything that one has been, is, and will be, so much so that a key feature of many religions is a belief that death is not the end, that there is an afterlife where we will all live forever and where evil is punished and good rewarded. Even if, as seems most likely, death is simply the end, and the time after death is just like the time before we were born (or, more properly, before our first memories), something that…
dr. dolittle | September 23, 2013 Image from: 41 ACTION NEWS KSHB.COM
Image from: Myfoxdetroit.com
Outlandish stories about a 25-pound Savannah cat, known as "Chum", on the loose in Detroit (above) may have been responsible for his untimely death last month. The 3-year old cat was owned by a local family but was spotted roaming the neighborhood. Neighbors mentioned calling Animal Control and the Detroit Humane Society, whom they say did not respond.
Savannah cats are considered exotic and are a cross between domestic and African serval cats. Chum was approximately 2 feet tall when sitting. However stories would have you…
tsmith | May 13, 2011It's been not even a month since the last paper looking at MRSA in meat, and up pops another one. So far here in the US, we've seen studies in Rhode Island (no MRSA found); Louisiana (MRSA found in beef and pork, but "human" types: USA100 and USA300); the recent Waters et al study sampling in California, Florida, Illinois, Washington DC, and Arizona, finding similar strains (ST8 and ST5, associated with USA300 and USA100, respectively). Now a new study has collected MRSA samples in Detroit, collecting 289 samples from 30 retail stores in the city.
For this study, they collected only beef,…
sastyk | November 19, 2010In yesterday's NY Times Op-ed, Kristof apologized for comparing US income inequity to that of "Banana Republics" - that is, for insulting other nations by comparing them to the US, which has now achieved wholly unprecedented levels of economic injustice.
My point was that the wealthiest plutocrats now actually control a greater share of the pie in the United States than in historically unstable countries like Nicaragua, Venezuela and Guyana. But readers protested that this was glib and unfair, and after reviewing the evidence I regretfully confess that they have a point.
That's right: I may…
palmd | April 25, 2009I used to teach at a hospital downtown. While on rounds, I'd often ask my residents and students where they were born, and get answers such as, "Alabama", "Kerala, India", "Damascus, Syria". Inevitably, they'd ask me where I was born, and I'd point to the floor and say, "Right here".
"You mean in Michigan?"
"No," I'd explain, "I mean right here in this hospital."
So I have a certain pride about my hometown. I like Detroit, and although I, like many others born there, don't live in the city, I always hope for a recovery. So it saddens me whenever I see news stories that paint my natal…