Things happening in the news:

Global goofs: U.S. youth can't find Iraq

So National Geographic surveyed young Americans between the age of 18 and 24, the prime age for military recruits, and only 13 percent were able to locate Iraq on a map. 17 percent were able to find afghanistan, which i find very interesting because Iraq is easier to find than Afghanistan. The most interesting factoid that they listed was they tested how many young people knew where New Jersey was, and only 30% could find New Jersey. This number is surprisingly high to me since nobody in college knew where it was. I would always get comments like, "New Jersey has a beach?!?!" or "New Jersey ... isn't that by Virginia and Florida and stuff?" In my four years of studying at Berkeley, i only met an handful (singular, not plural) amount of people that actually knew were New Jersey was... and that was because they were either from the east coast or just really smart.
(if you want to take sample questions yourself, click here. I got every question right except for #2.)

Sen. Thurmond Retires From Senate

For 47 years, Sen. Strom Thurmond has been serving congress. He is 99 years old, about to turn 100 in two weeks. I heard his farewell speech on tv today, and along with other speeches and interviews i've seen in the past - he can barely speak. no offense, i have great respect to a man who loves his country so much that he would retire at the age of 99... but he really had to take his time speaking. i don't understand how someone so old could really 'represent' his people when he can barely walk or talk. what about his memory? what about senility? what about his connection to the 21st century? i'm sure he has made great choices, lived a great life, and has earned great respect because otherwise he wouldn't have been elected for half a century... but sometimes, you just have to let go. i mean, i've been working at deltagen for about over a whole YEAR now - and i know it's my turn to let go!

new vaccine prevents herpes in women

I admit it. I have herpes - not genital herpes like the article is about, but i have herpes. has anyone ever seen that commercial about the new medication for genital herpes - with the woman saying proudly, "I have genital herpes" and it shows her boxing in the ring and working out? She seems so proud... she's smiling, posing... and all i can do is just feel bad for her character and her in real life. i mean, if i was an actor looking for a job, i think i'd honestly turn that role down. what if someone recognized you? "Hey! you're that genital herpes guy!" or if you actually do become famous, you're going to regret it... in any case, this article was interesting because they finally found an effective vaccine against herpes simplex II - but the methods they tested it really perplex me. here are some clips from the article:

"A new vaccine prevented genital herpes in more than 70 percent of women who were previously uninfected with either the oral or genital herpes virus, researchers announced Wednesday."

"In the report, which followed two phase-three clinical trials, doctors gave both men and women the vaccine against genital herpes. The vaccine worked only for the women, and only for those who had not been exposed to the type of herpes that infects the mouth."

okay, so how do you test something like that? do they make you sleep with someone with genital herpes? you can't just give a random population this drug and say it was 70% successful. if they tested a random sample of prostitutes, maybe... but honestly, you can't test the effectiveness of a vaccine unless they are exposed to the actual pathogen or virus. so did they actually expose like 30 vaccinated people and 9 of them became infected? and what was their control? when you run clinical experiments, you always need a control group - and in this case, it would be to infect people without the vaccine. this really doesn't make sense to me... i want to read the findings or someone explain it to me.

maybe i'm just deluded because i just saw a part of the victoria's secret tv show, saw carmen electra on dave letterman, it's 12:30 am, and i got in a tussle with my roommate.