Hasta La Gadget!

Obesity is associated with a higher risk for hearing loss, according to a new study in the American Journal of Medicine.

On the other hand, greater levels of physical activity are associated with a lower risk for hearing loss, found researchers from Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

“We often think of hearing loss as an inevitable part of the aging process, but these findings provide evidence that potentially modifiable risk factors, such as maintaining a healthy weight and staying physically active, may help in the prevention of hearing loss or delay its progression,” study researcher Sharon Curhan, M.D., Sc.M., of the Channing Division of Network Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, said in a statement.

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Over the din of our family’s morning routine, a news report last week told of a University of Texas political organization’s commissioning an on-campus event called “Catch an Illegal Immigrant.” In this supposed game, the organization would provide $25 gift certificates to its members who located and reported illegal immigrants, roles played by volunteers.

The stated purpose was to bring attention to the complex, often divisive issue of illegal immigration. My daughter innocently asked me, a fourth-generation Texan of Mexican descent, “Papa, what is an illegal?”

The stark nature of her query took me a bit by surprise. For the first time in her young life, my little one was presented with the notion that a fellow human being, maybe even one of her schoolmates, could be referred to simply as an illegal.

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More on Latino Politics

By Melody Wilson, Women’s eNews

NEW DELHI (WOMENSENEWS)–Three young women here hold court in the middle of the room, bedecked in their finest jewelry: necklaces, earrings, bangles. They haven’t been this dressed up since their weddings. Lavish gold and red saris drape over them, nearly concealing their swollen bellies.

They are surrounded by their mothers and sisters, aunts and cousins and friends, who are seated on the floor or standing up against the wall of the community center. A few attendees beat drums, and all of them sing joyously.

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More on Health

Michael loves his wife, Kamala. Michael also likes his 27-year-old girlfriend, Rachel. So six months ago, Kamala decided to do what most wives would never even consider: she invited Rachel to come live with the couple and their six year-old son.

Monogamy just doesn’t work for the couple, whose relationship is featured on Showtime’s “Polyamory: Married & Dating.” What does work for them is a polyamorous lifestyle, Kamala and Michael tell Nightline reporter Nick Watt in the report above. (Rachel is not the first person they’ve invited into their relationship during the course of their 12-year marriage; the couple previously shared their home with another couple, and Kamala has been in a relationship with another woman for two years.)

“Monogamy can be a really beautiful agreement between people when they’re deeply in love and they don’t have desire for another,” Kamala says. “But most people in our society are just monogamous because their vows said ‘I will forsake all others.'”

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More on Marriage

Second only to the Transformers and G.I. Joe as the greatest cartoon/toy lines of the 1980s, Voltron broke new ground in marketing, demanding kids beg for not one but five different toys in order to assemble one giant robot. In hindsight it was pretty sneaky, and now that us children of the 1980s are all grown up, we should know better. But with mountains of disposable income and a nostalgic itch that demands scratching, who wouldn’t want this glorious 30th anniversary edition of Voltron: Defender of the Universe?

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