GeezerSue

Look at the third(?) post in this thread...she's been here; she'll be here again.

You are aware that the "internal factions" are REALLY the artificially united peoples of three different areas, aren't you? And that they have been fighting each other for about 1600 years... Did you have a timeline in mind that would undo 1600 years of mutual murdering and marauding? (I'm pretty sure Dubya didn't...he thought the mission had been accomplished when he was playing sky cowboy.) Now, no matter how hard you try, 1600 years of hating your neighbor does impact how you live your life. What you WILL have there is probably fundamentalist (and you know how they are) Muslim as a backlash to Saddam's lack of religious interest. The call to prayer will ring out five times per day. Women may or may not be allowed to drive cars. People who convert to other religions may be executed. It will be okay to kill rape victims, since--by being raped--they have disgraced the family. There's your democratic Iraq of the very near future.

You should post this--I think--on one of the on-topic threads, because the answers will help others as well.

~~~ Ron, Edward Croker, a former FDNY Chief at the turn of the last century, said it better than I can: "...Firefighting is a hazardous occupation; it is dangerous on the face of it, tackling a burning building. The risks are plain...consequently, when a man becomes a fireman, his act of bravery has already been accomplished. Everything else is his daily duty." So, it's a shame that ANY of us get injured, but the act of heroism for any member of the military, was taking the oath at the beginning of service. After than, it was just a matter of wrong place-wrong time, because--as pawns in this chess game--were were all essentially interchangable. Next item...we will lose this war. There is no way anyone but a terrorist could win it...except if we flatten the earth. Burn the whole thing down. You are old enough to remember the War on Poverty and th War on Drugs and I think we had a War on Crime but I'm not sure. You can't win one of those. Dubya may as well have declared war on bad breath or rude driving. You can NEVER win that war because all it will ever take is ONE--count 'em, ONE--looney to go off and fifty-years of peace (as if THAT could happen) or fresh breath or bad driving would no longer count. So, the reason we will will lose this war--and we will--is because our religious fanatic (not just fundamentalist, but fanatic), stupid president declared war on something that can NEVER be conquered. Ever. Finally, I can't tell the difference between a reasonable Christian walking down the street and a Jim Jones or Ron Koresh or Warren Jeffs. Does that mean that, because those three were scary and dangerous, I get to kill 'em all? I think not. Same with scary Muslims.

I didn't pay that much attention...but I don't think they are one and the same. I'm sure Ron is Ron. He's all over the internet. But I'm also pretty sure that he was invited here by someone who was banned from the site and who--by using a different persona and different user name--is...well...a liar. So, if I'm right--and I admit I could be wrong, but I doubt it--we have the current religious preaching courtesy of someone who is--at best--breaking the membership rules and lying about who she is and essentially trespassing. (I guess it would be considered a sacrilege for ME to say, "Thank you, Jesus!") Sue

I'm more worried about the iNTERNAL threats we are all suffering. Going to Afghanistan is understandable. Iraq...no. I do not wish to sound like I think I have more of a "right" to opine on this matter becaue I don't, but I do have a clue as to what it's like to donate your body to the government to use as it pleases. And, I think that those who have not had the opportunity to make that kind of donation should consider that those who HAVE, might just have good reason for being against this endeavor.

All this war talk is making me even MORE curious... Ron, you seem very supportive of the mess in Iraq...and of our going after our enemies where we find them. Yet, TrueBlueSue and I seem to see if from a different perspective. (I don't speak on her behalf, it's just an observation.) Interestingly enough, she's a veteran of the Gulf thing and I'm a Viet Nam Era Vet...so, I'm naturally wondering if you, too, are supportive of all this military intervention because of/in spite of a military background? Or if maybe you are not a veteran yourself. (You're a couple of years older than I, and most men my age and older do have a military background...but it's just that you haven't mentioned yours, which made me wonder.)

Gadgetlady, I see you as a fundamentalist--and I see fundamentalism as a real problem--but I don't view you as a fanatic or as stupid. (Although I submit that the view from atop a pedestal is subject to oxygen deprivation and the related mis-interpretation of data...but that is STILL not stupid or fanatic.) My view of fundamentalism is that it leads--very often--to fanatic behavior that the doer feels justified in perpetrating because his/her view of the planet is non-negotiable and, because since (in his or her opinion) it is the only RIGHT view, SHOULD be foisted off on the unwilling for "their own good." I've SEEN Randall Terry in person... and his Stepford Wife Retinue. I had lunch that day with Gloria Allred. That was much more civilized company, away from fanatics.

My mom is currently in an Assisted Living facility--one with no nursing home section...if you need more help, you have to move elsewhere---and I am fearful about what the next move might be. I'm not sure what it would cost to find a roommate or two or three--depending on how many rooms are in the house--and then have the two or four residents share the cost of having a REAL caregiver--a nurse if needed--on site. My mom has an apartment in a senior development. There are good and bad caregivers. But if a good caregiver can be found, creative problem solving can be had. For example, a local "good" caregiver charges $100-150/day as a live-in. A bargain. Even more of a bargain if two people were to share the cost and just have regular household help in for cleaning, etc. And, since most of the people who need this kind of help also qualify for Meals on Wheels, there would be little cooking. I'm thinking that if a caregiver had help with the heavier chores--laundry, housecleaning, etc--and had a place of her own in the residence, decent help might be found. BTW...in this society, we farm out our infants, our elderly and the parts on our military equipment and space shuttles to the lowest bidder...strange, aren't we?

I don't think you lost 11 REAL pounds the first week. I think you were dehydrated and then...while losing a little REAL weight the second week...you REhydrated. It happens all the time. If you lose 8-10 pounds a month--and you have surpassed that--you are considered a band success.

If you are researching options, consider, too, the duodenal switch. A couple of us here have been revised FROM the band TO the DS. www.duodenalswitch.com It is MORE invasive. However, from one "grazer" to another, it is in my experience, the ONLY reason I am still losing weight instead of regaining. Whichevr you choose, I hope you get the right one the first time out....having to have two surgeries for one purpose is NOT fun! Sue

I was asleep. Old people do that a lot. I'll probably be asleep again in a few minutes. I was at the Bellagio in Las Vegas last week, too. But I was too busy in the casino and spa--mostly the spa--to bother watching weirdos on the strip. However, most people don't realize that until very recently, Las Vegas was a Mormon town and that--except for the strip--the Mormon-flavor of Christianity was predominant in Clark County. I haven't lived there in about fifteen years, but Las Vegas, except for the strip, really had little to do with being Sin City. It was a very decent small town kind of place. Now, here's what I wonder about...going back to the first page...Ron has been here at LBT for two weeks. (and racked up over 250 posts, almost NONE of them having to do with the band or losing weight or any of THAT stuff.) Anyway, he is here--or so it says--at the invitation of "tomorrowsdream," whom he calls "Dee." As coincidences go, there's a tomorrowsdream at OH, who also signs stuff as "Dee," except that THAT tomorrowsdream has the same face as Dody who--I thought--was permanently banned from here. At least the name Dody is not still active here. So who is Dee/tomorrowsdream and who, exactly, is having all the fun on this thread? This place can get confusing...

You can compare atheists to Tinkerbell or komodo dragons for all I care, for--at least--these reasons: I don't speak for all atheists. I don't claim to represent other atheists. (I am not even in possession of the Atheists Secret Decoder Ring, which might allow us to discern what the rules--if there are any--REALLY mean in spite of what they say...all the while insisting that what they say is accurate.) Since there is no discernable relationship between Hitler and atheists, such a comparison would just serve as MORE evidence that what you say makes no sense. Nothing else you say is acceptable to me, why should we bring in stuff like "acceptability" at this point in our relationship? But feel free...no skin off MY nose. See, Ron, MY agenda is not to prove to the world that I have the keys to the magic kingdom...my agenda is just pointing out naked emperors. March on in that pretty new suit!!

Oh..confusion abounds. I don't mock CHRISTIANITY!!!! I have Christian friends...even Christian minister friends...I mock FANATIC FUNDAMENTALISTS OF ANY STRIPE, because they are dangerous and stupid. There is NO difference between the Taliban and the Fanatic Christian Fundamentalists...none. They all deserve my derision.

Is your husband the head of your family as Christ is the head of the church? If so, you would not have noticed.

First, as you have with a number of other words--even big second grade words such as "says"--you have misspelled "capable." But, I figured it out, so don't worry about that, okay? My comments are not mindless...either am I, for that matter. However, YOUR negative attitude toward women--especially those who are demonstrably smarter than you (and of which there appears to be no shortage) is almost palpable...not that very many would WANT to get that close, but that's another thread. What's the REAL story, Ron? You sound very angry and very afraid...too bad. It's most unattractive on a man your age. As we get older, some of us have REAL trouble accepting that the game is in the last quarter, if you know what I mean. But, back to my questions...so you're saying that no amputees have been healed since the time of Christ? Not ONE? (And, btw, the good folks--also Christians--at this ministry don't seem to think that leprosy causes body parts to fall off, but they're probably the wrong flavor of Christianity, so they're wrong, too, huh? http://www.leprosy.org/LEPinfo.html#19 ) Anyway, no healed amputees in over 2000 years? But, we're still saying that God hears your prayers and heals when he is so inclined...he's just not inclined to heal amputees very often, right? And, your health insurance. Are you going for a MediCare Supplement policy or an HMO or just prayer...and hoping you don't have anything you really want to keep get chopped off since we can pretty much count on no miracle getting anything to grow back, huh? I'm just seeing an angry, bitter old man here...afraid of Islam and disrespecting of Jews...where do you stand on Druids?

Scene #3? I'm never showing up in heaven. (Because there isn't one.) Well, the Spa at the Bellagio is Las Vegas may be close, but other than that...

Which "explains" why God NEVER, EVER, EVER heal amputees, right. Either it wasn't in this all powerful and loving God's plan, OR he's imaginary and can't cure hiccups. I didn't say--or even IMPLY--that your story wasn't true...merely that you were using it as a metaphor. (You get that, right?) So, if God heals what he wants healed and things that are NOT healed are NOT healed because he doesn't want them healed--and, assuming that God mostly gets what he wants, doesn't that STILL mean that medical insurance is a waste of money...money that you could be using to publish more tracts to convert more Jews? So, do you have medical insurance and--if you do--doesn't that mean that either...you don't trust God to heal what YOU need healed OR you are going to try to go against God's will and get doctors to try to heal stuff God won't heal on his own? Curious, huh?

I WILL!!! This person noted that you believe in the literal word of God as written in (some version) of the bible. And, that the bible says that Christ can not only heal the sick but cause people to rise from the dead. And, you had a neighbor kid (whom you didn't mind using as a metaphor to tell me about how I'm going to be sorry that I did't listen to you, so you brought him into the conversation to try to prove your point) who got killed by running into the street. So, I logically (you remember logic, right?) asked why you didn't gather a group of people to pray about having God un-dead the kid. I mean the bible DOES say that if two or more gather 'round and ask...right? So, from what I see, you missed a golden opportunity to prove that your God not only answers prayers, but that he can bring the dead back to life. Which brings up the point...do you even HAVE medical insurance? Because that would indicate that you don't BELIEVE that prayer will fix everything in YOUR life, either, wouldn't it?

Why didn't you pray to your God to make the kid alive again? You didn't like the kid or you don't believe that would EVER happen? Seems like gathering a group of devout pray-ers and asking God to change his mind on this one should be enough to do it, right?

Well, here's an intelligent voice that I think merits attention, but--of course--those most needy will NEVER hear the message: Nobel winner assails religious intolerance in L.A. visit Wole Soyinka of Nigeria calls faith this century's defining issue, and says fundamentalism is the greatest threat to world peace and democracy. By K. Connie Kang, Times Staff Writer January 27, 2007 Religion, Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka says, is the 21st century's defining issue — just as W.E.B. Du Bois predicted race would be for the 20th century. On one level, he says, spiritual practices can enrich humankind. But religious fundamentalism is the greatest threat to peace and democracy in the world today, according to Soyinka,the Nigerian writer who won the 1986 Nobel Prize for literature. Here's the rest: http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-me-beliefs27jan27,1,2911522.story?coll=la-headlines-pe-california Meanwhile, it would be nice if the self-anointed, self-appointed would stop trying to hit others over the head with their imaginary friends. Ron, you are--one day--going to die and then you will--unless cremated--rot. You will then be "done," "finished," "all gone." IF I AM WRONG, feel free to return to the earth from the hereafter and help all the needy hear your blessed message. At that point, you MAY be in a position to make a point or two among those of us who live in a reality-based world. Meanwhile, what bothers me the most about this entire debacle is that you will never know how wrong you are...but then a lot of people have gone to their graves convinced the earth was flat or that the world was ending that day or that Jim Jones and Ron Koresh actually KNEW something...and you will be metaphorically joining them in eternal--or until some religious war causes the planet to be blown up--wrongness. Even Saddam just checked out thinking HE was the president of Iraq.

Our daughter's friend has a five-year-old. He has an imaginary friend. AND he has a little brother who is three and is, of course, strongly influenced by the big brother. Now the boys argue about who gets to sit next to the imaginary friend AND about what, exactly, the imaginary friend said. So I feel right at home watching all of this.

Actually, "success" is a medical term and refers to the loss of at least fifty percent of one's excess weight. People who lose less than 50% of their excess weight--with any surgery--are declared as having had a "failed" procedure. She was apparently not on a decent diet. With the band, I COULD NOT be on a decent diet, because of the damage the band was causing. The problem here is--like it is becoming with the band as more people get their insurance to cover it--that people have wls and expect to just carry on as though nothing had happened. You can't do THAT with ANY wls. Yeah, my iron came back a bit low at my one-year labs. I panicked. And then I pulled my PRE-DS labs...the ones done while I was banded and couldn't eat a decent diet. My iron was in better shape post-DS than it was with the band. But you know, it depends on where you started. If someone who weighed 350+ and was on her way to an early death has had three iron infusions but other than that can WALK, can GET OUT OF A CHAIR, can TIE HER SHOES, can DUMP THE CPAP MACHINE, can LOSE THE INHALER, etc all for the price of a few hours of iron infusions...well, I know which one I'd choose. About iron...when banded I couldn't eat most iron-containing meats. I couldn't eat Cereal. Last night, I had top sirloin steak for dinner (which contains 25% of the MRD of iron) and I'm about to have a bowl of Trader Joe's Raisin Bran (which contains 60% of the MDR of iron) for MY FIRST Breakfast. (Later on, there will probably be a cheese omelette and a little bacon.) In other words, my diet post-DS is probably healthier in that I CAN eat things that contain iron...I just have to be careful to eat enough. (Now THERE'S a problem I can live with.) Easy! She was trying to say that--on a percentage basis--not enough banded people actually get to a low enough weight that saggy skin is a problem. I was banded in 2002. I know LOTS of banded people--in person, even. MANY if not MOST of them are still on the high end of "Obese," and a good number remain "Morbidly Obese." Sure...SOME do well. But the "success rate" (see above) is not high enough that the juice (so to speak) is worth the squeeze. And, if you lose enough weight with the band to be healthy and if you don't have complications, things will be just as you have planned. My best friend is from Alabama. She often says, "If we had ham, we could have ham and eggs...if we had eggs." Your comments show me that you either just don't "get" what is being said or you choose to factor out the reality of Morbid Obesity. So, does my poop stink? Yes, unfortunately, it does. So I had to cancel all the gatherings I had where I invited other people in to smell my shit. ??? Who CARES if it stinks? They make room deodorizer for a reason and if I'm really concerned I can take a Pepto-Bismol tablet. What REALLY counts in my bathroom is that I can now wipe my own ass without contortions. And you wrote "just another indication of malabsorption" as though it's a BAD thing. Uh...that's what makes the surgery WORK. It is a "malabsorptive procedure." You write: I have yet to read ANY recommendations with lapbanding for "needing" to take a multivitamin (it's always recommended for everyone), or extra calcium or iron. No need for extra Protein or labs to check Vitamin and mineral levels, either. And therein lies a real problem. As I said, my labs were better post-DS. Why? Because, since the band is restrictive and not malabsorptive, people (doctors and patients) FOOLISHLY assume that their post-banding diets are healthy. Too bad THAT'S a false assumption. And the problem gets worse for those who consistently barf up their meals (lovingly called PB'ing...bullshit, it's vomiting without the stomach acids, vomiting anyway.) THOSE people may have really off-kilter labs and have no clue...because they all think that since the band SURGERY (that one-hour part of the process) is so safe, everthing that happens after the surgery is safe. Not so. Lactose Intolerance Problems? First, I'm not a big fan of cow's milk...I think it's for baby cows. I RARELY fed it to my kid, since a number of ethnic groups (and I'm one of them) have lactose intolerance problems. But, since the Dairy Lobby is SO successful and so many people think it's essential, I'll tell you the seret. The more FAT there is in a dairy product, the less lactose there is. So, while I avoid non-fat and low-fat milk like the plague, I'm sitting here drinking coffee with half-and-half...sometimes I use cream. And that experience is valid because it is YOUR experience. MY experience includes not having been able to eat a salad for the three years I had a band, and having to know how much bread was hidden in someone's meatloaf or crabcakes, so that I didn't barf up gobs of slimy mucous. It meant that I was "plugged up" after two bites of broiled fish and all i could "eat" (while feeling famished) was a little coffee or something that would melt on the way down...like ice cream. It meant having esophageal damage and having to have the band removed...so, in my case, no, the band was not "healthy." But then NO wls surgery is without its faults and risks to our health. It's just that with the DS, the problems I have (see poop above) are accompanied by a 98 pound weight loss. I'm still "obese," with a BMI of 32, but when I got out of Basic Training in the Army (and that process doesn't produce a lot of fat people) my BMI hovered between 24 and 25, with is either normal or overweight...so I'm not aiming for a BMI of 22 or anything and I'm still losing. It will be reassuring for some people (and they usually PM me to learn more and I welcome those inquiries) that, if the band was the wrong choice for them, there ARE other options. Sue

Oh, but that we could convince his self-appointed, self-anointed spokespersons of THAT novel concept...

Don't try to confuse me with fancy wargames, or you'll be dipped in hot bacon drippings courtesy of the spirits of the North American Jewish Warlords.