Today I came back from a quick bike sprint to the store to return some PET bottles and buy a couple of things. When I was about to insert the key to open the garage door, I noticed this nice snail moving slowly around the edge. Its shell was beautiful, so I thought it was worth getting my phone out to take a picture.

Over the last couple of weeks, we have had news stories about Harvey and now Irma. Harvey caused a lot of havoc in Texas, and now Irma seems to be on the same path through the Caribbean islands and Florida. The Hurricane Research Division of the Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory tracks the number of storms per year on its website, and based on the data, it looks like the number is steadily increasing. Sigh... climate change.

Today I was making a copy of the pictures I shared on Twitter a couple of years ago during my career break, and when I was reviewing those photos, I remembered this particular long-exposure shot where a guard stayed only for a brief time, creating this cool phantom effect.

Wikipedia has an interesting article called Where-to-be-born Index, which discusses an article published by The Economist that classifies countries based on which ones provide the best opportunities for a healthy, safe and prosperous life in the years ahead.

Not surprisingly, Switzerland and the Scandinavian countries are at the top of the list, joined by Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and Singapore.

Last week an anesthesiologist friend of mine was on TV discussing how opioid abuse has created a huge crisis in the US. I was searching the web for statistics about this subject, and I found a 2017 report published by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime that shows that the US indeed has the highest drug-related mortality rate by far. Those deaths are mainly related to opioids, so the public discussion about this subject is definitely worth having.

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