Deric: when I was at grad school, I experienced a similar thing (though less pronounced) and found wearing a pair of clear (non-prescription) glasses while biking helped.
Although goggles are cooler.
Saveloy: As I promises in the related Books thread:
The Anarchist Threat
On Friday afternoon, September 6, 1901, William McKinley, twenty-fifth president of the United States, greeted well-wishers filing by him at a reception at Buffalo’s Pan-American Exposition. Although three Secret Service agents, local police, and military guards were on duty, no one spotted a self-proclaimed anarchist who patiently stood in line, a revolver concealed in his handkerchief-wrapped hand.
At 4:07 p.m., McKinley turned to greet this man. Two shots rang out. The gunman, Leon Czolgosz (shole-gawz), was wrestled to the floor and taken into custody.
and (bear in mind the author of the page/book is a doctor)
Despite the use of every known therapeutic measure, William McKinley, aged 58, died on September 14, 1901.
One desperate man had stolen the glory owed not only to Buffalo, its surgeons, and its grandest public event, but also to McKinley and the American people. A hugely popular president, poised to lead the country to ever greater prosperity at home and prestige abroad, was dead. The nation was stunned! The president's surgical team, granted heroic stature immediately following surgery, was declared incompetent by laymen and professionals alike. Nearly every historical interpretation of the McKinley era concludes that "bungled surgery" cost the nation its leader.
A different explanation emerges when the medical evidence is re-examined in light of a more thorough understanding of surgical physiology. It is unlikely that Park or any other surgeon could have saved McKinley in 1901. Similar surgery today, however, would likely be successful. A reconsideration of the McKinley tragedy thus also provides the occasion for celebrating a century of medical progress.
McKinley’s assassination, believed to be the result of a vast conspiracy, fed popular fears of "foreign influence," despite the gunman having been a disillusioned native son. The story begins with the anarchists who mistrusted every form of ruling authority, even a democracy governed by elected leaders.
You can click around the site using the left-hand bar to find more snippets, like this:
Repudiating the teachings of his family faith, Roman Catholicism, he turned his attention to the newspapers and read about the socialists and, especially, about the exciting anarchists. Czolgosz was thoroughly captivated by the story of Gaetano Bresci, a common day laborer like himself, who had murdered the King of Italy with a tiny revolver. He clipped the article and folded it into his wallet. Periodically, he would remove and reread the story, savoring its details.
There's a much clearer version of the story (written from a non-surgeon's perspective) located here, at the marvelous Crime Library site. |
