More on the above, below.
I’ve not written here in ages — mostly offline for awhile, now back on but adjusting to a switch from Windows to Mac. While I was without my laptop, I spent some time looking around my house. [You can follow this drama in The Laptop Saga category at Watermark, if you like.]
I moved here nearly twelve years ago, happy and healthy and full of
plans. Even after becoming ill, I continued with some of those plans,
as energy and finances allowed — remodeling the kitchen and bath;
adding a powder room on the main floor (a boon and necessity, given
what followed); and adding a sunroom, then a garden, to the back of the
house. All this designed with my imagination filling the house with
people and activity.
In the decade of my illness, I have made no changes, and few
accommodations, to these new circumstances. The garden, actually, was
designed in illness, and so works well for me — raised beds that I can
mostly (though not entirely) manage myself. And of course it is very
small, which is excellent.
So I noticed, pacing about, cut off from my virtual world, that my
real world is actually not very well designed for my current condition.
My study — with the old desktop computer, printers, writing desk — is
upstairs. Stairs I climb in the evening, to bed; and down in the
morning — but rarely otherwise.
Downstairs, what would modernly be called a great room,
except that it’s not great — it’s a relatively small, long and narrow
room, that is arranged as a livingroom at one end, a diningroom at the
other, and a bill-paying desk in the middle. In the old days, I liked
to separate my creative work from my business activities. At the end of
that desk, a long- empty aquarium that became too much for me to care
for, and is too heavy for me to move.
Behind the dining table (which hosts no dinner parties) is a hutch,
where favorite dishes are displayed — changed with the season, when
possible. But now it occurs to me that here is a reasonable study. The
table can serve as a desk and the hutch as a bookshelf; these shelves
are deep enough to hold a printer. With the bill-paying desk, I have a
fine study, right here where I might use it.
I am typing this on my iBook, on the livingroom chaise. This laptop
is so light that I can easily carry it, each morning, to the daybed in
the sunroom, where I spend my days — those parts of the day that I am
not in the garden. Slowly I learn to adapt to these slow days.
And I am pleased to see more evidence that this slowness is not just in my mind. From BBC News:
Chronic fatigue gene signs found:
Scientists believe they have pinpointed biological
markers of chronic fatigue syndrome which could help develop a test and
treatment for the condition. . .The scientists say their findings fit with the
understanding that a virus, such as Epstein-Barr, may trigger CFS/ME,
because that illness might alter how genes are expressed. . .The researchers compared levels of gene expression in
the white blood cells of 25 healthy people and 25 who had CFS using DNA
chip technology.They found differences in the behaviour of 35 of the 9,522 genes they analysed.
Further genetic testing showed 15 of the genes were up
to four times more active in people with CFS, while one gene was less
active.Several genes the team pinpointed play important roles in mitochondria, the "powerhouse" of cells.
One of the products of these genes is EIF4G1, which is involved in the protein production in mitochondria.
EIF4G1 is hijacked by some viruses, so cells may compensate by increasing gene expression.
The genetic differences lead to changes in how blood
proteins behave which could allow the development of a blood test for
CFS, the team say.Other genes are involved in regulating the immune system or playing important roles in nerve cells.
The team will now carry out further research on 1,000 CFS patients and healthy people.
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