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The Dark Side and the Light
Posted on December 2, 2016 1 Comment
“A Native American elder once described his own inner struggles in this manner: Inside of me there are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean dog fights the good dog all the time. When asked which dog wins, he reflected for a moment and replied, […]
Leaving the Science to the Voters
Posted on November 25, 2016 2 Comments
GMOs scare the hell out of people for some reason. I guess they’ve been watching too much science fiction, or something, because I really can’t explain the fear that a lot of people in a lot of places are exhibiting toward Genetically Modified Organisms. They think they’re mutants, or something. Yeah, okay, GMOs are sort […]
Take Care of Number One
Posted on November 22, 2016 3 Comments
Before I left the mainland, I had a conversation with my academic advisor. He has been all over the world, and he has done a lot of work away from home and family. I told him how apprehensive I was about my extended time away from home, and how I was going to be very […]
People Are Generally Good, Except When They’re Not
Posted on November 18, 2016
One of the things you must understand about the world is that people are generally, for the most part, on the average and in the long run, good. It’s in the murky definition of what being good is that we get into some of the troubles with being human. For example, the white nationalists cheering […]
Whaddaya know? My head didn’t explode.
Posted on November 9, 2016 1 Comment
Horror. Anger. Despair. My world was ending… All of those were feelings I felt when Netherlands eliminated Mexico in the last World Cup competition. Every four years for the longest time, I get my hopes up (way up) and follow Mexico’s qualification toward the World Cup. Every four years I think to myself that this […]
One Thing I Promise You: Work
Posted on November 7, 2016 3 Comments
I’m in Atlanta for some training before heading out to Puerto Rico to chase me some Zika Virus. As an Uber driver took me to CDC this morning, we started talking about his life story. Mr. Mohammed arrived in the United States in 2000, escaping war in Sudan as a refugee. He told me that […]
How Today Went, in GIFs
Posted on November 3, 2016 5 Comments
In case you don’t know, there are several steps that you must go through to become a Doctor of Public Health. First, of course, you need to get through school and into a doctoral program. It’s a lot like climbing a mountain and having to ask someone at the top to teach you how to […]
The Political Fights You’ll Get Yourself Into
Posted on October 31, 2016 1 Comment
During the 2000 election, I had just recently moved to Pennsylvania from Texas. It is safe to say that a good 80% to 90% of the people I worked with were socially conservative. In essence, they were rooting for George W. Bush to win the election. As we all know, the election went on unresolved […]
Where Do You Even Begin?
Posted on October 25, 2016
As some of you know, I am attending Hopkins on a scholarship. One of the perks of the scholarship is that we, the scholars, get to meet some interesting people from in and around Baltimore. These people range from artists to activists, to politicians and authors. They’re all very interesting people, even if we sometimes […]
We Need to Pay Attention to What Is Going on in Puerto Rico
Posted on October 24, 2016 7 Comments
I’ve been doing a lot of reading about Puerto Rico since I agreed to go down there to help in the Zika outbreak. According to most media reports, the situation in Puerto Rico is quite dire from a financial and demographic standpoint. Crime is high, yes, but it’s not any higher than Baltimore, where murder […]
EpidemioLogical 