I ran into an article on-line regarding the purposed calendar reform by two professors at John Hopkins University.   The calendar called the Hanke-Henry Permanent Calendar, named after the two professors who devised and are pushing the reform, is based on a fixed day calendar.  The idea is that there are always 7 days in a week, the year always starts and a Sunday, and you never have to change your calendars to reflect movements of the dates from one day of the week to the next again.

Just because you are employed by John Hopkins doesn’t make you right.

And if this ever did go through . . .   do they really think they that name will stick?  How arrogant to name a new calendar after oneself.  I know it’s the academic thing to do, but it’s not like they just discovered new plant life or developed a new physics theory.  They are proposing to modify how we denominate time.   They are professors . . .   not the pope . . . .

One half of this team, Henry,  wants the reform so your calendar days stay the same every year because he was annoyed at changing the dates for his students for lectures and syllabi.  I am sorry you are annoyed by that.  How inconvenient.  He himself admits: “The calendar I’m advocating isn’t nearly as accurate”; but he goes on to say “But it’s far more convenient.”

Wish that worked for me.  Man, the P&P I just wrote isn’t very accurate . . .   but it sure will convenient to use!!!!  What, we are missing pieces?  That’s okay . . .  I’ll just tag it on the end every few years, no one will notice.

Blink Blink

Oh, you say it’s better for business . . .  by all means.  After all time is money right?  That is the concern driving the second half of this duo to push reform.  Hanke believes that a more business friendly calendar is more right for the times.  Under their reform, The calculation of interest would be more uniform and holidays would be easy to schedule, always falling on the same day, especially not needing to pay people holiday pay for Christmas and New Years for they would always fall on Sunday.

Say good-bye to long weekends and the excitement of your birthday finally landing on a Saturday.  Is that petty?  Maybe.  But I kinda like my birthday floating around year to year.

This is not the first reform proposal in recent decades.  The last century was  full of different concepts from different parties on how to better rearrange our marking of time.  Bigger fish than two smarty pants professors have tried including the UN and their predecessor the League of Nations.  And they failed.

The problem with calendar reform is there is no one solution to the multitudes of issues that people have with the current Gregorian Calendar.

• It is not perpetual. Each year starts on a different day of the week and calendars expire every year.
• Making it difficult to determine the weekday of any given day of the year or month. (this interrupts my daily life)
• Months are not equal in length nor regularly distributed across the year, requiring people to make up ways to remember which month is 28, 29, 30 or 31 days long.  (I have a brain injury, and I can remember without tricks)
• The year’s four quarters (of three full months each) are not equal (being of 90/91, 91, 92 and 92 days respectively).  Equal business quarters would make accounting easier.
• The Calendar is based on religious beliefs.  7 days a week.  Sunday being the final day of the week, the Sabbath.
• Each month has no connection with the lunar phases.
• Leap Year every four years accounting for the .2422 days in a solar cycle not accounted for in the 365 days in the calendar year.

The Hanke-Henry Permanent Calendar

My biggest beef with this idea:  lets take a giant step backwards and adopt an inaccurate calendar because it is more convenient.  Take an abstract concept of time and make it whatever we want, completely disregarding the only natural indications of passing time:  Nature.    We do not account for the moon, why account for the sun?

The truth of the matter is, no matter how inconvenient the Gregorian calendar might be, when looking in terms of the solar cycle, it is very accurate.

But perhaps what the world needs is to adopt a calendar system more like the Mayans.  They had three calendars.  And they used how these calendars fell with each other to make extremely accurate predictions in solar activity.    They had a Lunar Calendar, their shortest, the solar or agricultural calendar, their largest, and then a really weird 260 day sacred calendar.  260 days, or the human gestational period.  Yeah . . .   we can skip that one.

That will never happen.  MULTIPLE CALENDARS to keep track of?  SHEESH!  How inconvenient.  Well, Hanke and Henry, I don’t find your proposal more convenient enough for the hassle of changing our current system.  I would rather make the move to the metric system. At least that system is indisputably logical.  And despite how accurate  and easy it is, look at the US refusing to make that change.

The big hubbub about this right now is the first day of the new year lands on a Sunday, as purposed by this calendar reform.  It would be an easy transition to start it this year.  Well . . . seeing how that day is tomorrow, I do not think the world is going to come around by then.  They can spend the next five years petitioning.  They will have another perfect opportunity in 2017, when Jan 1 lands on Sunday next.

You know if this Henry dude is so annoyed, he could save his syllabi for five years and just cycle it then.  He would only need five copies.  Really, though, you should freshen your classes more than that I would think . . .

I’m not terribly worried about waking up tomorrow or in five or ten years and having the Henke-Henry calendar on my wall.  The last two times we overhauled the western world’s calendar it took a Pope and an Emperor to make the change.  Sorry guys.  You need a serious backer.  Good luck with that.

An interesting episode of A Gifted Man on CBS from a couple of weeks ago, “In Case of Memory Loss”, deals with the subject of CTE, Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, a sad progressive degenerative disease most common in professional contact sport athletes who sustain concussion or head injury after concussion or head injury.  The episode is about an NFL player who has no idea who he is, lost, confused, damaged.  Nothing shows up on the MRI, and the tech says, “Since when is a normal MRI mean bad news?”

One of the most scary things about CTE, like many head injuries, they do not appear on scans or MRIs.  The scariest thing about CTE is that it can appear months after repeated injury. . . .   or decades later.  You’re fine, you’re fine, you’re fine . . .  then you’re not fine.  And you will never again be fine.

Right now the only physical proof that one suffer(ed) from CTE is autopsy.  There is a  movement in the professional sport world where athletes are donating their brains to science.  Upon their death, many of those suspected to have CTE are turning over their brains in hopes that we will one day better understand it.

I would like to know what it will take to better respect and fear it.

American football players, hockey players, boxers and even professional wrestlers sustain head injuries and get right back out there and play, putting themselves at further risk.  With every head injury your risk for further injury increases.  But they do not care.  They can work with a head injury.  Hell, they would rather have their heads bashed than their knees blown.  Because they know they wouldn’t be able to work afterward, and their lifestyle for their families would disappear.   I much prefer having my brain in one piece than my knees to be honest.

Yes, they do take the one or two weeks off to prevent Second Impact Syndrome, which can be fatal.  This is where the first concussion has not healed before receiving a second, causing the brain to massively swell.  But the risk to one’s cognitive facilities do not magically end at two weeks.    They are at risk for life.

There has been much news lately about Pittsburgh Steeler Troy Polamalu who has sustained multiple head injuries during his career.  He and his wife have been told the severe long-term risks of his continued playing.  He was actually fined $10,000 last month after calling his wife on the sidelines during a game to assure her he was alright after taking another hit to the head.  Yeah, he’s alright . . .  for now.

I find it ironic that the Pittsburgh Steelers are having so much news lately of head injuries.  In ’09 there was lots of buzz about their star quarterback receiving his third concussion at that time.  Hines Ward suffered a concussion late in the season last year.  And this year fans hold their breath hoping Polamalu is ok. . .    The irony comes from and interview one of their own, LB James Harrison, did a year ago for Showtime.  One I have brought up before.    In this interview he states he’s okay with the idea of being a blubbering vegetable later in life, as long as he was able to work long enough and make enough money so his kids are ok.  WHAT?!!

“And though the league’s intention is to curb head injuries and the devastating consequences they can have, the potential trade-off of suffering a degenerative mental condition later in life is worth it to Harrison.

‘To be honest with you, I’m not too concerned with it,’ he said. ‘If that happens, you know, it’s gonna suck. But hopefully I’ll (have) made enough money and put in enough time that my kids don’t have to worry about it. And if I got to go through a little bit of hell so that they don’t have to, I’m fine with it.’ ”

SHAME ON HIM.  Shame on all of them . . .

You can read more here. 

All I can think is 1)  he is talking about and accepting a hell he does not understand,   and 2) his seemingly selfless mindset is entirely backwards.  A decade or two from now, I am sure his children would rather have their father, than money in the bank.  If the money is still in the bank.

What’s the big deal?  you ask . . .    CTE and the hell it brings.  That’s the big deal.  Dementia, Memory Loss, and not the where did I put my keys kind, depression, aggression, and the complete alteration of the person.  What is so sad is we spend billions of dollars trying to figure out cures for diseases like Alzheimer’s . . .   while diseases like CTE are PREVENTABLE.

Knowledge in the world of head injuries is growing dramatically.  So is awareness.  But acceptance as a real and formidable and dangerous life altering injury . . .we are far from it.   Back to the Steelers again, Roethlisberger has gone on record stating he believes a lot of players go to great lengths to hide their head injuries.  They don’t want to be taken out of the game.   Attitudes like that, and like Harrison’s, what does that teach the millions of kids that idolize these sports heroes?

A half million sports related head injuries are reported in US hospital emergency rooms annually.  70% of football related deaths are due to head injury.  Highschool football accounts for the majority of all football head injury related deaths.  This isn’t just concern for national football “heroes”. 

One of the scariest pieces of information I wish to share with you is about a 21 year old junior lineman at the University of Pennsylvania that committed suicide in 2010.  His name was Owen Thomas.  Owen was the youngest person to be found with CTE, and only the second non-professional.  Don;t thinking they’ve been doing much looking there . . .     The medical experts believe his suicide was directly related to the CTE.  The saddest part of this all is that Owen never missed any play time due to concussion.  Never any record of one.  They believe he played through concussions and potentially suffered thousands of sub-concussive impacts to the brain.  at 21.

You have never heard of Owen Thomas.  So he  might not be of any interest to you . . .    But you might know names like Lou Creekmur, Chris Henry, John Grinsley, Tom McHale and for my Chicago friends, Dave Duerson, all post mortem diagnosed with CTE.  For NHL fans you might recognize the names of Reggie Fleming or Bob Probert. 

One of the most famous deaths of recent years in the sports world, Chris Benoit, a WWE professional wrestler, who killed his wife and his son before committing suicide in 2007, was also diagnose with CTE upon autopsy.  I am sure his son was really glad his daddy had made a lot of money during his sports career, too!

My apologies for the bad attitude.  I might be a tad biased being thrust into the world of brain injury by no control of my own.  And I do admit the NFL is trying to change regulation to protect their players, tightening down on helmet to helmet contact.  But the players and the fans need to take it seriously, too.  The way I see it, this issue should be a game changer. Literally.

I give a lot of props to John Mackey’s wife who is still advocating for awareness and change inside the NFL.  John Mackey died after battling with dementia for ten years.  He died at 69.  They founded a program called the “88 plan” which provides help for former players with their nursing home or adult care bills.  For a lot of former players, when they need it the most . . .  the money’s gone.

But more needs to be done, not just for the guys that are now living through that terrible hell. . .   But for those that could be preventing it.  But I somehow have little faith in a $5 billion dollar industry, such as the NFL, making much change.

But you parents out there . . . your awareness, and your kids’ awareness on the subject could be life saving.  Teach them to respect their bodies, the importance of them being sound for their entire lives, teach them there is more to life than the game.  Teach them the courageous thing is not to get up and keep playing, to push on, but to live long.  You can make a difference in this young generation.  I don’t think any parent wants to have the next Owen Thomas in their future.

Peace, Health, and Wisdom be with you.

I have GOT to go on record here . . .  I have stayed silent far too long.   I have watched the disasterous footwear out there for so long, I have admitedly grown partially complacent over the bad desicions and ingnorance out there, mostly from men, on what they should put on their feet.

NO MORE!!  Be warned.  The fashion police are coming to get you!!!  Men, Listen up!!

Just because this world has grown more casual, and in many cases lost respect for appropriate dress, does not mean that when a man wears a suit he can neglect his foot wear.   Something I do not understand:  if you are going to spend good money, or even medicore money, on a man’s suit . . .   why would you not carry your attention down to the detail of your footwear?  Don’t just look in the mirror from the waist up.  What about your shoes?

The choice of footwear is just as important as the choice of hemline, pant style, and the width of your tie.  Things that have also started to slip, if you ask me  . . .  YES, people do look at your feet.  You can tell a lot about somneone by their shoes.

There are many things to consider in a shoe and when it is appropriate to wear certain shoes.  There are fine details of a shoe that make or break it in the formal department.  There is a difinitive scale from casual to most formal.  Pay attention to the upper, the quality of the leather, the shine.  AND POLISH YOUR SHOES!!!   A general rule to remember: the higher the shine, the more formal the shoe.  Patent leather is very formal. 

Pay attention to the laces, how close they are, and for all that is holy in fashion, DO NOT lace them cris-cross like one does with sneakers.  A dress shoe with a suit should be staright-laced (yes that is wear that comes from), as in laced horizontally.  If you do not know how, look it up!  Ian can help you.

The distance between the laces is also a determination of how formal the shoe is.  The distance between the laces is called the crossover.  A wider crossover is a less formal shoe.  That said, a formal shoe has laces!!  A slip on shoe is less dressy.  Now I am a sucker for sexy, modern shoes with a smooth upper, no laces.  And in some environments they work perfectly.    The same goes for a loafer.  A loafer is decidedly casual wear.  You can wear them with a suit, but be selective on the occasion.  The office, maybe a meeting, never dinner.  Add a tassle to that loafer and it just moved down a notch on the casual wear.

Wingtips:  famous, highly common shoe known by the rest of the world as Brogues, that made its way into the everyday scene here in America during the mid 20th century. The wingtip is a semi-formal shoe.  Zappos.com weighs in, “It’s appropriate for a business casual or suited office look, but not for a formal dinner or with a tuxedo. In such circumstances the Oxford is required, although this distinction is often lost in an increasingly casual society.”  A sentiment I highly agree with.

Cap toes are more formal than a wingtip.  A tradition Oxford is the more formal option.  Another easy to remember tip: the less embelishment on the shoe, the more formal the shoe.  If you do not know what these terms and shoes are AskMen.com has a great easy to understand guide to the five most common dress shoe.

As plush as suede might be, as a shoe material, suede is very casual and should NEVER be worn with a suit.  I will repeat this:  Suede shoes should NEVER be worn with a suit.  Wear them as much as you like with trousers and a sport coat . . .   NEVER a suit.

And the big thing that really gets me . . .   the thing that actually spurred on this tutorial: THINK TWICE BEFORE GRABBING YOUR BROWN SHOES!!!!

Brown is not the new black.  It never will be.  Black is always black.  And black is always the more formal shoe.  And the most versitile.  Hogwash to the idea that you cannot wear black with a navy suit.  My father put me straight before I was ten years old.  That saying applies to women, not men, and according to Donna Karan, it doesnt apply to women’s fashion anymore either (though I will be a tough convert).   Black is for most of you men who own three pairs of shoes, is your BEST choice.   

The darker the shoe, the more formal.  If you have a navy suit, get a pair of shoes that REALLY look nice with them.  If you do not want to go black, try a dark burgundy, or an oxblood.  Leave the brown at home.  There are people out there that will tell you a dark brown is ok.  It would have to be REALLY dark, like an espresso.  General rule #3: The shoe should always be darker than the pant.

Leave your brown shoes for brown and tan and olive suits. 

The most ignored aspect of a shoe?  What is the bottom of the shoe made from?  Look at the heal, the arch, and the thickness of the sole.  A rubber soled shoe should never be warn with a suit.  Do I need to repeat that one, or is that common sense enough?  Men all over where clunky, ugly, heavy soled shoes with their suits.  No.  Actually, just get rid of those . . .

No matter what shoe choice you make, solidify it with a matching belt.  Your belt should be as close to the color of your shoes as humanly possible.  In the world of men, you can find a match.  Your color options are not that extensive!

And then when you have the right shoe and matching belt, pay one more ounce of energy to the attention of your socks.  Your socks should match your pant, unless you are wearing a tan suit, or lighter suit, in that case, match your socks to your shoes.

I am sure I have left some things out.  But over all, this should help make your entire look a polished one.  And women, don’t leave it up to your men!  They have no idea what is going on.  Their dad’s didnt teach them, their mother’s didnt teach them.  It is your job.  Don’t you want him to look nice when he’s trying to look nice?

Again, if the effort is being made to put on a suit, make it count.

Actually, today, it’s women’s underwear, but I am blaming the likes of Calvin Klein.   And I might be coined a hypocrite for the fabulously amazing patent leather trench I have in my closet that sports his logo at the back of the neck but THAT IS NOT UNDERWEAR!!!!

The world of women’ underwear is a travesty!  In modern society where we have information at our fingertips, and tv in the palm of our hands and cars that drive themselves and people practically living in space why is it that we cannot figure out how to fit a woman’s body for something that is worn (hopefully) everyday by every woman?   So what there are multiple shapes of us out there.  Oooh, toughy . . .  So big deal we aren’t a one size fits all.  WE GET IT.  DO YOU??!!  Make underwear for me, and for her and for the the girl over there.  I promise you, there is enough of us, we will buy it.

And I have figured out why it is the way it is . . . .   At first, as I was glaring at the options in front of me this afternoon with steam building between my ears. The initial judgement of blaming this on MEN who design clothing for women kept flashing red over and over in my brain.  And I kept asking myself:  who hires men to make undergarments for women?  HANES??!!!!  And what kind of woman do you put these on for trial before you ship them off to market?  Hmmm?   just because it fits nice on miss size 5 doesnt mean size 7 or 8 is going to fit it the same . .  and that tiny elastic band  . . .   its been long enough GET RID OF IT ALREADY!

But its deeper than just MEN.  Its worse than that.. . .   The leading underwear designer out there, Mr. Calvin Klein himself is not only a MAN, not only been ridiculed for decades for his marketing image leaning toward the anorexic and sickly thin . . .  but has publicly admitted that women’s bodies are fitting for . . . wait for it . . . men’s clothing.   HELL NO!

“I think there’s something incredibly sexy about a woman wearing her boyfriend’s T-shirt and underwear. ”
-Calvin Klein

*Eye Roll*  Sexy. Maybe.  Not practical.   And my curvey self aint fitting in a straight boys briefs.  Nothing wrong with my body.  But I am not meant to be cut in those places. And with that much elastic . . .

THAT’S  IT!   Its  CALVIN KLEIN and all those dudes out there that never grow up and think that women are sexy in prepubescent sizes and fantasize about them wearing their own (dudes) clothes cuz they think its hot.  THEY are the ones designing our underwear, ladies, and flooding our stores with junk that we just wear because its just underwear and its whats available.  GRRR.

Over the years, off and on, I have found a line I like here and there but they never stay on the market long enough.  I am going to turn into a hoarder the next time I do find a pair I like and buy them in droves and store them brand new untouched for decades just incase.  Its a frustrating epic issue that we are too silent about.  We talk about men’s underwear all the time.  Boxer or briefs.  Hmm.  Tough.  Maybe its not that simple.  But what I do know, for the farer sex it isn’t that simple.  So why am I the only one so mad?

The whole reason I was even buying underwear today is laughable.  I should be ashamed to even be posting about it.  Not the buying underwear part.  We all should be buying underwear at some point!  PLEASE PEOPLE BUY UNDERWEAR!!  But I should be so embarrassed that I was out buying underwear today because in two days time I would be out of underwear it has been that long since I have done laundry . . .   And I will not have time to do laundry between now and then . . .   And I have not had time to do laundry . . .   And I have been out of laundry detergent . . .  And I have only done laundry twice since my roommate moved in. . . Mid March . . .

That’s the real kicker, to be honest.  I have this creature that lives under the stairs.  I hate sharing my house . . .  He has taken over the laundry room.  Doing laundry is now a huge undertaking, with the TBI.  I have to have a full day,  and now one with no roommate.  I cannot work, or have therapy, or anything else to do that day.  HA!  it doesn’t ever seem to work out that way . . .   So . . . laundry doesnt get done.  And I dont know when I will be able to . . .  So, today, on errands.  I was to buy some underwear to buy me some time.  I am too damn stubborn to start washing my clothes out in my tub in my own house.  THAT’s WRONG.  just wrong . . .

So, I go to Target.  I am a simple girl.  simple needs.  I am also broke.  I cant do the fancy smancy stuff.  I head straight to the packaged goods.  And I get so irritated. There is a whole wall of underwear.  A whole WALL!!!!  And can I find anything i want?  no . . .  I am 32 years old.  I am not 7.  I do not want bright pink or yellow underwear.  I dont want stripes, or crazy squiggles or polka dots . . .   I dont want “fun” underwear.  I’m not fun.  I dont think that under my pin stripes during the day that a crazy pink and turquoise blue patterned bikini brief cotton panty is going to make me feel “fun” like I have some secret from the world.  Giggle.  Giggle.  I want black, white, grey, beige . . . yes beige.  Beige.  because it matches my wardrobe.  I am a sophisticated professional who happens to be a bit frugal and cant afford $5 or $10 or $15 a pair for “nice” underwear.  Why must I be subjected to childish, ill fitting options?   Not that, in my experience, when I could afford nicer things, they fit any better . . .  they just were made nicer, out of nicer stuff and in colors I could stand.

So . . what did I do, you ask?  I blew my budget and bought the $5 underwear (5 for $20) .  in beige.  God forgive me. for blowing my budget, not the beige . . .   But, on the upside, next week I will have clean and NEW underwear to wear.  Doubt my roommate would care.  Neither would Calvin Klein . . .   jerks . . .