Bollocks to panhandlers!

I detest panhandlers.

"Help me buy a cup of coffee?"

"I'm so hungry."

"I just need enough for a bus ticket."

Lies. As a student, I could afford little. I never carried any cash around so that I would never be tempted to spend it. But when a man plaintively tells you he hasn't eaten for three days and piteously petitions you for money to buy food, a stone would be moved to pity.

I had an apple. I had been saving it for the long ride home, but his need seemed so great. I gladly gave it to the man, who thanked me as I boarded the bus. As I sat down, I glanced up and through the window, watched as he disgustedly threw my shiny-sweet apple in the garbage.

When I volunteered at the hospital, I would get free bus tickets to help me get there and back. Since I had to purchase a monthly bus pass to get to the university anyway, I would save these bus tickets for the holiday months when I didn't have to travel as often. When people asked me for money to buy bus tickets, I would hand them mine, only to hear them opportuning other strangers on the street for money to buy bus tickets that had already been secured.

I've since learned to donate my money directly to shelters and other agencies that help the homeless. For a number of reasons, it is difficult to measure the prevalence of mental illness and substance abuse among the homeless. Nevertheless, a 2001 study from the Canadian Psychiatric Association found that as many as 2/3 of homeless people using urban shelters have some sort of mental illness. Even if you look at more conservative studies citing a prevalence of 40%, the numbers remain impressive. That same year, the Canadian Medical Association Journal published a literature review by Stephen W. Hwang on homelessness and health in Canada. According to his research, mental illness and alcohol use disorders were widespread among the homeless.

So what does this tell me? This tells me that homeless people are less likely to be able to make well-informed decisions. As a surgeon, I cannot legally secure consent for a procedure from anyone who is mentally ill or under the influence of exogenous substances, as both of these compromise informed decision-making and, therefore, autonomy.

By simply and naïvely giving money to vagrants, there exists no guarantee that they will get the help they so desperately need. All it does is reinforce to the panhandler that this is a viable way to attain an income and therefore maintain the status quo. However, if I donate money to the agencies who provide food, clothing, shelter, and job training to the homeless, I can better ensure that those funds aren't spent on cigarettes or alcohol or crack.

Please think before you part with your spare change. Are you just trying to momentarily assuage your Christian middle/upper-class guilt by occasionally tossing a few coins the way of the homeless? If you truly wish to effect change in their lives, help them gain access to what they truly need.

For the butterflies!

Yay, Taiwan!

***
Highway shut for butterfly travel

Taiwan is to close one lane of a major highway to protect more than a million butterflies, which cross the road on their seasonal migration.

The purple milkweed butterfly, which winters in the south of the island, passes over some 600m of motorway to reach its breeding ground in the north.

Many of the 11,500 butterflies that attempt the journey each hour do not reach safety, experts say.

Protective nets and ultra-violet lights will also be used to aid the insects.

Taiwanese officials conceded that the decision to close one lane of the road would cause some traffic congestion, but said it was a price worth paying.

"Human beings need to coexist with the other species, even if they are tiny butterflies," Lee Thay-ming, of the National Freeway Bureau, told the AFP news agency.

Under the bridge

Each year thousands of butterflies die when turbulence generated by fast-moving cars drags them into the traffic or under the wheels of oncoming vehicles.

Ecologists hope the triple-action effort of lane closure, protective nets and ultra-violet lighting will dramatically increase the milkweed's chances of reaching the breeding ground.

The protective nets are designed to force the butterflies to fly higher, reducing the chances of them getting caught in the traffic.

Ultra-violet lighting will be used below an elevated section of road to encourage the butterflies to head beneath.

The measures are estimated to have cost $30,000 (£15,200).

Resolutions

1. I will work on my flexibility.
2. I will do 100 stomach crunches a day.
3. I will learn to be proficient at the guitar blues scale.
4. I will learn how to play "Clair de Lune" by Debussy.
5. I will finish my research project on MRI and Breast Cancer.
6. I will finish my latest oil painting.
7. I will sing every day.
8. I will dance every day.
9. I will kiss my husband passionately on the lips at least once a day.
10. I will make a fool of myself as occasion calls for (which is often).

"For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn?"
-Mr. Bennet, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Freethought

Freethinking, anyone?

An interview with Richard Dawkins

Mumble Happyfeet!

I have found a new obsession: dancing penguins!

Restaurant Makeover

Shift work has afforded me the luxury of loveseat lounging and watching cable television. My latest obsession is visiting the following restaurants featured on the show Restaurant Makeover.

The Town Grill

The Ossawippi Express

Sweet Divinity

Pairing chocolate with sweet orange: absolute genius. Imagine my delight then, when Callebaut-deprived for seven months, I spied a slim white box, nestled unassumingly amongst its candy compatriots, bearing the Lindt insignia and the words Orange Intense. As if illuminated by an errant ray of gold-flecked light, the previously quiescent gilded letters spelling "Dark" and "Extra Fine" began to softly shimmer before my dazzled eyes.

Tearing back the silver foil wrapper, I broke off a corner, the fragrance of oranges and almonds filling my nostrils long before the silken chocolate had begun to melt on my tongue. Ambrosia, I thought deliriously. I have discovered ambrosia, my fingertips stained dark with melted chocolate.

Now if only Lindt made nectar...or do they?