press – Page 6 – don't confuse the narrator

fats and figures

A story in the Metro caught my eye today:

Metro headline: UK is the fattest nation in Europe

One paragraph in particular leapt out:
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of gender and generalities

There’s a general strike planned in Spain for this coming Wednesday and this advert appears in El Público today:

The call to action comes from the Izquierda Unida, the main left wing party in Spain (as opposed to the PSOE – the Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party – currently in power and not half as left wing as the name might lead you to expect).

Whatever my sympathies might be for the left, and for those who intend to strike, I object to the phrase nosotras y nosotros.
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higher, lower; faster, slower

I’ve been interested in relativity for a long time – or at least it seems that way! – ever since the 1970s when Dr Walker drew a stickman following a stickwoman and flashing a torch at her on the blackboard in a maths lecture at Nottingham University. I’m pretty sure the theory was that if they were both travelling at the speed of light the woman would never be aware of her pursuer. Or something like that.

Anyway, according to this story on physorg.com:

[National Institute of Standards and Technology] physicists […] demonstrate[d] that you age faster when you stand just a couple of steps higher on a staircase

and

Similarly, the NIST researchers observed another aspect of relativity—that time passes more slowly when you move faster

I think that means that if I want to keep young, it’s time to stop sitting in front of the computer and go and run around doing the cleaning downstairs.

the marrow of life

My elderly mother lives alone. One of her main interests is the vegetable garden, which keeps her busy and fairly fit, but I guess I do occasionally worry that there would be no one there to help in an emergency.

Mind you, this headline from the BBC reasssures me that, while her garden continues productive, she has the means at hand to deal with certain dangers.

Only, I really do think it’d take more than a courgette to deter a ‘200lb (91kg) black bear’. (Some other sites are referring to the weapon as a zucchini, but both the BBC and the Telegraph call it a courgette.)
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