oh, the monsters, they ain't just inside my head

So...it's been some time since I updated. I would like to say, I've been thrillingly occupied with a fascinating new development RL that is taking the whole of my attention, but...while it does involve new developments in RL matters, they are developments I neither wanted nor asked for.



I'm fairly sure I've missed at least one offering each from /Vae Victis\ and Arkivet when they were at those particular events, go me. And I so want to say, well, it was a drop in productivity, but that's done now, so let's GOOOOO...but I'm trying to be a realist in this. At Day 218 of the Eternal Headache, and coming up on three full weeks with the new horror, it is safe to say the Em no longer functions.

I'll do what I can, y'all. Okay. Back to your regularly scheduled whatever.

oh, wishful drinkin'

So, this is not a medical blog, and I am not a medical professional, and I most certainly am not advocating anyone take anything in this particular entry as a recommendation. Why I am posting this, however, is for the information value in the graphs and the study. So take that into account.

This link leads to a downloadable .pdf concerning a study that was released in 2001, but the information is still not well known. The graphs posted below are in the study, "The multifaceted and widespread pathology of magnesium deficiency" by S. Johnson, but I think it's worthwhile to also post them here.



Please click for larger versions of these. This one mainly documents the effects low serotonin levels and magnesium deficiency (see chart below, and again, click for full version) have on the human body.



Which brings us to the rest of the charts.



This one largely lays out links between vitamin B2 and zinc deficiency as well as magnesium deficiency.



This is mostly how magnesium deficiency impacts the gastrointestinal system, though it also displays--glaringly--the connection between muscle cramps, Tourette's, Parkinson's, and myasthenia gravis.



This one pretty much goes everywhere, because magnesium deficiency in humans is the start of many ills, but I'd point towards the kidney and liver impacts.



This mostly lays out the wide spectrum of ailments that can cause magnesium depletion as a side effect. Apparently it's not just emotional self-sabotage that's a gift in humanity, but biological self-sabotage. How fun!



And finally, the direct effects of zinc deficiency when paired with magnesium deficiency, with a side of vitamin K deficiency effects for flavor.

Again, I am not a doctor, I am not advocating self-diagnosis of anything. But at the least, if you see yourself in any of these, maybe talk with your doctor about a magnesium level test. They're not standard, but they're also not hugely expensive, and many insurances are happy to comp tests before surgery or other more invasive treatments.

say what you want me to say like (part CII)

(Roleplay entry. Continued from part CI.)

Zack sat at the desk in the clinic, opening the book. He picked up the pen and thought, then began to write.

Journal entry 1

Dear Diary, it's now been a few weeks since I installed myself in Gearhaven. I was before a clinician medic in Tau 34, and I've been gradually stopping to go to Haven.

He sighed, looking out over the veranda.

It was...supposed to be a community, a family, but things seems to have changed since I had an attempt here to put an end to my life. Things that a Companion would never do. My gesture was disapproved, and I had to leave. In the meantime, i was confined to do my work at Northstar Station in Fu Xing House.

Quite a story to put a resume at it. Anyway, after a moment I decided to cut the ropes with my current Mistress...

He stopped, breathing. He put a hand on the heart pendant of his collar, and closed his eyes a moment, before picking up the pen again and continuing.

I needed my freedom, as I was unhappy, and I claimed it. So after that, I decided to do what iI do best and keep traveling. During my travels, I end up going to Gearhaven. I had already been there before, but very briefly, and not in such spirit. It was during Justine's birthday that I felt that spirit, that...instinct of family, and I was starting to understand why she was feeling so good with them.

It took me some time to decide, but I finally accepted to come more often, and offer my help to this community. When I arrived the first time to come and install myself, there was an attack of tentacle creatures, I remember it quite well. Justine was the one who contacted me and asked for help, but myself, I was getting shot and quickly. Justine gave me a tag, saving my life.

He paused again, thinking, pondering.

I think...that because of this...I feel like I have a life debt toward the countess and the Duchy. She protected me and she was injured, so I brought her to the science lab to treat her wounds and then brought her back to her room to make sure she got some rest.

Justine...in my opinion...is not just a little Meimei to me...She is an anchor to this community.

After that, this is where things went forward. The duchess built a clinic for me to work here as a medic to help the Duchy in case of injuries, medical treatment or follow ups. I heard that the Duc Hiro loved the idea and is happy to have me here for the family...a family...

He rubbed a tear from his eye, continuing after a deep breath.

I think this is something I missed, I don't feel like I am part of the community or that close anymore to Haven's colony. In fact, I feel like I am closer here, like I can be who I really want to be. This clinic is mine to run, my home and Gearhaven is probably so far the best family I had.

I have the feeling that I have a lot of adventures waiting for me here, and there will be over time.

End of Entry 1

He put the pen down, smiling, and closed the clinic for the night, retiring to bed.

(Continued in part CIII.)

tissue to tendon, congeal to seal my catacomb (part LXXXV)

(Roleplay entry. Continued from part LXXXIV.)

He pressed a few buttons again to begin the nanite transfer into the tank, watching the process of regeneration and keeping an eye on her stats and vitals. She watched him, expression slightly worried. Would she feel anything? Would she feel different?

Then she blinked, wondering why she wasn't just asking. "Will I--feel them go in?"

He shook his head, smiling. "You won't feel anything at all. Just relax and breathe normally."

She nodded, working on relaxing. She heard the comm chime.

"My brain hurts," she heard Deebs say.

"So, what's happening over there?" she murmured. "I'm seeing a lot of open water."

She heard Deebs sigh in frustration. "Heck if I know--I am here, and--it's all live--"

Emilly considered that. "So...we can't see you, but you're up and running?"

"Sure. Come look."

Emilly smiled. "I will? I'm currently in a regen tank, amusingly."

"Oh dear."

"Hiro took me on a tour of Tannhäuser last night and I got shot by the new ship."

"Ahhh, it happens. Been tanked meself from time, to time."

She nodded. "Teach me to wear the wrong tag..."

She heard Deebs laugh, then caught Zack looking at her. She looked down, feeling....it was odd. She was used to feeling tissues knit when she was wounded, but...the fact that the surface skin didn't heal first puzzled her. She looked up at Zack again.

"The nanites are working on the inner tissues quite well. I can see it on the board."

"Oh, good."

"The outside injury might take a bit more time. I'll probably have to close it manually with a dermal mender."

She nodded, but her mind was racing. The Prometheus' plasma beams had thrown her system a bit, but she'd gotten through that. This, though...the way the beams had moved through her...She was going to have to ask the Duke about the weapon systems.

Zack focused on the monitors, watching the nanite levels, eyes looking up at her body in the tank, nodding professionally.

"Just another minute...and it should be fine."

She nodded. "I feel...stronger. Or at least....not as drained."

He nodded, tapped the front panel, and looked up with a smile.

"Aaaand done! The internal tissues are repaired and the nanites are going out."

She breathed a sigh of relief.

"Now, I just need to finish the job with the dermal mender, and we should be fine."

She considered as the tank cleared. "The last time something this...serious, happened? I'd taken twelve iron arrows. I thought I was going to die that night..."

Zack opened the tank, taking Emilly gently by the arm to support her while she climbed down. He led her to yet another table.

"Lay down here. I'll take care of closing the wound."



She hopped up on the next medical bed. She was feeling better. She watched him put on gloves, picking up the mender, checking the charge, and moving it close to the wound. It took a few passes, careful and slow. He smiled reassuringly.

"That wasn't so bad, was it?" he asked.

Emilly looked up at him as her skin smoothed and restored. "What, getting shot, or the...mender thing?"

Zack chuckled as he kept slowly repairing the skin. "I meant the nanite regen."

Oh. "You were right," she said aloud. "I didn't feel it. I thought I would, but...no."

Zack nodded, continuing to work. "It's a technology I used quite often on Haven as a medic. The one I was trained to use. There' no pain to it, and the nanites extract and dissolve from the body after they're done."

"That's good," she murmured, considering. "All I know is, the Duke's getting involved in some pretty heavy weaponry at this point, and...I can't just blithely assume I can take any damage and shrug it off."

Zack finished the last touches and set the mender down on a side table. He took a clean alcohol stamp, checking the contours of where the wound was, and smiled. "And done. No more big hole in your chest, Duchess."

She smiled ruefully. "Thank you, Zack."

He removed his gloves, reaching out to caress her chest lovingly. "You're welcome, Duchess."

She closed her eyes, breathing out. "Now, if we can just keep it that way..."

He took her hand, reaching behind her shoulder to slowly help her stand up. "Give yourself at least twenty-four hours of rest, no intense effort during that time. And nothing to stressful either."

She nodded. "All right."

"The nanites repaired your heart injury, but it is best to make sure they did their job well, and not let your blood pressure go too high."

She looked up, grinning. "So, nothing that makes my heart pound, you're saying."

He chuckled. "For twenty-four hours, yes. And the regenderation should hold."

"All right. I'll be careful."

"That's good," he said, his eyes traveling down her form. "You should dress back up. I wouldn't want to...make your heart pound too much myself, Duchess." He grinned at her.

She ducked her face, grinning, and strolled through her closet, choosing something she rarely wore, a simple French revolution smock in red wool.

"Fairly non-salacious?"

He smiled at her, taking her hand to give the back of it a loving kiss. She smiled back.

"Thank you, Zack. Truly. We've needed you here."



She stepped to the open door of the clinic, looking at the wide expanse of empty ocean where New Alexandria should be. Time for the next problem. She walked back down the stairs to the port circle, tracing the patterns in the air that would take her to New Alexandria's shores, not her own. Time to address the next problem...

(Continued in part LXXXVI.)

so, where is the Duke, anyway? (part LXXXIV)

(Roleplay entry. Continued from part LXXXIII.)

Emilly woke the next morning, stretched, and shifted as she prepared for the day, sorting through her vast closet and choosing human form just in case she needed to drop by Mont Nuit, before she stopped in place. She looked down. She saw the wound; she did not, unfortunately, see the gel. Oh. Oh dear.

She heard the tone of the comm clicking on.

"Good morning Duchess!" Zack said.

"Good morning!"

"How do you feel?"

She swallowed. "I think...I felt fine until I shifted back from fur."

"I see," he murmured. Then, louder: "Are you available right now for a check-up?"

She nodded. "I am."

"Come join me at the clinic," Zack said. "I'll be waiting for you."

She gave up on finding an outfit she liked and just pulled out one at random, ending up in pink. Her lip curled, but she needed to go. She took the nearest port circle she found and walked up the stairs.



"Good morning!" she said, walking into the room. He was standing next to the back table, looking over notes. He looked up with a smile.

"Please, lay down on this table here, I will make a scan."



She gingerly hopped up on the table, touching her chest briefly. "Should I...take this off?"

He nodded. "Yes, please, and try to breathe normally."

She sat up again, wincing as she pulled off the dress. As she laid down once more, she looked up at the doctor.

"It was...bad...I shifted when we hit land again, and...I seemed fine? Then, this morning..."



He looked at the injury and frowned. "It seemed like a natural regeneration when you shifted?"

She nodded. He looked at the readings, nodding in turn.

"It allowed you to survive the wound, but you were lucky. It could have been fatal."

She nodded, brow furrowing. "I think the Babalon has stronger weaponry than the Prometheus."

He started a full-body scan to check for internal trauma, and frowned a moment as he saw the readings. "Duchess...your heart is damaged...We'll need to put you in the tank for the nanites to repair your inner trauma."

She nodded, though she wasn't entirely sure how nanites would interface with her system. "All right."

She got off the table with his help, and walked over to the free-standing tank close by. Zack opened the tank, pressing a few buttons on the side.

"The nanite system will repair your inner tissues. It should take a few minutes to do so. They should not interfere with your body normally, as I program them to use your DNA to repair the tissues."



She stared at the tank for a moment, but finally stepped in, feeling it tilt back. She'd seen the Duke use similar devices, but she'd never actually used one herself. She watched Zack put a hand on the glass, looking at her reassuringly.

"Do you trust me?"

She nodded.

"Then you know you have nothing to fear. I'll make sure you're safe, and healthy."

(Continued in part LXXXV.)

walking by myself down avenues that reek of time to kill

The capability of 3D printing has taken another leap forward, this time into low-cost, home brain scans. Through a combination of software from GitHub, the controller board and 3D headset rig from OpenBCI, with possible additions from the Arduino system for power and interfacing, the entire thing (assuming you have a 3D printer already) will set you back between anywhere between three and six hundred, depending on whatever you already have for home electronics design. Which is a vast reduction from the tens of thousands for a commercially-available brain-scan set-up.

In other brain-hacking news, DARPA wants to develop a "black-box" implant for soldiers who've suffered brain damage, that can be remotely triggered to stimulate memories. On that link, it's being described as a helpful way to keep soldiers with brain damage awake and aware, which sounds laudable. And the potential commercial and medical uses of such adaptive technology could be very good for brain injury cases. But I'm paranoid enough to be suspicious of potential alternate motives...like, remote-controlled soldiers, systemically fed overriding signals directly into the brain to do...well, whatever DARPA and the Pentagon wants, one would assume.

Do the potential medical uses outweigh the potential mind-control ones? I don't know. Morality gets iffy on the edge.

Paired with this, the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (apparently that's a thing) released a paper earlier this year detailing ways to create and manage "warfighters", or chemically and physiologically enhanced supersoldiers. Obvious comparisons to Captain America and the supersoldier program from the comics come to mind, and admittedly, between the Avengers movie and the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. show, supersoldiers would be in the forefront of at least some think tanks' research lines.

But there's a difference between theory and application, and it's important to remember that the IHMC works with DARPA, for many of their projects. Within a decade, we could have active "warfighters" on the battlefield. Is this a good thing?

Keep in mind, also, that both the US Navy and DARPA researchers have requested grant funds to finish developing tracking tattoos for soldiers. Prototypes of such devices already exist, that will track stress levels, skin responses, and the like, but most of these are wearable items--armbands, wristbands, et cetera. These would be a fine network of implanted electronic sensors under the skin, with tattooed coding or design atop that could be scanned for further information. Let me say this again, because it's vaguely important--this isn't theory; they're seeking completion funds. This will be happening at some point.

From Laughing Squid comes some literary horror--in this instance, artist Andrea Mastrovito's diorama paper installations. Why is this horrifying? Because, even though we have extraordinarily detailed, photorealistic color printers, she still destroyed over two thousand books to make her art.

Two thousand. My soul shudders.

And Vihart has an absolutely excellent eleven-minute video on the state of net neutrality in the US at present. If you're in the US, follow the links given underneath the video to air your concerns to the FCC. It's very important to do this calmly, responsibly, but clearly, in the hopes that public input will sway them to change commercial ISP definitions from information carriers to common carriers.

If you're not in the US, there's still a ton of tasty information below the video--everything from term definitions to other videos on current net neutrality concerns, plus links to a lot of court case rulings for the growing monopoly that is cable in the US.

That's all. You can return to your day, already in progress.