You have to admire the consistency of our government, especially when it comes to protecting us.

While the TSA is strip-searching 95-year old women in wheelchairs, a janitor tripped over a box of smallpox samples that someone left in an old Budweiser cooler in some closet.

OK, this may not be strictly accurate. It could have been Bud Lite. And it wasn't really a janitor, but it really doesn't makes much difference in the grand scheme of things.
What really happened is that a bunch of sealed vials of the smallpox virus—possibly the most deadly pathogen ever—were discovered in a  cardboard box in storage room, unsecured and unlocked. This is not good.

I am fortunate enough to own a small cottage on Fire Island.

The island is a barrier beach, located about five miles off the south shore of Long Island. It is a wonderful, unique place. There are no roads or cars. And no stress, which is especially astounding, since it is only 50 miles (and a short ferry trip) from Manhattan.

We may not have cars, roads or stress, but we have mosquitos— plenty of them.

We all have bad days.

Sometimes "bad" is a woefully insufficient adjective. Ask Dr. Mehmet Oz (henceforth known as The Lizard of Oz). He had a really bad day this week, courtesy of Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO). 

She is not someone you want as an enemy. She tricked The Lizard into testifying before  the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee.

Is life great or what?

We have all kinds of wonderful choices available to us. Yankees or Mets (better still, neither), Frosted Flakes or Cap'n Crunch, Homeland or The Walking Dead. Awesome. 

And now we get to choose between an old artificial sweetener that was perfectly safe and a new one that is perfectly safer. 

For more than 30 years, aspartame (aka NutraSweet), has been the target of conspiracy crazies and those who profit from the crazies. Speaking of whom, supplement mogul Crazy Joe Mercola calls aspartame "By far the most dangerous substance added to most foods today." 

After 20 years of grueling research, unimaginably effective drugs to treat hepatitis C are hitting the market. They are so good that cure rates (aka sustained virological response, or SVR)—defined as the absence of detectable hepatitis C virus (HCV) RNA six months following cessation of treatment—are approaching 100 percent. Even ten years ago this would have been regarded as science fiction.

These drugs are quite expensive. But, are they worth it? 

It’s been all over the news. 

Depending on the accuracy of the headline, you may conclude that worms live longer when exposed to glucosamine, mice live 10 percent longer when fed glucosamine or that YOU will live 8 years longer if you take the stuff.

As usual, the devil is in the headlines.

Some were pretty accurate: Glucosamine promotes longevity in worms and mice, study says (from the L.A. Times).