I was thinking “February is getting up to 45º, what the hell that’s a heatwave in Febru——”… and then realised Dorothy is talking in Fahrenheit. xD My bad! xD
SillyGoose
On the same note, kudos to Americans who know without checking whether 16 ounces is really less than two liters, or if the joke is precisely that it’s a difference of one gulp.
APW
@Silly goose to Europeans too! I had to check :D
APW
@SillyGoose to Europeans too! I had to check :D
thejeff
The weirdness is that soda is sold here in both 2 liter and 16 oz bottles for reasons. It’s one of the very few places we regularly use metric, but only for some sizes.
The Other Mike
@thejeff: That’s always cracked me up.
Victor Mortimer
@The Other Mike
It was the 1970s. Carter was president, it looked like we might actually go metric, and reusable glass bottles were being replaced with disposable plastic because it was cheaper. And so they switched from the 64-ounce returnable glass bottle to the plastic 2-liter to give us some incentive to save them money and give the world more litter.
Oh yeah, the glass bottles were not disposables, you’d take them back to the grocery store, get your deposit back, and they’d ship them back to the bottling plant to be washed and reused. Can’t have that, it costs the bottler money.
Lena
@ SillyGoose that’s just what the bottles are sold as here. I can very clearly picture what size those two bottles are, despite having no knowledge of how to convert the measurements.
Azhrei Vep
16 oz. is roughly a quarter of two liters. I make regularly purchases of six packs of 16.9oz bottles of Coke, which are also labeled as .5 liter. So, dropping the .9 oz would leave you 3.6 oz short of a full two liters.
Dwampre Scorrigank
That’s not just a big gulp, that’s an X-treme-ly big gulp
thejeff
@Victor Mortimer: Ah, I’d never thought of linking it to our attempt to go metric. Obvious once you think about it, but I also didn’t think of that size or the plastic bottles being introduced at the right time. I guess we’d probably have had half-gallons of soda if the timing had been different.
Osopescado
@sillygoose The other funny thing is that 20oz is a way more common size for soda bottles to be sold in, at least where I live on the west coast of the US. I only see 16oz bottles in big multipacks at Costco.
Ockshully, people who act elitist about the right way to drink coffee aren’t drinking it for the flavor, they’re drinking it for the elitism. (in jest, also I can’t drink coffee at all so jokes on me)
Dwampre Scorrigank
Wow totally whiffed on what thread to post that to. Uh, spoilers, people talk about coffee below.
BarerMender
Yeah, heck with coffee. On the other hand, I get my tea straight from India. Talk about elitism.
bliss
No coffee, not even decafe?
My body cannot deal with caffiene but I love the taste of decafe with some
form of plant milk iced as weather warms up. Here in San Francisco we are
told to expect a heat wave starting today.
elebenty
Oh my family TRIED to get me to like coffee. Coffee candy, coffee ice cream. I just don’t like it.
If I want bitter, I’ll take dark chocolate. (Both are import items we’ve grown dependent on…..)
Dwampre Scorrigank
@bliss For regular, even first thing in the morning, even a small amount, leads to insomnia at night and usually increased anxiety. I should try decaf, I’m not really sure. It hasn’t seemed worth the effort but coffee has other active compounds in it and maybe that plus the few mgs of caffeine leftover from decaffeinating would be just right for me. On the other hand a tiny dose of straight caffeine has seemed to cause less anxiety so I am not confident.
@elebenty One thing I grew to like was unsweetened hot cocoa (like baking cocoa powder in hot water). I have not tried it in a while, can’t really eat chocolate anymore but that might not cause the same problems as solid dark chocolate. On the other hand I don’t think there’s any place nearby I can buy fair trade (might be same with coffee for that matter), which kind of makes it not worth it for a luxury item. I already have enough foods to feel guilty about that I can’t avoid so easily.
Dwampre Scorrigank
@BarerMender adjusts monocle Truly, the branded stuff you can get in the west gets the job done but direct-sourced Indian tea tastes like TEA. (we used to have some we’d get mailed to us by family, iirc that was my favorite. We also get some from I think an Indian grocery store that tastes pretty standard to me, I think that one is mostly for frugality. But I don’t pay too close attention as I’m not a big tea-drinker either)
thejeff
There are some small online tea businesses that import good tea. Mostly loose leaf. Teas from India, China, Japan and some other smaller tea countries.
I’ve used Upton and Harney, but there are others.
The mail-order ant farms are all super depressing unless you actually get into it as a hobby, build them a better enclosure, and give them a territory to explore.
You just watch them dig a few tunnels, then stagnate and slowly die off. You’re left with plexiglass full of gel and dead ants.
it does not the aspartame slows your metabolism, causing you to gain more weight, at least go for the stevia stuff (or you know take your pills with hot black coffee!)
(i donot recommend taking pills with hot liquids, it can cause them to disolve premeturely and get stuck to your throat, i unfortunately speak from experience (although) that was taking pills with water, then immediatly drinking hot coffee)
what exactly is meant by “slows down metabolism”? which part of it?
because my friend whose a diabetic once told me eating fatty foods slows down the absorption process, which is also part of the reason why athletes tend to perform better on high fat diets — it takes the body more time to get the energy out of fat then carbohydrates, with the latter however eating a bunch of simple carbs all at once means you have that much more glucose in your blood all at once — when the body has nothing to do with it at the moment (i.e. no physical or mental exercise), by default it’s stored in fat cells. This energy can later be turned into glucose via gluconeogenesis if not a lot of carbs are “expected” or available, via gluconeogenesis, — the efficacy of the process is different for each individual and determined a lot by diet, exercise, genetics, etc.
eskimolos
I get why you’d describe it like that, though it doesn’t slow absorption exactly, more that a molecule of fat can produce like 4x more energy than one of sugar, and it is harder to release – triglycerides need to be broken into free fatty acids by severing the chain from the hydrocarbon backbone, then they need to be oxidised into a form that can cross through the mitochondrial membrane, then in the mitochondria they’re further transformed and broken down into energy through the citric acid cycle and oxidative phosphorylation. Sugar is easily accessible energy, but it can be used for less in metabolic processes, whereas transformation of fat leads to the creation of acetyl-CoA, an essential part of most catabolic processes.
The body is more likely to store excess sugar as fat or glycogen thanks to, as you mention, gluconeogenesis, while fat is a longer lasting form of energy that means for athletes they have more readily available energy rather than catabolisation of glycogen stores from the liver or protein from their muscles, which is more likely to go if they have low fat stores.
It’s been a few years since I studied catabolic processes, so hoping that my impression is still mostly accurate here!
embe13
i know very little about the science of the metabolic process just what the reports i’ve come across summarizing the research the metabolic variance in studies regarding aspartame seems likely to be a situation of a certain portion of the population likely have the ability to breakdown aspartame at a quicker rate than others do, similarly to how some folk have a gene that make cilantro taste like soap. the other factor regarding the slowdown of the metabolism is that it is reletively easy to counteract it through regular exercise
Interesting. I have had some with hot milk before and don’t recall ever having an issue. Might depend on the type of pill. My stomach is not a fan of water in the early morning (or anything in the morning with menstrual cramps), and with cramps from hell, I had to figure out a way to down pain medication to help.
If she can tolerate sparkling water, that might work due to the fizziness of the bubbles. We used to have a really good ginger lime sparkling water, with a true ginger lime flavor and wasn’t sweet or fake, but they stop making it.
eskimolos
In this case hot coffee may be more likely to break down pills faster because it is acidic and the pills are normally basic/alkaline so that they will react and digest appropriately with stomach acid. Milk also being basic would interact with the pills less. The addition of heat really just accelerates free energy which facilitates faster and bigger reactions if reactions are to happen.
embe13
also hot milk may be 40-50c, hot coffee is closer to 70-80c
Another good thing to note here when we’re talking about medication being messed up by your choice of beverage, is furanocoumarins, present in a lot of plants and fruits. Particularly bergamottin, found in large amounts in grapefruit and bergamot oranges, and I’d assume in trace amounts in earl grey tea. These will compete with medication in liver metabolism and can make medication ineffective or toxic. I double checked to ensure this wasn’t the case with sprite, and fortunately the virtually nonexistent nutritional variance in the drink does mean that despite being citrus based, it doesn’t seem to contain any furanocoumarins.
I’ve found out in efforts to ensure accuracy in my comment that furanocoumarins are also phototoxic, they bind with DNA in epithelial cells when exposed to UV rays, killing the affected cells, which initiates an inflammation cascade. This makes me wonder, why does anybody consume grapefruits?
Ray Radlein
I would suspect that Fresca might contain grapefruit extracts, even if Sprite doesn’t, but who drinks Fresca these days?
i know diet might be ‘slightly’ (altho not much) healthier but i never liked the ‘after taste’, zero sugar is a bit more tolerable and even then only for specific sodas for me personally, like dr pepper zero. altho for coke zero just plain coke i’d need to add creamer in if not just get cherry (aparently they have an orange coke again but it’s like ‘orange cream’ but not as orange leaning as their previous kind so if you want more of an ‘orangey’ taste best to get orange fanta or sunkist zero lol, jarritos is nice idk if there’s zero sugar versions of there but despite being in the south i’ve only seen like 1-2 flavors of it even tho there’s a handful more)
and rootbeer can be hit or miss as well tho icani magine joyce enjoying root beer floats unless it counts against her ‘mixing’ tolerance
If she’s downing a 2L bottle of Sprite everday just to take a pill… that’s gonna get real expensive. I mean, I drink a lot of Mt Dew, *and* I have a problem swallowing pills, but I’m not that bad!
Well, yes. People who don’t like their coffee black don’t actually like the coffee. They like the stuff they’re putting in it.
AMagicalDuck
Do you think that people who drink lattes only like the taste of milk
Cbwroses
Exactly, Clif, which is why I don’t drink coffee.
It’s not worth the effort to make it enjoyable for me, and there are other beverages I do enjoy that can give caffeine and sugar.
I do like the smell of coffee, tho.
embe13
@cbroses youd prob like chocolate covered coffee beans, best friend hates coffee but loved those.
@clif real lattes made with expresso (i know its repeated) are an act of chemistry where you get both flavours and as an enjoyer of both milk and espresso those are nice (especially after outdoor winter activities) but french press can make folgers drinkable (i use salted caramel beans bought bulk that make good coffee in a drip unit as well as a press)
HueSatLight
It’s ok if you don’t like two ingredients to touch, without looking down on people who do.
deliverything
@clif
Let’s consider that logic…
People who drink coffee with milk don’t actually like coffee, they like milk.
People who drink milk with coffee don’t actually like milk, they like coffee.
Oh, wait, there’s also the simultaneous air intake. True coffee drinkers drink coffee in a vaccuum!
Judging people’s beverage choices seems like it might get confusing. I think I’ll not bother.
clif
How dare y’all insinuate that the way I enjoy something isn’t the only right way to enjoy it. This ignores the fundamental structure of the universe which was obviously fashioned for my amusement. I can’t imagine any other sensible way to explain reality.
Yumi
I enjoy coffee as a means to consume cream and sugar and flavorings, and I’m quite clear abut that. Would I enjoy that without the coffee? Yes, actually, steamers are great. But I do enjoy the included coffee as well at times.
For you and anyone else who has trouble with pills, try this:
Take a swig of water, pop the pill in your mouth, and then drink normally through a straw. Practice with M&Ms Minis (assuming you’re not diabetic).
I´ve found that what works for cats and dogs?
Also works well for pill-shy human gullets.
One teaspoon of yoghurt, pills mixed in.
Never knew a cat, kid or cancer patient who still had problem swallowing pills that are embedded in a spoon of lubricating gloop.
Having the tummy tolerate the specific pharmacological side effects ?
Sadly is a whole other bucket of fish.
I’s say Dorothy should try the trick you do with dogs where you wrap the pill in cheese, but Joyce might consider that to be mixing ingredients and become even MORE upset.
Damn metric users. You guys are savages, don’t you know that every single unit of measurement should have its scaling system set with no regard to practical applications or other units of measure within the system, and that they should only add into larger units at seemingly random quantities. Increases by base 10 from cm to meter to km? I will take my 3 feet to a yard and 1,760 yards to a mile, thank you very much.
The only time I want meteric nonsense around is to jam it haphazardly into systems that already use the US customary units. Everyone knows drinks should come as six ounce, eight ounce, 16 ounce (already exactly 1 pint but never cut out the unneeded syllablus and call it that), and one liter (its basically 2 pints but why do that when you can add an ounce and a billion digit fraction of one and jump to a utterly different system of measurement). Your not using your head! Think, IntangibleMatter, Thnk!
Harsh but fair. This metric user went naturally to the cubit for measuring mic placement in my old studio. Well, a cubit and a handsbreadth. Can’t do that with newfangled units without pulling out a ruler.
On a couple side tangents, there are some practical benefits for having things divided by 12 (and therefore divided by 3 and 4 instead of just 5). Out in the field or doing cooking measurements, etc, it isn’t uncommon to need something divided by a third or a quarter. For very large numbers, it doesn’t matter as much, but I specifically find it easier for cooking and gardening (after dealing with both through science and greenhouse work). On the other hand, I can’t picture the concept of a mile other than the amount of time it takes me from point a to point b, so the size is large enough that I could care less if we used kilometers instead.
Celsius would be less annoying to me if they made the boiling point of water be 200 instead of 100. It would be a closer match to Fahrenheit (since they are 1.8 degrees different, with a 32 degree adjustment). I find using the freezing point and boiling point of water to be just as arbitrary as what Fahrenheit used with water, frigorific mixture and human body temperature. My thoughts are most people are only going to deal with around 0F to 100F (give and take about 20F or so depending on location) in their everyday lives besides cooking (and even then it is only through what you set the oven to). Why reduce that everyday amount by around half and reduce the range people can describe how it feels outside? It also seems silly to do it based on the boiling point of water, as most people wouldn’t need to know that in their everyday life as they just set the point to boil with whatever heat they want from the stove. Sure, it could be useful for science and larger temperatures, though I believe they switch to Kelvin at some point. I guess I just don’t understand why the boiling point of water matters when we talk to each other weather on earth? The temperature at which you die from heatstroke or freeze to death feels more relevant than the boiling point of water at that rate.
deliverything
Yes, it’d be much more convenient if we used base 12 or even base 16 instead of this silly base 10.
As to that other stuff, though… well, while I’d disagree that the freezing and boiling points of water seem as arbitrary as the temperature of a specific mix of three substances and an incorrect estimate of human body temperature, it’s really just numbers, and (for example) water freezing at 32°F works just as well as at 0°C, as long as everyone understands and agrees. Trouble is, in that sense, Celsius has the advantage, with only a few places still using Fahrenheit. Would be nice if people didn’t seem quite so insistent on using only integers, though.
The temperature ranges people deal with depend greatly on where they are, as James mentioned below, and don’t stay within that tidy 0°F to 100°F range… and even survivable temperatures vary by person.
So, again, arbitrary, whichever scale you use (unless you’re using Kelvin or Rankine, where 0 is properly 0, but most people don’t encounter that in everyday life).
Just to add, though: some of the phrasing in your comment made it look like you were accusing a shadowy cabal of trying to divide temperatures in half or something, when it’s just a difference between the the numbers one Polish physicist chose in 1724 versus those chosen by a Swedish astronomer in 1742 — not quite so exciting, sorry.
clif
Don’t trust Swedish physicists and Polish astronomers. Or was it the other way around.
…
Don’t trust Clif’s short term memory.
Kimi
I called it arbitrary in a reference to the fact that we could have chosen any compound’s melting point and boiling point. Like setting the melting point of mercury as 0 and its boiling point as 100. While water is important to life, so are several other compounds.
As for temperatures, I just said generally between 0 and 100 degrees. I know quite well that temperatures can easily get above and below those temperatures, and that they can have variations depending on humidity, wind chill and other things. If they decided to use the maximum temperature felt on earth to be 100 degrees and thr minimum to be 0, I would be fine with that.
I didn’t mean to imply that there is some conspiracy going around. That was never my intention. The fixation on making everything base 10 is interesting to me, as 10 isn’t the most practical number to make a base except for the fact that we normally have 10 fingers and 10 toes and our numerical system based on it. I might digress and start singing “new math” by Tom Lehrer if I get too much on that subject though. I do wonder what thr most optimized base number would be.
16 oz is not a pint. A pint is 20 fluid ounces – proper British fluid ounces at that. Because believe it or not, the colonials made up *different* fluid ounces. This is the root of all the world’s problems.
clif
True. If only the British had defined it correctly to start with, there would have been far fewer problems.
thejeff
I could be wrong about this, but I think the British actually changed it afterwards, trying to standardize things in the early 1800s. The colonials kept the old version.
176 thoughts on “February”
Dot
Perfunctory disgruntled aside
clif
It’s good to set boundries.
Yet_One_More_Idiot
I was thinking “February is getting up to 45º, what the hell that’s a heatwave in Febru——”… and then realised Dorothy is talking in Fahrenheit. xD My bad! xD
SillyGoose
On the same note, kudos to Americans who know without checking whether 16 ounces is really less than two liters, or if the joke is precisely that it’s a difference of one gulp.
APW
@Silly goose to Europeans too! I had to check :D
APW
@SillyGoose to Europeans too! I had to check :D
thejeff
The weirdness is that soda is sold here in both 2 liter and 16 oz bottles for reasons. It’s one of the very few places we regularly use metric, but only for some sizes.
The Other Mike
@thejeff: That’s always cracked me up.
Victor Mortimer
@The Other Mike
It was the 1970s. Carter was president, it looked like we might actually go metric, and reusable glass bottles were being replaced with disposable plastic because it was cheaper. And so they switched from the 64-ounce returnable glass bottle to the plastic 2-liter to give us some incentive to save them money and give the world more litter.
Oh yeah, the glass bottles were not disposables, you’d take them back to the grocery store, get your deposit back, and they’d ship them back to the bottling plant to be washed and reused. Can’t have that, it costs the bottler money.
Lena
@ SillyGoose that’s just what the bottles are sold as here. I can very clearly picture what size those two bottles are, despite having no knowledge of how to convert the measurements.
Azhrei Vep
16 oz. is roughly a quarter of two liters. I make regularly purchases of six packs of 16.9oz bottles of Coke, which are also labeled as .5 liter. So, dropping the .9 oz would leave you 3.6 oz short of a full two liters.
Dwampre Scorrigank
That’s not just a big gulp, that’s an X-treme-ly big gulp
thejeff
@Victor Mortimer: Ah, I’d never thought of linking it to our attempt to go metric. Obvious once you think about it, but I also didn’t think of that size or the plastic bottles being introduced at the right time. I guess we’d probably have had half-gallons of soda if the timing had been different.
Osopescado
@sillygoose The other funny thing is that 20oz is a way more common size for soda bottles to be sold in, at least where I live on the west coast of the US. I only see 16oz bottles in big multipacks at Costco.
geno
Gotta say Willis I understand this is a gag, but this comic genuinely makes me worry about your health
Doctor_Who
Joyce needs her daily 2 liters of High FUCK-OFFtose Corn Syrup.
Risky
Agreed. I generally use water for my pill pile but if it helps her take her pill then more power to her.
Abdomino
Someone get Dorothy an ant farm, I think she’d fuckin love it
Nono
What about a tamagotchi
Dwampre Scorrigank
Ockshully, people who act elitist about the right way to drink coffee aren’t drinking it for the flavor, they’re drinking it for the elitism. (in jest, also I can’t drink coffee at all so jokes on me)
Dwampre Scorrigank
Wow totally whiffed on what thread to post that to. Uh, spoilers, people talk about coffee below.
BarerMender
Yeah, heck with coffee. On the other hand, I get my tea straight from India. Talk about elitism.
bliss
No coffee, not even decafe?
My body cannot deal with caffiene but I love the taste of decafe with some
form of plant milk iced as weather warms up. Here in San Francisco we are
told to expect a heat wave starting today.
elebenty
Oh my family TRIED to get me to like coffee. Coffee candy, coffee ice cream. I just don’t like it.
If I want bitter, I’ll take dark chocolate. (Both are import items we’ve grown dependent on…..)
Dwampre Scorrigank
@bliss For regular, even first thing in the morning, even a small amount, leads to insomnia at night and usually increased anxiety. I should try decaf, I’m not really sure. It hasn’t seemed worth the effort but coffee has other active compounds in it and maybe that plus the few mgs of caffeine leftover from decaffeinating would be just right for me. On the other hand a tiny dose of straight caffeine has seemed to cause less anxiety so I am not confident.
@elebenty One thing I grew to like was unsweetened hot cocoa (like baking cocoa powder in hot water). I have not tried it in a while, can’t really eat chocolate anymore but that might not cause the same problems as solid dark chocolate. On the other hand I don’t think there’s any place nearby I can buy fair trade (might be same with coffee for that matter), which kind of makes it not worth it for a luxury item. I already have enough foods to feel guilty about that I can’t avoid so easily.
Dwampre Scorrigank
@BarerMender adjusts monocle Truly, the branded stuff you can get in the west gets the job done but direct-sourced Indian tea tastes like TEA. (we used to have some we’d get mailed to us by family, iirc that was my favorite. We also get some from I think an Indian grocery store that tastes pretty standard to me, I think that one is mostly for frugality. But I don’t pay too close attention as I’m not a big tea-drinker either)
thejeff
There are some small online tea businesses that import good tea. Mostly loose leaf. Teas from India, China, Japan and some other smaller tea countries.
I’ve used Upton and Harney, but there are others.
Odo
The mail-order ant farms are all super depressing unless you actually get into it as a hobby, build them a better enclosure, and give them a territory to explore.
You just watch them dig a few tunnels, then stagnate and slowly die off. You’re left with plexiglass full of gel and dead ants.
Abdomino
Thought you oughtta know I can actually read this in Odo’s voice. Sounds like something he’d say after getting solid’ed.
Sirksome
Awwww. Their first fight!
Pocky
baby’s first “fuck off” to their partner lol
mindbleach
Is at least Diet Sprite?
Because that tradeoff gets you a whole candy bar guilt-free.
embe13
it does not the aspartame slows your metabolism, causing you to gain more weight, at least go for the stevia stuff (or you know take your pills with hot black coffee!)
(i donot recommend taking pills with hot liquids, it can cause them to disolve premeturely and get stuck to your throat, i unfortunately speak from experience (although) that was taking pills with water, then immediatly drinking hot coffee)
NGPZ
what exactly is meant by “slows down metabolism”? which part of it?
because my friend whose a diabetic once told me eating fatty foods slows down the absorption process, which is also part of the reason why athletes tend to perform better on high fat diets — it takes the body more time to get the energy out of fat then carbohydrates, with the latter however eating a bunch of simple carbs all at once means you have that much more glucose in your blood all at once — when the body has nothing to do with it at the moment (i.e. no physical or mental exercise), by default it’s stored in fat cells. This energy can later be turned into glucose via gluconeogenesis if not a lot of carbs are “expected” or available, via gluconeogenesis, — the efficacy of the process is different for each individual and determined a lot by diet, exercise, genetics, etc.
eskimolos
I get why you’d describe it like that, though it doesn’t slow absorption exactly, more that a molecule of fat can produce like 4x more energy than one of sugar, and it is harder to release – triglycerides need to be broken into free fatty acids by severing the chain from the hydrocarbon backbone, then they need to be oxidised into a form that can cross through the mitochondrial membrane, then in the mitochondria they’re further transformed and broken down into energy through the citric acid cycle and oxidative phosphorylation. Sugar is easily accessible energy, but it can be used for less in metabolic processes, whereas transformation of fat leads to the creation of acetyl-CoA, an essential part of most catabolic processes.
The body is more likely to store excess sugar as fat or glycogen thanks to, as you mention, gluconeogenesis, while fat is a longer lasting form of energy that means for athletes they have more readily available energy rather than catabolisation of glycogen stores from the liver or protein from their muscles, which is more likely to go if they have low fat stores.
It’s been a few years since I studied catabolic processes, so hoping that my impression is still mostly accurate here!
embe13
i know very little about the science of the metabolic process just what the reports i’ve come across summarizing the research the metabolic variance in studies regarding aspartame seems likely to be a situation of a certain portion of the population likely have the ability to breakdown aspartame at a quicker rate than others do, similarly to how some folk have a gene that make cilantro taste like soap. the other factor regarding the slowdown of the metabolism is that it is reletively easy to counteract it through regular exercise
Bobby
Research is divided on that bro, you’re gonna need to do better than that. Signed, a diabetic
Kimi
Interesting. I have had some with hot milk before and don’t recall ever having an issue. Might depend on the type of pill. My stomach is not a fan of water in the early morning (or anything in the morning with menstrual cramps), and with cramps from hell, I had to figure out a way to down pain medication to help.
If she can tolerate sparkling water, that might work due to the fizziness of the bubbles. We used to have a really good ginger lime sparkling water, with a true ginger lime flavor and wasn’t sweet or fake, but they stop making it.
eskimolos
In this case hot coffee may be more likely to break down pills faster because it is acidic and the pills are normally basic/alkaline so that they will react and digest appropriately with stomach acid. Milk also being basic would interact with the pills less. The addition of heat really just accelerates free energy which facilitates faster and bigger reactions if reactions are to happen.
embe13
also hot milk may be 40-50c, hot coffee is closer to 70-80c
eskimolos
Another good thing to note here when we’re talking about medication being messed up by your choice of beverage, is furanocoumarins, present in a lot of plants and fruits. Particularly bergamottin, found in large amounts in grapefruit and bergamot oranges, and I’d assume in trace amounts in earl grey tea. These will compete with medication in liver metabolism and can make medication ineffective or toxic. I double checked to ensure this wasn’t the case with sprite, and fortunately the virtually nonexistent nutritional variance in the drink does mean that despite being citrus based, it doesn’t seem to contain any furanocoumarins.
I’ve found out in efforts to ensure accuracy in my comment that furanocoumarins are also phototoxic, they bind with DNA in epithelial cells when exposed to UV rays, killing the affected cells, which initiates an inflammation cascade. This makes me wonder, why does anybody consume grapefruits?
Ray Radlein
I would suspect that Fresca might contain grapefruit extracts, even if Sprite doesn’t, but who drinks Fresca these days?
anon
i know diet might be ‘slightly’ (altho not much) healthier but i never liked the ‘after taste’, zero sugar is a bit more tolerable and even then only for specific sodas for me personally, like dr pepper zero. altho for coke zero just plain coke i’d need to add creamer in if not just get cherry (aparently they have an orange coke again but it’s like ‘orange cream’ but not as orange leaning as their previous kind so if you want more of an ‘orangey’ taste best to get orange fanta or sunkist zero lol, jarritos is nice idk if there’s zero sugar versions of there but despite being in the south i’ve only seen like 1-2 flavors of it even tho there’s a handful more)
and rootbeer can be hit or miss as well tho icani magine joyce enjoying root beer floats unless it counts against her ‘mixing’ tolerance
IntangibleMatter
Who is off and why does everyone keep telling me to fuck them??? And why is Joyce telling Dorothy to??
QueenofSodor
joyce likes to watch
butting
Joe’s part of this somehow, I just can’t quite figure out how.
Ornathe
Off is actually the last name of Joe’s very good longstanding friend Jack, I think.
Cholma
If she’s downing a 2L bottle of Sprite everday just to take a pill… that’s gonna get real expensive. I mean, I drink a lot of Mt Dew, *and* I have a problem swallowing pills, but I’m not that bad!
Thag Simmons
Also, not great for your teeth! I’m paying for my sugar drink sins pretty badly.
clif
There’s a lot to be said for coffee addiction.
embe13
as long as it is black coffee
clif
Well, yes. People who don’t like their coffee black don’t actually like the coffee. They like the stuff they’re putting in it.
AMagicalDuck
Do you think that people who drink lattes only like the taste of milk
Cbwroses
Exactly, Clif, which is why I don’t drink coffee.
It’s not worth the effort to make it enjoyable for me, and there are other beverages I do enjoy that can give caffeine and sugar.
I do like the smell of coffee, tho.
embe13
@cbroses youd prob like chocolate covered coffee beans, best friend hates coffee but loved those.
@clif real lattes made with expresso (i know its repeated) are an act of chemistry where you get both flavours and as an enjoyer of both milk and espresso those are nice (especially after outdoor winter activities) but french press can make folgers drinkable (i use salted caramel beans bought bulk that make good coffee in a drip unit as well as a press)
HueSatLight
It’s ok if you don’t like two ingredients to touch, without looking down on people who do.
deliverything
@clif
Let’s consider that logic…
People who drink coffee with milk don’t actually like coffee, they like milk.
People who drink milk with coffee don’t actually like milk, they like coffee.
Oh, wait, there’s also the simultaneous air intake. True coffee drinkers drink coffee in a vaccuum!
Judging people’s beverage choices seems like it might get confusing. I think I’ll not bother.
clif
How dare y’all insinuate that the way I enjoy something isn’t the only right way to enjoy it. This ignores the fundamental structure of the universe which was obviously fashioned for my amusement. I can’t imagine any other sensible way to explain reality.
Yumi
I enjoy coffee as a means to consume cream and sugar and flavorings, and I’m quite clear abut that. Would I enjoy that without the coffee? Yes, actually, steamers are great. But I do enjoy the included coffee as well at times.
Needfuldoer
For you and anyone else who has trouble with pills, try this:
Take a swig of water, pop the pill in your mouth, and then drink normally through a straw. Practice with M&Ms Minis (assuming you’re not diabetic).
ResRam
I´ve found that what works for cats and dogs?
Also works well for pill-shy human gullets.
One teaspoon of yoghurt, pills mixed in.
Never knew a cat, kid or cancer patient who still had problem swallowing pills that are embedded in a spoon of lubricating gloop.
Having the tummy tolerate the specific pharmacological side effects ?
Sadly is a whole other bucket of fish.
Shiro
Consider: a glass of water but then you chase it with a delightful treat to make sure it makes it all the way down
Doctor_Who
I’s say Dorothy should try the trick you do with dogs where you wrap the pill in cheese, but Joyce might consider that to be mixing ingredients and become even MORE upset.
IntangibleMatter
45°F is about 7°C, for all my fellow metric users who weren’t quite sure what temperature that was.
TrueSurvivor
Damn metric users. You guys are savages, don’t you know that every single unit of measurement should have its scaling system set with no regard to practical applications or other units of measure within the system, and that they should only add into larger units at seemingly random quantities. Increases by base 10 from cm to meter to km? I will take my 3 feet to a yard and 1,760 yards to a mile, thank you very much.
The only time I want meteric nonsense around is to jam it haphazardly into systems that already use the US customary units. Everyone knows drinks should come as six ounce, eight ounce, 16 ounce (already exactly 1 pint but never cut out the unneeded syllablus and call it that), and one liter (its basically 2 pints but why do that when you can add an ounce and a billion digit fraction of one and jump to a utterly different system of measurement). Your not using your head! Think, IntangibleMatter, Thnk!
butting
Harsh but fair. This metric user went naturally to the cubit for measuring mic placement in my old studio. Well, a cubit and a handsbreadth. Can’t do that with newfangled units without pulling out a ruler.
Kimi
On a couple side tangents, there are some practical benefits for having things divided by 12 (and therefore divided by 3 and 4 instead of just 5). Out in the field or doing cooking measurements, etc, it isn’t uncommon to need something divided by a third or a quarter. For very large numbers, it doesn’t matter as much, but I specifically find it easier for cooking and gardening (after dealing with both through science and greenhouse work). On the other hand, I can’t picture the concept of a mile other than the amount of time it takes me from point a to point b, so the size is large enough that I could care less if we used kilometers instead.
Celsius would be less annoying to me if they made the boiling point of water be 200 instead of 100. It would be a closer match to Fahrenheit (since they are 1.8 degrees different, with a 32 degree adjustment). I find using the freezing point and boiling point of water to be just as arbitrary as what Fahrenheit used with water, frigorific mixture and human body temperature. My thoughts are most people are only going to deal with around 0F to 100F (give and take about 20F or so depending on location) in their everyday lives besides cooking (and even then it is only through what you set the oven to). Why reduce that everyday amount by around half and reduce the range people can describe how it feels outside? It also seems silly to do it based on the boiling point of water, as most people wouldn’t need to know that in their everyday life as they just set the point to boil with whatever heat they want from the stove. Sure, it could be useful for science and larger temperatures, though I believe they switch to Kelvin at some point. I guess I just don’t understand why the boiling point of water matters when we talk to each other weather on earth? The temperature at which you die from heatstroke or freeze to death feels more relevant than the boiling point of water at that rate.
deliverything
Yes, it’d be much more convenient if we used base 12 or even base 16 instead of this silly base 10.
As to that other stuff, though… well, while I’d disagree that the freezing and boiling points of water seem as arbitrary as the temperature of a specific mix of three substances and an incorrect estimate of human body temperature, it’s really just numbers, and (for example) water freezing at 32°F works just as well as at 0°C, as long as everyone understands and agrees. Trouble is, in that sense, Celsius has the advantage, with only a few places still using Fahrenheit. Would be nice if people didn’t seem quite so insistent on using only integers, though.
The temperature ranges people deal with depend greatly on where they are, as James mentioned below, and don’t stay within that tidy 0°F to 100°F range… and even survivable temperatures vary by person.
So, again, arbitrary, whichever scale you use (unless you’re using Kelvin or Rankine, where 0 is properly 0, but most people don’t encounter that in everyday life).
Just to add, though: some of the phrasing in your comment made it look like you were accusing a shadowy cabal of trying to divide temperatures in half or something, when it’s just a difference between the the numbers one Polish physicist chose in 1724 versus those chosen by a Swedish astronomer in 1742 — not quite so exciting, sorry.
clif
Don’t trust Swedish physicists and Polish astronomers. Or was it the other way around.
…
Don’t trust Clif’s short term memory.
Kimi
I called it arbitrary in a reference to the fact that we could have chosen any compound’s melting point and boiling point. Like setting the melting point of mercury as 0 and its boiling point as 100. While water is important to life, so are several other compounds.
As for temperatures, I just said generally between 0 and 100 degrees. I know quite well that temperatures can easily get above and below those temperatures, and that they can have variations depending on humidity, wind chill and other things. If they decided to use the maximum temperature felt on earth to be 100 degrees and thr minimum to be 0, I would be fine with that.
I didn’t mean to imply that there is some conspiracy going around. That was never my intention. The fixation on making everything base 10 is interesting to me, as 10 isn’t the most practical number to make a base except for the fact that we normally have 10 fingers and 10 toes and our numerical system based on it. I might digress and start singing “new math” by Tom Lehrer if I get too much on that subject though. I do wonder what thr most optimized base number would be.
tim Rowledge
16 oz is not a pint. A pint is 20 fluid ounces – proper British fluid ounces at that. Because believe it or not, the colonials made up *different* fluid ounces. This is the root of all the world’s problems.
clif
True. If only the British had defined it correctly to start with, there would have been far fewer problems.
thejeff
I could be wrong about this, but I think the British actually changed it afterwards, trying to standardize things in the early 1800s. The colonials kept the old version.