Guns becoming a problem in CR

Four members in the Cedar Rapids community decided to hide guns and ammunition in boxes of goods that was supposed to be shipped to Lebanon and Syria to help those in need. The boxes of guns to be shipped to the Middle East was intercepted by federal officials and was said to have intercepted guns and ammunition. No one is for sure who the weapons were intended for in Lebanon. Three men and a woman were arrested and were put on trail last Tuesday in a court of law. Each of them were faced with charges of conspiracy and delivery of packages to a carrier without notice that it contained fire arms. One of the locations that was raided was the Midamir corporation which bills itself as a leading U.S. based food brand. This is the business that held a clothing drive to collect items for refugees in Syria. The court records show that the shipping arrangements were made by an employee of the company, and other didn’t know. They found all of these guns and ammunition inside three Bobcat skid loaders at a port in Virginia.

Considering that these people planned to ship our American guns across the country to do god knows what with them is quite scary. This is why people have a problem with charity work and things like what these were doing. For all the American public knows these Lebanese people could have been shipping their guns and ammunition to ISIS or al-Queda groups. This is not our faults for “allowing guns” it is the governments fault for not taking things like this seriously. When things like this begins to happen the government needs to become, much more aware of what people in OUR country are doing. It is not the fact that we are allowed to carry guns it is the fact that we are LETTING these people get a hold of them to eventually turn their backs and kill us right back. If these people were hiding this than something is happening where it involves us as an enemy. We need to begin to control who gets a hold of what. Because if American guns are being transported across the world to people who are our enemy’s then the people who are shipping the guns need to be kicked out and sent back to where they’re from. This is a wake up call for every single American.

Hypersomnia

Everyone at sometime or another feel really sleepy or tired and can barley keep their eyes open. But a women by the name of Danielle Hulshizer lives with this feeling constantly. Hulshizer suffers from a sleep disorder called hypersomnia. This is a sleep disorder where the feeling of sleepiness that never seems to go away. Even after she sleeps all night and takes naps throughout the day Hulshizer never seems to be fully awake. She signed up for a sleep study fourteen years ago before being diagnosed with hypersomnia. She always just thought that she was tired from her busy schedule and long hours.

Well after her sleep study she met with Doctor David Rye, a neurologist at the Emory Clinic Sleep Center, in Atlanta Georgia. After Dr. Rye’s years of research with his team, they found that some patients have a sensitivity to a naturally occurring sedative in the brain, known as GABA. His team of researchers found that a drug called Flumazenil, a drug usually used to pull people out of anesthesia, helped some to overcome GABA. Hulshizer was asked by Dr. Rye if she would participate in the study on how effective the drug was. She found that it completely changed the way she felt through out the day and made it much easier for her to be happy and focus on her day instead of always feeling tired. “It was incredible — it actually made me feel for the first time like I was alive,” she said. She now continues to take the drug and it not only makes her stay awake, but also makes her feel more awake than ever. I think that she never really knew how to live her life to the fullest, because of her sleeping disorder. Always feeling tired and like you want to just fall asleep all day would not be very fun to deal with on a daily basis. A lot of things can cause this disease anything from genetics to a drug or alcohol addiction. It doesn’t seem like it would be very common, but actually in a way it is pretty common. Researchers are still continuing to find ways to better help this disorder so that it is easier than having to use a drug. A lot of people may feel like they have a disorder like  this, but actually may just need to get more sleep, according to researchers on this condition.

 

“Robots Wanted”

It is pretty usual and common to walk into a store and be greeted right away by a “helpful smile”. This is so common that you might walk right by them without even noticing anything about them. Even the fact that they are not human. This is happening in some stores in Japan already.

Japans economy and aging population are causing employers to have trouble finding workers. This is causing an increase in the need for more working. With the many technological advances in Japan, these employers are finding a new way to fill these positions. That’s right, some stores in japan have already “hired” robots to do simple jobs such as greeting people at the entrance of the store. While these robots can be very expensive in the long run an employer could save lots of money by not having to pay a human employee for their services. There are even robots that are planned to eventually be able to live in homes with people and help them with things. Just like your typical maid or butler, they could help take care of the typical house hold chores. Or potentially even help take care of the person! So far, this has been very popular not only among the business owners but the customers to. they think it is very cool and unique. many businesses have be able to draw a lot of attention from people just on the basis that they have a human like robot to greet them.

This is becoming more common in Japan although it is still new and very experimental. Many robots are just a temporary experiment, although they could be an answer to some employers, and the economies, prayers  as the population continues to age and finding young workers is harder and harder.

While this seems like it may be the answer to this problem could it be the cause of another potentially? As the need for employees increases with the ability of the robots can do, could it get to a point where these be a better investment to the employer than human capital. this may seem very new and cool now but could eventually lead to Japanese workers losing their jobs to robots if the trend continues. this could be very dangerous and  bad for japans economy if the trends continue but as for right now it is just a cool and new way to see where we are going and a potentially a fix to an already existing problem.

Should you be able to choose how you life ends?

This is a debate going on in our country. There lies one question, should a person decide how and when their life ends? Well a lot of people have different opinions, but one person in particular who knows what it is like has an opinion. Dan Swangard is a physician who sees his patients die every day, some times he sees them die over weeks, others are on a morphine machine in their last hours. And now he is in a position as well. He was diagnosed with metastatic cancer and cancer which invades pancreas, liver, gallbladder, and spleen. Surgeons went in to remove this invasive cancer, but Swangard is certain that it is likely to return. He thinks that he should have the option on how to end his own life. He isn’t sure that is he were given a couple months to live if he would want to live them or end his own life with physician assisted suicide. He says that he wants to be able to make that choice, when it comes to a point where medicine is not an option anymore.

In a CNN article about Dr. Swangard it talks about the right-to-die movement and how it is becoming bigger than ever, especially in California. It followed the recent case Brittney Maynard who had brain cancer and moved to Oregon to take advantage of its “Death with Dignity” law and died in November after taking a fatal dose of barbiturates prescribed by her doctors. As of now only three states, Vermont, Washington and Oregon allow physicians assisted suicide, but legislation is pending in several other states. 54% of physicians agree with assisted suicide, a raise in 46% over the years. Swangard says that he just wants to be able to say good bye to the people that he loves.

I know a lot about this topic, because when I was a freshman, in personal law I studied a case on Doctor Jack Kevorkian a famous man you assisted many people in their deaths. He was charged with a lot of murder charges and spent a lot of time in prison. This is a widely controversial topic across America today, there lies a question, Should our country allow physician assisted suicide?

I think that answer should be yes, because a person should have the right to choose how and when they die and also where. In Doctor Kevorkian’s case he allowed this to be done in the comfort of their own bed with all their loved ones around. I think it should especially be available to those with terminal illnesses and want to end their lives before they get much worse. This should be an option open to people through out America if they a terminal and want to die in a homey place with their loved ones.

Tracking Babies Sleeping Patterns

Mimo. Heard of it? Well, neither have I, but it sounds pretty cool. It is a $199 kit that includes three onsies for infants, it has a sensor in the pattern of a frog on the front that can track your infants, breathing, body movements and sleeping patterns. How do you figure out the information do you ask? Well its an app that you download onto your phone that the sensor on your baby has Bluetooth that sends the information to your phone. Parents can customize settings on their phone based on their child’s age and where they are currently sleeping to make sure that all of the data is accurate.

The goal of this Boston Based Rest Device is simply to give parents a piece of mind about their baby when their sleeping at night. According to a CNN article online, it can eventually help parents and guardians of an infant to improve their child’s sleeping pattern and make it easier on themselves. “They can also look at the past 10 days of data and see if they need to feed the baby closer to bedtime not, or if they’re putting the baby down to sleep too late,” Co Founder of Boston Based Rest , Dulcie Madden said. He also adds that the main goal is to make it easier. All of these items including the tech devices to the onsie is made in Tennessee or Boston.

I think that this is an awesome idea for new parents trying to learn how their baby’s schedule works through out the day and night time. Especially so parents can figure out if they should feed their baby closer to bed or farther from bed time. This could really help parents tremendously, because with new parents they almost get no sleep, but with this new tech device they can figure out the best time to do things so they aren’t loosing as much sleep through out the night. The founder of this business also says that people think the device might be uncomfortable, but when they were doing tests in previous years that never seemed to become a problem for the baby. This also doesn’t seem like it would be to technological for parents, because all you have to do is download an app. Sounds easy enough to me, if your a new mom or dad and needing to get a little extra resting time.

Cancer

More than 1 million American’s get some type of cancer every year. A sad thing to think about indeed. So many people whether it is themselves, their loved ones or their best friends have to deal with a loss because of the life threatening disease: CANCER. Cancer is just a general name for more than 100 types of disease, but overall people know it has a life threatening disease. Cancer starts with a persons cells begin to grow faster than they should, typically they just go out of control. A normal persons body should grow cells and also kill off cells, but if you have cancer then your body grows too many cells and your body won’t kill off any so you have too many cells for your body to hold. Normal cells become cancer cells, because the DNA in them is damaged. Unfortunately cancer cells spread to other parts of the body if  it is not treatable. This happens when the cancer gets into the bloodstream, which then means it  can form new tumors where the cancer has spread.

Now, for the last 65 years doctors have been finding ways to save the lives of cancer patients, but unfortunately there is no true cure to cancer. One who has cancer usually goes through something called Chemotherapy where they use radiation to try and kill off the cells that are over populated in someones body. In 2015 there will be an estimated 1,658,370 people diagnosed with new cancer cases, along with that there will be an estimated  589,430 cancer related deaths in America during this year.

I myself have lost someone to cancer, my cousin, Scott Beaty was a radio host at KHAK for many, many years and he had been diagnosed with cancer about six years ago. Him and his wife, Misty recently had a baby about six months ago, when the doctors had told them they were not going to be able to ever have kids she found out she was nine months pregnant and had no idea. Well about two months later on December 18 2014 Scott had gotten really sick and passed away from his very invasive cancer after battling a strong fight for many years. A lot of times doctors will say you have maybe two years left, but some people out  grow that and go like 6-10 years with staying alive

Cancer sucks, but until their is an absolute cure, nothing is going to change, everyday people are going to be diagnosed and every day people are going to die from it. It will always be apart of our society until that one person finds a cure.

iOS 8.3 update

Recently, last week apple came out with a new update, iOS 8.3 was released. In this new update siri’s voice was changed. She now speaks much more clearly, it might be a lot harder to tell but there definitely is a difference. You just have to be listening for it and you are able to understand her much better. A YouTube video came out where you can hear the new voice vs the old voice of siri, it was released on an Apple blog. It is almost just like an English speaker because at the end of her clauses, so it sounds like a person naturally talking.

Not only did Apple introduce siri’s new and improved voice, but also 300 new emoji’s were available to the iPhone and iPad. A lot of the emoji’s are now racially diverse, there are six skin tones to choose from, you just have to hold down the emoji and it will come up with different skin tones to choose from. Unfortunately the regular emojis aren’t yet racially diverse, but the cartoon ones are. If you don’t own an iPhone then you’ll have to wait until June when the Unicode (the people who are in charge of emoji’s) releases their new update. Not only will they be like all emojis on the iPhone, but other new ones will be released as well.

One last small thing that was changed in the new update was the availability for you to not have to put in your password every time you buy a free game. Usually when you buy free apps through the app store you are required to enter a finger print or type in your apple account password, but now you won’t have to worry about that.

My favorite part of the update is obviously the new emoji’s that were introduced in the new software update. I think that most people are most excited about this, because not only can you pick new emoji’s, but you also see a new set up when you click on the emoji button at the bottom left hand corner of your keyboard when you are sending a message to someone. This is easier to scroll through the different emoji’s that you are able to choose from and then you can see all of the emoji’s on the same page, no matter what the theme is.

The Worst Foods to Eat While You’re Sick

Getting sick sucks no matter what, and most people will try everything possible to stop feeling bad and start to feel better. What you eat while you’re sick actually matters some can it make you worse and other foods can make it better. It all depends on what kind of sickness you have.

If you are constipated the best foods for you are whole grain breads, nuts, beans, prunes, oatmeal, broccoli, pears and apples. Constipation can occur when you don’t have a fiber rich foods in your  body. The worst foods to eat with constipation would be chocolate, dairy foods, iron supplements and any over the counter medications.

If you are feeling nauseous probably no food sounds very appealing to you, but there are some foods that may make you feel better. Some good foods to eat would be saltine crackers or pretzels, dry toast, cereal, ginger or lemon tea, lemon slices and peppermints may all help your stomach to not feel as worse.

If your throat is sore and it hurts to swallow fortunately there are many foods that can help make the pain tolerable. One of the best things that works for me is apple tea with a tablespoon of honey, creamy foods, such as soup, mashed potatoes, yogurt and scrambled eggs. Some really bad foods that you may want to avoid eating would be hard scratchy foods, such as, potato chips, nuts and granola. Some other foods to stay away from with a bad throat would be, juices with fruits such as, orange juice, grape juice, and lemonade, all of those have a good chance at irritating the throat more.

Having a headache is the worst and with a headache comes a lot of things like stress and anger. The biggest leading cause of headaches is dehydration. Staying hydrated is so important and it can make you feel so much better in every aspect. “Drink a bottle of water and wait 20 minutes to see if you feel better,” says Dr. Arthur. Some foods to avoid would be any sweetened drinks or food, chocolate, wine, dried meats and dried fruit.

To me water is the biggest help when it comes to feeling better, with enough hydration your body can overcome most everything.

 

 

Fresh air, fresher sleep

Sleeping in fresh air with the windows open. Doesn’t sound much better to me. Well it’s actually really good for you. Sleeping in colder climates is prove to make you sleep better, says Natalie Dautovich, PhD an environmental scholar. “Fresh air can have a cooling effect and we know that a cool bedroom environment is key to getting a good night’s sleep,” Dautovich said. A slight drop in body temperature can also begin to make a person feel tired. Even if the temperature drops in your bedroom it can signal the brain that it is time for you to fall asleep. The ideal sleeping temperature is somewhere between 60 and 68 degrees. Sounds about right to me!

Well there could be a problem if you live in a noisy city or right next to a busy street, but with a little ‘white noise’ or some ear plugs you may no longer have that problem. Dautovich talks about the setting up a fan or air conditioner to help you make a perfect sleep heaven.

I am all for this, a slight breeze and a noise like a fan or the ocean to fall asleep to would be my perfect way to sleep. Sleeping in hot conditions or with that heater that makes you all stuffy does not sound very fun to me, especially when you wake up the next morning with a sore throat. So with spring right around the corner I can guarantee that I will be sleeping outside with my windows open with the fresh air just coming in.

“Sometimes we don’t make the link between the changes in the seasons, the changes in the temperature and the changes in our sleep,” Dautovich said. This is true changing the seasons can also mean it can change how good we sleep all together. Waiting for these nice cool summer and spring night just so that  I can fall asleep more comfortably than usual.

Why Your Commute is Bad for You

Don’t you just hate, waking up and having to drive to work or school every single day? Well most people hate the fact that getting there is so frustrating. Bad drivers, hitting every red light, the list goes on and you just can not do anything about it.

A CNN article discusses why your everyday commute is actually bad for you health wise. The average American drive 25 minutes to work. In Los Angeles in a year workers spend about 90 hours stuck in traffic. In New York City the average worker spend 48 minutes getting their destination and that includes multiple train and bus swaps. They discuss five ways that taking your car, the train or the bus might affect your health now and in the future.

The first one is that it may contribute to weight gain. A 2012 study conducted by the American Journal of Preventive Medicine concluded that the farther Texas residents commute to work every day the more overweight they are. Also the people that travel farther are more likely to not get as much physical activity in their daily schedules. Men and women that drive to work ended up being about 6.6 pounds heavier than a person who takes public transportation such as buses and trains.

The next one is neck and back pain. A third of the people who say that they commute more than 90 minutes everyday deal with severe neck and back pain. The extra time that you spend slouched over in the drivers seat can really mess up a persons neck or back. I know that even if I didn’t drive my neck and back would hurt all the time so I don’t think that it is just because of the commute, but I guarantee that that plays a large roll in the pain that goes on in some ones neck.

The third is that it affects peoples general mood for the day. Compared to cyclists and walkers, people that commute every day are less likely to enjoy daily activities. Although for a lot of people there is no way of getting around public transportation or driving a car, public transportation may be your best bet, interacting with strangers and having full on conversations with them may help improve your mood through out the day.

The fourth reason why commute is bad for your health is that it stresses people out. Those who were commuting by car for any length of time or used public transportation for more than 30 minutes were concluded to have a higher anxiety level that those who didn’t commute or if it was based on public transportation commuted for a shorter amount of time. Stress is something a lot of people have to deal with, but it just so happens that if you commute by car then your blood sugar and anxiety may be higher than the person who does not have to commute every day.

The final reason is more pollution exposure, a study was done in 2007 that showed that people who commute by vehicle was more exposed to pollution. Driving with the windows down and less than 20 MPH can reduce the pollution that you are exposed to while driving or riding in a vehicle.

There may be no way to reduce the things listed above if your only option is to drive to work, but I think the biggest thing is exercise and if you do anything during your busy day take a half hour to stretch and do a bit of jogging.