James W. Heisig, a researcher at the Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture in Nagoya, Japan, has released an excellent set of books for memorizing Japanese Kanji, traditional Chinese Hanzi, and simplified Chinese Hanzi:

Remembering the Kanji:
http://www.amazon.com/Remembering-Kanji-Vol-Complete-Characters/dp/0824831659/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1269118367&sr=8-1

Remembering the Traditional Hanzi:
http://www.amazon.com/Remembering-Traditional-Hanzi-Meaning-Characters/dp/0824833244/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpi_5

Remembering the Simplified Hanzi:
http://www.amazon.com/Remembering-Simplified-Hanzi-Meaning-Characters/dp/0824833236/ref=pd_bxgy_b_img_b

While this technique focuses on memorizing the meaning of the characters (and how to write them yourself) and not so much on the readings of them, I've found it an absolutely invaluable technique for doing the former. I have an abysmal memory to the point that it's shocking, and yet using his techniques, I was able to easily memorize the meaning of about 400 characters and how to write them in a couple of weeks with only a couple of hours of dedication a day, which I was very impressed with. His technique is based on building up from simple radicals and employing visual memory to make everything stick in place, which basically means concocting an elaborate and often ridiculous story for each character to tie the correct radicals into their correct places. The story is usually so silly that it cannot be forgotten, which is, IMO, in where the trick lies. As your skill in recall develops, you can let go of the stories and move to natural recall.

Also, the use of timed memorization software is essential when we're talking about this amount of information. Here are two great free software packages for this that were largely based specifically at learning Japanese (and thus are quite suitable for other languages, especially Chinese):

Anki:
http://ichi2.net/anki

Mnemosyne:
http://www.mnemosyne-proj.org/

(Personally, I prefer Mnemosyne a bit more, even though Anki has many more features, but this is because I'm making a set of cards to memorize all of Heisig's Kanji, traditional Hanzi, and simplified Hanzi, and I'm using HTML tables to store all the information. Mnemosyne preserves my HTML exactly, whereas Anki futzes with it and ruins the formatting.)

How could Donald Knuth be omitted from this? He's far more a pioneer than Jobs. I love my Mac, but Jobs is primarily an idea guy / businessman.

Agreed. That's more or less what I do, too.

The resale value of Macs is insane, and if money is a concern, resale should be taken into account. For example, in 2000, I became interested in trying the Mac OS X public beta, so I went on eBay and bought myself a bondi blue iMac for about $450. After a year, I had completely fallen in love with OS X and decided it was time to buy a better Mac in order to run OS X more efficiently. I sold the bondi blue iMac on eBay and managed to receive $600 for it.

Similarly, I had a second hand blueberry iBook, which I purchased for about $1000. I sold it two years later for $900, if I remember correctly.

It never fails to amaze me at how slowly Macs depreciate in value. I've never received less than 50% of the original purchase price of a Mac after selling one after three years.

As a very experienced drinker, I can say that while this certainly reduces the intensity of a hangover, it is in no way fully preventative (at least, it isn't for me). I drink a lot of water by habit (often 15-20 cups a day), so this is no difficult feat for me: when I drink alcohol, I alternate one alcoholic beverage and one equal sized glass of water. These days, I usually end up consuming the equivalent of maybe 10-12 shots of vodka when I drink, and despite the water and a multivitamin, I wake up with a raging hangover the next day:

I wish that there was a way to guarantee the elimination of a hangover, but from what I can tell, there isn't. The only thing that works to reduce a hangover is a nice greasy, salty meal and a couple of benzodiazepines, which make me functional. For really bad hangovers, the only thing that helps is hair of the dog, as revolting as that seems at the time.

I needed an MRI two years ago and got one within two weeks. I've also needed emergency CT scans and got them within three hours of being in the hospital. Recently, for my Crohn's Disease, I needed a double intestinal resection surgery, and while initially, because the surgery was considered "non-critical", my wait time was quoted as being six months, after an intestinal blockage and a visit to the ER, I was offered a choice between immediate surgery with a general surgeon who was not specialized with my case, or a wait time of a month for surgery with my own surgeon, who had studied my case intensively. I chose to try to wait the month, and the surgery turned out very well.

The only time where the Canadian health care system sucks is in trying to find new doctors, be they GPs or specialists. It was slightly challenging for my partner (type I diabetic, severe depressive episodes) and myself (Crohn's Disease, anxiety, chronic pain) to find doctors when we moved from Toronto to Ottawa, and while neither of us was able to see a variety of doctors and make a selection, we both were able to sign on with excellent doctors within a month of moving here that have been very willing to work with us and our conditions.

Specialists, however, are a different story: I had to wait six months to get a gastroenterologist appointment, and that was after my doctor predicted there might be a problem and thus referred me to three different gastroenterologists in the hopes that one of them would be willing to see me. The other two of them, 18 months later, still haven't responded to his request. My partner has also had significant difficulty finding an endocrinologist that doesn't suck balls... the one he was able to get in to see was over three hours late for their appointment, which lasted for all of three minutes. He hasn't been able to get another appointment yet.

You are correct, as per Google translate. Note, though, that slashdot breaks the below link; you have to fix it manually. (Apparently | indicates an end of URL in slashdot logic.)

http://translate.google.com/#da|en|midlertidig

For example, kava is a fairly strong anxiolytic, and doesn't have the addiction profile of benzodiazepines. It's commonly used as the recreational drug of choice by Polynesians, so clearly it has pronounced psychoactive effects. I've played around with it quite a lot and find it to be pleasant, albeit mild.

5-HTP, which is the extract of the Griffonia simplicifolia plant, also invariably boosts serotonin (5-HT) levels in the brain. Whether or not it actually functions as an antidepressant is debated; I found some success using it for anxiety and depression, but that its effects wore off after a few weeks and the dosage needed to be boosted. (I take this, though, as a testament to the fact that depression != low serotonin, which I think is a complete fallacy.)

Not everything is homeopathic / naturopathic bullshit. Some plants, believe it or not, actually do have medicinal value. What about aloe for skin conditions?

Hear, hear. As someone with Crohn's Disease, there are times where I get about a 30 second warning that I need to use a bathroom. Think of those flus or cases of food poisoning where you go from, "This book is inter... HOLY MOTHER OF GOD AND ALL THAT IS HOLY I NEED A FUCKING BATHROOM NOW!!!" That is the life of many people with Crohn's, colitis, and irritable bowel syndrome. To expect us to wait an hour - which causes a lot of anxiety, and makes things much more likely to brew - is a recipe for a smelly seat disaster.

Agreed. I've been taking benzos (alprazolam aka Xanax and lorazepam aka Ativan) for generalized anxiety disorder for a little more than 10 years now, and despite availability to large quantities of both and a highly addictive personality (former addictions to alcohol and nicotine, and currently to opiates, but for medical reasons), never have I felt any danger in becoming addicted to them or desire to abuse them.

Opiates, on the other hand, strike me as dramatically addictive: when I was taking Oxycontin regularly for pain due to Crohn's Disease, I swear that half my day, my brain chanted "oxycodone" over and over again like it was some kind of mantra that would bring me inner peace (and good god, did it ever - like being wrapped up in a lovely warm blanket of "do not care"). I am not lying or exaggerating or bending the truth: seriously, my thoughts over and over were that single word, which could lift me to the highest clouds (if I knew that oxycodone time was nigh) or plunge me into the pits of despair (if oxycodone time was far off, or my supply was running low). What a horrible waste of CPU cycles.

Benzos, on the other hand, in low doses are excellent at making me feel calm. At higher doses, they put me to sleep. Nowhere in there are there good feelings: indeed, my only recreational experiment with 25 mg of Valium back when I was a teenager had me remarking that it was a lot like alcohol, only without any good feelings and the typical painful hangover. (Note that there is a hangover nonetheless: I felt groggy and out of sorts upon awakening from benzo-sleep.)

I was interested in LDN myself, but of course (and it bears mentioning), if you're on opiates, you cannot do LDN without first getting off of them.

Glad to hear you've had success with LDN! I know maybe three people who have tried it. One person had mixed results, and I'm not sure about the other two, as I haven't spoken to them in awhile. I believe that one of them was having some initial promising reduction in symptoms, though.

Agreed. Having Crohn's Disease, I can't imagine being responsible for making another person suffer through this nightmare hell. I would never, ever have biological children and I do feel that Crohnsies that do are acting irresponsibly. I don't disrespect them for it, but I can't help but feel that it's too much of a risk.

If I ever decide to have kids, it'll be via adoption.

Oi... I'm sorry to hear you had such a wildly negative reaction to an immunosuppressant, and glad to hear that you survived. Messing with the immune system is scary enough in theory, and even more so in practice. I was so terrified for my first Remicade infusion that it took me a couple of milligrams of Xanax and some oxycodone just to be able to walk into the hospital without freezing up with a horrible panic attack. My friend, who began Remicade two days after me, had a horrible reaction that necessitated emergency care. Thank goodness I was treated before her, or I most certainly would have canceled my Remicade infusion after hearing what happened to her.

I'm going to read your post in more detail in a moment (and thank you for taking the time and effort to put all of that information together for me - it's very much appreciated), but having skimmed it, I just wanted to point out that some researchers now are actually hypothesizing that Crohn's may be caused or exacerbated by an excess of Vitamin D, or an inability to eliminate it, or something along those lines (I can't recall exactly).

In any case, my Crohn's is almost always much worse in the summer, usually by several orders of magnitude, and it tapers in the winter. Having spoken to many other Crohnsies, this is not at all uncommon, either. Seasons definitely seem to affect it on some level.

Unfortunately, it's throughout my intestines: right now the problem is predominantly in the small intestine just above the terminal ileum, so I"m looking at resections (60 cm of small intestine need to be removed, and 30 cm of the colon).

I'm glad to hear that a colectomy worked for you. I wish that my Crohn's wasn't so all over the place so that that would be an option. I'd even consider total parenteral nutrition if my doctor would go for it, but he's quite against it.