I guess it's true what they say: You learn something new every day. This morning I received a call from a local medical study that I had signed up for. They're studying diabetics and I figured any way I can help... So they say to me, "Are you taking any meds for your diabetes?" I say, "Insulin and some other pills..." Immediately I get removed from the study. She says, "We're not studying diabetics who use insulin." Suddenly my mind goes back to a time in Calgary when I tried to give blood. I called in advance and asked if diabetics could give blood and they said it would be fine. As I got to the clinic my phone rang and the person on the line asked me, "Are you taking insulin?" I thought that the majority of us diabetics ARE taking insulin so rather than assume we're just recreational diabetics, or beginners, the assumption should be that we've committed to this disease and are taking advantage of Banting and Best's fine work. But it seemed the opposite. Here again it seemed like they were assuming they'd get volunteers who have lazy pancreii, not, like me, pancreases that have attained superfluous organ statii/statuses. So I look it up. Evidently only 30-35% of us take insulin. ALL type 1 diabetics do, but they're only about 5-10% of diabetics. The majority are, like me, type 2ers. However, UNlike me, many rely on lifestyle changes or oral medication and only eventually (I guess when they get old) transition to insulin usage.
I visited my new diabetes doc just a couple days ago. All my Doukhobor friends who read this would get a charge outta his name - Dr. Pandu Shetty. He's quite a character actually. 77 years old and looks like he could still pull the plough. He asked me how long I've had diabetes and I couldn't even give him a guess. I only found out by accident really and the first time I measured my blood sugar (after sum gyup sal with the Fam about 5 years ago in Korea) it was off the charts! I called up a hospital and asked if I could see a doc about it and they said they only admit patients with private medical insurance, predominantly foreign professionals and US military. The person I had reached asked if I knew my blood sugar level and I said, "Yeah, it's 545." She said, "Come in immediately!" The doctor I ended up seeing started me on insulin and some other drugs immediately so I didn't get to experience the "transition" to insulin that type 2ers are supposed to.
I often think about situations I was in before I found out I had diabetes like having to take a leak so bad I went in Seoul traffic or a Beijing subway garbage can; any of the times a friend told me something I had done (while drinking) the night before of which I had no recollection; or even times when I was thirstier than an Irish roofer in Kuwait. I have never passed out or had a seizure - to my knowledge, but I bet the diabetes "augmented" my life long before I knew I had it. I wonder how many stupid life choices, or how much of my erratic behaviour could be partially or even fully blamed on it. How many Facebook friends have unfriended me while I was so high on sugar I didn't know what I was typing? How many have I unfriended under those conditions? I have to admit, I wasn't eating jujubes or swigging fruit juice to get my sugar up. In almost every case it was booze that caused me to sugar-ramble in talk or text so I can't claim absolute innocence, but I wonder what the levels are here. I mean at what point do I start blacking out. Maybe I oughta do my own diabetic study and carefully keep track of what sugar levels are when diabetics start saying stupid stuff and doing things they'll be embarrassed the next day about. I will allow patients who ARE taking insulin, I won't snub them.
So I guess we can all agree here to one thing: anything stupid/insulting/awkward/nasty I have said or done to any of you, that was the diabetes talking/typing/acting. Okay?
Okay, now that THAT'S settled, back to this study. While punishing the study-conductors by eating a big bowl of sugary Honey-nut Cheerios I checked online and found that (forget the 545 - that was the Korean scale. It's about 30 on the scale I'm using now) typical target range for diabetics is between 4 and 7. I liken that to a dentist telling you to brush 3 times a day. They know twice is enough but they ask for 3 hoping you will end up on 2. I try to keep my blood sugar between 7 and 10. Like brushing twice a day, it's enough. I find that I can still have most of the foods (and drinks) I like best that way. I have to control diet and exercise somewhat, but I manage to do it. ***Don't tell Dr. Shetty on me.
If only we knew earlier in life the things we find out later! Who knows how much better my life could have been if I'd known about my diabetes and controlled my blood sugar levels better? I am finding the same about other things of which my younger self was ignorant as well. For instance, politics. I remember wanting to be a lawyer and actually giving thought to participating in Canadian government in some form. It's a good thing I didn't get the chance! I worked closely with an MP from the Rainy River riding while living in Ignace as a high school student. He saw in me the intelligence and work ethic needed for political success... for a short time. Then he DIDN'T see in me an all too important aspect of politics, or, I hope, several. I didn't have the sleazy, self-important, opportunistic, ambition or the ethic-sapping lust for money and power so integral in the field. Again, not knowing then what I know now, it was probably the same deficiencies that sabotaged any law career I could have had.
Story 15 of The Rose Garden includes a "vezier" which is a high-ranking political advisor, who took up with a circle of dervishes (which are members of a branch of Islam who take vows of poverty and austerity seeking divine truth through ascetic practices. Yes they sometimes whirl too.) after he was removed from his political post. The king asked the vezier to resume his post when he was back in political favour but the vezier had become so much like the dervishes he refused saying, "Retirement is better than occupation." The king pleaded saying, "We are in need of a man with sufficient intelligence to carry on the administration of government." His reply was classic! "It is a sign of sufficient intelligence not to engage in such matters."
A recurring theme in the stories of Saadi is the fickle and paranoid nature of the ruling class that is caused by riches and power, and how often they can turn on those loyal to them. The vezier preferred the freedom that allowed the dervishes to be honest and just: the freedom that comes from poverty and powerlessness.
Now I'm not a politician in the court of Stalin or Trump, but lately I have abandoned my profession in all but its voluntary form for (in large part) precisely the same reason. I have spent too much time with the dervishes to trust education administrators, or political administrators. It's all just a ruse. We've all seen this right?:
I love Henry David Thoreau's take on government! He says "The government that governs best governs least" is not far enough. How about "The government that governs best governs not at all?" But, says HDT, the people must have some complicated machinery or other, and hear its DIN to satisfy the idea of government they have been given. Yet the government of itself never furthered any enterprise but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way.
Maybe he's right. I used to think we WERE ready to govern ourselves without the sounding brass and tinkling cymbals government provides. But then I see stories like this: Marilyn Gladu says she "crossed the floor" and joined the Liberal party to get more funding for the local riding here in Sarnia. I would think that no matter what party you support, this might be something that locals liked. It means more money for our area. More road construction, maybe a mall, some more jobs, ploughing service to your neighbourhood in winter, who knows? But it's pretty easy to take a walk around Sarnia and see a dozen "Marilyn Resign" signs on people's lawns. Indeed the head of the family with which I live commented just recently that she is a traitor and has to go.
I'm not going to sit here and type that Marilyn Gladu was a GOOD politician right after basically saying none of them can be trusted. Look at that picture of her and PM Carney and tell me if YOU think butter would melt in either of those mouths. You can bet there were ulterior motives. But the two party system, which is designed specifically to perpetuate the tribalistic, we're-right-they're-wrong, black-or-white thinking that makes multi-faceted issues like cost of living and wages sound so complicated is just one of many political self-preservation efforts that intelligent voters should be able to see through. But it appears that either we can't, or we're not that intelligent. Until one or both of those things changes, on the con will stumble and bumble until ONE person has ALL the fucking money and power and the rest of us have nothing.
Watch this:
Can you tell me wtf the "genius" reason was for putting the hamburger in the glove? I can tell you what it was. So you'd watch the video. That's it. The more people that watch, the more money this video makes. Hell I'M even helping them by posting it here! This is not genius and it certainly doesn't "deliver exactly what it promises!" It's a trick to get you to watch the video.This is politics. Thousands of phonies promising something, looking like they might be trying to deliver it, but really all they want is for you to watch them with some hope in your heart that they're legitimate. Maybe even hope enough to vote for one of them.
Tell me something... After watching that video did you try to justify the hand-shaped burger? Did you say or think something like, "Well, I COULD make this on Halloween," or something like that? If you did, you might watch another video like this. Maybe not right away, but in 4 years you'll be ready to give one another chance.
I heard one of my favourite comedians Mark Normand say that if politics were handled like the World Cup of soccer maybe we could all get along. He also said that maybe we could get the whole world to stop calling it "football" and call it soccer instead. See how soon the cracks form in political logic? You could instantly form the Grand Old Football party and the Progressive Soccer party and have them disagree on exactly everything so that soccer fans believe they are necessary. Then he went so far as to compliment the Japanese on cleaning the stands after games and say that they are definitely the master race! Yeesh! Mark Normand had better stay out of politics or he'll form a fascist party or a "reich" if you will that would be so successful it almost takes over the world. He'd call it the Japanese Soccer Party It's only downfall would be that Normand got too paranoid about protecting his riches and power as the J.S.P. grew. Members of the GOF would infiltrate his party headquarters and assassinate him. It would be easy after he culled several of his most trusted officers and left the JSP without effective sub-leadership. The new world power, the Grand Old Football party would promise international rules that are equitable to all countries that participated in the allied resistance against the JSP. This would alienate Canada and the US who secretly still call football soccer and they would eventually rise to rival the GOF party. This North American Soccer party would rise so fast and become so strong that they would almost take over the world. But its leader Megan Rapinoe would get paranoid due to all her power and money and she'd need to be assassinated. And so on and so forth...
We should force a dervish to run the world. What do you reckon...
