Two possible research subjects: one for neuroscience, one for social science

I recently finished a contract where I was working remotely with a company in Southern California. I live near Seattle. The main guy I had to talk with on the phone is a native German speaker with a thick accent, and as first I was having trouble understanding him:

For some reason I decided to try switching the phone from my right ear to my left:

After this I could understand what the guy was saying better, it seemed.

I'm not sure if I just got used to his speech patterns after a few minutes of conversation or if switching from right ear (left brain?) to left ear (right brain?) gave me an advantage in pattern matching, which surely comes into play when parsing a foreigner's speech over a phone connection.

Anybody know of research on this?

My second possible research subject: is there a possible inverse correlation between enjoyment of country music and mass transit usage/appreciation?

I am currently working for a company in Boston and have to travel there periodically for work. The recruiter I'm dealing with insisted on my first trip on "saving money" by putting me a $20 Uber ride from the end of the Red Line at Alewife, my closest point to the T in Boston that could take me to the downtown Boston office I needed to get to.

The first morning I was there the guy met me for breakfast at another hotel and then drove me into the work site. The first question he asked me was "do you like country and western music?"

My answer: "not really, but it's your car" ... he left the radio off and eventually we discussed the hotel site and traffic and it turned out he was apparently personally uncomfortable with expecting somebody from out of town figuring out the system and how to ride it where they want to go, and probably uncomfortable using it himself.

This doesn't make sense to me; I grew up in rural Louisiana and places with functioning mass transit seem like magic to me! The fact that I could stay in a hotel a few blocks from the Red Line and just walk over and get on for a ride downtown ... wahoo!

And I don't care for most country and western music ... so based on 2 (apparent) data points, that's a perfect 0 correlation between those two variables.

Social scientists: any existing literature on this?

Low-carb meals (and a drink!) I like

I wanted to get the "dunlap guy" off the top of my blog. :-)

Here are a few ideas for those wanting to try lowering carbs ... it took me a few months for all of these to occur to me so I hope this is helpful.

Pictured above, of course, is a beef steak. Looks beautiful to me as I like mine medium rare ... but any way you like to cook it, it has zero carbs. Add a salad for just a very few carbs (less than 5% carbs by weight for lettuce and most other typical salad fixings):

My German/Bohemian wife introduced me to bratwurst, which I used to eat with a bun and potato chips. But now I typically have:

... as a meal. I just grill typically two of the "beer and brats" on my outdoor grill, preheating it on high then turning low before putting the brats on and turning them every 4 minutes until cooked. This typically takes 20-24 minutes, and they typically catch fire for part of the cooking time when cases split and fat drips on the heating element:

A few slices of cheddar and a handful of peanuts and two of these brats is a fine meal, in my book.

And of course there's the breakfast standby:

I don't know how I ever ate all the toast and potatoes that often comes with this combination ... just 2 scrambled eggs (with cheddar, please!) and 4 strips of bacon is plenty for me ...

A Couple of Restaurant Meals I Like

I've been a fan of Chipotle for several years:

I like their chicken burrito, which I had been getting with black beans and brown rice. I started halving or eliminating the rice most days; otherwise I just have cheese, guacamole and lettuce. This cuts probably 1/2 of the carbs and is still plenty of a meal ...

I also like Jimmy John's:

... and once again, their "unwich" lettuce wrap versions of the sandwiches they sell are plenty of food ... how did I ever eat all that bread?

Sweet Iced Tea with 1/2 or So of the normal carb load

I grew up in Louisiana and was raised with sweet iced tea (and Coca-Cola, which I quit during the New Coke fiasco of 1984). I have been making my own with a home 3-quart tea maker, in which I had been using 1 1/4 cups of sugar (sucrose: the standard stuff).

After some experimentation I came up with a mix of sugars that taste goods and should be only 50-60% of the carbs of the previous formula:

• 1/4 cup xylitol
• 1/4 cup erythritol
• 5/8 cup sucrose

Your taste buds may differ, but in particular the xylitol and erythritol combo seems to have a smoother taste than either one alone.

Bon apetit!

Lowering carbs: how to, what you can expect, why it still isn't mainstream

I've been happily married for almost 20 years ago, and as almost anyone can tell you: this tends to be fattening ...

I'm not quite 6 feet tall and gradually increased my weight over the last 20 years from about 160 in 1995 to 187 last year. Not quite like this picture, but I was filling out my 36-size slacks without needing a belt.

I had always heard about the idea of a low carb diet for weight loss but never paid much attention to it because:

• I was an ectomorph and pretty much ate whatever I wanted (at least until I was 32 or so)
• I like bread and other carbs, especially sweet iced tea

I was doing the standard mainstream plan for keeping weight in check: exercising.

 I've been wearing a pedometer for years and for a while I was being pretty doctrinaire about getting 7000 steps per day ... without much noticeable influence on my weight.

Last fall I attended a conference put on by the nutritional supplement company Rain International. A featured speaker was Brian Peskin who had a book for sale: The 24-Hour Diet.

My wife wanted a copy so I bought one and sat reading it while waiting for her to emerge from a conference session ... it turns out to promote a simple variant on the low-carb diet idea:

• Reduce carbs during the week
• Eat all the carbs you want Friday night and Saturday
• Holidays: don't worry about it, just get back on board the next day

I decided to try this and immediately lost 10-12 pounds making a few simple changes:

• Eliminating most bread, for example getting lettuce wraps instead of sub sandwiches
• Reducing rice, for example just getting 1/2 the normal brown rice and black beans I normally had been getting on the Chipotle Chicken Burrito I like
• Eating more beef and fewer potatoes

I then read a book that presented the same ideas in a narrative I found compelling:

And a book and podcast series that also promotes lower carbs:

After this I further reduced carbs, most recently by changing the sugar content of iced tea I make at home. I used to use 1.25 cups of normal sugar (sucrose) but have started using:

• 0.5 cups sucrose
• 0.25 cups xylitol
• 0.25 cups erythritol

... per pot of tea, with a drizzle of honey added to the top of some cups I pour early in the pot. (The xylitol doesn't dissolve well in iced tea and therefore the bottom of the pot it a bit sweeter than the top.)

I estimate that this changed sugar formula is about 1/2 of the carbs in the full-sucrose formula. 

The bottom line: when I weighed myself on Saturday a.m. I hit a new low:

I don't look like this and won't, but I did hit a new low: 168! And I don't see any reason I can't get down to the low 160's or even lower if I wanted. And this is without feeling deprived or hungry!

As for why this sort of dietary plan still isn't mainstream, I just read yet another book on that subject:

According to Taubes, it's impossible to do scientific studies on changes in diet and control for a single variable. A valid study is also horrifically expensive and therefore many smaller studies happen and researchers tend to stick to the mainstream "calories are all the same and obesity is a will power problem" view in spite of evidence to the contrary.

Brunch tomorrow for me: a 2/3 pound organic beef burger from Costco, with cheese ... zero carbs never tasted so good!

Code: An Essay

I read this Bloomberg BusinessWeek article on code this week and it was excellent for anybody

who's not quite sure about code and very enjoyable for me (a computer geek with experience similar to that of the author.)

38000 words: make sure you have time for it! Enjoy ...