More photos of the carnage in Bangkok 2010

Click on the title link to see the pics.

Heart attack survivors 'fear sex'

Heart attack survivors are highly likely to avoid sex, fearing it could kill them, US researchers say. The team told an American Heart Association meeting that those whose doctors failed to talk to them about sex were most likely to avoid it.

In terms of sexual activity, the study of 1,184 men and 576 women who had experienced heart attacks were asked about their sexual activity prior to and after having a heart attack. They were assessed one month after their heart attacks, and then again after a year. The men were more likely to be sexually active prior to the heart attack.

What this tells you is that life needn't end just because you have a dodgy ticker. In fact, most studies will tell you that having an active sex life is extremely healthy, and those who reduce this or don't have a sex life after major heart surgery (or simply a heart attack) that doesn't require major treatment are in fact putting themselves back in danger by changing their sexual habits and proclivities.

So what's the moral of the story? More sex please we aren't British!

More great pics of Bangkok - Siam Square and MBK

Click on the title link to see the pics.

List of buildings attacked so far...

BMA: Rioters set fire to 34 places

A total of 34 places were set ablaze during Wednesday's riot, Bangkok Metropolitan Administration said on Thursday morning.

They are;

1. Siam Square’s Siam Theatre
2. Centara hotel in Ratchaprasong
3. SET building
4. Mahathun Plaza Building
5. Maleenont Building
6. Bangkok Bank (BBL) Asoke branch
7. BBL Din Daeng branch
8. BBL Rama IV branch
9. BBL Victory Monument branch
10. BBL Sukhumvit 83 branch
11. BBL Sathupradit branch
12. BBL Thanon Chan branch
13. BBL Saphan Luang branch
14. BBL Klong Toey branch
15. BBL Hua Lampong branch
16. Klong Toey office of the MEA
17. Krung Thai Bank (KTB) Asoke branch
18. KTB Sala Daeng branch
19. KTB Sukhumvit branch
20. GSB Din Daeng branch
21. Office of Narcotics Control Board building in Din Daeng
22. Central World
23. Kasikornbank Ngam Duplee branch
24. Kasikornbank Victory monument branch
25. Siam City Bank (SCIB) Din Daeng branch
26. SCIB Penang branch
27. Center One shopping centre
28. Noodle shop at Victory Monument
29. Gold shop at Victory Monument
30. 7-Eleven in Din Daeng
31. Lotus Express Rama IV
32. Dok Ya Book store at Victory Monument
33. Watson shopping mall at Victory Monument
34. Police booth on Rama III road

Remnants of Central World - RIP

Central World burning down

End of an era! A place I have bought items I still use. To view the pics, click on the title link.

Great pics of the violence of the last month or so in Bangkok.

Cick on the title link to see the rest of the pics.

University of York offers degree course on The Wire

Laughable though it sounds, The Wire, a cult US television series about the fight against crime in Baltimore, has become the subject of a British university course. The American police show will be studied at the University of York from this autumn as part of its sociology degree.

The 10-week module, thought to be the first of its kind in the Britain, will be offered to all final year students. Titled The Wire as Social Science Fiction?, it will use the HBO series to look at topics including class, race, political process and the city.

The lecturer behind the course, Professor Roger Burrows, head of sociology at the university, believes the popular show could challenge traditional methods of teaching and presenting social science.

"We spend an enormous amount of our time trying to craft books and articles that are read by so few people and it could challenge how we represent the work that we do in the academe. I find it odd that we're still using 19th and 20th century forms as a way of disseminating what we do."

Can't but agree as most sociology courses these days are based on antique texts like those of Margaret Mead and similar old crusties, so anything that makes use of modern technology and ideas has to be a welcome addition to the sociology canon.

One wonders what will be next on the list of new degree courses? How about a degree in The BBC six O' clock news!! Survivor? The Apprentice? Or my favorite - The TeleTubbies? Who said the world is increasingly dumbing down to the populace nowadays? Never! I can just see Detective McNulty now putting in a request for a transfer!

Why are British women's breasts getting bigger?

This is a funny look at a strange phenomenon e.g. that British women's breasts are getting increasingly bigger every year. It seems that recently, the average British bra size has jumped from 34B to 36D, which means that while women's backs have grown one size, breasts have jumped up two.

Many department stores have increased the range of cup sizes on offer to meet the ballooning, er...humongous demand. In 2007 Marks & Spencer introduced the J cup. Earlier this year, Selfridges began stocking a K cup range, and its sales of D to G cups have risen by 50% year-on-year since 2005. Last week, Debenhams started stocking KK bras, which were previously only available in specialist stores.

In Britain where obesity is fast becoming the norm, you'd think there was a simple, fat-related reason for this, but it doesn't explain the jump in cup size, nor the biggest growth area in bra sales: smaller back size and bigger cup size. Judging by recent underwear figures, there are more slimmer women with larger boobs than ever before. Women are happy about this. Men are happy about this. But no one seems happy to explain why this is happening.

Perhaps it's nature's way of showing the supply and demand dynamic. If men want bigger boobs, then that's what they get. Or have I made a boob here?!

Mother's phone call as comforting as a hug, says oxytocin study

Hearing your mother's voice on the telephone has the same stress-busting effect as a cuddle, say US scientists. Children know that mum's got the words when life seems to be getting too much.

Now it seems her voice on the phone can work the same soothing magic as when she is there to give her offspring a comforting cuddle. US scientists believe hearing mother down the line produces the same stress-busting effect on her daughter as physical contact such as a hug or a loving arm round the shoulder.

In a study that will send phone companies into their own comfort zone, researchers found mothers' calls released similar levels of the social bonding hormone oxytocin in girls as when they were in close proximity.

Writing in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the scientists report how they deliberately raised the stress levels of 61 girls aged seven to 12. The children had to make an impromptu speech and solve maths problems in front of strangers. This sent their hearts racing and levels of stress hormone cortisol higher.

This is probably what all mothers instinctively know anyway and Freud no doubt understood this at a psychological level: that there are many unseen bonds that exist beyond the level of psychology e.g. what are often classified as the Oedipus and the Electra complexes.

We all know that the words that come from mum are soothing in ways we can't understand but which we feel as doing us the power of good when we are sick, or angry, stressed, or just simply in need of conversation and communication.

This is always comforting to know.

Life gambler finally dies of cancer

This is my favourite story of the week as an ex gambler myself. A British man with terminal cancer who won 10,000 pounds (15,000 dollars, 11,700 euros) by gambling on his own life has died, just weeks short of cashing in a third bet.

Jon Matthews, 60, from Milton Keynes north of London, was diagnosed with mesothelioma, a cancer linked to asbestos, in April 2006 and his doctor told him he would not be alive to see 2007.

The widower refused to accept the prognosis and placed a 100-pound bet with odds of 50-1 that he would survive until June 1, 2008 _ and cashed in 5,000 pounds when he made it, according to bookmakers William Hill.

The odds that he would stay alive another 12 months went up to 100-1 and he placed another 100-pound bet, which would have netted him 10,000 pounds if he survived until June 1, 2010, but he finally succumbed to his illness last week, the bookmakers said.

This is a great way to set yourself targets and by that very way, prolong your life when you have unfortunately gotten a terminal illness. Let's be honest - life is one big gamble anyway, so what's wrong with having a flutter where your life really does depend on it?

'Historic' day as first non-latin web addresses go live

Arab nations are leading a "historic" charge to make the world wide web live up to its name. Net regulator Icann has switched on a system that allows full web addresses that contain no Latin characters. Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are the first countries to have so-called "country codes" written in Arabic scripts.

The move is the first step to allow web addresses in many scripts including Chinese, Thai and Tamil. More than 20 countries have requested approval for international domains from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann).

"All three are Arabic script domains, and will enable domain names written fully right-to-left," said Kim Davies of Icann in a blog post.

This has to be great news for countries which do not have English as their first language as there has been worries in some quarters that you were starting to see a kind of dominance of the world through the English language, and that those who could not read it, were increasingly being left behind in a kind of digital divide.

Now, whether you are Chinese, Thai, or an Arab, you will be able to have web sites specifically created to cater for you and thus act as a kind of mirror to the life that you yourself lead, not something that is reflected back at you through the medium of another language, with all the cultural baggage that inevitably goes with it, and which leads to a kind of cultural hegemony. Very welcome news for minority languages indeed!

'Cuddle hormone' makes men more empathetic

A nasal spray can make men more in tune with other people's feelings, say a team of German and UK researchers. They found that inhaling the "cuddle hormone" oxytocin made men just as empathetic as women. The study in 48 volunteers also showed that the spray boosted the ability to learn from positive feedback.

This is really interesting as women have long been known to be more empathetic than men and also able to learn from others especially from men, but this is not true the other way around.

Oxytocin is a naturally produced hormone, most well-known for triggering labour pains and promoting bonding between mother and baby. This study is the latest of several that suggest that intra-nasal oxytocin seems to 'sensitise' people to become more aware of social cues from other individuals said Professor Gareth Leng. But it has also been shown to play a role in social relations, sex and trust.

In terms of positive feedback, in a second experiment, the researchers measured "socially motivated learning" where the volunteers were asked to do a difficult observation test and were shown an approving face if they got the answer right and an unhappy face if they got it wrong.

In these types of experiments, people generally learn faster if they get positive feedback but those who had taken the oxytocin spray responded even better to facial feedback than those in the placebo group.

This is very interesting to all people, not just social researchers, as it sheds more light on the link between relationships and how people show emotion and are generally able or not to show empathy and identify with other people's feelings.