Wists and Magic

Like, I have some things I do for health and some things I ignore and I don't know how I choose but I seem to. I eat too much, I eat sweet things a lot, I drink more than I should. But I also go to the gym a couple times a week and I've never smoked or done hard drugs. I don't hydrated like I should but I get enough sleep as much as possible.

I have changed things because of health advice. I eat red meat cos I have a bad time taking in iron, despite disliking red meat. I got a gym membership cos my incidental exercise went down with a job change and I noticed my body getting weaker. I don't go to the supermarket hungry to try and remove sweet snacks in the house. But I haven't cut out alcohol and I don't go on an hour long walk every day and I don't have a steady sleep schedule, despite these all being reasonable things I could do for my health.

Do you have any idea why some bits of health advice have an impact on people and others don't?

Can you remember a time you received health advice and it worked; you changed an action permanently?

How was that advice presented?

Can you imagine how health advice would need to be presented to you for you to change something you currently don't want to change?

If I'm scrolling Tumblr to pass a little time while I'm waiting for something else, I'm not remembering Health Tip #72 regardless of presentation. Brain isn't ready to grab knowledge.

If I'm looking up answers for why I'm having X problem or a friend I'd having X problem, I'm probably going to remember the answer.

Even if I do casually absorb something when my brain is a broken clock that's right 2x a day and is ready while I'm idly scrolling, I'm more likely to remember if the advice is semi-immediately applicable and works the first time. I'm more likely to remember if it's something that directly affects me that I didn't know what a thing (like the migraine post that goes around talking about where to massage throat and jaw muscles, which I use frequently when I get a headache now).

As a writer, I'm also more likely to grab info if I think it could be useful in a story later. I'm at least more likely to save the info for reference later so I can find it easily.

I'm also more likely to remember something if it's really, really specific. "Exercise is good for you" leaves my brain immediately. No duh but I hate exercise. "Look at how easy this little stretch is and here's how it helps you!" Very specific, easy to do, something that probably has an immediate effect.

Shame also just literally doesn't work and adds to me avoiding the thing. Same with being told what to do "you should-" nope I'm out, don't tell me what to do.

Changes I've made? I take iron a few times a week after learning what the symptoms of anemia are (and realizing oh THAT'S what the problem is, and it was). I try to sleep on my left side after reading about the way the stomach sits making it less likely to cause acid reflux if you're laying on your left rather than your right. I took the doors off my cupboards after reading about someone's therapist talking to them about removing obstacles, and now it's cleaner in the house and I'm more likely to make a meal if I don't have to open a cupboard first. These were all just random Tumblr posts by people excited to share with others to help them.

this guy?

sure!

Male tufted social velvet spider, Stegodyphus tibialis, Eresidae

Photographed in India by vipinbaliga

i had to look it up. ohhh my god

The request is so urgent my boss needs it by the end of the work week. Which, y'know, is 5 PM on a Friday. So I have four hours to do it.

It's a forwarded request. Somebody contacted a member of the donation team asking for help, "I need a map from the Vietnam War to use for a presentation." It's somebody she's trying to coax into giving a five figure donation to the museum.

The request was asked to the donation team member, who then emailed my boss, who then emailed and called me urgently.

This map required:

North and South Vietnam in it

All four areas that South Vietnam was divided into for military purposes ('Corps') clearly delineated

Four cities, all of them horrifically misspelled, and only identifiable because I know what battle the requester is asking about (it’s in III Corps on the border with Cambodia) (the requester danced around the battle but I’m knowledgeable enough to identify it)

Has Laos and Cambodia in it

Has the Ho Chi Minh Trail in it

So. I was mad about the 'you have literally four hours to find a map with a lot of requirements.'

I was then mad at myself about finding a copyright free map from Texas Tech University within half an hour, proving her right for asking me to do it.

Then, after I found a map that perfectly met the requirements, I was equally amazed, baffled, and horrified when I read further into the forwarded email chain.

The donation team team member they were speaking to used AI to generate a map.

The above put half of North Vietnam in South Vietnam, made the Ho Chi Minh Trail a country, made 60% of Cambodia part of South Vietnam, put the DMZ extremely high up in North Vietnam, completely disconnected the southern tip of Vietnam, misplaced all of the Corps zones, etc etc

At the very last second the donation team member had a moment of divine clarity, remembering there's three historians on payroll to ask for this kind of thing from. So she contacted my boss while saying, "I had fun with this, but I decided I should check for accuracy before I send it to the donor! I need a fact check by the end of the day, then I send it"

My boss, while not the most knowledgeable on the Vietnam War, does know her geography. She took one look, and knew it was so off she called me to tell me how urgent it is that I look at the email and respond

My boss immeadiately brightened and rushed to explain - "Of course ! Of course! We want to accomodate you! We have another worker who takes off for Ramadan. Do you need to take off for Ramadan?"

@vangoggles THAT WHAT I WAS SAYING .

And I was finally on a shift with this guy. We were both sitting in silence because we had the ass-crack-of-dawn slot.

Over my coffee and twirling my Magen David necklace around my finger, I say "So. Ahmed. Ramadan.

He sighed, and let me know that he did indeed try to explain to our manager that all he needed was to get shifts not around sunrise or sunset. But that in him explaining what Ramadan was, the plot very quickly got lost into this unhinged confusion where our boss was trying to google how people could survive an entire month without food or water.

So halfway through, he decided to pivot and go along with it, expecting less shifts in March because that's a difficult academic time anyway. Then, he had to keep a straight face when the end-product was the entire time off with paid leave.