Cold...

-21C today, which puts it well below 0F, which is too cold for civilized thought.

But it's easier to get around than when the temperature stays around the freezing point.

Uniformed or misinformed?

In the 'some things never change' department:

If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed. If you do read the newspaper you are misinformed. - Mark Twain"

Pondering food, gender and Torchwood...

I love it when TV shows focus on unexplained bits of reality. Like the disappearing bees in series 4 Doctor Who. Here's an article that reflects Captain Jack Harkness' initial monologue in Torchwood:

I can taste it! Oestrogen. Definitely oestrogen. Take the pill, flush it away, it enters the water cycle. Feminizes the fish. Goes all the way up into the sky then falls all the way back down onto me. Contraceptives in the rain. Love this planet. Still, at least I won't get pregnant. Never doing that again.

Not that the article is blaming oestrogen; it's pesticides and pollutants and new chemicals in general that that are to blame. "The research ... shows that a host of common chemicals is feminising males of every class of vertebrate animals, from fish to mammals, including people. ... On Wednesday, Britain will lead opposition to proposed new European controls on pesticides, many of which have been found to have "gender-bending" effects."
It's one way of dealing with overpopulation.

I wonder how much it's an option for us simply to not use these chemicals. Can we feed the world on organic foods? I know people used to say "it's all a matter of distribution of food" - isn't it more to the point to say it's all a matter of economics? And is that even true now? I suspect the world popular is so high that we need such extraordinary measures to keep the food flowing.

Heroes: Our Father...

Watched Heroes this evening. What a brilliant episode. The best this year. Better than anything last year. Better than most of first season. Loved it! The whole theme of parents and children is what this show does best. Got sniffly over the conversationn between Claire and Noah Bennet. And the Hiro bits... beautifully done. Great use of powers. Even Mohinder was interesting.

Clearly this is not like the Doctor Who universe, where the world ends if, in the course of time travelling, you hold yourself as an infant.

Peter was at his best, and we saw more than usual of the Haitian. I loved the story arc around Sylar: getting the lie-detection power so he could confront Arthur Petrelli. And Ando fits so nicely in a trio with Daphne and Matt.

I'd go on at length by I'm way too tired. Tired and happy.