There’s a big wave out there, and we just saw the first speck of foam. Chicago attorney Larry Zanger reports in the October Chicago Computer Guide that a Michigan grocery store has filed what may be the first year 2000 lawsuit, “claiming it incurred substantial losses because its [computerized] cash registers froze whenever a customer used a credit card expiring after 1999.”
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Rx: One big white-bread pill. Robert Katz of Rush Medical School on placebos, in “Focus on Lupus” (Fall): “Larger capsules are thought to be stronger. White tablets are often believed to be pain killers. Injections are perceived as ‘stronger’ than pills….Placebos can sometimes get people to change behavior, and this in turn can lead to a positive treatment response. For example, those with fatigue and achy joints may decide to resume an exercise program, whereas previously they avoided exercise because of pain or fear.”
“In 1982, the largest class of women to enter the Congress of the United States were completing their first year–all four of them,” recalls Lynn Martin in Today’s Chicago Woman (October). “It was considered remarkable then. I was one of those four and another was Claudine Schneider of Rhode Island. We were constantly mistaken for one another but we did not look alike at all. Nonetheless, since we were both tall, that seemed enough to flummox many of our male colleagues.”
Facts we didn’t know anybody knew, from the Harper’s Index (October): “Percentage of Americans earning more than $246,000 who met Bill Clinton last year: 11.”
