Daily Buddhist Wisdom

Even as rain breaks through an ill-thatched house,
So lust breaks through an ill-trained mind.

Even as rain breaks not through a well-thatched house,
So lust breaks not through a well-trained mind.

-Dhammapada 13-14

From "365 Buddha: Daily Meditations," edited by Jeff Schmidt.

Study ties gambling to Parkinson's drug

One American with Parkinson's disease went from being an occasional gambler to racking up losses of more than $100,000. But within a month of discontinuing one of his medications, he stopped betting and his relieved wife told his doctor, "I have my old husband back."

A patient with no history of gambling became so obsessed that he lost more than $200,000 in just six months. When he curbed a drug, his habit faded.

Another man turned into a compulsive gambler who stayed at casinos for days on end and was "unable to pull myself away from the tables." And while on the drugs, the Parkinson's sufferers became obsessed with sex -- one went from having sex once a week to four times a day. Two ate compulsively and one drank more.

The dramatic behavioural changes are outlined in a study published in yesterday's on-line edition of the journal Archives of Neurology. Like previous papers, the research concludes that medications known as dopamine agonists -- especially Miraprex -- trigger pathological gambling.

"It's very striking, this temporal relationship between the initiation of the drug and then the beginning of the behaviour, and then the discontinuation of the drug and the discontinuation of the behaviour," Leann Dodd, a psychiatrist at the Mayo Clinic who led the analysis, said in an interview. "It's suspect, that's for sure."

This year, an Ontario man with Parkinson's launched a class-action lawsuit after losing $100,000 gambling while taking Miraprex, which is the trade name for pramipexole.

Dr. Dodd stressed that a very small number of patients on the class of drugs become compulsive gamblers -- one study found the behaviour in 1.5 per cent of people taking Miraprex -- and that the side effect can be reversed. One of the patients said discontinuing the medication was "like a light switch being turned off."

The Mayo Clinic study examined the cases of 11 patients who reported problem gambling after taking dopamine agonists, that mimic the effect of dopamine, a brain chemical that allows the body to move smoothly and be co-ordinated. Nine patients took Miraprex and the other two took Ropinirole.

Of the 11 people, seven became pathological gamblers within one to three months of reaching a certain level of medication. The other four reported compulsive gambling between 12 and 30 months after beginning the therapy. And six of the patients, the study says, also developed other behavioural changes, including compulsive eating, drinking more, higher spending, and increased interest in pornography, extramarital affairs or a higher libido "bothersome to the spouse."

Eight individuals' pathological gambling was resolved when the dopamine agonist was suspended or decreased, the study says. Follow-up information was not available in the remaining three cases.

Earlier this year, Boehringer Ingelheim (Canada) Ltd. asked Health Canada to change Miraprex's patient insert and product monograph to include warnings that it may cause compulsive gambling or changes in sexual desire.

New Breed

Well, I don't even know where to start, about my vacation. Slash, hell.

Anyway I'm talking to two new chicks online. No idea why. Partly boredom, partly for sexual satisfaction, partly because I feel compelled to and can't stop myself, and partly out of wanting to seize the day. I've held back on written to girls on online adult personals sites before, and then they cancelled their membership so I lost the opportunity and was pissed at myself. I don't want to feel like that any more, so now I'm being more proactive about hitting them up.

Both are 22. One of them just mentioned she has a boyfriend so this may be a good sign that she has no interest in a relationship. I don't really feel all that interested in knowing her; there's no real spark there and she doesn't seem like all that special of a person. Cute, though. One of her profile pictures is her ass covered in cane marks so I know I can do almost whatever the hell I want to her.

The other one is really interesting. She gave me her yahoo messenger screenname, and I typed that name into Yahoo Profiles and saw her profile, on which she had a link to her blog, which had her real name and place of work and pictures of her parents and sister and so on. It's like she hides nothing. Very strange.

Her profile states that she's not the one, if you're looking for love. She says she just wants to experiment but I can't believe she's not bombarded with tons of guys of all ages trying to fuck her.

I feel kind of threatened in a way because I'm 35 and not exactly up on all the things a 22 year old would know about, which is pretty much the latest bands and styles and slang. Not being into the same bands is no big deal but not ever having heard of a big-name modern band is kind of a black mark against ya. Not being up on style is a bigger no-no, and not knowing current slang, or using old slang, people can find that weird. It just shows how much older you really are.

So now I feel weird 'studying up' on what the world is like for younger hipsters, because

1. I like to be myself
2. I don't like to feel like everything I do is contrived
3. It's crazy thinking that I'm old, because I still feel like I'm 23 in many ways.

I think if I'm just myself she'll dig it more, but that takes a lot of balls. You have to be prepared for people to not "get" you, especially younger people, at which point you lose them.

I find her intriguing because, why would she openly give out personal info to guys she meets on an adult personals site? I wonder whether she just knows it's unlikely that many will come by her work and stalk her, or whether she doesn't care, or what.

~

In addition to emailing girls I was going to wait forever on, I'm trying to do more things like that too. Looking at myself I see that I'll prepare forever, I'll put off the good stuff forever, in favor of 'seizing the day,' so to speak. I'm trying to change that; maybe if I do it enough, I can change the basic tendencies of my thought processes.

I saw a bit of an independent documentary on the punk scene in the 70's and 80's, and a couple of the biggest-name guys were talking about how on the one hand you have guys like Emerson, Lake, and Palmer, who went to music school and then stayed home practicing their instruments in dad's study for years, and on the other hand you have these kids who just get a hold of some instruments are are like "Yeah, let's do this, and we'll figure it out along the way."

And I saw an interview with Quentin Tarantino in which he said, "Go make your movie. Don't worry about 'how am i going to do this,' 'how am i going to do that,' about going to film school first, about working your way up, just do it."

Roberto Rodriguez says the same thing. Just start making your movie. Don't worry that you don't know everything; you'll figure it out.

I'm more like the guys the punk musicians were ridiculing for staying home studying. First off I hate being just a total rookie, looking like every other would-be expert who is just now starting the long road to proficiency. I hate floundering around publically making my embarrassing mistakes. Besides, why jump in and do it, when I'm going to have no idea what I'm doing and am going to start trying to learn, start seeking books and people who can teach me. I like to stop and look at what's going to happen, to act, not react. So I just skip ahead and start finding resources and people to learn from.

I hate people who don't use their brains. So many people are so stupid and don't rise above it and look at themselves objectively. Anyone can be a rookie and anyone can get out there and try what feels like their hardest, without studying first. But what's really the hardest is studying and learning all the ins and outs of something, figuring out and comprehending all the concepts that are so difficult to grasp. Flailing as hard as you can isn't trying your hardest. Sucking it up and having the self-control to be persistent while reading and studying, is.

However...

A) I rarely make the transition from preparing to actually doing. They say life passes most people by while they're making grand plans for it. That's so true for me. I have a hard time figuring out when it's time to stop learning, because, it's not like you ever "get" all of it. First you learn the basics, then you learn the trickier stuff, and by that time I've got my own theories and questions about things none of the experts and none of the books even know about. I've become an expert or one of the leading experts, without ever having touched or experienced or done the thing.

That's kind of what happened in my line of work. I sat home dreaming and studying about it until I finally was urged to get into it. Kind of given a boot in the ass, really. When I did get into it, I learned that there was no-one who could verify the theories I had come up with. So I experimented and figured it out for myself, making myself the top guy in the industry in the process.

Sadly my A.D.D. and compulsion and lack of self control fucked me out of being a multimillionaire. If you can believe it, I still haven't made a doctor's appointment to get medication, either. And I haven't started smartrecovery.org. I'll do it "tomorrow."

the modern man must hustle

The first time I met the Devil was at a Motel 6
she left Hell to spend a weekend on Earth just for kicks
sexy little bitch,
shorter than expected, about five-foot five
big an' thick in the breast and thighs
beautiful, dark eyes, a strong stare
large lips, soft hands and long hair
I said I'll make you smile for the simple fact I'm good at it
I'll make you smile just so I can sit and look at it