tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-855802737317865685.post7082902257719579046..comments2024-02-24T15:58:56.712-08:00Comments on The Good Typist: Fun with Co-Dependence, Bad Back, New Coke FlashbackKristen McHenryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03467256747399406710noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-855802737317865685.post-48062807847934164502016-04-23T14:37:11.142-07:002016-04-23T14:37:11.142-07:00I spent about a year researching my book about opi...I spent about a year researching my book about opium (which just goes to show that effort does not necessarily pay off in sales). And the most interesting thing I learned was that opioid peptides and receptors are all about the management of pain. Put bluntly: we can deal with pain better when we are happy. And people on morphine for pain will tell you: it isn't that the pain is reduced as much as that their response to the pain is reduced. So I think you might well be right about the reason for that 80% reduction in pain. On the other side, I think stress is a killer. And it makes dealing with anything else so much harder. Hopefully, this will keep your pain manageable. But I hope you will go see someone about the base pain. I mention it only because I'm so bad about doing to the doctor myself.<br /><br />The test sounds interesting. I'm jealous! I have a kind of addiction to taking tests that tell me that I'm pretty much who I think I am. I even took a psychopathy test recently because I began to wonder, "Wouldn't a psychpath think he was empathic?" Apparently not. I scored almost zero. Now if there was a "blubbering fool" test, I'd ace it.<br /><br />Speaking of which, my boss brought up an old episode of <em>This American Life</em>. So I listened to it, even though I had heard it before. And the last part of made me cry -- just like it did the first time I listened to it. I think it could be used as an "Are You Human?" test. Check it out: <a href="http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/511/the-seven-things-youre-not-supposed-to-talk-about?act=6#play" rel="nofollow">Route Talk</a>. It beautiful and sad. It provides what I consider the perfect kind of cry. (But note that I am kind of a sucker for -- and overly sentimental about -- father-son stories.)<br /><br />Thanks for the shout-out on my "New Coke" post. I'm sorry if it brought back bad memories. But you have to admit that it got rid of Bill Cosby. Those commercials bugged me because I generally had a good opinion of Cosby at that time, and his pre-New Coke commercials were so clearly disingenuous. But I did have a friend at the time how was a big Coke drinker. I don't know if he felt betrayed. It was hard to say because he was so angry that it was hard to get past that. He talked of nothing else for a month.Frank Moraeshttp://franklycurious.comnoreply@blogger.com