Let's see. It's still snowing and we're probably up to about twelve inches and counting. A freebie day off! Spent the vast majority of the morning and afternoon upgrading the website. Since much of the site used Java as part of the navigation and unfortunately a lot of people either have disabled Java or never activated it in the first place, a lot of folks had problems getting around the site. Most of it is simple busy-work, changing parts of code that control how the top and bottom of how the pages load (the headers and footers) but every once in a while I found some aspect of the new design that required a re-write of the code.

Kids are off from school today, which nowadays means a non-stop ‘Sims 2' festival. I've not the patience necessary for the game, which is a simulation of the daily life of characters that you create and follow through life. Most kids I know are addicted to the game, but I expect that it would hold little thrall for any adult with kids. Really, when you have to follow real life characters through life, would you want to spend your free time following computer characters as well?

The website rewrite has at the least pulled me away from the SWAMI project, which has now grown to over 4,000 lines of code. I've begun to let a few colleagues play with the program and the response has been quite positive, with a few remarks about the fantastic detail that the program is able to produce in its eventual diet printouts. As to when it will make its public appearance, only time will tell. I keep thinking of new things to add.

My brother alerted me to a Wikipedia entry on the BTD that was not exactly flattering. Turns out it was just the old tiresome Klaper article that was cross-posted all over the internet by several of the vegan websites. I responded to this article years ago, but I no longer do this type of riposte, as it constitutes a type of cheerless infanticide that leaves me no more satisfied or happier than if I had just ignored it in the first place.

I think the martial arts studies have certainly helped me to accept that the field of nutrition is basically a dog-eat-dog world, and that in certain circles there will always be unacceptable conclusions, no matter what the quality of the work or originality of the concept.

Of course these folks have a major problem with my advising certain other folks to eat meat. I suspect that if I had concluded that, based on blood type, everybody should be a vegan, they would be in love with my research.

It's not surprising that polls consistently show that more and more people feel that the vast majority of material on the internet is not believable. Often it is not who is right or wrong; it is simply who got there first with their side of the argument. However, if this all leads to greater iconoclasm and less gullibility on the part of the internet public, then perhaps it will have been a good thing.