US research has found that chemicals in everyday household products are now a key contributor to city air pollution, rivalling some vehicle emissions.

The study, led from Colorado University, focussed on so-called volatile organic compounds (VOCs).

These are contained in petroleum-based products such as cleaning fluids and paints, and when they get into the air can form particles that affect health.

Dr Jessica Gilman said it should not be seen as that remarkable because vehicle fuels are burned (to yield mostly carbon dioxide and water), whereas many of the household products are simply wafted into the air by design.

"Most commonly, they're used as solvents - things like nail polish remover, the hairspray I used this morning; they are used in many cases as cleaning agents like carpet cleaners," the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientist told reporters.

Sorry I haven't been posting much, & it seems like I've disappeared a lot.

I've been at my sites every day & on the servers taking care of things, updating our software, security, & looking around as usual. But I haven't had the time, energy, & health to do much else here lately.

As most of you know after stabilizing my COPD for over a couple years, it got much worse over the summer. It never improved again after that. Suddenly before Christmas it got even dramatically & terribly worse. Just getting up to the bathroom to go poo was a dreadful, traumatic experience of gasping for air almost suffocating to death. Every few steps I had to stop, gasping to catch my breath. It would take a miserable & desperate couple hours just to go poo & make it back.

I have no health insurance. So I have no legal prescriptions to get meds, treatments, or oxygen. A single trip to the doctor could cost me months to years of my rent money. I'm also home-bound. Without meds or portable oxygen I can't step out of my apartment for more than a few minutes without desperately gasping for air anyway -- and doctors don't make house call for free anymore.

With well filtered air in a climate-controlled apartment, I'm just barely able to get by. Outside of my place my breathing gets substantially worse. My food & supplies have to be delivered to me. I can no longer get down the stairs. I'm stuck up here. I had to give someone my keys, to bring my food & supplies up to me once a month.

I was forced to buy a small oxygen machine that I can't afford. It helps, in that I won't die of suffocation or a heart attack just trying to go poo, but other than that, it doesn't make my life much easier... I'm just not in danger of imminent death anymore with the new machine.

I could only get a smaller undersized oxygen machine... and it's AC powered, so not portable or mobile. Got long hoses for it though. It's just not powerful enough or makes enough O2 for my condition.

It takes me 40-60 minutes of desperately gasping for air to go poo instead of 2 hours. And at least with the O2, I probably won't die, pass out, or shyt my panties trying to go. I can bend over to pick something up twice before getting way too out of breath instead of just once.

So I've been very busy, & in terrible, miserable health.

Hopefully with your prayers, help, & donations, it will all just be temporary & there's a light at the end of this dark terrible tunnel.

In the meantime, rest assured. I'm still here taking care of our sites, servers, & security. We're still functioning normally. I'm just too busy, ill, & tired to be as sociable as usual or post lots of cool stuff.

My highest priority at our sites will be the safety, security, functionality, & reliability of them. The social graces & frills will have to wait until I have more time & feel a little better.

CDC gets list of forbidden words: Fetus, transgender, diversity

Trump is prohibiting officials at USA's top public health agency from using a list of seven words or phrases — including “fetus” and “transgender”

The forbidden terms are “vulnerable,” “entitlement,” “diversity,” “transgender,” “fetus,” “evidence-based” and “science-based.”

It’s likely that other parts of HHS are operating under the same guidelines regarding the use of these words, the analyst said.

At the CDC, several offices have responsibility for work that uses some of these terms. The National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention is working on ways to prevent HIV among transgender people and reduce health disparities. The CDC’s work on birth defects caused by the Zika virus includes research on the developing fetus.

A longtime CDC analyst, whose job includes writing descriptions of the CDC’s work for the administration’s annual spending blueprint, could not recall a previous time when words were banned because they were considered controversial.

The reaction of people in the meeting was “incredulous,” the analyst said. “It was very much, ‘Are you serious? Are you kidding?’ ”

“In my experience, we’ve never had any pushback from an ideological standpoint,” the analyst said.

Tom Petty passed away last night of a heart attack at the age of only 66.

Here's a mix of some of his popular stuff:
http://unclegadget.com/media/Petty.mp3
(13.9mb, 39.5 minutes mp3 V3)

Lockheed Martin unveiled it's spaceship design to get people to Mars in 10 years. Looks like it's gonna cost at least a trillion dollars.

Cool video:
http://unclegadget.com/media/marsmission.mp4
(3.9mb, 3 minutes)