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What is anosognosia?

Do you know someone with a serious mental illness who you think is always in denial? While denial does definitely exist, someone with Anosognosia isn’t simply in denial or being stubborn. Their brain can’t process the fact that their thoughts and moods don’t reflect reality. Experts think Anosognosia results from damage to an area of the brain involved in self-reflection. Everyone, regardless of their health status, is constantly updating their mental image of themselves. Whenever you gain new information about yourself—say, after you get a haircut or ace a presentation—it ...

Why the government’s debt is actually your problem

When someone hears that the government owes more than 40 trillion dollars, the normal reaction is to shrug. It's a number so large it stops feeling real. It's not like owning a mortgage or a credit card balance, it's a figure that almost lives exclusively in the news and yet reaches everyone's ...

From Handle to Scramble

Ginnie was on me to fix the handle on her toilet. (We each have our own bathrooms.) I picked up a new handle at the hardware store, and installed it on Ginnie's toilet. It took me awhile to figure out that the handle has left hand threads. Well, duh! Her toilet seemed to be flushing fine with the new handle. We were reading on a Friday night when Ginnie heard my toilet gurgling. She went in, jiggled the handle and sat back down. Then she heard something in her bathroom, and went to investigate. I heard her scream. Thinking there was an intruder in the house, I scrambled to her ...

Let the public see what government boards see

In recent weeks, people from Cherokee, Des Moines and Ottumwa have contacted the Iowa Freedom of Information Council with concerns about the refusal of local officials to share documents distributed to city council and school board members before they meet. Typically, Iowa government boards ...

Rent control still doesn’t work

In 2022, politicians in Minneapolis and St. Paul voted for rent control. I said that would lead to bigger problems. Was I right? My update video reveals what happened. St. Paul politicians pushed rent control, saying rent caps would stop "unfair profiteering." But what the heck is ...

A message for men over 50

The diagnosis was not a surprise - well, yes it was, because like many men with a health issue we try to deny it, or delay treatment when everyone knows that "early detection" is critical to a cure. My PSA (prostate-specific antigen) had been slowly creeping upward for the last two years. ...