Commentary by H.G. Listiak

Friday 10/24/2003

Welcome to my world, where every time you think you are avoiding the grim reaper a little longer, getting maybe even healthy, along comes the medical community just raining all over your parade. Yes, more and more Americans are obese and they are probably correct, but the tonnage for being obese has been lowered, meaning more and more folks fit the burgeoning bill. Cholesterol levels are coming down in America, but that doesn't mean much since we now have good and bad cholesterol, with a lot fewer of the bad guys needed to kill you stone dead. And more and more people are suffering from hypertension, or high blood pressure, a no brainer. Of course more and more people have high B.P.s since they have lowered the limits 20 points on top and 10 on the bottom. If they lower it any more your pulse will kill you. In every case there is always some kind of psychological culprit. The latest concerns high blood pressure and impatience. This week's Journal of the American Medical Association prints research that claims people who don't like waiting are probably going to have high blood pressure. If traffic, grocery lines, or waiting for someone who is late bothers you, you are in trouble. If you get hostile about it, you are the walking dead. My blood pressure runs high. I'm simply wired tighter than a banjo string. I've had a tough life, and yes, I hate waiting, but part of my problem is where they take my blood pressure. The ball is all in the doctor's court. You've got a ten o'clock appointment to get cuffed. After waiting 45 minutes reading old issues of Time Magazine, so ancient they deal with Reaganomics, they finally get you in so they can tell you it's bad news and that you need to chill out. Why it's enough to raise your blood pressure, as I see it ... I'm H.G. Listiak.