Wow.

I’m flat-out stealing this from the venerable AnyCheese, [well, her buzz feed anyhow] but this story exploded my thinker.

A 42-year-old HIV patient with leukemia appears to have no detectable HIV in his blood and no symptoms after a stem cell transplant from a donor carrying a gene mutation that confers natural resistance to the virus that causes AIDS, according to a report published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.

“The patient is fine,” said Dr. Gero Hutter of Charite Universitatsmedizin Berlin in Germany. “Today, two years after his transplantation, he is still without any signs of HIV disease and without antiretroviral medication.” – More from CNN

They do point out later in the article that the process is prohibitively dangerous to use in all but the most extreme of situations, and that the process itself kills one in three patients. My thoughts are that the skeptics can tell it to Christiaan Barnard.

I’m not arguing for a technocracy, but when are we going to get The R&D Candidate?

Piano and Flute and Acoustic Guitar

Why is on-hold music still so terrible? We’ve obviously got phone and music technology working fairly well these days, why can’t we successfully combine them into a non-iPhone application?

Is there a concern that if they start providing CD quality music, people will call in just to record a swath of “Non-Specific Adult Contemporary Instrumentals vol XIV” for resale on the streets of Bangkok?

Perspective

A screen grab from CNN:

General On CNNWill spend entire weekend in his room listening to New Found Glory and weepily texting his girlfriend.

It’s a shame the General isn’t in some sort of position to make changes to the way the military operates, it must really tear him up inside to feel so helpless.

A Brief Refresher

I understand why it’s easy to confuse the two:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBqcEo5CNTQ]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7S90z0jJDAQ]

Both were written by the same fellow, Jesse Fredrick.

Jesse Frederick is a film and television composer best known for writing the themes to television shows such as Perfect Strangers, Full House, Family Matters, and Step By Step. – Wikipedia

Chad Allan & The Reflections

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puYjGU27eo0]

Man, The Guess Who were a weird and fantastic band.

I don’t really enjoy the stadium style of BTO anymore – it certainly held a fascination for me when I was twelve – but Randy Bachman is one of the CBC’s greatest assets at the moment.

Er, while this began as a ridiculous Friday night music post, ten minutes of wikipedia has me thinking I may be returning to this topic. Is there a quality book on 1960s & ’70s Canadian rock music?

I suddenly feel like re-watching Festival Express.

The News

Somewhere there’s a woman elbow deep in another human’s blood, scalpel in hand, her brow roiling with sweat. She is an expert. She has trained her entire adult life to carry out these delicate maneuvers, investing countless hours in study and hard won practice, living for her victories, raging against her defeats.

Somewhere there’s a cluster of men in a humvee, scared and fatigued, rolling down a sun drenched street. The dust of their tires is the only evidence of their passage. Each pile of refuse that slides by their sandy windows may mean death, each inquisitive face that turns to watch their progress must be assessed to be friend or enemy, with little room for error.

Somewhere there’s a Mother who has just made the hardest choice of her life, having crept into the silence of suburbia in late morning. She is waiting at a bus stop with all she has in the world – a baby carrier, two small pieces of luggage, and a black eye.

Somewhere there’s a rich, self-important golfer, holding a press conference.