The Coke in... Red Bull

About a year ago, the makers of Red Bull, the famous caffeine-loaded energy drink, decided to come out with a soda, unsurprisingly named Red Bull Cola. The shared name implied the same big kick. But could the cola's boost — supposedly "100% natural" — come from something else? Officials in Germany worry that they've found the answer — cocaine. And now they have prohibited the soda's sale in six states across the country and may recommend a nation-wide ban.
"The [Health Institute in the state of North Rhine Westphalia] examined Red Bull Cola in an elaborate chemical process and found traces of cocaine," Bernhard Kuehnle, head of the food safety department at Germany's federal ministry for consumer protection, told the German press on Sunday. According to this analysis, the 0.13 micrograms of cocaine per can of the drink does not pose a serious health threat — you'd have to drink 12,000 L of Red Bull Cola for negative effects to be felt — but it was enough to cause concern. Kuehnle's agency is due to give its final verdict on Wednesday when experts publish their report. [...]
But the problem is when it comes to coca and cocaine, it's not just a health concern, but a legal one. Since 1961, trade of coca outside the Andean region — where people have chewed or brewed coca in tea to stave off hunger and exhaustion for centuries — has been prohibited unless the cocaine alkaloid is removed. Few companies in the world have authorization to trade in the leaf and most are pharmaceutical companies that perform this decocainizing process. The most prominent is New Jersey-based Stepan Chemical Company which has been reported to supply Coca-Cola with its narcotic-free derivative. [...]

Intrigued? TIME.com shares the rest of the details here.

The Howlin' Wolf Story [2003]

should be required viewing by anyone with any interest in any type of rock music. Mr. Wolf is not only my choice as the single most important blues artist of the 20th century, he was also the most exciting live performer in any musical genre; Hendrix, the Stones and Iggy Pop combined might qualify as a decent opening act for Wolf. Mere words can not explain the power, excitement and explosive force that was Howlin Wolf. A unique and captivating singer, a strong harp player, a woefully underrated guitarist and a historically important songwriter; add all of that to the incredible live performances and you have the king of blues (and rock) artists.
The film captured a handful of surviving bandmembers (hubert sumlin, jody williams, sam lay) and mixed in some great archival footage of folks ranging from Muddy Waters to Son House to Brian Jones (his "How-LING Wolf" intro on Shindig was good for a laugh). Wolf is easily at the top of my list of artists I regret not seeing in person, but this film did a good job of giving us the next best thing. If it comes up short in any area, it doesn't offer that much actual live performance footage. But the 50s/60s era bluesmen were completely ignored by USA television during this time, so little or NO commercial footage exists for these extremely important musicians. Fortunately, the American Film Blues Festival (1962 to 1969) brought many of these artists over to Europe for an annual tour that was regularly filmed for Euro television audiences. A three volume DVD set has been released in the past couple of years and volume 2 has an incredible 3 song segment by Wolf. The "Howlin Wolf Story" and all 3 volumes of the AFBF series might be the best return on $60 imaginable.

- imdb user's comment

The Day's Tune

The reasoning about Uncertainty

Seventy-six years ago, Franklin Delano Roosevelt took to the inaugural dais and reminded a nation that its recent troubles “concern, thank God, only material things.” In the midst of the Depression, he urged Americans to remember that “happiness lies not in the mere possession of money” and to recognize “the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success.”
“The only thing we have to fear,” he claimed, “is fear itself.”
As it turned out, Americans had a great deal more to fear than that, and their innocent belief that money buys happiness was entirely correct. Psychologists and economists now know that although the very rich are no happier than the merely rich, for the other 99 percent of us, happiness is greatly enhanced by a few quaint assets, like shelter, sustenance and security. Those who think the material is immaterial have probably never stood in a breadline.
[...] But light wallets are not the cause of our heavy hearts. [...]

Consider an experiment by researchers at Maastricht University in the Netherlands who gave subjects a series of 20 electric shocks. Some subjects knew they would receive an intense shock on every trial. Others knew they would receive 17 mild shocks and 3 intense shocks, but they didn’t know on which of the 20 trials the intense shocks would come. The results showed that subjects who thought there was a small chance of receiving an intense shock were more afraid — they sweated more profusely, their hearts beat faster — than subjects who knew for sure that they’d receive an intense shock.
That’s because people feel worse when something bad might occur than when something bad will occur. Most of us aren’t losing sleep and sucking down Marlboros because the Dow is going to fall another thousand points, but because we don’t know whether it will fall or not — and human beings find uncertainty more painful than the things they’re uncertain about. [...]

- more of the above in The New York Times.

Marasesti . April 2009

viewing the Mausoleum from the outside

inside, upstairs

inside, downstairs

More of my Marasesti experience here.

Certain cruise

... This was the Europa of Hapag-Lloyd Cruises, rated best ship in the world with five stars-plus by the Berlitz guide to Ocean Cruising and Cruise Ships. Clearly this is a ship, as Frankie Howerd would have said, worth a trip around the bay.
It was going to be better than that – Europa, gleaming white with orange and blue trim, was going to circle the Black Sea. So were our fellow passengers, some 400 Germans and a handful of Swiss, who arrived, on time or course, in a fleet of buses. Older Germans, like the French, like the convoy system as they don’t do languages very well. [...]
Europa is 28,000 tons, a similar size and exterior design as the Silversea ships (they share the same architect) but while the latter’s ships are showing signs of wear, Europa is immaculate in every respect. Its contemporary design, liberally sprinkled with decent artworks, high quality soft furnishings and superb lighting make this a ship that is incredibly elegant yet warm. ...

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