A placeholder

I'm somewhat wired this evening with a number of thoughts pinging around my cerebral cortex, not unlike a BB let loose in a corrugated steel shed. A friend was just diagnosed with glioblastoma, possibly stage II, and is scheduled for surgery in just a few hours. He has been otherwise quite fit and healthy, but noticed some odd cognitive disjoints. A scan in the MRI revealed the brain tumor. Scary stuff. The prognosis for gliomas isn't exactly rosy.

In the 18th or even 19th century, by all rights I would be a wizened old grandmother or even long dead, but in the early 21st century, I mentally view myself as not terribly different in many ways than "me" in my late 20s/early 30s. It is thus a rude shock to find that it is more difficult to regain fitness than it was 20, or even 10 years ago, that the results of my blood tests are not as pristine and perfect as they once were, and I am sometimes taken aback when I see a dowdy matron, crowned aplenty with salt n' pepper curls, in the mirror's reflection. But being an old broad has its perks, no doubt about that. Still, the news of my friend gives me pause as mortality taps me on the shoulder during my merry march toward cronehood.

The placeholder, just to whet the appetites of the two or three individuals who might drop by the chimp refuge, is for the following which will be blogged in the near future:

Joyce Carol Oates, Paul Krugman, Odocoileus virginiana, Ixodes scapularis and a garden trowel. Circle the four which belong together.

Pink and blue matter: some bonobic observations of men's and women's brains.