Nill by Mouth

Conditions: Pensive.

Be Afraid. Be Somewhat Afraid

As Ebola works its way across the international news channels, one of the key points being regurgitated is that it’s actually very difficult to catch the disease. Someone would have to transmit blood or vomit or saliva into you somehow, which usually doesn’t happen at most dinner parties.

If your Twitter feed is anything like mine, news that Ebola might have turned up in Manhattan is freaking out a lot of Americans. “Helpful” bits of commentary include as that it’s “deadly uncurable,” has a 90% fatality rate, and causes “a hemorrhagic fever that eventually leads to a complete bleed-out.” Today’s news merely amplifies the anxiety that’s been building since word got out that two Americans infected with Ebola have been moved to US hospitals for treatment.

There are plenty of people who should be protecting themselves against Ebola’s spread—and they live in West Africa. Those of us who are in the US should feel comforted by the following:

Ebola’s not airborne. It can only be spread through bodily fluids. The virus spreads when blood, semen, urine, vomit, feces, or other bodily fluids of an infected person come into contact with someone else’s mucus membranes.

- qz.com

So something concerns me about all this supposedly calming advice. Bodily fluids of an infected person should include sweat, right? And sweat can become like sweat vapour, passing across a room and being breathed in by another person, yes? Thus exposing it to their mucus membranes, yeah? So while people should be refraining from such activities as rubbing infected vomit into open wounds, I also strongly suspect they should refrain from breathing as well. I mean, how much water vapour do people expend when they breathe for that matter? And that is something to be worried about. You’re welcome.

- http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/10/20/four-unsettling-ways-the-cdc-has-subtly-changed-the-way-it-talks-about-ebola/



Film Review: The Equaliser.

Apparently the upshot of Olympus Has Fallen’s success is that Antoine Fuqua gets the chance to make another top level film with Denzel Washington, and so together they’ve produced this effort. It’s the story of Robert, who used to do something violent for the government and has now retired to a life working at a hardware store, looking after people. He doesn’t sleep, so spends his nights at a diner reading books. That leads him to making friends with Chloe Grace Moretz, a prostitute. She works for the local Russian mafia, and when they put her in the hospital Denzel decides to pay them a visit. This goes exactly how you’d expect it would, and so the Russian higher ups send over a “fixer” (Martin Czokas, mad as a badger) to clean things up.

Things escalate quickly, and much more death and chaos are dealt out as Denzel is more than ready to deal with everything they throw at him. Eventually we get a nice violent finale at the hardware store, followed up by a somewhat glossed-over tying up of loose ends. A lot of this film relies on Denzel’s charm and focus convincing you scene after scene that He Could Totally Do That, and he’s one of the few actors these days that can make it work.

It is a very good looking film, with some satisfyingly violent dealing out of swift vengeance. It’s not as complicated as it perhaps could have been, for instance Denzel and Chloe don’t really have many scenes together. In fact Denzel seems to be doing all of it more because he’s bored than angry about Chloe, but still. When Denzel’s focused like this he can carry a film all the way home, that’s why they pay him the big bucks. Three and a half drills out of five.



- Peace out