Not So Desirable

A recent survey from Pew Research Center showed that only 15% of those polled found the K.C. area a desirable place to live. At 15%, the K.C. area is fourth from last of the big cities listed. From experience living here, I concur!

Really though, KC is “equal” statistically with St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Minneapolis, and Cincinnati.

My top 5 places I find most desirable
1) Denver/Boulder
2) Vancouver, B.C.
3) Seattle
4) New York City
5) Colorado Springs

What is the Most Worthless Show on Network Television?

What is the point of this show? I’ve been trying to understand it since TMZ first came to the airwaves here on Fox (where else right?). In the short lived quest to attempt to understand, I watched about sixty total minutes of it and I still got nothing out of it. As I sat and watched, I felt several of my own valued brain cells just dying away with every passing minute…

…and this is what happened.

I refuse to watch anymore of it. If I want to kill more brain cells, I’ll drink. And although studies have shown adults do have some neurogenesis (birth of new brain cells) capabilities, TMZ is not worth it. There are too many shows like it devoted to celebrities, following every little thing they do, wear, and eat. I’m tired of hearing about how celebrities live and how we can dress, eat, and shop like them. It’s not important. It’s not entertaining, though millions probably disagree with me for whatever reason. But, it’s all just whatever.

Conclusion: worst half hour of T.V. period, time I’ll never get back.

It Isn’t the Water…Duh!

The very first post I ever did was about a case of brain tumors going around a town about an hour north of Kansas City. The original report was of 12 tumors in the past 7 months, in a town of 6,500 or so being linked to drinking water. I think they were reaching for something that was not there blaming the town’s drinking water as the only thing they could find as a causal action on the “surge” of brain tumors. It’s still an interesting case because it’s not often that 12 people from the same area are diagnosed to have brain tumors.

On Thursday, (26 June) the townspeople had a gathering for Q&A with the people who are investigating this issue. In the month since, there has been an increase in reported brain tumors in the area and not the town itself. From about 12 within Cameron itself, now to anywhere between 20 and 40 in the area. I don’t know how big the area is and most of the diagnosed cases are with benign tumors.

“State environmental health officials disclosed the plan Thursday night at a community meeting attended by more than 150 worried residents.” (KMBC)

Either the town of 6,500 isn’t worried that much, there was limited seating, people were still at work, people were watching it online, or the majority of the people just don’t care; ‘more than 150′ doesn’t seem like a lot of concern to me in a town that size. I’ve been in lecture halls that were attended by 6x more people. We were listening to a drab lecture that for many of us was not a concern for our major. I would think that a potential life threatening/debilitating problem would raise more eyebrows than 150+.

Now this is 8 to 28 people who have stepped out of the woodworks since they’ve aired the story. A new target, as to what the possible cause is, has been fingered and guess what…it’s not the water!

He thought it was the water.

There is an insulation plant Rockwool Industries in the area but the plant closed a long time ago. This is the suspect and it makes a little bit more sense. This company in the past has had an issue raised with public health, but no concluding evidences linking bad health to the plant.

“Although the available data do not indicate that people are being or have been exposed to levels of contamination that would be expected to cause adverse health effects, data are not available for all environmental media to which people may be exposed. Due to data inadequacies and the potential for bioaccumulation of site-related contaminants into fish tissue, we have categorized this site as an indeterminate public health hazard.

Soil and other contaminant sources on the site contain contaminants at concentrations above health-based screening values. Although there is no evidence that people are currently coming into contact with contaminants in these sources in amounts sufficient to pose a public health hazard, if in the future the site is used for residential purposes, the public health significance of the contaminants in these media should be reevaluated.

Although the presence of contaminants in water beneath the site has been documented, there is no evidence of current or past exposure to contaminated groundwater.” (ATSDR)

More people are coming forward with reports of diagnosed brain tumors, but there is still no known, concrete, tangible, evident causes. At least they’re now headed in the right direction instead of blaming the drinking water. However, they (the media) still haven’t told the other side, the numerous people who have lived there and are perfectly fine. I guess we’ll never hear from them.