It's unusual for me to have nightmares — especially nightmares about flying. Mine are usually about family relationships gone completely awry. But facing a World Diabetes Day on which I am working at a place whose uniform does not allow even a touch of blue, having given Nick Jonas my last World Diabetes Day pin (and not having had the money to replenish my stash), and having failed to have the presence of mind to do the Big Blue Test at least once (even though I am bicycling to and from work at least half the time), I feel a bit like a diabetes failure. (READ MORE)

One of the issues that many of my Type 1 compatriots are often confronted with is the idea that "juvenile diabetes" is restricted to, well, juveniles. That once you turn 18 -- or 21, in some jurisdictions -- your diabetes automatically transmogrifies into Type 2 and you can be cured by exercising three hours a day, losing 10 pounds, and avoiding any food that isn't pure protein. And maybe, taking a cinnamon pill, a bitter melon pill, or whatever the herbal cure du jour might be.

As we all know, that popular myth has about as much truth to it as, umm, the belief that Princess Anastasia is still alive and well and living in the same body she had in 1917. Let me rephrase. The probability that Rasputin is alive and well and living in the same body he had in 1917. (READ MORE)

Last week's #dsma (Diabetes Social Media Advocacy) twitter chat topic was the delivery of diabetes education, medication, supplies, and support to others -- both in the US (and other "First World" nations) and emerging ("Third World") nations. I've blogged before about the logistical and political issues organizations such as the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) and Doctors Without Borders (MSF -- Médecins Sans Frontières) have in delivering medical care and medications to those in need. But while we often talk as if everyone in the United States had fingertip access to smartphones (with unlimited data plans), cable TV, and the Internet, that certainly is not the case.

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In the rainbows-and-unicorns world of diabetes activism, it is often said that one of the most egregious oversights in international politics is the lack of available medical insulin in economically-depressed areas and emerging nations. Our standard-bearers act as if all we need to do is ship tons of strips, gallons of insulin, and forests-worth of needles to the middle of the African bush and every person with diabetes will live forever in the world of Blood Sugar Nirvana and No Complications.

The truth of the matter is much more complex.

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With a new year come new ideas, new resolutions, new solutions to old problems, and of course new problems needing solutions.

Among the last is, once again, need for a full-time job. Cell phone sales were not high enough to keep me on until Christmas, so I am once again navigating the waters of unemployment and job-search.

For now, enough of that. The meme going around the Diabetes Online Community has been that of "spreading the word" -- both telling people with diabetes of the online resources available to us, and bringing our online activism out to the world in which we live, visit our doctors, purchase our food and medications, and educate our children. While most of us talk about outreach in terms of getting our real-life neighbors to hook up with our online resources, I see a different reality.

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Towards the start of the Passover seder, three cakes loaves completely-formed pieces of matzoh are raised with the incantation,

"Lo, this is the bread of affliction [poor bread, lakhma ani] that our fathers ate in the land of Egypt. Let all who are hungry come and eat..."

Traditionally, we consider this bread "afflicted" or "poor" because it was made hastily, without having had time to rise. It was "poorly" made, and "afflicted" by a lack of the airy texture we associate with bread.

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