zen.org Communal Weblog

The Feburary 5th strip of Opus states that cough syrup does not work. To quote UPI quoting somebody:

“There is no clinical evidence that over-the-counter cough expectorants or suppressants actually relieve cough,” said Richard S. Irwin, M.D., of the University of Massachusetts Medical School.

And

The new guidelines recommend against the use of over-the-counter cough and cold medications for children age 14 years and younger.

Google this to find more sources. My Dad always says that it takes a week to cure with the medicine, seven days without.

The same days strip of User Friendly says Western Union telegrams are no more, and Wester Union site confirms it. While I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen a telegram, it’s still the end of a telecommunications era.

Last, United Feature Syndicate, Inc. has been republishisg Peanuts strips from 1959. No curn events being reported on that strip, I just think it’s so cool reading those old strips.

It’s an incredible freebie Firefox 1.5 Extension called, Hyperwords™ that makes browsing the Web easier and faster than ever!

All you have to do is select (highlight) any text on a page and a menu automatically appears; click on what you want to do with that text – use it to find more info with search engines, check reference sites [eg., Wikipedia, IMDB, Share Prices, etc.], get its definition from a dictionary or translate into another language; if you’ve selected a product name or type, go shopping for it and/or do a raft of other things.

Hyperwords runs on the Mac, Windows and Linux versions of Firefox, and also works with Flock; one for Microsoft Explorer is anticipated sometime by this coming summer.

I’ve only had it for a short while but am already addicted. Do give it a whirl; it’s simply brilliant! 🙂

Merry Groundhog Day, or as Wiccans call it, Imbolc. Phil says “Six More Weeks of Winter.” It seems Phil’s a poet too.

Prophetic rodent aside, I was walking around Princeton Borough before eight in the morning a week ago and gardeners where taking out the winter cabbage and putting in bulbs. I love winter, but not without the anticipation of spring. Zoë picked up a stick of the ground the other day, even it was budding. Has anybody seen signs of spring yet?

Less then two months until Ostara, er Spring Equinox. Stupid Wiccans.

With a platform including: “I despise and hate the Christian God the Father. He
is my enemy” and “Any Terrorist who is caught in Minnesota while I am Governor, will find out what the true meaning of my nickname ‘The Impaler’ means. Right in front of our State Capital” how can Minnesotans not vote for this former wrestler?