Brownian Motion

It would be a lot more incredible if the camera were able to stay on the subject rather than continually cutting to the panel of spectators.

The current tv show "America's Next Top Model", which 15 year old girls love, is at core an updated version of QFAD.

Newt Gingrich Hoppy T Frog Sidewinder Lizard Breath Berke Breathed Bill the Cat Billy the Kid King Billy Billy Boy Billy in The Low Ground Hans Brinker Lenny Dykstra

Newt Gingrich Hoppy T Frog Sidewinder Lizard Breath Berke Breathed Bill the Cat

Charlie Ventura Jesse Ventura George W. Bush

Bud Melman Leslie Bloome Robert Plant Charles Gardener Art Farmer Sam Shepherd Sam I Am The Cat In the Hat Ted Geisel

Roast chicken breasts rubbed with Old Bay Seasoning; basmati rice cooked with thyme, onion, and chicken bullion; and steamed collards.

The New York Times Printer Friendly Format Sponsored By June 7, 2008 Shortcuts Vacations Are Good for You, Medically Speaking By ALINA TUGEND GAS prices are going up, the economy is going down, and it seems hard to justify a vacation when many of us are glad just to have jobs. But now, more than ever, we need to take a break — a real break, not just a long weekend — from our stressed-out lives. But, it turns out, even before the downturn, a lot of Americans were working through their vacation time, taking fewer and shorter holidays. A global study by Expedia.com found that about a third of employed Americans usually do not take all the vacation days that they are entitled to, leaving an average of three days on the table. This is not so unusual. About a quarter of the workers in Britain do not take all their vacation time, and in France a little less. The only difference is that the British get an average of 26 days of vacation and the French about 37 — compared with our 14 days, Expedia.com said. According to John de Graaf, executive director of Take Back Your Time, a nonprofit organization that studies issues related to overwork, 137 countries mandate paid vacation time. The United States is the only industrialized country that doesn’t. Here are some more depressing figures: The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that about a quarter of all workers in the private sector do not receive paid vacation. And the Conference Board, a private research group, said the number of Americans who said in April that they were going to take a vacation in the next six months is at a 30-year low, according to their regular consumer survey. Only 39 percent of those responding said they would go away on holiday over the next half year. That is the lowest figure since 1978 and reflects a general decline since 2000, when, in April of that year, 49 percent said they were planning a getaway in the next six months. But really, should you just stay home, relax in front of the television, read a novel, do a few day trips? Well, vacations are not simply a luxury. There is increasing evidence that they really are necessary for good health. Using information from the Framingham Heart Study, which started in 1948, researchers looked at questionnaires women in the study had filled out over 20 years about how often they took vacations. Those women who took a vacation once every six years or less were almost eight times more likely to develop coronary heart disease or have a heart attack than those who took at least two vacations a year, said Elaine Eaker, a co-author of the study and president of Eaker Epidemiology Enterprises, a private research company. The study, published in 1992, was controlled for other factors like obesity, diabetes, smoking and income, Ms. Eaker said, and the findings have been substantiated in follow-up research. “It shows how the body reacts to a lifestyle of stress,” she said. “This is real evidence that vacations are important to your physical health.” Another study, published in 2000, looked at 12,000 men over nine years who were at high risk for coronary heart disease. Those who failed to take annual vacations had a 21 percent higher risk of death from all causes and were 32 percent more likely to die of a heart attack. So forget about cutting down on cholesterol and exercise — I’m off to the Bahamas. Well, no. But even if you don’t have heart problems, a vacation of at least one week — and preferably two weeks to really unwind — can help you relax and sleep better. Mark Rosekind, president and chief scientist at Alertness Solutions, a scientific consulting firm, has worked with NASA pilots and astronauts on sleep issues. In 2006, he was commissioned by Air New Zealand to see if he could scientifically measure the benefit of a vacation. He asked a group of 15 people who were flying from the West Coast of the United States to New Zealand for vacations lasting a week to 12 days to wear a wrist device that monitored quantity and quality of sleep — for three days before the trip, during the vacation and three days afterward. They kept a sleep diary and took a vigilance test to determine how good their reactions were before, during and after the holiday. The participants were also hooked up to a brain monitor during the 12-hour flight, and other variables, like health, jobs and gender were factored in. Here’s what he found. After a few days on vacation — and it usually took two to three — people were averaging an hour more of good quality sleep. And there was an 80 percent improvement in their reaction times. “When they got home, they were still sleeping close to an hour more, and their reaction time was 30 to 40 percent higher than it had been before the trip,” Mr. Rosekind said. The trick, these days when going on vacation, is not only to physically remove yourself from your normal routine, but mentally as well. Checking your BlackBerry every few hours or rushing to the nearest Internet cafe doesn’t cut it. For 10 years, the Faculty of Management at Tel Aviv University has conducted a study looking at what is called “respite effects,” which measure relief from job stress before, during and after vacations. Professor Dov Eden, an organizational psychologist who has conducted the study, found that those who are electronically hooked up to their office, even if they are lying on the Riviera, are less likely to receive the real benefits of a vacation and more likely to burn out. Here’s one trick. My neighbor Mark had a colleague who was a workaholic. But when he went on vacation, he made sure to go where there was no cellphone or Internet service. Mr. de Graaf sees a solution to the vacation deprivation problem, even if it’s a long shot. His organization is working with Congress to consider national legislation requiring paid vacation time. He is hoping that such legislation, currently called the Minimum Leave Protection, Family Bonding and Personal Well-Being Act, will be introduced next year. It calls for a mandated three weeks of vacation every year. “It’s tough, there’s no question about it, but there’s a lot of interest in it,” Mr. de Graaf said. “There’s less business opposition for this leave than sick leave or parenting leave because it’s more predictable.” He estimated that it could add an extra 2 percent to 4 percent to the labor costs of a business, but “that would be balanced by less turnover and maybe less sick days.” Now that I’ve made such a case for vacations, maybe it’s time to acknowledge that in some cases, these trips — particularly with entire families in tow — can be stressful in their own way. The joys of a holiday can also include lugging around a ridiculous amount of paraphernalia, jet-lagged children sobbing on airplanes, hotels that looked wonderful on the Web but are in reality next to a construction site. Back in 1979, a journalist, Lance Morrow, wrote an article in Time magazine about how rising gas prices were curtailing the annual family vacations. (Sound familiar?) He noted that “the real danger of the vacation lies in its capacity to compress all family conflicts into an exquisitely focused drama.” And some years before that, the humorist Robert Benchley wrote that “traveling with children corresponds roughly to traveling third class in Bulgaria.” William Doherty, a professor of family social science at the University of Minnesota, said that “vacations tend to create memories more than any other family activity, and the bad times are some of the best memories.” He said he remembers, for example, being at the Jersey Shore when he was a child and his father stepped on a shell that sent him to the hospital. “I got to ride in the ambulance,” Mr. Doherty said. “That was great.” The trick, then, is to have a vacation that enhances family bonding, but not too much. I’ll let you know how that works out after our Cape Cod trip this summer, where we will be joined by my sister, her husband and three children and my parents. Email: shortcuts@nytimes.com

Daniel Rowan Daniel Day-Lewis Lewis Daniel

The New York Times Printer Friendly Format Sponsored By June 10, 2008 Loyal to Its Roots By CAROL KAESUK YOON From its diminutive lavender flowers to its straggly windblown stalks, there is nothing about the beach weed known as the Great Lakes sea rocket to suggest that it might be any sort of a botanical wonder. Yet scientists have found evidence that the sea rocket is able to do something that no other plant has ever been shown to do. The sea rocket, researchers report, can distinguish between plants that are related to it and those that are not. And not only does this plant recognize its kin, but it also gives them preferential treatment. If the sea rocket detects unrelated plants growing in the ground with it, the plant aggressively sprouts nutrient-grabbing roots. But if it detects family, it politely restrains itself. The finding is a surprise, even a bit of a shock, in part because most animals have not even been shown to have the ability to recognize relatives, despite the huge advantages in doing so. If an individual can identify kin, it can help them, an evolutionarily sensible act because relatives share some genes. The same discriminating organism could likewise ramp up nasty behavior against unrelated individuals with which it is most sensible to be in claws- or perhaps thorns-bared competition. “I’m just amazed at what we’ve found,” said Susan A. Dudley, an evolutionary plant ecologist at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, who carried out the study with a graduate student, Amanda L. File. “Plants,” Dr. Dudley said, “have a secret social life.” Since the research on sea rockets was published in August in Biology Letters, a journal of the United Kingdom’s national academy of science, Dr. Dudley and colleagues have found evidence that three other plant species can also recognize relatives. The studies are part of an emerging picture of life among plants, one in which these organisms, long viewed as so much immobile, passive greenery, can be seen to sense all sorts of things about the plants around them and use that information to interact with them. Plants’ social life may have remained mysterious for so long because, as researchers have seen in studies of species like sagebrush, strawberries and thornapples, the ways plants sense can be quite different from the ways in which animals do. Some plants, for example, have been shown to sense potentially competing neighboring plants by subtle changes in light. That is because plants absorb and reflect particular wavelengths of sunlight, creating signature shifts that other plants can detect. Scientists also find plants exhibiting ways to gather information on other plants from chemicals released into the soil and air. A parasitic weed, dodder, has been found to be particularly keen at sensing such chemicals. Dodder is unable to grow its own roots or make its own sugars using photosynthesis, the process used by nearly all other plants. As a result, scientists knew that after sprouting from seed, the plant would fairly quickly need to begin growing on and into another plant to extract the nutrients needed to survive. But even the scientists studying the plant were surprised at the speed and precision with which a dodder seedling could sense and hunt its victim. In time-lapse movies, scientists saw dodder sprouts moving in a circular fashion, in what they discovered was a sampling of the airborne chemicals released by nearby plants, a bit like a dog sniffing the air around a dinner buffet. Then, using just the hint of the smells and without having touched another plant, the dodder grew toward its preferred victim. That is, the dodder reliably sensed and attacked the species of plant, from among the choices nearby, on which it would grow best. “When you see the movies, you very much have this impression of it being like behavior, animal behavior,” said Dr. Consuelo M. De Moraes, a chemical ecologist at Pennsylvania State University who was on the team studying the plant. “It’s like a little worm moving toward this other plant.” Although a view of plants as sensing organisms is beginning to emerge, scientists have been finding hints of such capabilities and interactions for 20 years. But discoveries have continued to surprise scientists, because of what some describe as an entrenched disbelief that plants, without benefit of eyes, ears, nose, mouth or brain, can and do all they are seen to do. “A lot of the examples of plant behavior are examples in which the phenomena are pretty easy to observe,” said Dr. Richard Karban, a plant ecologist at the University of California, Davis. The problem, for many scientists, is that as obvious as the behaviors sometimes are, they can seem just too complex and animal-like for a plant. “Maybe if we understood more mechanistically how it’s happening,” Dr. Karban added, “we’d feel more comfortable about accepting the results that we’re finding.” It does not help credibility that scientists in the field often find themselves having to distinguish the results of careful experimental studies from decidedly nonscientific, even kook-fringe, discussions about phenomena like plant sentience and emotion. Plants are not “sensitive new age guys who cringe when something around them gets hurt and who love classical music and hate rock,” Dr. Dudley said as she referred to depictions in popular works of plants living tender, emotion-soaked existences, in particular the 1970s “The Secret Life of Plants.” Even mainstream researchers do not always completely agree on which ideas are clearly within the realm of science and which have gone a bit too far. Recent debates have revolved around a longstanding question: which of the abilities and attributes that scientists have long considered the realm of just animals, like sensing, learning and memory, can sensibly be transferred to plants? At the extreme of the equality movement, but still within mainstream science, are the members of the Society of Plant Neurobiology, a new group whose Web site describes it as broadly concerned with plant sensing. The very name of the society is enough to upset many biologists. Neurobiology is the study of nervous systems — nerves, synapses and brains — that are known just in animals. That fact, for most scientists, makes the notion of plant neurobiology a combination of impossible, misleading and infuriating. Thirty-six authors from universities that included Yale and Oxford were exasperated enough to publish an article last year, “Plant Neurobiology: No Brain, No Gain?” in the journal Trends in Plant Science. The scientists chide the new society for discussing possibilities like plant neurons and synapses, urging that the researchers abandon such “superficial analogies and questionable extrapolations.” Defenders point out that 100 years ago, some scientists were equally adamant that plant physiology did not exist. Today, that idea is so obviously antiquated that it could elicit a good chuckle from the many scientists in that field. As for the “superficial analogies,” the new wave botanists are well aware that plants do not have exact copies of animal nervous systems. “No one proposes that we literally look for a walnut-shaped little brain in the root or shoot tip,” five authors wrote in defense of the new group. Instead, the researchers say, they are asking that scientists be open to the possibility that plants may have their own system, perhaps analogous to an animal’s nervous system, to transfer information around the body. “Plants do send electrical signals from one part of the plant to another,” said Dr. Eric D. Brenner, a botanist at the New York Botanical Garden and a member of the Society of Plant Neurobiology. Although those signals have been known for 100 years, scientists have no idea what plants do with them. “No one’s asked how all that information is integrated in a plant, partly because we’ve convinced ourselves that it isn’t,” Dr. Brenner said. “People have been intimidated from asking that question.” The mention of the possibility of plant neurobiology elicits such visceral responses that Dr. Brenner said he had at times worried that it could harm his career. “I see a lot of people waiting on the sidelines,” he said, “to see how this all pans out.” Home

Davey Jones Mickey Dolenz Peter Tork Torquemada Madeleine Peyroux Albert Roux Roo Dr. Foo Boo Radley

Toad Frog Friends

Booker Little Tiny Grimes Wee Dot Little Dot Little John Alan Littlejohn

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Vernon Duke Ira Gershwin Bunny Berigan

Chef Paul Prudhomme Julia Child The Waiter With the Water for My Daughter

The New York Times Printer Friendly Format Sponsored By June 8, 2008 Sports of The Times Wondering if Steroids Fueled a Run At Glory By WILLIAM C. RHODEN He blew away the field at the Kentucky Derby. He made the Preakness field look like circus ponies. But on the day that would solidify his legacy and give racing a respite from intense scrutiny, Big Brown crumbled. He crumbled so badly that one could legitimately wonder whether he was nothing but a chemical horse, a paper tiger propped up — and propelled — by steroids. After three months of dominance, Big Brown became the first Triple Crown hopeful to finish dead last at the Belmont Stakes. His jockey, Kent Desormeaux, said that heading into the final turn, when he called on Big Brown to give him that special reserve, he realized, “I had no horse.” The racing public has the right to ask: Did he ever have a super horse? On Friday, the trainer Rick Dutrow told reporters that he had not given Big Brown a shot of the anabolic steroid Winstrol since before the Kentucky Derby and would not use it Saturday at the Belmont. Earlier, Dutrow admitted that he gave Big Brown and all his other horses shots of Winstrol on the 15th of each month. He said he did not know what it did. A day that the troubled racing industry hoped would temporarily focus attention on a historic achievement wound up raising more questions about the horse and the industry. On the other hand, Big Brown’s dramatic fall may be the sobering kick this industry needs. There will be long-term debates about breeding, about racing surfaces, about the age at which horses should race. There should be no debate about drugs. “The legacy of Big Brown will be a consensus in this sport that it’s time to end the use of steroids, to ban its use in horse racing for good,” Alex Waldrop, the president and chief executive of the National Thoroughbred Racing Association, said in a telephone interview on Saturday. “This industry understands that the time has come and I am confident that steroids’ days are numbered in the game.” After Big Brown’s collapse, there were suspicions, fairly or not, that the horse, who looked unbeatable in April and May, was a fraud. • Winstrol, a synthetic steroid used to build muscle mass and promote weight gain and healing, is banned in 10 states, but not in the three where the Triple Crown races are held. “Anyone who is on the fence about steroids and racing now sees that by allowing the use of steroids, we unnecessarily raise questions about our stars, and that needs to end,” Waldrop said. From the moment Big Brown galloped into national view as the Kentucky Derby winner, the 3-year-old colt shared the spotlight with controversy. He claimed a magnificent victory at Churchill Downs after running the race of his career. The moment of glory turned sour when a filly named Eight Belles ran the race of her life as well. It was her final race. As Big Brown strutted in victory, Eight Belles, her ankles shattered, crumpled to the track and was euthanized, stunning a national television audience. Against this backdrop of triumph and sadness, Big Brown took the Triple Crown stage as a potential savior, an almost transcendent figure in a sport that has been forced to examine and, in many ways, explain itself beyond the spectacle of the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont Stakes. Dutrow, whose brash, bragging style and personal history often overshadowed his gifts as a trainer, practically guaranteed that Big Brown would secure the Triple Crown. Shortly after Saturday’s stunning loss, Dutrow initially brushed reporters away and went to attend to Big Brown. There would be no validation for Dutrow, no redemption for jockey Kent Desormeaux. Asked to describe his feeling after the race, Desormeaux said: “I’m numb, really, a little lost. Just feeling no emotion whatsoever. Blank.” • The greatest beneficiary of a Triple Crown champion would have been the thoroughbred industry itself. With the deaths of Barbaro, and then Eight Belles, racing needed a great moment, a great accomplishment, an achievement the sport had not seen in 30 years. In 2004, Smarty Jones was a half-mile from history; he had a four-length lead, but he was caught by Birdstone and lost by a length. One great day would not have healed racing’s wounds, but a great victory by Big Brown could have validated an industry consumed with breeding, but one still unable to come up with a horse fast enough, strong enough and durable enough to win the Triple Crown. From Barbaro to Eight Belles, racing has endured an arduous few years. As jockey Edgar Prado said in 2004 as he apologized for defeating Smarty Jones, “This sport needs heroes.” No. This sport needs reform. E-mail: wcr@nytimes.com

Joao Gilberto John Gilbert Gilbert's Syndrome Gilbert & Sullivan Ronnie Gilbert Holly Near

That's strong! Struth! Sometimes my wife and her friend share a tea bag! You wouldn't catch me doing that, but two tea bags reminds me of the story Shelley Berman put on one of his LPs about trying to impress his girl friend by lighting her cigarette and his together, then giving hers to her. But he forgot to give it to her and smoked two at the same time. MG I can't imagine sharing a tea bag--not enough caffeine for me. I should note that I often as not brew my tea in a coffee mug, which holds 10 or 12 ounces, so it's more double quantity than double strength.

Love Tetley tea but never tried it in a microwave. Am I missing out on something really good here? Not really, Paul. I start with cold water in a cup, pop in a tea bag, and bring it to boil in the microwave. The tea tends to be a bit stronger than tea made the more conventional way. I like my tea fairly strong. I often use two tea bags.

Muffin the Mule Pony Poindexter See See Rider H. Rider Haggard King Solomon Solomon Ilori Sol Yaged Lew Soloff Napoleon Solo Mitchell-Ruff Duo The Kingston Trio The Four Lads

Hot tea made with a Tetley tea bag in the microwave.

Rube Goldberg Jean Tinguely Alexander Calder Joan Miro Jeanne Moreau Dr. Moreau

Tubby Hayes Tubby the Tuba John Prescott Prescott Bush Adolf Hitler Smedley Butler

Peter and Gordon Jan and Dean The Everly Brothers