i can't find any studies arguing that excess folates may cause recession.

but, i'm back to the c. as i'm nodding off. again.

the studies on vitamin c are consistent over a long period: bombarding yourself with c won't undo anything, and won't cure anything, but it's exceedingly important to ensure you're getting enough, as a preventative.

in theory, i should be getting lots of c - but that relies on the fruit i'm eating actually containing it, and that's a little sketchy. strawberries, kiwis, red peppers, grapefruit & guava are all very high in c; limes, raspberries, bananas & avocados are useful supplements.

but i don't know for sure.

i can't, really.

so, what if i start popping c? it's one of the very few pills i'd consider popping...

that's not going to stop me from needing to find some kind of way to get the collagen in topically, and some kind of way to inhibit collagenase. but, i need to ensure i have sufficient c to start with, and it's perhaps the only way to do it.

i'm not talking about a superdose.

but, 100 mg with each meal in addition to what i'm taking will make sure i'm getting enough, for sure.

so, i don't want to take cyclosporin or any type of anticonvulsant (well, what if it works, right? but i don't want to shut off my t-cells, especially not in a pandemic) and calcium channel blockers strike me as dangerous, given my low blood pressure and general fit health.

further, the mechanism for the anticonvulsants seems to have to do with folate deficiency. that is, gingival enlargement may be caused by folate deficiency.

my folate intake levels are pushing the maximum daily safe amounts.

so, if folate deficiency causes gingival overgrowth, does that mean the excess folate can lead to gum recession? chemistry isn't logical - that's the foundational observation defining modern science. so, i can't and shouldn't make that deduction. but, what do experiments suggest about excess folate on gum health?

decreasing my folic acid intake is something i could do with minimal effort.

what fixed the b5 deficiency?

avocados. mostly.

i also increased the amount of fortified soy milk i was drinking dramatically, started eating a specific kind of highly fortified cereal and started eating fortified yogurt. i replaced my store bought caesar salad dressing with a homemade dressing that used fortified probiotic yogurt & fortified soy as a base. in the process, i went from getting about 60% of the rdi on a good day to getting over 200% of it, regularly. i also started eating eggs far more regularly, instead of as a once-a-week top-up. 

i think that was a potential cause. i don't know...

the increased amount of soy also boosted my vitamin d count. low d in the winter is a known risk factor for ms.

as seems to be normal in this country, the doctor assumed i was exaggerating it, and told me it was just a headache. so, i don't really know. again, universal coverage and competent care are different things.

the frustrations i'm having with the smoking cop upstairs aside, i should point out that it's near the end of february now and i haven't had a migraine since december, and i hadn't had one before that since the spring. so, the frequency of the attacks is decreasing.

and, i'm calling these "hemiplegic migraines" and suggesting they're triggered by smoke and pollution, but they could very well be ms attacks or a dozen other things. i last spoke to a neurologist over the phone a few months ago and he wasn't very helpful.

what has changed? my diet has improved, in terms of nutrition. this time last year, i was eating infrequently and modulating between soy fruit smoothies and pasta dishes - neither of which were terrible, but when i actually worked it out, i realized i was low on almost everything. i was very, very low on b5. 

so, was i just malnourished?

well, i say that like it's a triviality.

"oh. i was merely malnourished. i'm ok now."

but, chronic malnutrition has some pretty serious side effects, and we just don't even know what causes half of this stuff.

the last time i said this, i got a migraine, so i don't want to get cocky. but, it's also the only one i've had in roughly a year. so, let's hope i've fixed this...

what the progesterone does is increase blood flow to the mouth, which causes a series of problems.

that does not seem to be what i'm dealing with. at all.

i'm actually ruling out the progesterone, which appears to be known to cause bleeding and inflammation, but not recession, exactly.

again: i've had no bleeding, no inflammation, no redness, etc. it's just solely recession, with no signs of actual gingivitis.

"you're free to do what you're told"

"freedom of religion" is always a contradiction in terms.

one is never "free to worship" - one can only be captured by the system of religion, enslaved by it, brainwashed by it and placed under it's subservience and control.

it's just a strictly orwellian phrase, that is equivalent to "freedom is slavery".

that said, this may be of some interest to you if you think your recession is bacteria-related:

https://www.iosrjournals.org/iosr-jdms/papers/Vol16-issue9/Version-5/H1609053646.pdf

so, i stumbled upon the aspirin bit when sorting through this article, one of the few i've seen that addresses the potential of drug use to regrow gingival tissue, while looking for options regarding collagenase inhibitors:

https://www.nature.com/articles/sj.bdj.2014.905#Tab2

....but this is related specifically to plaque, which is not what i'm dealing with.

i don't have cavities, and my oral health is quite good; i'm dealing with recession due to some combination of factors that does not appear to be related to gingivitis at all.

so, we'll forget about the aspirin, it's not what i want.

but, i am getting some salicylates in my diet, regardless.

so, aspirin would help by acting as a prostaglandin inhibitor.

what does that actually mean, though?

this weekend was utterly wasted and i'm not happy about it.

let's see if i can get back to what i was doing, which is trying to derive some way to try to stimulate gingival growth in my mouth - which does appear to be possible, if perhaps somewhat perilous due to a lack of development, despite what the dentistry industry says.

the indigenous cultures of central asia and siberia are actually startlingly similar to the indigenous cultures of north america, to the point that it's hard to really believe that they're separated by 15,000 years of history.

i'm also going to smack you down if you try to argue that muslims are indigenous to anywhere.

no - islam is an imperial system of control. it is not indigenous to anywhere, and certainly not indigenous to central asia.

if anything, the turks are an eastern people that were colonized by imperialist arabs and undoing that is a process of reconnecting them to their ancestry. but, i'm a leftist -  i don't think in terms of identity, like that.

just briefly.

the argument i'm going to advance against religionists that are condemning what china is doing is in the definition of control, and the question as to which means of control is more negative, overall.

see, these people will condemn what china is doing as "brainwashing", and then point to participating in the religion of islam as an act of free expression. this is an utterly ridiculous way to frame the discourse. whatever we think of what is going on, we have to begin with the understanding that islam is, itself, a system of brainwashing and control, and that these people were brainwashed into this system from the time they were born.

so, i don't want to engage in this discourse that is about statist brainwashing v religious freedom, as that is an absurd framing from the start. what we have, here, is rather a question of two different systems of brainwashing and two different systems of control. once these people get through their training with the "communist" party in china (which is anything but...), they will no doubt see islam as what it is, and wonder how they could have ever seen it differently. and, while i have a list of criticisms directed at china, i'm at least more on the side of the chinese on the specific question of religion.

if real, ideologically pure leftists were to take over the universe tomorrow and do this right, it would no doubt look a whole lot like what china is doing, except cleaned up to be a little less vicious. insofar as the focus is on undoing the religious brainwashing, i'm entirely on their side, on this - but i want to replace it with critical thinking, rather than obedience to the chinese state. so, i'm calling for the chinese to be humane.

but, that's the extent of my disagreement with what they're doing - it's a big disagreement, but it's about what to replace islam with, rather than about the process of doing away with it.

and, at the end of the day, i would consider china to be less of a threat to global peace and less of a barrier to progress than islam. so, it's a step in the right direction, however minimal and however flawed.

but, it's a good demonstration of why i'm a leftist and not a liberal, and a good purity test for the left. if you find yourself standing up for "freedom of religion" to "protect islam", you're just missing the basic plot on the left - you're failing to recognize religion as a tool of control that must be eradicated to become civilized and live freely, which is foundational to any coherent concept of leftism, and instead retreating to these liberal/conservative concepts of bourgeois rights, that are just intended to uphold the status quo of capitalist and aristocratic hegemony.

ultimately, i support modernization in western china.

i've already posted an analysis of the uighur thing and this is the conclusion of it: i would call on the chinese government to be as humane as is possible in it's attempts to help the turkic populations in it's western regions leave the past behind and enter the modern world.

this house hereby declares that a genocide is currently underway in the people's republic of china

(pause)

"glad that's over with."

"same"

"so, what's for lunch?"

"i hear there's a nice spot up on sparks."

"chinese?"

i would advise that the broadly ignorant individuals that make up the canadian parliament (there are some exceptions, but these people are, broadly, hardly anything approaching scholars.) avoid making foolish statements about what is or is not a genocide, without the benefit of clear facts on the ground.

the facts of the matter are not clear and anybody suggesting they are is operating on political bias.

so, if it turns out that they're wrong, they look like idiots and tarnish the reputation of the country as a rash, authoritarian state that legislates without properly investigating, largely in the servitude of neo-british imperialism. it would just be an empty attack rooted in politicized rhetoric, and somebody will need to apologize for it, one day, in the end.

if it turns out they're right, they open up legitimate questions as to inaction. and, let's be clear - the parliament is not proposing actually doing anything about this genocide, it just wishes to decide a complex historical question on a party-line snap vote and then use it to whip up identity-driven voters to drive them to the polls in the next election. but, if an actual genocide is occurring, and they have evidence to support it, and they decide as much in the legislative body, do they not have a moral responsibility to act? of course they do. the criticism then rightly falls to the government for inaction.

they should just shut up.

but, this is true about their foreign policy, in general: this government, and this prime minister, should just shut up and leave the room when the topic comes up. it lacks basic experience, basic wisdom and basic knowledge.

canada needs to avoid being the bull in the china shop, here, and just not do this at all.

and, if i was in the house or the senate, i would refrain from voting by citing a lack of evidence required to present an informed analysis.

fell asleep again.

let's try again.

i've said this about hitchens and iraq before: his argument is airtight, but his facts are completely wrong. so, like the worst type of medieval religionists, he's erected a perfectly correct syllogism that is erected on a framework of absolute bullshit; it's a perfect deduction, a flawless exercise in logic, but follows uniquely from a set of facts that simply are not true. and, so one is reminded of the witch drowning scene in monty python's holy grail, as this basic truth must be gotten across to him, and never was: christopher, you cannot build a castle in a swamp!

parenti's response is consequently the appropriate one, in that he mostly focuses on correcting the facts.

see, i don't believe that the rulers believe what they tell us. but, they aren't revolutionary leftists. and, i consequently don't really even care what the elite believe, or even care why they do the things they do - i care what i believe, and base my support on the projected outcome, and whether it aligns with what i believe in and want or does not.

i opposed the invasion of iraq in 2003 and i think that was the right position. there was no opposition on the ground.

but, if the american government were to present to me the same argument about iran, i might go along with it - not because i care about what the elite thinks or why they're doing it, but because i would have solidarity with the secular left on the ground, and would see it as a way to advance their causes.

this goes back to the old debate they had in spain about accepting support from stalin. they knew better, and stalin slaughtered them, in the end. but, it's not that easy.

sometimes, base pragmatism is the right choice. 

while hitchens was wrong about iraq, he might not have been. and, in the long run, he may seem less wrong than he does now - which doesn't and can never excuse the error, but can only mitigate it.

---

and, yes - hitchens ripped him apart in the q & a.

he's christopher hitchens.

he'd do that to anybody.

---

the united states has convened all four.

the only other country i can think of is israel.

...& the saudis.

again: the democrats have the chance to materially improve the lives of their voters by expanding access to education and healthcare, and they are instead choosing to restrict the rights of people to express themselves on the internet.

let nobody be surprised by the inevitable backlash against them.

and, force them to take responsibility for the consequences of their actions.

another night wasted sleeping.

why bother to exist under such meaningless conditions?

where has my energy gone?

the answer is that i've been drugged with "medicine" that is stealing my life from me.

fuck off. i want this to stop. i want my 72 hour days back, again.