Archives for March 2005

“TUESDAY, March 22 (HealthDay News) — A large glass of pomegranate juice a day may help keep the heart doctor away.

Italian and American scientists report that pomegranate juice helped keep fatty deposits from collecting on artery walls in mice, and kept human heart cells healthier.

“Mice that drank pomegranate juice were able to significantly reduce the progression of atherosclerosis, [by] at least 30 percent,” said study co-author Dr. Claudio Napoli, a professor of medicine and clinical pathology at the University of Naples School of Medicine in Italy.

The findings appear in this week’s issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (news – web sites).

Pomegranates, a native Middle Eastern fruit, are finding their way into more and more homes in the United States. The fruit contains crunchy seeds surrounded by juicy pulp and is a good source of potassium, vitamin C and antioxidants, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (news – web sites) (USDA).

“Pomegranates are fun to eat, but messy,” noted Samantha Heller, a senior clinical nutritionist at New York University Medical Center. For that reason, she said, “juice may be a better option.”

The old rimonim trick. When I was in elementary school we used to have pomegranate wars. There were two groups of us who would walk back and forth between home and school. Along the way we would sometimes ambush each other with pomegranates, oranges, dirt clods, whatever we could get our hands on. Every now and then you would get nailed in the head and if the fruit was soft not only did you get a headache but you’d end up a real mess.

And let me say that more than one mother yelled at us about this.

A while back I noticed that some of the older stories I linked to were suffering from a problem. The problem is that many of the stories are only hosted on a site for a relatively short time before they are archived or moved.

The reason this is significant is that you cannot always find the original source for something that I have remarked about through the link that I provided. So if you are going through my older stuff you will find drabs and drips that do not always make as much sense as they would if the original link were still active.

I have been mulling over how to respond to this and have not come up with an appropriate solution yet.

The Shmata Queen had choice words regarding my post about the Red Underpants. Perhaps it wasn’t the same quality of work as the Red Tent, but it did have its moments.

I’ll have to go into more detail later, but for now we’ll wish her father a refuah shleimah, a speedy recovery and leave it at that. 🙂

Ok, here is a post of a more personal nature. It very well may bore many of you so feel free to skip over it, or not. Whatever you choose is your choice. That is a ridiculous thing to say, but my junior high school English teacher used to say it with great frequency.

Once when she said it I got in trouble for saying “duh!” Of course whatever I choose is my choice, unless I am not the one choosing in which case it would not be my choice.

Some time ago I found myself being dragged through the Outlets Mall in Camarillo. While engaged on a mission of getting out of there as quickly as possible I stumbled into a Jockey store. As I was in need of new undergarments it made sense to take a look there.

And lo and behold I found a new pair of underpants. I say a new pair because they were more expensive than the Costco pack I normally buy. But I grabbed these because they are high-tech and supposed to help keep you dry.

They are called the Jockey Dri-Yâ„¢ Sport Brief and since I exercise regularlyI decided to try them out and see if they performed as promised. I was pleasantly surprised to see that they did so I have gradually been adding to my collection.

During a recent trip to the store I found a section called “clearance” and took a look at what they had to offer. Bam, there was a pair of my new favorites in my size, but they were red. I hesitated for a moment because I felt silly grabbing a pair of red underpants. It didn’t feel masculine to me and it kind of weirded me out.

They were substantially reduced in price and it is not like I parade around in them so I picked up one pair.

Many years ago in college I had one other experience with red underpants. My fraternity used to throw a party we called Chippendales which was named after the female entertainment joint. We would set up a stage and offer about seven different acts in which various members of the house would emulate the real joint with a strip tease.

I only did it once. I was a no rhythm but willing try anything freshman who joined six other men on stage. We dressed up as parking garage valets and with the exception of one guy stripped down to red bikini briefs.

The other guy wore a thong. What a mistake. For a while he was known as double-feature.

Fortunately there is no video footage of the night, but there are various pictures floating around. To the best of my knowledge I have acquired the copies and the negatives of almost all of the pictures of me.

In any case, the party that followed the show was wild and I had a great time. You would think that I would associate the current pair with the former and maybe on some level I do, but they still kind of throw me.

But it hasn’t changed my funny feeling. I still wear them, but I do admit to feeling a little weird when I see them in the old laundry hamper.

I am not the first person to blog about this, but since CNN finally joined the game I thought that it was worth putting this out there again.

“SAN JOSE, California (AP) — A former prosecutor’s claim that he conspired with a judge to keep Jewish jurors off a death penalty case will be the focus of a court hearing scheduled for Tuesday.

The California Supreme Court ordered the hearing in San Jose to investigate the sworn statement of John “Jack” Quatman, who said he and other lawyers in the Alameda County district attorney’s office routinely used peremptory challenges to keep Jews and black women off juries in capital cases.

Quatman’s testimony was filed on behalf of Fred Freeman, who was sentenced to death in 1987 for killing a bar patron during a robbery in Berkeley. As the prosecutor assigned to Freeman’s trial, Quatman said he colluded with the late Alameda County Superior Court Judge Stanley Golde to keep Jewish jurors from hearing the case.

“No Jew would vote to send a defendant to the gas chamber,” Quatman alleges the judge, who was himself of Jewish descent, told him.

“Judge Golde was only telling me what I already should have known to do,” Quatman stated. “It was standard practice to exclude Jewish jurors in death cases.”

Excluding jurors based on religion, race or ethnicity violates state and federal law and are grounds for a new trial.

If Quatman’s claims are proven to have merit, they could provide grounds for appeals of other death penalty cases in which he and Golde were involved.”

This bothers me on a number of levels. I am irked by the bias demonstrated here and wonder what other areas were impacted. A judge is supposed to be impartial and rule based upon the law and it is clear that he did not.

As a Jew I am also irritated because I am not afraid of the death penalty and if the case warranted it would be more than willing to vote for it. This is a conversation that I have had with other Jewish people and can attest to their willingness to do so as well.

No group is completely monolithic in their thinking and approach to life.