1. Let's give some props to Iran, or generally to the people of Iran. We in the U.S. tend to take things for granted since we've had it so good for such a long time, but there are lots of places in the world where there are no guarantees. An event like 9/11 would be just a blip on the radar for many countries. I'm amazingly impressed by the extemporaneous and courageous actions of all those people who aren't afraid to be pissed off. Let's face it, Iran isn't the most hospitable place for discord or nonconformity. Remember this is a country that's dominated by a religion not known for acceptance and governed basically by a dictator. It's hard to find many more precarious environments in which to protest.
Another thing about Iran that I don't think many of us are attuned to: it's big. Iran is bigger and potentially much more powerful than most Americans realize or would ever care to accept. As the 18th-largest country in the world, over 70 million people live there, including over 7 million in its capital of Tehran. It would be Europe's third-largest country(A), after Russia and just 12 million people smaller than Germany. It's bigger than France, Britian, Italy, Spain, and Korea. It's more than twice the size of Canada and more than three times as big as Australia. This is not a small country that can be written off or neglected. Just imagine if a shitstorm like this were taking place in Germany or France right now. Iran is a very big deal.(B)

2. In addition to the more famous ACL, did you know there was a PCL in the knee as well? The Ls (ligaments) don't end there, either: on either side of the knee, you've got an MCL and an LCL. To add confusion, the C doesn't designate the same thing in each case. ACL is Anterior (front) Cruciate (crossing) Ligament, PCL is Posterior (back) Cruciate Ligament, while the MCL is Medial (inside of knee) Collateral (supporting or running alongside) Ligament, and LCL is Lateral (outside of knee) Collateral Ligament.
The reason I know all this right now is that I rather stupidly hurt myself last weekend and I've been googling in an attempt to placate my fears of serious injury. To leave out some important details, I fell while running and landed very hard on my left knee. I first thought I had messed up my kneecap in some way (I did bruise it), but now almost a week later I realize what I actually did was agitate at least one of those four Ls listed above. Best uneducated, non-doctor guess: ACL and MCL. I'm still a bit swollen which could mean the patella was bruised worse than originally thought, but it could also mean the blunt trauma scared up a lot of scar tissue and seriously inflamed all those bursae hanging out in the knee. But my main concern is that as the days have passed, my flexion has increased pretty consistently, but my turning ability, even while walking slowly, hasn't improved much. I can actually almost feel the MCL when turning, and it doesn't feel great. So basically what I think happened is that I heavily bruised the patella and seriously inflamed my bursa sacs while also inflaming (but probably not straining) through blunt force the ACL itself, and that all of this has caused me to lightly strain the MCL as an effect.
Nice, huh. I'll report back in another several days to see how right I am. Now though, some things I've found are very difficult when dealing with a knee injury: pooping (actually ass-wiping), walking faster than a toddler, getting into and especially under the covers in bed, putting on socks, stairs (obviously), and even sitting with any kind of posture at my desk at work because I need to extend my leg constantly. So naturally my backs hurts now too.

3. It's really fun when a stereotype comes to life before your eyes. In addition to eight different flavors of coffee, we also carry green tea here at the office. Up until about three months ago, I would have put green tea maybe 7th or 8th in popularity out of the nine options. Lately, it has been more like 3rd or 4th. Now you surely must be curious what might have happened about three months ago to cause this change. Well, of course we started subletting four offices(C) at that time to a hedge fund comprised of five Asians. That's it.
My follow-up to this is: what would be more amusing, to have a minority group show up and absolutely display a classic stereotypical behavior, or to behave in just the opposite way you might expect? I don't have a good answer to this, because they're both great comedic results.



A. No, I'm not counting Turkey, which is just over a million people bigger than Iran.
B. So maybe we westerners can resolve to pronounce the goddamn name of the country right? It's Ih-RAN or Ih-RAHN. Not hard.
C. That's four offices out of about 75 or 80, so a very tiny percentage.